He was curt and dismissive, and I knew in my bones that this entire interaction was unproductive, but I was now not just angry and worked up and worried but also I was goddamned hurt. By both Hudson and Edward. And while I was still learning how to deal with strong emotions, these were some of the most potent I’d had in a long time. They spun in my belly and pressed upward, demanding to be let out. They ruled me.
So instead of leaving, I spewed on. “I have always been real with you,” I told him with raw sincerity. “No matter what I’ve done, what schemes I’ve pulled. I have still always been honest with you, when we were face-to-face. So when I say I didn’t do this, you should know I’m telling the truth.”
Hudson sank into his chair and looked up at me with disdain. “How could I know anything?” he asked with feigned innocence. “I don’t know you anymore. Remember?”
The sharp pain in my chest made it impossible to speak, impossible to even breathe. All I could do was nod and stare and nod some more. What had I even expected? That Hudson would just intuitively understand all I’d done to protect him? That he would apologize or acquiesce or that he’d console me and tell me not to worry about a thing?
Even if it were possible for him to set aside everything that had happened after he met Alayna, even if he knew that I’d tried my damndest to keep him out of this, he was still going through a crisis of his own. Someone was threatening his family. His focus was there, as it should be, on the drama that was already happening to him. He couldn’t be expected to be concerned about drama that was yet to come. He couldn’t be expected to be concerned about me.
Then why was I concerned about him?
Without another word, I spun around and left Hudson’s office. It was time I got my own priorities straight. Hopefully both of those priorities would be waiting for me when I got back to our suite.
Edward wasn’t at the hotel when I got back. He didn’t return that evening either. My messages remained unanswered, as did my calls. By bedtime I’d stopped reaching out all together. He’d come back when he was ready, no sooner, and that was that.
I’d done this to him once. I’d taken off from London and hid away at my parents’, refusing to talk to my husband except for short yes or no texts.
Reminding myself of that fact did nothing to calm the intense storm inside me, but at least it helped my head keep it together.
Thankfully, once I put away my phone, I had a task to keep me preoccupied. The diaries had arrived in a box from London by special delivery just after eight pm. While Cleo gnashed at baby cereal in her high chair, I spread out the books across the dining table, eleven black leather-bound journals containing the record of my cruel past.
I picked one up and leafed through it, my stomach churning as my eyes scanned familiar names and places. There was a lot written in them that I’d forgotten. Much more that I didn’t want to remember. Going through them with Hudson was going to be tough, and for the first time since he’d disappeared, I wished Edward was back specifically to guide me through the task. I still wanted to fight with him, but I wanted him to comfort me, too. Wanted him to wrap me in his arms and let me feel my feelings and tell me what to do.
I can take care of myself.
With a sigh, I put the book back down and worked out a plan for how to get through them. Then I put in an order for breakfast room service and left the journals for the next day.
When I woke up the following morning, my priority was firm in my mind—put our differences aside and find the person who was terrorizing Hudson and Alayna. I’d been too wrapped up in myself to realize how serious the situation was. There was someone angry with things Hudson and I had done in the past. Someone who very much wanted to even the score. His family’s lives were in jeopardy. If it wasn’t Edward behind it, there was a very good chance that my family would be threatened next.
And if it was Edward...well, I needed to know that too.
“Come on in,” I said cheerfully when the Pierces appeared at my door. I nodded to the room service cart that had arrived only minutes before they had. “I’ve already ordered tea and coffee.” I assumed Hudson still drank black coffee, but his wife…? I directed my next words to her. “I didn’t know which you preferred in the morning. I also have an assortment of fruits and breakfast pastries, in case you haven’t eaten yet. I know sometimes it’s hard to remember to take care of yourself in times of stress.”
“I’ve already eaten,” Alayna said without feeling. Then, warmer, she added, “Thank you.”
I refused to be anything but a perfect host. “They’re here if you change your mind.”
“How about we just get started?” Hudson said, as efficient as ever. “Where are the journals?”
“Since you’re obviously not hungry either, Hudson, they’re in here. Follow me.” I walked them down the hall and around the corner to the dining room.
“Is Edward working with us as well?” Hudson asked as they followed behind.
I was glad I wasn’t facing them when I answered. “No. He went into work.” It could have been true for all I knew. Point was, my marital troubles were not of interest to Hudson, nor were they important today. “It’s just us and the nanny.”
When we reached the table, I turned to face them. As composed as Hudson usually was, I was surprised to see him viscerally react to the sight of the journals, as if their mere existence churned his stomach.
I know the feeling, bud.
It felt oddly reassuring to have that in common.
“I don't know if you had a plan about how to attack this,” I said, suddenly nervous. I tucked a stray hair behind my ear. “But I was thinking that you and I, Hudson, could each grab a journal and start reading through it. When we come to a name of someone involved in an experiment, we could record the name as well as any other details that may be important regarding the subject. Such as whether or not we believe they might still have hostile feelings toward you or me. Most of those references in the letters seemed vague, but if we come across anything that seems to possibly be referenced, then we can note that as well.”
