CHAPTER ELEVEN
How can everything look the same when everything in my life, as I know it, is different?
It was all I could think about as I drove back to the funeral home in the five-a.m. gloom, in that hour right before the world began to wake up, and the thought filled me with such an overflowing cocktail of rage and sadness that I could barely concentrate on the road ahead.
I longed for the drive to go by quicker. I considered stepping on the gas and speeding my way home, but that would also mean facing what awaited me beyond the door that much faster.
The hollowness of knowing Leonard would never return alive.
The faces of my brothers when I eventually told them what had happened.
No. My hands gripped the wheel tighter as my eyes widened with fear.
I couldn’t tell them what had truly happened.
What the hell would I even say? It was bad enough that I’d been to Gerald’s house, even worse in the most tragic way that Leonard had been murdered.
I might have been able to tell them all of that, and I might’ve gotten away with their forgiveness, had it not been for the fact that I’d killed a man.
As I pulled up to a red light, I covered my mouth with my palm and squeezed my eyes shut, instantly envisioning the waiter convulsing at my feet as his life rapidly slipped away.
“Oh God,” I groaned, my voice muffled as tears sprang to my eyes. “Oh my God, what the hell am I supposed to do? What the fuck am I supposed to do with this shit?”
If I could undo it all, I would, and in a perfect world, maybe even in another realm coexisting alongside this one, none of this would’ve happened at all. Leonard would still be alive. He never would’ve been at Gerald’s fucking birthday party, and neither would I.
But I never would’ve met Analise, I reminded myself, and then I laughed, a sound on the brink of mania.
Because meeting a woman who was entirely off-limits was not at all a consolation prize for the things I’d experienced tonight.
Leonard’s life was worth more than a few moments of happiness with her, and I would’ve traded anything to simply get him back.
That wasn’t the world I lived in though, and, oh fuck, what I would’ve given to live there instead. But even as I wished to wage war against reality, I knew there was nothing I could do about it.
I was a murderer. Coerced, sure, but that didn’t make me any less guilty. And although I loved my brothers, I didn’t trust them to not turn me in if they knew the truth about what had happened tonight at Seint Manor.
I have to lie.
What I would say, I wasn’t sure yet as I pulled into the funeral home’s parking lot. I supposed I had some time to figure it out, considering the time. Shawn wouldn’t be awake for another couple of hours, and Ike usually slept in until nine, unless there was a funeral to run.
I’d nearly calmed myself down when I parked the hearse, but as I got out, the panic was quick to return when I saw Isaac standing on the porch, just outside the storage room door.
Fuck, fuck, fuck! I resisted the urge to beat my fist against the roof of the car as I rounded the rear and headed toward the porch’s backsteps.
“Hey,” I greeted him in as casual of a tone as I could muster while hoping he didn’t say anything about the clothes I was wearing that were very clearly not mine.
"Where the fuck have you been?" Ike was quick to ask as I entered the side door into the storage room.
"Where's Shawn?" I asked, figuring I should get this all over with as soon as possible.
I walked through the room full of boxes and supplies, stopping only momentarily inside the doorway to remember that one fateful day when I had been sixteen. That morning when Leonard had found three runaway kids asleep in his funeral home.
He could've called the cops. He could've kicked us out. He could've done a lot of things that day, but instead, he'd seen our desperation for help and taken us in. He fed us, clothed us, gave us work and an education.
But more importantly, he gave us love and guidance. He had made us a family—a real one.
I pressed my hand to the wall and hung my head, fighting the overwhelming urge to crumple to the floor and grieve the man I’d loved more than anyone else I’d ever known. I needed to desperately, as the lump in my throat grew and grew alongside the gaping hole in my chest, and eventually, I would.
But there wasn't time for that now.
First, I needed to talk to my brothers. Somehow, I had to tell them that Leonard was gone, and maybe I could do it without them asking too many questions.
"What the fuck is going on with you?" Ike asked, and I opened my eyes to find him staring at me, his brow furrowed with concern. "Are you high?"
I wish, I thought as I hesitated, then shook my head. "No."
His nose wrinkled as he raked his scrutinizing gaze over me entirely, and my heart sped toward panic, as I hoped he wouldn’t say anything about what I was wearing.
"What the fuck are you wearing, dude?"
Shit, shit, shit.
