Shake The Frost (Crystal Lake #6) - Juliana Stone Page 0,1
hot spray, but it was long enough for the water to run cold and make his teeth chatter. Eventually, he stepped out and secured a towel around his waist before brushing his teeth to wash away the taste of tequila.
His head still pounded, so he popped a couple of pain pills and downed two big glasses of water before he headed to the kitchen. The coffee would help. At least he hoped as much. He’d just poured himself a generous mug of hot black liquid when his cell pinged. He scooped it off the counter and leaned his hip there as he glanced down at the device.
It was his mother. Fuck. Me.
With a sigh, he tried his best to sound as normal as possible and picked up. He owed her that much, because without a doubt, he was in trouble for something.
“Hey, Mom,” he managed to say, the greeting sliding past the grit that sat like stones at the back of his throat.
“You missed dinner last night.”
Ethan grimaced and had to think hard on what the actual fuck day it was. He glanced at the calendar on his phone. Monday. Shit. Sunday was family day, something his mother took seriously.
“I made roast beef with brown sugar carrots and mashed potatoes and Yorkshire pudding. All your favorites.” A pause. “You promised you’d come, Ethan. We all knew this would be a hard weekend for you, and I wanted you home with us, and you…” Her voice broke, and if the floor could have opened up and taken him down, Ethan would have gladly welcomed that. “You promised,” she said.
“Mom,” he began, but his mother caught some wind and plowed over him like a damn freight train, so he gave up. Besides, he deserved whatever the hell she was sending his way.
“Don’t Mom me. Your father and your sister and I waited for nearly two hours. I called you at least four times, and we almost drove out to the lake because we were so damn worried about you. But then I realized something, Ethan.”
There was silence. Ethan wasn’t sure if he should respond. He cleared his throat to get rid of all that grit and was about to apologize, something he’d done so much, he should be better at it, when she spoke, her voice tremulous and thick.
“I realized that I can’t do it anymore. I can’t sit and wait and hope and pray for my son to come back to me.”
“Mom,” he said as gently as he could, pushing the words past that damn lump. “Come on. I missed a family dinner.”
“You’ve missed more than one.”
“I’ve been busy is all.” It was lam,e and he grimaced as soon as the words fell from his lips.
“You’ve been busy disappearing from life, and I’m done watching it happen. I can’t do it anymore. I want you to pay close attention to what I’m about to say, Ethan Robert Caldwell. Are you listening?”
He felt like he was five again. “Yeah,” he replied roughly.
“Rick Davenport was injured in that awful accident all those years ago. Not you.” Her voice grew stronger, even as Ethan shrank inside. “Rick Davenport lay in that hospital bed for years, existing in some in-between world, which is sad and tragic, but it wasn’t you. It was Rick Davenport who died nearly six months ago. Not you. So that stunt you pulled a few weeks back that landed you in the hospital makes no sense. Are you trying to kill yourself?”
It should have been me. He mouthed the words, a mantra, really, but didn’t say them out loud.
“Mom, I’m sorry. I just…”
Just what? Truthfully, he had nothing to offer as an excuse other than the blackness in his soul, and how in hell did he explain that to his mother? She didn’t know about the fight he and Rick had had that day, or the details leading up to the accident. And she sure as hell didn’t know about that night a few months ago, under the stars and feeling the weight of grief and guilt when he and Emily had…
“You need to find your way back to us, and no one wants it more than me. I love you more than you can hope to understand, and it kills me to see you in pain. To know you spend day after day alone and holed up in that shop working on your bikes and not seeing anyone. It’s not normal or healthy, and you drink too much. I want