“You expecting someone?” Alec asked, getting up, and I started to say yes and that he needed to get the fuck out again, but his waistband gave me pause. His shirt slid up as he kicked the barstool from underneath him.
The nine-millimeter on his hip had been old hat when we’d been together. The man hailed originally from Texas, something he’d always had, but in this situation...
“Alec.”
He paused, facing my way. The knock on the door hit again, and I forced myself to ignore it. I swallowed. “You said you wanted to talk. Let’s talk.”
I waited with bated breath as this man righted and returned to his seat, so desperate for whatever he thought this meeting would result in that he did listen to me. He gripped his hands on the counter. “I do want to talk.”
One more knock, only one until it stopped, and I closed my eyes.
I couldn’t sink into the dread of my reality, Ramses leaving, leaving me, and this man in my kitchen. I couldn’t because I needed to figure out what to do.
I had knives, but none easily accessible. I had a knife drawer, but it was across the room and kept no guns like Alec.
I didn’t know if, not hearing from me, Ramses would take the initiative and use his house key. I’d given him one for emergencies but wasn’t sure if he’d just let himself in after the week we’d had. We were basically on a pause until I said something different.
The thought sobering, I eased forward, my ex-husband opening his hands. “Now, just hear me out, Bri.”
His words were lost to the ether at the sight of movement behind him, a man lingering in the hall. A large man with broad shoulders and dark eyes.
Oh my gosh, Ramses.
I lost my breath in that moment, my stance rigid and straight. It was enough for Ramses to pass his gaze between Alec and me, the man still talking. And where Ramses may have introduced himself, he didn’t. He stood there, watching on.
But then I mouthed: “Help.”
Alec noticed, turning back, but arms looped around his neck, cutting off his words mid-sentence.
Alec choked, struggling against Ramses strong hold. He punched at Ramses’s arms, and Ramses growled.
“Bri, get out of here. Call the cops!” Ramses roared, my ex standing, but even with his height, he fell just short of Ramses.
My boyfriend held on tight, but Alec had him in width. He was used to tackling guys twice Ramses’s size and shot an elbow into my boyfriend from behind. Strengthening his hold, Ramses refused to let go, but then Alec backed him into the wall and I screamed.
“Ramses!”
I forgot completely about running. I forgot about calling the cops because the impact completely knocked Ramses’s equilibrium off and he fell back.
He let go.
It was enough for Alec to reach back into his waistband, the action in slow motion. The man had death in his eyes, intention in his gaze. I knew he’d have no problem shooting Ramses right there in my kitchen. He’d have no problem killing him.
That was all I saw, my life and future flashing before my eyes.
It was enough for me to run.
It was enough for me to act, refusing to let this man take everything away from me. Ramses stood across the kitchen with his hands up, but while Alec moved that gun in the direction of my boyfriend, I found something to defend myself with.
I found something to end this.
The steak knife lodged into my ex-husband’s back, coming out dripping, coated in red. Alec stiffened, ramrod straight, but he didn’t drop the gun.
“Stop this!” I roared, tears streaming down my cheeks, and I stabbed again. “Stop!”
He merely stared back at me, rage in his eyes.
But then I stabbed again.
Again.
And again.
The rage slowly changed then, anger and fury twisting into something else. Something more deadly. That malice quickly transferred to fear, and it wasn’t until he dropped the gun, falling to his knees, it turned into something else.
Vacancy.
His soul lost behind his gaze, his face hitting the floor, and I blinded completely at the sight before me. At what happened and didn’t need to. My ex-husband didn’t have to die. It didn’t have to be this way.
“Brielle…”
It took me a second, a long second, to realize I was on the floor, sobbing and rocking with arms around me.
Ramses’s arms, his strong body hugging me close. He held my bleeding hands, my arms shaking in his. “I know,” he said. “I know.”
Apparently, I’d been saying it out loud. That this didn’t have to happen, over and over, I kept saying it, and each time Ramses kept saying he knew. He kept saying he understood. He told me it would be okay, and it took so long to believe him. That this nightmare would finally be over. That I could move on.
That I could heal.
I started to do that in his arms while we waited for the cops to arrive later that night. He’d taken the time to call them, but then, he was back with me. He was back to this, on the floor with me and holding me so tight.
I’d never felt so safe in my life.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Ramses
There was this thing my mom had told me a few years ago. After my dad’s trial, then again once they’d finalized their divorce. She’d said, “After the ashes fall, things will be okay. After the ashes fall, we’ll be all right, but only after the ashes fall, Ramses.”
After the ashes fall.
Her words hit me in a new way that day Brielle’s husband went after her. Because it wasn’t my own trauma or even my family’s this time. It was the woman I loved, her own rebirth as I stood by her. We had a sea of cops and noise we had to deal with that night. Her ex had died.
He was gone.
He’d succumbed to clearly his own insecurities and made Bri have to deal with those, too. I stood by Brielle during the thickness of it, and Mom came over too, doing the same. We were both there for her while this new reality manifested itself before her. Her own ashes were falling around her, and I found my mother’s words surfacing again after the night concluded. I told Brielle these ashes would fall. They’d rest, and after, she’d be okay.
We’d be okay.
Back when my mom had shared the words, I honestly hadn’t believed her, but going through everything with Bri, meeting Bri, told me what kind of place I was in, as well as what kind of man I’d become. I was living for the day and completely feeling it. I sunk into it with no life raft. I was alive for the good, but also for the bad. But one better, I was strong enough for both. I was brave enough to let in the good and not worry about it being taken away. But I also came equipped to handle whatever life decided to toss out along the way. That was how life was. One couldn’t have one without the other. One couldn’t truly appreciate love until they endured pain. I had endured pain. I had endured love, and Brielle had as well.
She later told me she’d been about to come see me, when her husband had intercepted her. That she’d planned to fight for us and ended up fighting for herself that night. What happened to her husband was truly horrible, but on the other side, she came out stronger. She was brave enough for the good and bad too. She was ready to live and take on whatever life gave her. We’d do that together.
After the ashes.
The next couple of weeks prior to commence were truly deplorable. Brielle had to deal with a lot of stuff she shouldn’t have had to deal with. Press and the media alike surrounding her and her ex-husband’s confrontation. He obviously hadn’t left her condo alive that day, and once the media found out, they’d had a frenzy. The man was a beloved sports icon, there for his fans on the outside, but clearly, not for the woman who had probably trusted him most. I felt for the guy in the only way I could that didn’t involve me punching a hole through a wall. He’d experienced trauma too, but in no way did that justify the way he’d treated Bri, then gone after her.