Page 267 of Darling Venom
I shook my head.
This was goodbye.
“Losing Kellan taught you his worth. I apologize in advance for what losing me will teach you.”
Charlie left.
Charlie is gone.
I lost Charlie.
I patted my mouth, my throat, my chest, inventorying my body.
Initial diagnosis: it hurts, but I’ll get over the pain.
Follow-up diagnosis: still hurts like a motherfucker.
Operation Forget Charlie kicked off two weeks ago and failed every day since.
Here was the weird thing.
I knew I’d be okay. That the unsettling, phantom-limb feeling would evaporate with time. It sucked, but it was what it was.
And still.
Still.
Her number tempted me whenever I passed it on my phone. An act of torture that could only be considered intentional, seeing as only one other contact sat in the device, and calling Walter Bernard at three in the morning sounded as appealing as joining The Bachelor.
My alarm went off, reminding me I had a job, babies to deliver, a woman I’d no longer see.
Not that I’d slept a wink.
I glared at the red digital numbers on the clock. When was the last time I’d gotten more than four hours of sleep?
Charlotte Richards had exited my life, yet she still managed to be here.
In my space.
I woke surrounded by the scent of lemons. Of Charlie. (She’d switched the detergent from unscented to citrus a few months ago, and it smelled like her. I could change it, but I didn’t.)
A crease marred my forehead, etched into my flesh fro
m lying facedown all night. A common occurrence, since I’d changed my sleeping habits to accommodate the monstrosity on my ceiling.
Not that I couldn’t get through reading a mere paragraph.
I just knew better than to kick myself while down. I could’ve torn off the poster, but something stopped me.
An invisible barrier.
Terry entered the room without knocking, setting a grease trap on my nightstand. Whatever hid inside the brown brag had leaked through the kraft paper.
He nodded at it. “From Mike’s.”
I stared at the unidentifiable lump. Dark stains littered the sack, and oil had already begun to spread onto my wood.
“Pass. I prefer my arteries unclogged.”
