“Only once since Scott’s funeral.”
I shifted from foot to foot, trying to alleviate the growing tension low in my back. Little ice picks stabbing into my spine. I forced myself to focus on Lisbeth. “How was she?”
“How do you think? She’s a mess.”
Guilt pricked at me. The last words she’d hurled at me hadn’t been kind ones, but I should’ve tried harder to heal that divide. We were all struggling, doing the best we could, given all we’d been through. “I’ll call her.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” Lisbeth’s phone buzzed, and she pulled it from her purse. “I need to go. See you around, Laiken.”
She took off without another word. The woman who used to be one of my closest friends. Maybe we weren’t even acquaintances now, either. Maybe we truly were strangers.
The walls seemed to close in around me, my temperature ticking up a few degrees. I wove through the crowd of people. It wasn’t a massive group. They were all faces I recognized to one degree or another. Yet the room felt stifling.
I moved to the bar. “Ice water, please.”
The bartender sent me a wink. “You sure I can’t get you something stronger?”
“Just the water.”
His smile slipped a fraction, but he filled a glass with ice and then water. “Here you go.”
“Thank you.”
I scanned the room quickly and moved towards a somewhat-empty corner. My back throbbed as I eased myself into a chair. Too much standing for one day. I rubbed at the muscles as I took a sip.
I closed my eyes for a moment, letting the cold liquid soothe my throat. I imagined it traveling down to the worst of the agony that wrapped around my spinal column. Three surgeries, and they still hadn’t found a way to lessen the pain. The last one had made it worse, and I’d made a promise to myself never to let someone slice me open again.
“Laiken.”
My eyes flew open at the sound of the deep voice. It cut like a knife. So similar to the one I’d lost, yet with a hardness Jase’s had never had.
“Jax. What are you doing here?”
As much as Jax had cleaned up his act after his brother’s death, a library opening wasn’t exactly his scene, even if the building held Jase’s name.
He inclined his head in his mother’s direction. “I promised Mom I’d come.”
I nodded, taking another sip of my water.
“Are you coming on Saturday?”
“Of course.” Pain pulsed in my back as though just thinking about the gathering for Jase’s birthday had intensified it.
Jax’s jaw worked back and forth. “I don’t know if ‘of course’ really fits the bill. Haven’t seen you around much lately.”
I lifted my gaze to his. There was pain there, but Jax had transformed that pain into anger. I got it. Anger was sometimes easier to live with than grief. “I come when you’re at work.”
It was easier that way. I’d given up on trying to reach Jax, attempting to explain to the person who had once been a brother that I’d give anything, even my life, for things to be different. Nothing would ever be enough for him. Because after Robert Aaron had gone to prison, Jax had lost his punching bag. He’d needed someone to blame, and I was a handy target.
A muscle ticked in his cheek. “Never could handle confrontation.”
“I don’t see a point in it when it doesn’t help a damn thing,” I gritted out.
“Maybe you should stop showing up altogether. It might be better if the birthday celebrations were just family.”
I reared back as if Jax had slapped me. He might as well have; it would’ve been less painful. Since kindergarten, the Grangershadbeen my family. Jax had been more of a big brother to me than mine. But now, only derision bled from his gaze.
“We all lost someone we loved,” I whispered.