At the Brink (32 page)

Bree ignored Josh’s hand and made a beeline for my bed. “Lily?” Her face shriveled in horror. “What happened to you?”

“I’m fine,” I mumbled, unable to say much more than that.

Bree whirled on Josh, growling like a lioness. “What did you do to her? What the fuck did you do to my friend?”

“Me? No, not me,” Josh said, as dismayed as I’ve ever seen him. “Do you think I’d ever harm my Lily?”

“
Your
Lily?” Bree snapped. “She was
my
Lily,
my
best friend, way before
you
ever came in the picture.”

“Well, she’s
my
goddamn Lily now,” Josh said, appropriating my hand.

Uh-oh. Xena Warrior Princess squared off against the Scorpion King. The two were about to come to blows.

“Guys, please,” I mumbled.

“Well, if she’s
your
Lily then you suck at taking care of her, don’t you?” Bree’s sharp tongue was out for blood. “Look at her. What the hell happened? No, don’t even try to explain this. She was with
you
, wasn’t she? Whatever happened to her it’s
your
damn fault!”

“Bree, please,” I said. “If I’m alive it’s only because of him.”

“Oh, really?” Bree crossed her arms and glowered at Josh. “’Cause he looks pretty healthy to me. Where the hell were you when Lily got hurt?”

“Bree’s right,” Josh said.

“What?” Bree and I said at the same time.

He squeezed my hand. “Bree is right, sweet, what happened to you was my fault.”

“Josh, no, you didn’t know, you couldn’t have known.”

I knew he felt guilty. I didn’t want him to feel that way, but Bree wasn’t helping and the meds weighted my eyelids, slurred my speech and slowed my brain down to a crawl.

“She’s tired,” Josh said. “Let’s take this outside.”

“Don’t worry, Lily.” Bree patted my shoulder. “I’m going to take good care of you.”

Josh straightened. “
I’m
going to take care of Lily.”

“In your dreams, cowboy.”

“I wouldn’t have called you at all if I’d known you were such a cranky witch.”

“Says the jerk who almost got my best friend killed.”

I wanted Bree to back off. Josh had done everything in his power to take care of me. He’d risked his own life to come after me. Couldn’t she see the guilt haunting his eyes?

But Bree was on a warpath, too upset to think clearly and too mad to back off. She harped on Josh mercilessly. Josh’s expression betrayed his exasperation, but for my sake, he tried to be civil.

“Lily wants out of the hospital,” he explained. “As soon as the doctors arrange her in home care, I’m taking her home.”

“Home where?” Bree demanded.

“My house,” Josh said, “where she’ll be safe and comfortable. That’s where she needs to be. That’s where
I
want her to be.”

“Well, megalomania aside, I’m the closest thing to family that Lily has,” Bree said. “And I think she needs to be in
her
house,
her
apartment, where she’ll feel safe.”

“I want her with me,” Josh said.

Bree scoffed. “Do I look like I care about what you want?”

“You’re a fucking pain in the ass.”

“Look who’s talking.”

My eyes closed. My ears shut down. I couldn’t follow the rest of the argument. Bree’s voice woke me up a little later.

“I’ve got it under control,” she said. “I’m going to be checking on you all the time.”

Much later, Josh climbed into my bed and gathered me gently in his arms. It felt good, having him all around me. The scent of him scattered the hospital’s clinical smells and sweetened my breaths. His warmth heated the sheets and soothed the cold sealed into my aching bones.

“Lily,” He whispered in my ear. “I know you’re hurting and this isn’t the right time, but I’m not letting you go. Do you hear me? We’re going to work it all out.”

“Oh, Josh.”

I felt the sting of a tear running from the corner of my eye. By then, I remembered why I’d been so mad at him. The pictures didn’t seem that important anymore. I had a memory of him, swimming above me; of his powerful strokes, breaking the surface; of his body diving down toward me like a graceful dolphin. Something about the memory disturbed me. I hovered at the edge of discovery. A vital truth stared me in the face. I thought perhaps I knew what it was. Instead, I floated into no-man’s-land.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Lily

The next time I woke up, I lay in my bed, in my apartment, entertaining recollections of nurses, doctors and therapists who’d come and gone. I rubbed my eyes and tried to focus on my surroundings. The little lamp on the night table illuminated the room with a diffused glow. Bree’s bee puppet was tucked in next to me. The top of my old dresser looked like an altar, covered with flowers. The biggest bunch was a stunning arrangement of tall white callas. Next to me, Josh sat cross-legged on the bed, sorting through a pile—of what, I couldn’t tell. He took up a lot of the space. He seemed almost too large to fit in my little bedroom.