It was a pretty straight-forward plan, one that removed Alayna from reading the journals, which was selfish on my part.
But they were, in fact, journals. They were private and terrible and not the kind of thing I ever wanted anyone reading. It had been bad enough when Edward had read them. He’d been enraged and disgusted. I couldn’t imagine the contempt Alayna would feel reading them, especially when she already hated me so intensely.
I would have thought Hudson would feel the same way, but when no one spoke, I wondered if I’d thought wrong. “If you have another plan…”
“No,” Hudson said. “This is good.” He removed his jacket and sat down to work.
I followed suit, taking a chair across from him.
“What should I do?” Alayna asked.
It wasn’t my place to keep her away from the journals. I looked to Hudson for that.
Thankfully, he seemed to be on the same page. “You can do the recording, Alayna. As Celia and I read, we will call out information. If you could track it and sort it, I think that would be the best use of your time.”
I worried momentarily that she might object to being kept on the sidelines. From what I knew of Alayna, she had always been headstrong and ready to buck against anyone who tried to hold her down.
But she surprised me, taking to the job enthusiastically and even setting up a shared spreadsheet on the laptop she’d brought.
We dug in then, working throughout the morning. It was difficult reading, as I’d expected it would be, but I concentrated on detaching myself from the stories I read, and that helped the process go smoother. We developed a sort of rhythm between the three of us, Hudson and I shouting out details, Alayna confirming them before entering them into her computer. It was a good process.
That wasn’t to say there wasn’t tension amongst us because there definitely was. It wove around us like the tight weave of a spiderweb, keepin
g us trapped in its sticky silk-like thread. The only time it broke was when Elsa brought Cleo. Alayna was a sucker for a baby, it turned out, and no one could remain somber around mine.
It was only a momentary reprieve. As soon as Cleo was burped and back with the nanny, the contention was back, worse than before. It didn’t just surround me, either. Alayna and Hudson bickered as well and eventually they excused themselves to take their clipped conversation to the hall.
Admittedly, I was pleased that, for once, their argument couldn’t be blamed on me since I’d been on my best behavior, which was probably petty, but also it was a big thing. I hadn’t ever spent time in a room with the two of them without scheming and plotting to turn them against one another. It was new for me, and as silly as it was, I took it as evidence of how far I’d come.
When Hudson returned, he came back alone. “It’s a little much for Alayna,” he said, vaguely. “We’re on our own for the afternoon.”
I held back a dozen snarky comments that came to mind. “Probably for the best. No one should have to deal with our shit except us.”
“Amen.”
If only my husband felt the same.
Reminding myself of my agenda for the day, I pushed the thought away. “I’ll call down and tell room service one less dish for lunch.”
When that was done, we resumed working, only breaking when our food arrived then quickly resuming when we’d finished. Our process had altered with Alayna’s absence. Now we took turns reading, the other recording on Hudson’s laptop. It was easier than it had been, despite being down one person. We both knew our stories so well that we could fill in the details that the other had read almost at the same time as they were recited out loud.
The tension was far less noticeable as well. In fact, there was almost a sense of camaraderie. Whatever our past sins, Hudson and I had committed them together. That created a bond between us that could never be broken, no matter what changed about us as individuals.
Maybe that’s why I’d been so quick to keep Hudson a secret, because we’d been linked like that. I was bound to protect him. Whatever Edward thought, he was wrong—I hadn’t chosen Hudson over him. I hadn’t made a choice at all.
Eventually, Hudson closed his laptop. “I think that’s enough for today.”
I looked at my phone. Almost five o’clock. Where had the time gone? “Did we figure anything out?”
He hesitated. “Not really. Did you?”
“No,” I answered honestly. Nothing we’d read connected to any of the letters Hudson had received, and I still was no closer to figuring out if Edward was involved. “We still have a few journals to go through.”
“Back at it tomorrow?”
“Of course.” He was about to stand when I stopped him. “Are you scared?”
“Of the person sending the letters?” He settled back in his chair. “Yes. I am. Someone is very angry, rightly so, I presume. Valid anger is one of the most dangerous weapons I’ve encountered.”
I’d seen my husband use valid anger as a weapon. It had almost gotten me killed. I’d lived, but what about Camilla’s husband? I was sure Edward had killed him. Would he go that far with Hudson?
A chill ran down my spine. “I feel like I should tell you I’m sorry.”
Hudson seemed to assume my apology was for the past since his eyes scanned the journals laid out in front of us. “I was as much a part of this as you were.” He waited a beat. “Sometimes I’m not so sure I shouldn’t be apologizing to you.”
It was peculiar how the cold I’d felt a second ago could so quickly turn to warmth. I didn’t want an apology from Hudson, never had, but he’d considered it, and that meant something. Small that it might be, it was still something.
I flashed a brief smile. “It won’t do any good, for either of us, at this point.”
“No, I don’t believe it will.”
I stood as he did, planning to walk him to the door, but my thoughts were still tied up in the journals. “Should we be doing something? For all those people that we…” I couldn’t find the right words.