I glanced down at the black sweatpants, gray sweatshirt, and too-small sneakers Dean had given me.
"I …"
I slowly shook my head as I thought about every bodily fluid that had splattered onto my clothes, my shoes.
All my things that Jesse had taken and tossed into an incinerator to be burned up to nothing but ash after I saw, experienced, did far too much, and, God, what I would've done to simply rewind and put myself back in that library with Analise.
Because even though I knew I should have, I couldn't bring myself to regret meeting her.
But I would’ve left immediately after.
I never would’ve sat down for dinner—that was for damn sure.
Would Leonard still be alive if I had left?
"I … don't know," I finally admitted in a voice so weak that it didn't sound like mine. “I, uh …”
Get it together. Calm the hell down.
This isn’t going well.
But did I really expect it to?
"You're freaking me the fuck out, Bram. What the hell is going on?"
"Where's Shawn?" I asked again.
This time, he answered, "Sleeping. Why?"
"I have to talk to both of you."
"What …" Something seemed to dawn on him then, and his face fell as he asked, "Is this about Leonard? Do you know something?"
My jaw shifted from side to side, and there was nothing I could do to hide what I knew in my heart. Ike's eyes widened with panic and realization as he grabbed the too-short arm of the sweatshirt.
"What the fuck happened?"
"I …" I shook my head and turned away. "Shawn has to be here too. I’m only doing this once."
"No! Fuckin' talk to me now! What—"
I reached out and grabbed his wrist, yanking him toward me until my nose barely touched his as I bent down, looming over my little brother.
"Get. Shawn," I said in a low growl, hoping he understood now that I meant business.
"Fine." He wrenched his arm from my grip, shaking me off. "And, by the way, bro, you grab me like that again, and I’ll—"
"Shut the fuck up and get Shawn!"
Without another word, he stormed off down the hall and toward the apartment we had shared with Leonard.
He will never walk these halls again, I thought as both hands thrust into my hair, pulling at the strands until I felt something other than this deep, horrible ache in my chest.
“Fuck,” I gritted out from between my clenched teeth.
Every breath was labored, a struggle, as I pressed my back to the wall of the storage room.
Leonard would know what to do. He’d know what to say, what to think, what to feel. He had taught me so much in the years I spent underneath his wing, but he never taught me what to do with this.
What would you do? Please. Help me. Tell me what to do.
Heavy footsteps barreled down the hallway, and the mumbled voices of my brothers approached.
Protect them.
As if Leonard himself had given me the answer, the words encircled my brain on a loop.
It was what he had done, wasn’t it? For whatever reason, he had kept us in the dark about his association with Gerald Crowley.
I didn’t know why, I didn’t know if I would ever find the answer, but somehow, I knew it had been to protect us.
And now, I had to protect them.
For as long as I was able, I had to keep them in the dark.
Even if it meant carrying the sinister weight of these secrets alone.
So, when I heard the familiar footsteps coming down the hallway, I sucked in a deep breath, pulled my shit together, and greeted my brothers with a sweep of my arm toward Leonard's office.
Then, like my predecessor had done countless times before, I sat behind his desk as they took a seat in the chairs on the other side, and I told them the news I didn't want to be true.
"Guys, Leonard's gone," I said plainly, my tone calm and nearly robotic.
Shawn gave his head a shake, as if unsure he had heard me correctly. He rubbed the lingering sleep from his eyes and asked, "Wait … what did you just say?"
"You heard him correctly," Ike muttered, his angry eyes trained on me. "What are you fucking talkin' about, Bram? What do you mean, he's gone?"
I leaned back in the chair, perching my elbows on the armrests and clasping my hands together to press them to my lips. I sucked in a deep breath, grasping for every shred of my composure, before saying, "I mean, he's gone."
"He's dead?" Shawn asked, like the words, the concept, weren't quite computing.
"He's dead," I clarified with a curt nod before clutching my hands to my mouth again, letting my vision focus on something other than them. Something far away, through distance and time.
I was younger, sitting in the passenger side of the hearse, looking across the car and seeing him. That gentle, little smile he always wore as we drove to our destination. Always so content, always so happy. Like life itself had been nothing but a gift to him, no matter how difficult or unfair.
What would you think of it all now?
"What …" Shawn's voice broke as he slumped into the chair. He sucked in a harsh, loud sniffle and knocked a fist against his temple. "What the fuck, man?"