“Time for her next dose,” someone said from the door.

I recognized Nurse Carmen, the stern-faced woman who, at Josh’s command, had been feeding me a steady supply of stupor-inducing drugs since I’d returned to the apartment.

“No more pain meds,” I said and this time, I meant it.

“Now, Miss Boswell,” Nurse Carmen said in her nasal voice. “We have a regimen to follow.”

“I want to be able to think.”

“Mr. Lane?” Nurse Carmen deferred to the highest authority in the room.

Josh relented to my silent plea. “Let’s see how she feels in an hour.”

I was glad to see Nurse Carmen leave. I yawned. “Where the heck did you find her?”

“At the best home health care agency in Boston,” Josh said. “She comes highly recommended.”

“By whom?” I said. “The Wicked Witch of the West?”

Josh laughed, leaned over and kissed me on the nose. “I’m glad to see you’re feeling better. Nurse Carmen may not be charming but she’s as capable as they come and she’ll follow my instructions, even if I’m not around.”

“Oh, so she’s obedient?” I said. “Now I know why you like her. Why aren’t you sleeping?”

“I’m not sleepy.”

“You look tired.” I reached out and caressed his face.

“I’m fine, Lily, I’ve never slept much.”

“You need to rest.” I trailed the shade of his beard with my fingertips. “How’s the investigation coming along?”

“It’s moving,” Josh said. “You don’t need to worry.”

“I’m worried about you.”

“Riker is on steroids,” he said. “I can’t piss without someone watching.”

“Good,” I said, getting up slowly. “That’s how it has to be.”

He came around the bed in a flash. “Where are we going?”

“Bathroom.” I limped and shuffled like an old lady.

“Careful.” He fretted over me. “Watch your step.”

I hesitated in front of the toilet. “I can do this part on my own.”

“Just sit down, okay?” He slid down my pajamas pants and helped me lower onto the seat. “I’ll turn around if you want.”

I might have argued with him, but I couldn’t hold my water any longer. “Can’t a girl get any privacy around here?”

“Not at the expense of falling, slipping or fainting.” He waited with his back to me for a few long moments. “Jesus Christ, are you plumbed to irrigate the whole of the Great Plains?”

“Oh, joy,” I said. “Company
and
commentary.”

“Are you done yet?”

“Yes,” I said, “but I don’t like the way I smell. I’m going to take a bath, and I mean by myself.”

“You can’t do it alone.” With his customary efficiency, he plugged the tub and worked the levers. “You can’t get your arm wet. The way I see it you have two choices: You can take a bath under my supervision or we can have Nurse Carmen give you a sponge bath. You decide.”

It was a close thing. I was terrified of Nurse Carmen. As for Josh, he’d pretty much seen everything there was to see.

“Fine,” I said. “But just so you know, it’s not that kind of a bath.”

“I might be a proven lecher around you, but I’m not a beast.” He tested the water and squeezed some bubble gel under the faucet. “I don’t get off on battered women, no way, so let’s get this show on the road.”

He helped me take off my clothes, negotiating the fabric around the bruises, stitches and scratches. “One leg first.” He helped me into the tub. “Now the other one. Good. Slowly. Arm on the ledge. There you go.”

I stretched out beneath the bubbles. It felt wonderful. I took in a deep breath and submerged my head as well. Glory.

“Better?” Josh asked when I came back up for air.

“Much.” I closed my eyes, delighting in the water’s therapeutic heat. A dribble of shampoo tickled my head and Josh’s fingers began to work up the fragrant lather.

“You make for a decent shampoo boy,” I said. “You may have a future at Antoine’s.”

He chuckled.

“I’ve been thinking,” I said.

