Page 75 of The Heartbreak List

Mr. Jones moves lethargically and when his gaze lands on Indy it sticks. He joins his wife on the other side of the counter without taking his eyes off his daughter.

He reminds me so much of Nelson in those last days. Withdrawn. Going through his suffering in silence. If I needed to get any of them into a smash room it’s him. “A Smash room is a room full of breakable items that you can smash. You wear protective gear and can use a baseball bat or a hammer.”

“Or a golf club.” EJ pretends to swing a putter. “And you don’t have to clean up the mess.”

“It helps, Mom,” Indy says.

“Well then, we’ll plan a family trip.” Sharon glances behind us. “Is Gray stuck at work again? Well, we can organize it when he arrives.”

“Gray said he’s running late, by the way,” EJ announces.

“Gray’s running late?” Indy’s eyes flare.

What does he mean, Gray is running late? I scratch my temple. My gut tightens. I was certain he wasn’t coming. So was Indy. Otherwise she never would have asked me to come with her. And I never would have agreed to joining their family dinner. The last thing I want to do is be the cause of the trouble this is sure to stir up.

“He didn’t tell you?” EJ’s brow furrows.

“Erm, well…” Indy curls her fingers around the strands that touch her neck. “The thing is…”

“Where’s your ring, baby?” Sharon covers her mouth. “Oh my God, did you lose it? I thought it looked loose the other day. I should have said something.”

“No, Mom.” Indy’s eyes fill with tears as she walks over to comfort her mother. She turns to include her dad. “I’m sorry. Gray and I broke off the engagement.”

“What?” Her brother’s gaze turns cold and hard as it lands on me. He folds his arms over his chest, bunching his fists into his armpits. He most likely knows his friend well enough to know that this isn’t his choice. “Why?”

“Because we’re not our best selves when we’re together anymore.” Indy dashes away the wetness from her eyelashes. “And because we shouldn’t be getting married when I’m dying. It isn’t helping me and it isn’t helping him either.”

“And if I ask Gray what happened?” There’s a kaleidoscope of emotions warring in EJ’s expression.

Her gaze slips to me as the color leaves her face. She swallows as she meets his eye. “Don’t.”

“So there’s more to it.” His jaw bulges as he turns on me. He knows I’m involved in this. Not the details, but that there is something. He was worried from the beginning that I’d be a problem.

He storms back the way we came in. The front door slams.

“Oh, Indy.” Sharon wraps her arms around her daughter and cradles her head on her shoulder while Indy sobs. The older woman’s eyes fill too. “What happened?”

Mr. Jones engulfs them both.

My chest tightens and pain runs through my jaw and my arm. I grasp at my heart, because the ache is almost intolerable. There’s so much pain here and I can’t do anything to help. I can’t take Indy in my arms and support her the way I want to. I should probably leave before Gray arrives and everything gets a thousand times more explosive.

Yet I know I won’t take off. Not unless she tells me too.

“It’s hard. I love Gray.” Indy sniffles.

I can’t stand here while she explains how complicated her feelings for Gray and me are to her parents, so I go to find EJ. Maybe he’ll want to thump me, but there are things we should probably talk about.

He’s sitting on the second step down from the porch with his head between his hands. I shut the door behind me and take a seat next to him.

“I knew something was going on between you two.” He doesn’t look up. “That morning I found you on her couch. But I let her convince me I was being unreasonable.”

“Neither of us meant for things to progress like this.” And before that day I didn’t think there was anything more than friendship between us. Neither did she. “We tried to fight it.”

“It’s why she’s been practically comatose for weeks, isn’t it? Because she tried to cut you out once she realized.”

I close my eyes and take a breath. “Yes.”

“I want to tell you that you’ve fucked everything up.” He cracks his knuckles. “That I was right in my initial assessment and that you’re a parasite. I want to get my golf club and put it through your skull. I could build a legal defense that would keep me out of jail.”

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