Growing and Kissing (35 page)

I shrugged and
harumphed
and pushed soil-flecked hair out of my face. “I have to go.”

“You have to
go
upstairs and sleep,”
he told me.

“But—”

“
I’ll
take Kayley to see the movie.” He pushed me towards the stairs. “No arguments. Go.”

Before I could stop him, he’d left. And after a few more seconds of staring after him in disbelief, I reluctantly crawled up the stairs and collapsed on the bed. I slept for fourteen hours and woke to a text from Kayley saying how much she liked Sean and “could they do it again, please?”

My heart swelled. I rolled over and saw Sean stretched out on the bed next to me—he’d crept into bed without waking me, one arm wrapped protectively around me. Kayley liked him and I needed him on a level I’d never known before. It was so, so tempting to imagine some future where we could all be together. But every day, he disappeared for a few hours to work another job for a dealer, smashing up someone’s car or house or business, scaring them into submission. I knew now where all the anger came from. I knew that he didn’t
want
to be doing that work. But that didn’t change the fear I felt every single time he put his hammer in the trunk of his car and drove off.
What if he doesn’t come back?
Or what if more of his enemies came looking for revenge, as the Serbians had done?
There was no way I could put Kayley at risk by having Sean in our lives, however much I wanted him.

Gradually, my efforts paid off. The plants shot up and the buds grew sticky, creamy and huge. When the time came to harvest, I finally dared to admit that maybe this was going to work. Me being me, I’d been cautious about my estimates all along: I’d planted enough that we could lose at least ten percent, but we’d lost almost none. And judging by the look of the buds, this really was premium stuff.

Sean helped me dry it and cure it, sealing it into carefully-weighed plastic bags. It really was a bumper crop: more like $550,000 worth, although I knew we’d be lucky to get that much out of Malone. For a second, I actually felt aggrieved. Who was he, to set the price? Maybe we could negotiate, threaten to go elsewhere….

What the hell am I doing?
I caught myself just in time. When did I start thinking like a criminal, trying to squeeze every last cent out of the crop?
This is not what I do! This is just a one-time thing.
Getting greedy was tempting fate. All we needed was the $500,000 to pay for Kayley’s treatment and not a cent more. I felt like I was stepping back from a deep, dark chasm and it took another hour focusing on the mindless task of bagging before I felt fully normal again.

When we bagged the last bag, the crop filled an entire large tabletop: we’d stacked the bags like bricks, making a solid mass of weed three feet high.

Sean whistled and ran his hand down the stack. “We’re going to need to rent a van to move it. It’s too much to fit in your car.”

I slipped my arm around his waist. “I can’t believe we’ve done it. We’ve done it, right? I mean, this is
it.”

He squeezed me and nodded. “This is it. And
we
didn’t do it. You did. This is all you and your green fingers.”

I shook my head and put my arms around his neck, grinning. “No. No way, I’m not letting you even
start
down that road. I couldn’t have done it without you.” I winced when I thought how many ways I would have messed it up without him: I wouldn’t have known about hiding the smell of the plants, I would have fallen prey to some loan shark like Murray, I wouldn’t have had any idea how to set up a meeting with someone like Malone. God, I’d been about to grow
in my own apartment!

Sean shrugged and grunted, but he was smiling. “We should celebrate,” he said. “How about—”

My phone rang and he went quiet while I answered. I was still grinning so hard that it took several seconds for what I was hearing to sink in. Then I grabbed Sean’s hand and ran for my car.

Kayley had been rushed to the hospital...and she was critical.

Louise

We crashed through the doors of the hospital and sprinted up to the desk. “Kayley Willowby,” I panted to the woman. “Kayley Willowby—where is she?”

“One second.” She started tapping at her computer.

“I should have been here,” I sobbed to Sean. I’d been too frantic on the drive over to cry, but now the tears were starting to burn my eyes. “I should have been at the apartment with her but I was off
—”

Sean grabbed me and pulled me in tight to his chest, stroking my hair. I could feel the tension in his body, too, every muscle knotted under the thin cotton of his tank top.

“Date of birth?” asked the woman behind the desk.

I told it to her between sobs.
Come on. COME ON!