“No thinking allowed,” he said. “No worrying either. We have more pressing concerns at the moment. Will you be using the lilac or the botanicals conditioner?”

I loved it when he made me laugh. He looked so much younger when he smiled, if only because he wore such a forbidding expression on his face much of the rest of the time.

After a little while, Josh helped me out of the bathtub. Within moments, I was dry, dressed in clean jammies, with my perfectly conditioned hair toweled and combed. Back in my bed, I sank next to a heap of socks.

“What’s this?” I examined the pile.

“Oh, this.” He grabbed a fistful of socks. “I have bad news, Lily.”

My heart skipped a beat. “Is Mom all right?”

“You Mom’s fine, but your socks, they’re an entirely different matter.”

“What’s wrong with my socks?”

He placed his hand on top of an orderly pile. “These are going to live, but these poor ones...” he shifted his hand to the next pile, “... I’m afraid it’s too late for them.”

“You’ve been organizing my socks?”

“Not just your socks,” he said. “Your closet, Lily. Disaster. I’m afraid I had to take matters into my own hands.”

“What?”

“Look.”

I followed the imaginary line of his finger to my closet, where the curtains that served as doors were thrown open. I had to blink twice. What had once been a small and crowded space was now organized into custom sections.

“Um...did you do that?”

“I did.”

“Let me get this straight: You built me a closet and rearranged all my clothes while my lights were out?”

“And your linen closet. And the kitchen cabinets. And the pantry.”

“You’re odd, you know that?”

“You’ve mentioned that before.”

“Josh?” I rubbed my eyes. “Where are Martin’s things?”

“Gone to Ohio or wherever the hell he is.”

I gaped. “Gone?”

“Gone.” He handed me a manila envelope. “There’s also this.”

The last time I’d tackled a manila envelope, things hadn’t gone very well. I opened it cautiously, relieved to find papers rather than pictures inside. For a long moment, I stared at the document in my hands, reading and rereading it, unable to believe my eyes. I turned to the last page. Martin’s oversized signature flared there, opposite to mine.

Oh. My. God. “How did you manage this?”

“Strategy,” he said.

“Did you threaten him? Did you tell him you’d divest from WindTech?”

“I was prepared to do all of the above,” Josh said. “But I decided on a different approach.”

“What did you do?”

“I worked out the design flaws plaguing the prototypes.”

“You fixed the prototypes.” I stared. “The prototypes worked?”

“They do now,” he said. “I told Martin he could have the amended design and the formula for optimum performance
, if
he signed the papers.”

I had a hard time keeping my mouth closed. Josh had conspired to get Martin out of my life. He’d devised the only possible scenario capable of compelling Martin to sign the papers. He’d put all the elements in place to force Martin to do what I wanted.

Perhaps the concussion had me hallucinating. “Am I dreaming?”

“You’re awake.”

“I... I don’t know what to say.”

Josh shrugged. “It had to be done.”

He was right. It had to be done. It should have been done. By me.

And yet I could have never done it this way. If Josh had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have believed it, but Josh was Josh, and even when he shocked the heck out of me, somewhere in the back of my mind I knew I shouldn’t be surprised.

“I can’t tell you how grateful I am.” My eyes welled with tears. “I’ll never be able to thank you for everything you’ve done for me.”

“Hey.” Josh gathered me in his arms and kissed the top of my head. “You were the one who sent the papers and got the ball rolling.”

“But...”

“But what?”

“Don’t you think you should at least have asked me before packing him up?”

“No need.”

I pulled away from him. “Josh!”

“What?”

“Is this some sort of perverse metaphor?”

“I don’t get metaphors,” he said. “Equations, now, those I get.”

“I mean, is there something you’re trying to tell me?”

“Like what?”

“Oh, I don’t know, like why you built me a closet, moved Martin out, and organized my entire apartment while Nurse Carmen kept me in bed and senseless?”

“Because it was a mess?”

I glared at him.

He sighed. “I don’t know why I did all of that, Lily, I just did it.”

“That’s a cop-out and you know it.”

“Don’t you like your new closet?”

“Yes, Josh, I like it. In fact, it’s the nicest closet I’ve ever had, but that’s not the point. You can’t just sweep into my room, reorganize my closet, my apartment and my life, and then pretend like nothing happened.”