Hudson didn’t have that problem. “For our victims?”
“Yeah.”
He sighed, a heavy sigh that practically thudded with its weight. “I’ve tried, you know. I still try, when I find the opportunity. Try to make it up. Try to pay it back. Every token of retribution is selfishly a way to ease my own heart. It’s impossible to make up for those kinds of hurts. There’s no price that can be paid to fix someone that you’ve so utterly broken.”
An immense grief wrapped around me. Not just for my own wrongs that could never be fixed, but also for all the wrongs Edward felt had been done to him. He sought justice at every turn, trying to mend wounds that would never close.
“How are we ever supposed to move on?” I asked, my voice small.
Hudson shook his head, as though he didn’t have that answer, but his words said differently. “We do just that. We move on. If we can’t fix it, it doesn’t do any good to dwell on the guilt. All we can do is forgive ourselves, try to be better in the future. And we can love the people in our lives wholly. We can believe in and fight for their goodness as strongly as we once worked to tear people apart.”
“Use our powers for good.” I’d said it once before to Edward when he’d wanted me to go after everyone who’d hurt me in the past. I’d hated the idea then, but now, framed like this, I could envision it as something different. Something beautiful and kind and right.
“Use our powers for good,” Hudson agreed. “I like that.”
Yeah. I really liked it too.
Suddenly I knew exactly what to say to Edward and what needed to be done in order to heal the rift between us.
Now he just needed to come home.
Fifteen
Edward
The incoming notification sounded on my mobile, a different tone than a normal call indicating it was FaceTime. Only one person communicated with me through this app, and only for one reason.
I glanced at the time then lowered my cigarette out of screen’s view before I answered. Freddie’s face filled the screen. “It’s nearly eleven there. Isn’t it past your bedtime?”
My sister leaned into the screen. “He had a nightmare about you. Couldn’t go to sleep until he made sure you were alive and well.”
“There was a monster with fire coming out of its mouth and a big swamp thing, too,” my nephew said excitedly. “And both of them were trying to eat you and I couldn’t see your eyes and I thought you were gone forever!”
Freddie’s dream felt eerily like a metaphor for my current life.
“No monsters here,” I said, twisting my phone so he could see the expanse of the hotel room balcony. “No swamp things either. And if you can see, I still have my eyes.”
He laughed as I brought the phone up close to one eye then the other.
“See?” Camilla said from the sideline. “Uncle’s fine. You’re probably just having dreams because you miss him.”
“Will you come home soon?” he asked me.
He wasn’t the only one wanting an answer to that question. Though the texts from Celia the day before had referred to our shared hotel suite as home and not London as Freddie meant.
I didn’t have an answer for either of them, unfortunately.
“You’ll be the first one I tell as soon as I know,” I promised.
“I hope it’s soon,” the six-year-old said with a yawn.
Camilla kissed Freddie on the forehead. “Think you can sleep now?”
“I’ll try.”
Camilla took the mobile. “Hold on for a second while I tuck him in?”
“Sure.” It wasn’t like I was doing anything other than brooding.
The screen went dark as she held her mobile against her body, the sounds of good night and the shifting of bed blankets coming through muffled. I took the opportunity to flick the growing ash of my cigarette into the glass I’d brought out with me to use as a makeshift ashtray, then b
rought it up to my lips for a drag.
Just in time for Camilla to return to the screen. “Please tell me that’s a joint and not a cigarette.”
I blew out a stream of smoke. “I could tell you that, but I’d be lying.”
“What the hell, Eddie?” The image bobbed as she walked down the hall to another part of her house. “You haven’t smoked in years. Have you taken it up again?”
Her concern was both annoying and oddly comforting. “It’s the first one of the pack so I can’t say that I’ve taken it up again. I suppose that’s something I won’t really know until I do or don’t buy a second pack.”
She frowned, a frown that grew deeper when I took another drag. “I kept you on because I wanted to ask how Celia was doing after Ron’s sentencing, but now I wonder if I should be asking after you instead.”
I ignored the inquiry about me, which was an answer in itself. “I couldn’t tell you how Celia is doing. I haven’t seen her in two days.”
The bouncing image subsided as Camilla settled into her bed. “Ah. Must be quite a row if you’re both avoiding her and smoking.”
“I’m not avoiding her, exactly.” I took another puff then crushed the butt into the glass. “I’m relieving her of having to spend time with my temper. It’s a courtesy, really.”
“Yes, that is a courtesy. The Edward Fasbender Temper is quite terrifying, speaking from experience. Congratulations on having the sense of mind to stay away.”
I let out a humorless chuckle. “It would be funny if it weren’t so true.”
“Perhaps.”
A beat passed, and I thought seriously about lighting another cigarette.
“You know, Eddie, speaking again from experience, when you sent me away to school, I would rather have had your rage than your distance. Your anger blazes like an inferno, but your silence is colder than any winter I’ve known. Personally, I’d rather be warm.”
“Thank you for that, Camilla. I didn’t feel bad enough already.” I pulled another cigarette from the pack.