The woman frowned. “No Kayley Willowby has been admitted.”

I clutched at the edge of the desk, close to meltdown. “Are you sure? Are you checking the ER?”

“Louise,” said Sean behind me.

My stomach lurched. “Jesus, is she—Have you checked the—” I swallowed. “Would it show up if she was already—”

“
Louise!”
said Sean, and this time he gripped my upper arm so hard it hurt. I turned around. “Call her,” he said.

I looked at him as if he was crazy. “She won’t be able to answer!” I snapped. “She’s
critical!”

“
Call her.”

I pulled out my phone and viciously stabbed at the screen, not understanding why I was doing it. One ring. Two rings.

“Yo,” said Kayley’s voice.

The phone almost slipped from my fingers. “Are you—are you okay?” I spun slowly, looking at the hospital around me. “Where
are you?”

“I’m fine,” she said, bemused. “I’m at the apartment.”

I looked up into Sean’s horrified face. I’m guessing I was doing the exact same expression.

We ran for the car and raced back across town, tires screeching and engine howling. We made it back to the mansion less than an hour after we’d left it.

But it was too late.

The table was empty. The entire crop was gone.

Sean

“No,” said Louise. The horror of it hadn’t sunk in, yet. She was still just staring at the empty table in disbelief.

Me? I was cursing myself. How had I not realized the phone call was fake? I should have got her to call the hospital to confirm or at least stayed at the house to protect the crop. I’d left it exactly when it was most vulnerable: we’d done everything except fucking gift wrap it for them.

“No,” said Louise again. The mounting fear in her voice resonated right through me, making my heart ache.

I never would have made that mistake, six months ago. I would have seen it for the obvious ploy it was. Hell, if I’d been asked to steal someone’s crop, it’s exactly the sort of thing I would have done myself.

I’d gotten soft.

I’d gotten
involved.

“
No!”
Louise’s voice had risen to a wail. “
No!”
She was gripping the edge of the table, staring at the empty surface as if she could wish the crop back into existence if she only wanted it hard enough.

“It’s Malone,” I told her. “I called him this morning, while we were bagging, to tell him we were ready to make the deal.” My voice grew tight. “He must have figured, why pay when he can just take it?”

“But
how?
How did he even know where we were growing?”

I shrugged. “My guess is, he tracked you down and found out where you lived, then had someone follow you here one day.”

She didn’t reply. She just staggered away from the table, tears in her eyes. I gave her space for a moment—she was too fragile to even touch, right now, a bomb ready to explode.

“It’s not just money,” she said in a choked voice. “Doesn’t he understand that? It’s not just money that he can steal, it—it’s
life.
It’s
Kayley’s life!”

I nodded. The weight of it all was crushing me down, a black granite rock a thousand miles high. “I know,” I said. And now I
did
reach for her, but she backed away, shaking her head.

“All that time,” she croaked. “This whole six months, we could have been—Jesus,
I’ve barely seen her! I’ve barely seen my sister!”

“I know,” I said slowly. I held out my arms. “Come here.” I could see she was close to cracking and I needed to get her into my arms before—

“I got it wrong,” she whispered. “I got it
all wrong.”

She ran and I grabbed for her just too late. By the time I caught up with her, she was already roaring off in her car.

Louise

It had started to rain—one of those chill, torrential downpours that makes your windshield run as if someone’s pouring from a bucket on the roof. But my tears were doing just as much to blur things, big wracking sobs jolting their way up from my guts to escape as scalding streams.

I wanted to go back. Right back to Dr. Huxler’s office, when he’d said this would be
a very difficult conversation
. I wanted to go back and I wanted to be a fucking adult this time. I wanted to grow up and make the hard choice, accept Kayley’s death and
be with her
instead of going on some stupid crusade to try to save her. We could have been together all day, every day. I could have gotten a loan from Murray and used it to take her on vacation instead of wasting it on fucking fertilizer and grow lights. She could have
lived
these last six months, instead of just surviving.

But I’d been too fucking selfish. I’d wanted a whole lifetime with her and so I’d squandered her last six months.

I pulled up outside our apartment building and ran all the way up to our floor, too desperate to wait for the elevator. I crashed in through the door and headed straight for Kayley who was—