Page 3 of Cedar Edge
“What the fuck were you doing with Royce?!” Ace yells, whirling on me.
I startle back from him, confusion and shock moving through my body. “I didn’t even know who he was until a moment ago. I was running through town to meet up with you and I literally ran into him.”
Now that there’s space between us, I can feel Ace’s heated gaze drawing down my body, his anger suddenly forgotten. “What are you wearing Cricket?”
My cheeks grow hot and tight as I fidget with the black body con dress I had shoved myself into. It had been months since all four of us had been together. At first I was able to rationalize why. Logan was in his apprenticeship tattooing in downtown Seattle, Law was in the police academy, and Ace had been off doing fire training. But after one two many weekends seeing their social lives displayed across social media the rational me went away.
I was jealous. Jealous of the girls pawing atmystepbrother and friends. It was an emotion I didn’t like and wasn’t used to. I hyper fixated on what those people had that I didn’t and everything seemed to point to the fact that I still clung to my ‘girly’ style. These women were sleek and sexy, something I had never been nor tried to be. But the idea of the boys no longer wanting me had me online shopping late into the evening looking for the perfect dress. A dress that would show them I was everything they needed.
“A dress Ace.” I finally respond, trying to act casual.
“That is barely a scrap of fabric.” His eyes lock on my bare legs slowly trailing upward as if he’s practically memorizing the curves of my body. Embarrassment, among other things, floods my system and I wobble on my feet a bit. Ace sees the movement and steps into my space. “You trying to make me jealous Cricket?”
“You're my brother, Ace.” I scoff, desperate to ignore the way his fingers are tracing the bare skin of my arms.
“Step.” He responds.
My breath shutters. “Doesn’t matter. You're with Lo.”
Is that my voice? That breathless sound?
Ace smiles with devilish intent before he leans so close that his lips brush the shell of my ear. “Don’t worry sis, Lo and I like to share.”
Chapter One
THREE YEARS LATER
“Poisonous does not always mean deadly. The official definition of a poisonous plant is ‘that which contains substances capable of producing varying degrees of discomfort and adverse physical or chemical effects, or even death, to humans and animals when they are eaten or otherwise contacted.’”
-Fez Inkwright,Botanical Curses and Poisons: The Shadow-Lives of Plants-
Grief changes you. The second it enters your bloodstream it rewrites your very soul. You’ll never be who you were before it touched you. At least that's what my mom used to say. And as I watch her coffin being lowered into the ground I can’t help but think she was right. That whatever is happening in me since she died is changing me right down to my very DNA. Because ever since I found her on the bathroom floor, so cold and lifeless, I’ve felt like I was playing dress up in the old Thea’s body.
“I’m so sorry for your loss dear girl. Your mother was such a special woman, who would have thought…” I slide my eyes overto her, a vague memory of her name passing through my mind before it drifts off. I don’t care enough to run after it.
“Who would have thought what?” My voice no longer sounds like my own, the tone hard and flat.
She stumbles a bit, her words getting caught up. I know what she was going to say. It’s what everyone has said,we never would have thought Maire Montgomery had a drug problem. We never thought Maire Montgomery would kill herself.
My mother didn’t have a drug problem. She didn’t kill herself. She was murdered. I know it’s true just like I know the sky is fucking blue. But it’s hard to convince a small town of that when one of their favorite women is found dead due to a drug overdose. At least according to the autopsy. The words had seemed surreal when I heard my stepfather, Rodger, read them outloud. The coroner stated her tox screen had come back positive for drugs, though he hadn’t specified what type, and ruled her death as suicide by drug overdose.
Nevermind there was no note, no message, nothing to indicate she had tried to kill herself. Nor did my mother have any history of drug use, fuck she only really drank once a year on the anniversary of my biological fathers death. She would drink one glass of wine at the unmarked grave before leaving a bottle of whiskey. Every year, like clockwork, up until this year. Now she was a permanent resident in the graveyard that she used to frequent. My eyes track towards the area that holds the unmarked grave and for a flash of a second I have the urge to pick up the mantle, drink a glass of wine and leave that bottle of whiskey.
But what about the months of isolation… maybe the town is right, she killed herself with drugs. She wasn’t well, like mother like daughter.
I want to rip the voice out of my mind. Hating the doubt that my brain likes to sow every now and again.
“Your mother was such a kind soul, I just can’t imagine what she got mixed up in.” This from a different member of the blue haired brigade, as my mother would have called them. Her patronizing tone grates at my nerves and the pity in their eyes feels fake as shit. All they want is the latest gossip.
“My mother didn’t get mixed up in shit.” I spat, ignoring the audible gasp from the ladies. “She didn’t do drugs and she didn’t kill herself.”
She never would have left me!
I want to scream it from the rooftops. How could anyone think she would have left me here alone, with fucking Rodger as my only family! And yet I swallow back the words instead focusing on the hole in the ground that currently holds my mothers casket.
“Poor Rodger, I can’t imagine how he must be feeling.” The words are all the same. Some even dare to say how lucky I am to still have such a doting stepfather. But all I can see is my mother dead.
“She never wanted to be buried. She wanted to be cremated.” The words are hollow. But I say them anyway, determined to keep my mother's wishes and memories alive whether people want to hear them or not.
