Proof of Life (The Potentate of Atlanta #4) - Hailey Edwards Page 0,46
lobby with Tisdale.
Now that she knew my secrets, I could imagine how that conversation would go.
Lots of threats, on both sides. Promises of retribution, on both sides. And then an uneasy truce.
Or so I hoped.
“How soon do you want to schedule the wake?”
Jerking my attention back to Grier, I replayed the chunk of conversation I had spaced out on, but my brain was spinning its wheels, worried about Bishop and Tisdale alone in an elevator. How much damage could they do to one another during a sixty-second drop?
Never mind.
I didn’t want to know.
Locking those worries away for later, I forced myself to focus on Grier for real this time, but it was hard. I had trouble adjusting to our dynamic. She was here, in the loft where she had spent so many nights with Linus, as a guest. As my guest. This had been their space for a year and change. Arguably, Grier belonged here more than me. The imbalance left me feeling like I ought to ask her permission before I got a bottle of water out of my own fridge.
Awkward as it might be to have her in my space, I had to remind myself she wasn’t here for me.
I had lost my brother, and she had lost her first love, and a friend. She had come to pay her respects.
That was it. That was all. It had to be.
There were no bodies. There were no bodies. There were no bodies.
The endless loop of Remy’s words wasn’t helping matters. With my brain fried extra crispy, I couldn’t get it to stop hopping from thought to thought like frog legs avoiding a pan of hot grease. “Tomorrow.”
“That’s…quick.” She checked with Linus. “Are you sure you don’t want to take another day?”
I could tell then that she was viewing this wake as a genuine farewell to our lost loved ones.
And I could also tell, I hadn’t given up on my brother or Addie or the others.
Hope is both a misery and a miracle.
“No one knew them here,” I reasoned. “They’ll expect the formalities to be observed in Savannah.”
An itch between my shoulders had me searching out Linus, and sure enough, he was watching me.
Chills skated down my spine, but I hadn’t lied to Tisdale. Linus didn’t require my consent, but he had it. It would hurt him, deeply, to clean up my mess, but he would do it. He was a good man, and a good friend.
While I respected his concern, I didn’t plan on embracing the dark side because of my loss.
Then again, I was obviously in denial. I could tell. I knew the signs. I couldn’t trust myself. Not yet.
I had to believe he would know if or when I made a wrong turn and correct it before taking extreme, but necessary, measures.
“Okay.” Grier hovered on my periphery. “I can handle this if you have somewhere else to be.”
She was giving me an out. A pass. An escape route.
A way to pretend, for a while longer, that the wake was window dressing.
Coward that I was, I took it. With both hands. And I ran with it.
“I would appreciate that.” I flashed her a wobbly smile. “Midas?”
With his hand pressed to my lower back, ready to guide me out, he said, “I’m with you.”
We made our exit without explanations or excuses. I didn’t want to lie to them, so I didn’t, but I couldn’t be here anymore. I needed open air, a purpose. I needed to make progress and not regress. I couldn’t waste another minute curled up in bed while the coven picked off everyone close to me.
No sooner had we hit the streets than Remy called me. “Did you find everyone?”
“Yeah, Lethe is clear. She left with Tisdale. Ares is good too, but yikes. I had to test her out in the hall just to hear myself think. That kid they’re watching has a set of lungs on him. I thought I might do a twofer and test Liz while I was there, but she was at work.”
“Wait.” I held up a finger. “They still have the baby?”
“There were complications with the sister-in-law’s surgery. She and Liz are on baby duty until the grandparents arrive to take over.” She caught her breath then finished her recitation. “Lisbeth was with Ford. They were staring longingly into one another’s eyes. I pried them apart long enough to test them. Both are clear. She’s got the kit, and she’ll bring it to HQ tomorrow.”