Page 4 of His Wounded Heart

Fuck, why can’t I get to her? What the fuck is wrong with me? I tear at the material tangling me up and grab my gun off the nightstand.

“Lizzy,” I scream one more time. Just one more time before I realize it was the dream. The same damn fucking dream about my little sister that I’d been having for the last six months ever since that fucker killed her. I should never have bribed that Minneapolis detective to show me the police report with the pictures, and the witness statements.

I latch on the safety and put my SIG Sauer back on the nightstand and push back the sheets. They’re shot, soaked through with my sweat.

Not going to sleep on those tonight.

Hell, who am I kidding? I will not sleep at all, no matter what, and it’s not because of sweaty sheets. I leave the lights off in the bedroom and in the tiny little living room as I stumble to the kitchen. Pressing my fingers to the bridge of my nose, I try to fight back tears.

Not tears for my loss.

No.

Tears for the life she had been leading that I hadn’t even noticed. All I deserve to feel on my behalf is rage at myself for having failed her so badly. How could I have missed the signs? How could I have let my beautiful baby sister down so badly?

Chapter Two

The bottle of Jack is staring back at me from where it sits on the coffee table. What the hell had been playing on the television all night is beyond me. I just know that it hadn’t been some fucking true crime show. I wouldn’t have been able to stomach it. If it had been true crime, I would have shot the TV, á la Elvis, seeing Ned’s face the entire time.

It doesn’t matter that Ned offed himself. Every day I dream of digging him up and killing him again, slowly… ever so slowly.

Shoving out of the recliner, I know it’s oh five hundred; it doesn’t matter that I haven’t slept a wink, and the sun’s not up. My body’s just scheduled to get moving at five a.m. That’s just the way it is. I wonder if I’ll ever break that habit. I snag the bottle of Jack Daniels and head to the kitchen. It’s an easy reach to put it back in the cabinet over the fridge. The sealed bottle will be there for me for the next time I have that goddamned nightmare. I should have never read their notes.

As I shove the heel of my hand against my temple, my stomach decides to growl. I’ve been hungry since yesterday. Maybe it’s time to eat. But I know before even yanking open the fridge that it will be empty.

“Not empty. There’s ketchup and week-old pizza.”

I kind of laugh. At least I think that’s what that sound is.

Fucking wonderful. Sense of humor, still intact.

I shove harder at my temple—apparently, lying to yourself brings on pain. Who woulda guessed? I scan the empty counter, then my gaze lands on nirvana.

Coffee.

When I go to pour my beans into the grinder, I realize I am down to the last of the beans.

“Dammit!”

I grind the beans, then pour the granules into my pride and joy, which cost me far too much money, and wait for the elixir of life.

The espresso machine was one of eight actual things I’d bothered to pack when I’d left my life to hide out in the middle of nowhere. Max and Kostya tried to talk me into putting all my other stuff into storage, but I’d insisted I didn’t want it. They’d sent me a hefty check. Someone, either on their team, or one of their women, did a bang-up job selling all my shit, so here I am in Tennessee with my eight things, and a brain that can’t stop swirling down a toxic drain.

“Cut it out, Clark! No backwards thinking, focus on the now.”

I shake my head, then check some of my cupboards to see if there is some oatmeal that I can eat, but all I find is a can of green olives, which I hate, and a can of black beans.

Really?

How’d I let it get this bad? I look over my shoulder and see the coffee is ready, and feel my lips turn up. I think it is called a smile.

After I suck down half a mug, I face the fact that I’m going to have to go into town for groceries… and coffee. This time, I’m going to take some time and actually buy shit, not just fill the basket with random goods and get the hell out of there. That’s how I ended up with nothing but ketchup, beans, and olives. I open the fridge again and lift the lid on the pizza. I think mold might have been growing on top of the mushrooms, but aren’t mushrooms basically mold? For God’s sake, I’m a grown-assed man.

I have to suck down the rest of the mug of coffee before I can agree with that last statement.

Despite the coffee, my stomach growls again. I guess I have to leave, which also mandates a shower and clean clothes. The morning is just getting worse and worse.

By the time I dress and am ready to go, I’m even more pissed off when I realize the one grocery store in goddamned Jasper Creek won’t be open for another hour. I get up and open the can of beans and sit down at my dining room table and start eating while staring at a month’s worth of mail. I divide it into three piles. The shit that’s addressed to Commander Simon L. Clark, US Navy, Retired I throw in one pile that’s already an inch high. Then there’s the pile that’s only fit for the trash.