His stare darkened. “We are not talking about the closet anymore, are we?”

I stared back.

“Look,” he said. “You’re good, I’m good and we’re together. Can’t we just leave it at that?”

“No.”

“Lily, you know I don’t do this talking shit very well.”

“You’ve got to try.”

“Okay,” he said. “You want to talk about the pictures? Let’s talk about them.”

“The pictures are not my main concern.”

“Hear me out.” His throat worked up and down. “Lisa Artiaga showed up at my office unannounced. She told me the report for the gala’s fundraiser was in the envelope. I set it aside, but that day, when DaSilva came to the house, I asked Alice to pack my stack because I was in a rush. That’s how the envelope came to the cove. When I found it at the bottom of the pile, I was as shocked as you were.”

He paused, but only to take a deep breath.

“As to the note,” he explained, “I told her that I was evaluating a project abroad when I met her in the airport lounge the day we first flew out to the cove. I told her that because I didn’t want to be with her. I wanted to be with you.”

“Why did you send her the clip and pictures of me?”

A muscle jumped along his jaw but he kept his temper in check. “I would never, ever send Lisa Artiaga, or anyone in the world,
my
clip and
my
picture of
you
. In her note, Lisa was referring to the pictures my office sent her of the gala, not to the clip or my pictures of you.”

“But that girl in the pictures with her,” I said. “She looked just like me.”

“Lisa saw you three times—at the gala, the airport and the party,” he said. “You’re right, she chose Rachella Willis because she looks like you. I didn’t realize it at first, but when I saw the pictures, I also saw the resemblance. That’s why I pulled up my picture of you, because I wanted to make sure my imagination wasn’t playing tricks on me.”

“What was she trying to do?” I said. “Mock me? Tease you? What?”

“I think she was trying to entice me.”

“Entice you?”

“She’s been trying to lure me back to her bed for a few weeks. My guess is that she thought including someone who looked like you might do the job. These pictures were her way of offering me a threesome.”

I gawked. “A threesome?”

“Which—for the record—never happened.”

My mind reeled. “Do you do threesomes often?”

“Christ,” he muttered. “What kind of question is that?”

“A fair one.”

“How is it fair if it’s all in the past?”

“Put yourself in my shoes,” I said. “I found those pictures. You’re talking about threesomes just now. The night we went to the benefit at the Prudential Center, you talked about going to places where people push the edge. How do you think I feel?”

He let out a stoic sigh. “Do you want me to guess?”

“I feel inadequate,” I said. “No matter how much I flex, I’m never going to fulfill your expectations. Those women, nothing stops them from trying whatever you want. They’re not timid, shy or reluctant. I bet you that Lisa Artiaga has never had a panic attack in her entire life. I’m never going to be able to please you like that.”

And there it was. The reason why the pictures had upset me so much. Because no matter how hard I tried, I was never going to measure up.

“Jesus, Lily,” Josh said. “If you knew me better, you wouldn’t have all these doubts. I don’t want anybody else. I want you, period. And I only took that picture of you because I wanted to remember.”

“Remember what?”

“You,” he said. “When I took that picture, I was sure you were going to leave me and soon. Either the prototypes were going to work or, most likely, you were going to get fed up with me and bolt. I wanted to remember you. Us.”

“Why didn’t you ask me?”

“I didn’t ask you because you would’ve said no.”

He was right and I knew it.

“Okay, I’ll give you that,” I said, “but had I said no, you would’ve had to live with that. Instead, you chose not to be truthful with me. That worries me the most. We have to be honest with each other. You can’t hide things from me.”

He knew exactly what I was talking about, but he chose to go in a different direction. “Let’s recap briefly. You walked into my room at the cove when I told you not to. You got into that power boat.
You
left
me
—you tried to bolt on me.”

“That’s beside the point.”

“That’s precisely the point.” He got up from the bed and began to pace my little bedroom like a trapped animal. “You know I can’t stand it when you leave like that. You know how I get. Then we have the issue of the slur on your door and the threatening text message. You went to the police, the police, for Christ’s sake. Why didn’t you come to me?”