“You died, Lincoln.” I pulled back, wiping my tears. “They used Narcan and still could barely bring you back and then the only thing you do is Morse code me The Lab? What the fuck?”
“Is that why you brought him?”
“No.” I wiped my face again. “He’s my boyfriend.”
A multitude of expressions passed over his face—confusion, pain, more confusion, before he settled on laughter.
“What’s so funny?”
“Fitz doesn’t do girlfriends.”
“I’ve heard.” I sighed. “But as it turns out, Fitz has a girlfriend and it’s me.”
“You trust him?”
“Why wouldn’t I? He’s never given me a reason not to.”
“The person who did this to me . . . the person who injected me with that shit was wearing a black cloak. It could be any one of them.”
“It wasn’t Logan.”
“How do you know?”
“You really think Logan would try to kill you?” I scrutinized him. “You think Marcus or Nolan or Nora would?”
I hadn’t formally met the other two members yet, but I couldn’t imagine they’d have anything to do with it either. Why would they? They had nothing to gain and everything to lose if they did some extreme thing like kill another member.
“I don’t know, Mae. I don’t know what to think and all I do is think.” His voice wasn’t his own and it had little to do with the hoarseness and more to do with the way he was slurring his words, as if his tongue was tripping over itself as he spoke.
“I know about dad and the girls,” I said, lowering my voice so mom wouldn’t hear. “And Lana.”
Lincoln flinched at the sound of her name.
“You tried to convince her to stop seeing him,” I said, “and the rest of the members wanted her out, they didn’t want her to be around or write about anything she saw.”
Lincoln kept his eyes on me, a faraway look in them as I spoke, as if he was physically here, but mentally elsewhere.
“She’s dead,” he said after a while. “Lana. She’s dead.”
“What?” I placed my hand on my heart, willing it to stop beating so hard. “What do you mean?”
“She jumped the fall. There are so many rocks down there, beneath those waterfalls. She just jumped.” He blinked away tears. “She just jumped and I just let her.”
“You’re not making any sense, Lincoln. When did this happen?”
“The night of the accident. We were arguing about dad. I was on the verge of just reporting all of them to the police, fuck the consequences, and then the accident happened and then she jumped.” He paused for a long time, taking deep breaths. “I don’t even remember how we got into the accident. I must have lost control.”
“So she got out of the car and jumped?” It didn’t make any sense. “What did she say before she jumped?”
“I can’t remember. I don’t remember. I just remember she jumped. The look in her eyes . . . she looked like she’d been defeated.” He wiped his wet face. “I think I made her jump.”
Chapter 39
I think I made her jump.
What did that mean? Did he ask her to jump? He didn’t remember details of what happened, but was it possible that my brother would ask another human being to commit suicide? The Lincoln I knew would have never done that, but now I wasn’t sure. I remembered what Logan had told me the night of initiation and how he also blamed my brother. Had they all been willing participants in that night? Was I being kept in the dark? I couldn’t picture Logan doing that either. It wasn’t up to par with the man I had growing feelings for. That was yet another issue though. Love blinded people and I could have very well been blinded by my love for my brother and the way I felt about my boyfriend. I didn’t want to be that person, the one who supported a man in the wrong just because I loved them, but I also couldn’t fathom either one of them knowingly hurting someone like that. Logan didn’t even like his brother because he’d been accused of rape and he’d chosen to believe the victims. He wouldn’t be capable of murder or plotting one. He didn’t even want to camp out while The Swords were hazing because of plausible deniability. That didn’t sound like a man who would participate in something this sinister.
That only left my brother. He stopped talking about it, probably because I was trying to convince him of his own innocence and he was tired of hearing it. After an hour, he warmed up to the idea of letting Logan visit with him. I left the room to go get him, and paused when I saw my mother, no longer working. She was sitting across from Logan with a glass of red wine in her hand and an array of snacks on the table, from chilled shrimp and mussels to Doritos.
“You’re going to get a stomach ache,” I told Logan, who was slurping down a mussel. He shrugged, grinning.
“Well, I’m glad somebody told me you have a boyfriend,” mom said, standing up. “Otherwise, I might have found out via a wedding invitation.”
“Mom.” My jaw dropped. I felt my face redden as Logan chuckled. “So embarrassing.”
My mother stood with a smile on her face, wrapping her arms around me. “I missed you, and I really like this one. He’s a keeper.”
“Wow.” I pulled away and glanced at Logan. “Good luck trying to escape now. Mom rarely gives her seal of approval.”
“It must be my lucky day, eh?” He grinned, that devilish grin that made everything inside my body come to life.
“I’m assuming you’ll stay the night,” mom said, sitting back down.
“Yeah, but we need to leave early in the morning. Logan has practice and games all week.”
“Pity.” She took a sip of wine.
“My brother wants to see you,” I told Logan. He wiped his hands and stood, taking a healthy gulp of the wine in front of him before walking into the room. I took the seat he vacated and poured myself wine in his glass.
“We have clean glasses, Amelia.” Mom gave me a disdainful look.
“This one is perfectly fine.” I took a sip and set the glass down.
“How does he look to you?” Mom whispered, leaning forward. “Did he talk? Sometimes he doesn’t talk. It’s maddening. The doctors said he’s doing much better than anticipated. He’ll need months of therapy.”
“I can’t believe you guys didn’t call me when he woke up.” I ran a finger along the rim of the glass. I wasn’t one to voice my feelings often, which made my psychologist mother crazy, but this was one time I was willing to do it because as much as I tried to ignore it, I knew I wasn’t going to just get over it. “That was really hurtful.”
“I’m sorry. I thought we were doing the right thing. Your brothers agreed that it came off as selfish instead of selfless.” She reached over and put her hand on mine. “I don’t want to lose another kid, Amelia. I want you to have regular experiences in school. I know what it’s like to go through trauma at that age, trust me, I don’t want that for you.”
“But still. I would’ve liked to have been there.”