Page 44 of Pillowtalk

Kennedy

“Please? I don’t think…” Kennedy paused, the urn slipping in her sweaty palms as she held it out to Chelsea. “I don’t think I can.”

It was only half-true. The other half was that she would bet her entire next editing job—nextfiveediting jobs—on Jared not wanting her to be the one to spread his ashes anymore. Not after what she’d done.

Chelsea shook her head so hard that her scarf nearly slipped right off the top of it. “He asked you, Ken. No way am I going to get my ass haunted for the rest of time.”

Kennedy attempted a smirk. “He’ll do that anyway. He’s your brother.”

“And he lovedyou.” She pushed the urn back into Kennedy’s arms, forcing it right up against her tired and torn heart. Kennedy’s grin disappeared, and she looked up at Chelsea’s eyes; there was more concern there than annoyance at the request. “You’re stronger than you think,” Chelsea said. “If you need more time, then take it. Seriously, we’re on no deadline. No one is forcing you out the door.”

That wasn’t true, though. Kennedy could feel in her bones that she wasn’t welcome anymore. It wasn’t Chelsea or Aaron or anyone else making her feel that way; it was purely internal. Just like the feeling she got when she made the trip to Lyra in the first place, it ate at her until she knew she had to give in and listen.

Her teeth tugged at her bottom lip, and Chelsea reached out and patted one of her hands, wrapped around Jared’s urn. “You feel like going out?” she asked.

Kennedy shook her head, her gaze flicking to the stairs as she fought the urge to move to her room, pack it up, and run.

Chelsea let out the tiniest of sighs and forced back a smile. “What if I called Aaron over?”

Kennedy’s eyes widened, and her brows jumped. Had she been so wrapped in her own bubble that she hadn’t noticed how obvious she’d been? How many times had someone in the small town witnessed the shared looks, the small touches, the passionate kisses…?

It wasn’t worth denying, nor was it fair to Aaron to do so, though running didn’t seem to be the right way to handle things, either. She squeezed the urn, folding her arms across her chest and shrugging. Aaron’s company had so many different effects on her and she wasn’t sure she wanted to risk feeling the one she had that morning on the dock.

“No,” she said, her stomach knotted so badly there was no hope of untangling it. “I…I…” She shook her head, her mouth open, her mind at a complete loss over how to articulate the battling emotions in her heart. Her confusion nipped at the back of her eyeballs and she shook her head, letting out a long sigh toward their feet. “I’m tired,” she told her honestly. But it wasn’t her body that was ready for rest; it was her head.

Chelsea laughed lightly, set a pair of slightly cold hands on Kennedy’s shoulders, and spun her toward the stairs. “Go take a nap. The place will be pretty darn quiet after I take the boys out.”

Kennedy’s heart sped up. A nap was the last thing on her mind, and a window of opportunity had been laid out so perfectly. She gulped and prayed that she could find the courage to take advantage of it instead of stewing in her own screwed-up mind for the next few hours.

She nodded over her shoulder, offering up a small smile. Keeping her voice locked up was probably her best bet; she knew better than to trust it not to give away her true intentions.

Her feet hit the stairs heavier and heavier the farther she climbed. When she got to the top landing, her body felt like mud; every action took twice the effort it normally did. Her arms ached as she unfolded them and propped Jared’s ashes up against the pillow on his side—the side that Aaron had just been resting on the night before.

Kennedy snatched up the urn and set it on the nightstand, gulping away at the tears she didn’t deserve to cry. Her conviction returned tenfold, and she sped around the room, tossing her belongings into her floral luggage. Her voice almost slipped out to explain to Jared what she was doing, why she was doing it, but she stopped it before the words could roll off her tongue. She hadn’t talked to him since she’d begged for his permission and forgiveness all at once last night while she was in Aaron’s arms. What turned into a need for comfort had transformed into something much more incriminating, and she couldn’t bear the thought of having to try to explain her way out of it.

Her fingers fumbled over the suitcase’s zipper as she pulled it shut, a rogue tear slipping off the tip of her nose and onto the curve of her wrist. She swiped it away and hoisted the suitcase off the bed, then rolled it to the door. Setting a hand over her heart, she hoped that it would calm it enough to stop the thumping in her ears so she could listen for Chelsea leaving the B&B.

She could hardly believe she was going through with it; when she’d read stories about the girl running to avoid everything, she’d always pointed it out to her authors as a pet peeve of hers. A simple conversation could fix the miscommunication, and as her heart calmed, she looked over at the urn, her eyes filling to the brim. What she had to say was anything but simple, and though the words were screaming in her head, she couldn’t even whisper them. Not until she’d gotten some distance, some perspective. She’d become one of her own pet peeves, and she shook her head at herself, more shame entering into her heart.

The afternoon sun pierced through the clouds, shining through the window and across the floor, warming the side of Kennedy’s face. She moved her gaze to the lake, to the small speck in the distance that she knew was Aaron’s red SUV, parked by the rustic, homey-looking place that he shared with Austin. Her fingers uncurled from her suitcase handle, and she padded across the floor. She closed her eyes, letting the sun soak into her skin and fill her with its warmth. It was so similar to Aaron’s touch, she could almost imagine him in the room with her, running his thumb over her cheek, tucking her hair behind her ear. She’d felt so complete, her wounds healed over, her broken pieces fused back together, her heart beating away the blue and black bruises and glowing red. She couldn’t leave without him knowing why, without him knowing that he’d forever changed her, and without him knowing that she was still in love with someone else, and she always would be, and how sorry she was for that.

Her eyes opened, and she reached for the drawer in the nightstand, finding a pen and notepad with the B&B logo on it. Her hand flew across the page, suddenly able to explain, to tell him thanks, to tell him goodbye.

She folded it up and propped it on the pillow where Jared’s urn had sat before she’d quickly moved it. Her teeth sneaked out and tugged at her lip, and she brought the pen back to her paper and wrote the four words she couldn’t bear to say out loud.

“I’m sorry, Jared,” she said, and set the note against the urn before pushing off the bed, grabbing her luggage, and turning to catch one more glimpse before leaving. Her words gleamed with the shiny, fresh ink as the sunlight streamed through the window.

I love him, too.

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