Aftermirth by Hillary Jordan Read Free Book Online Page B

grief, but rage. Not at Elena, but at the whole effed-up situation. And for the first time ever, at Jess. If she hadn’t had a temper tantrum and stormed out like a petulant teenager, I wouldn’t be sitting here blubbering in front of a stranger’s house in suburban Charleston. I wouldn’t have wrecked my career and driven away every person who cared about me, wouldn’t have spent two years lost in a gray hell.
    Fuck you, Jess, I thought. And felt something black and toxic slide out of me that I hadn’t even known I’d been carrying, even as the truth rose up and burst open in my head: I hadn’t just been cursing the sun that day. I’d been cursing her, my wife who was lying dead at my feet, and I’d been so ashamed of myself afterward that I’d taken all that rage and stuffed it back into whatever dark hole it had come from. And there it had stayed, festering, ever since.
    I was aware of Elena watching me patiently, giving me the time to work through whatever I was feeling. Jess had been lousy at waiting. She was always racing ahead of me emotionally, drumming her fingers while I made my halting, plodding way toward her. And in that sense, nothing had changed. Once again I was the laggard and she was the frontrunner, waiting for me to catch up. But this time she’d gone far, far beyond me, and the wait would be long.
    At least, I hoped it would be long.
    I told her I was sorry then. Sorry for my anger and for the things I’d said that day, sorry I hadn’t stopped her from walking out that door. And most of all, sorry I wanted to live without her—because there was no denying that I did. I sent the apology off into the ether and felt an answering whoosh of certainty that if Jess were here, she’d apologize too and forgive me for all of it, just like I would forgive her. Had already forgiven her. About damn time, Larssen, I heard her ghost say. Took you long enough.
    I looked at Elena and Catherine, and then past them, at George’s house. I’d had over two years to mourn Jess and come to terms with her death, but they’d only had a few months: three in Elena’s case, five in Catherine’s. I didn’t know what was waiting inside those pink walls, but I would go with them and find out, in the hope that they’d be able to leave a tiny part of their sorrow here, behind them.
    I HALF EXPECTED the door to be opened by a butler in coattails and white gloves, but George welcomed us himself, the ladies with kisses on the cheek, me with a handshake and a wan smile, and Izzy (who’d been preapproved on the way there) with a pat on the head and a dog treat. “I have two dogs of my own,” he told me, sounding a lot like Ashley Wilkes. “I’d introduce them to Izzy, but they’re territorial beasts, and I’m afraid they’d try to have him for breakfast.”
    George was tall and slender, fiftyish, with a long, Stan Laurel face, thinning ginger hair and mournful hazel eyes. Like the house and grounds, he looked ready for a garden party. He wore off- white l inen pants, pristine white bucks and a salmon-colored pullover. No silk cravat, but I bet he had a drawer full of them in every color.
    After the introductions he led us down a hallway and into a huge formal living room full of seriously valuable- and fragile-looking antiques and Oriental rugs. No doubt Scarlett O’Hara or an Architectural Digest photographer would have felt right at home, but I was afraid to touch anything. The room was dominated by a life-size oil painting of George and a much younger and better-looking man who must have been his partner. The two of them were holding identical pugs. I smiled; from George’s description I’d been picturing a pair of ferocious Dobermans.
    George waved to a nice spread of pastries and fruit laid out on a sideboard and told us to help ourselves. No mint juleps, but there was a pitcher of Bloody Marys as well