A light flickered from the bathroom.
I sighed in relief, then went over and knocked, the door creaked open, and there he was, sitting in the bathtub completely naked.
It was impossible not to notice his perfect physique; even drunk out of his mind, he was beautiful—like a fallen angel that forgot his place was in Heaven—not his own personal hell.
“You know…” He held out a giant knife and thumbed the blade, studying the point as a trickle of blood trailed down his thumb. “Most people do it wrong…”
I froze. “You’re drunk, Ash. Let’s just get you some clothes—”
“Fucking idiots.” His pupils were pinpoints as he looked at me over the blade of the knife. “They cut against the vein forgetting that you’re supposed to cut with it. But there’s other ways, Claire—other ways to join you…”
He was out of his mind. My chest heaved with panic as I weighed my options. He was an expert at killing things, even drunk. I was a college nerd on scholarship who had zero hand-to-hand combat skills.
Let alone against a proven killer.
“Three seconds,” he rasped as he lowered the knife to the inside of his right thigh cutting the side like he was testing the sharpness of the knife. “Three seconds, and I’ll see you, sweetheart. Three seconds and you’ll be real again, three seconds, and we’ll be a family.” Tears streamed down his face. “That’s all, Claire. That’s all it would take.”
The knife was so dangerously close to his femoral artery that I had no time to call Chase or the ambulance.
No time but to figure out a way to save his life.
No other way.
“Don’t,” I whispered. “Ash, please… don’t.”
“I have to.” He sobbed. “I have to!”
“Please!” I choked on my tears. “Please don’t, Ash, please! Just stay, stay with me, right here, right now—hand me the knife.”
“Three seconds, Claire.”
“Ash, Claire would want you to live.”
“I killed you…” He grabbed the blade with his other hand and squeezed as blood spurted all over the bathtub. “This may as well be your blood. You were my soul, and I spilled it, I spilled it all. I didn’t see, I didn’t—” The knife slipped out of his bloody hand.
I lunged for it and barely grabbed it in time before he did; he was thankfully too slow.
I threw the knife away from us; it clattered against the bathroom floor as I tripped against his legs as they dangled out of the tub.
With a grunt, I fell on top of him.
He held me there.
Bleeding on me.
Sobbing.
His arms came around me. “You’re gone, you’re gone!”
I squeezed my eyes shut as he held me close, and then he was kissing the back of my neck.
“It’s Annie…” I moved away from him. “I’m not Claire—”
“Claire…” He moaned. “Please…”
“Ash,” I said it more firmly that time. “It’s Annie.”
I finally broke free from him, but he was fast; he grabbed me again, this time shoving up from the bathtub and reaching for me, jerking me against his chest as he pressed a hungry kiss to my mouth.
Every time I tried to pull away, he pulled me back.
And then he was turning the shower on.
My sweatshirt was coming off.
Escape was futile.
“Claire—”
“Ash.” My heart cracked in half.
He stole it then.
He stomped on it.
He wrecked it like he wrecked everything.
And I let him because I was too afraid he’d kill himself.
Too afraid that he’d snap.
I’d always been too afraid.
And half in love with a man who loved a ghost and would do anything to follow her into Heaven.
“Until the sky falls…” he whispered as he kissed me again and again, so I said the only thing I could say back.
The only thing I’d ever heard Claire repeat over and over again.
“Until,” I whispered, “if the sky falls, Ash.”
“You’re here…” He smiled for the first time. “Finally… finally…”
A tear slid down my cheek and joined the blood, and whatever was left of my broken heart as I swore to take this to my grave.
Right along with any feelings I’d ever had for Ash Abandonato.
He may as well be dead.
I may as well have let him do the digging.
“Goodbye, Ash,” I whispered under my breath.
This time I kissed him.
This time I pulled him.
This time I gave him what he’d been wanting since yelling into the dark night sky—Claire.
I gave him Claire.
Chapter One
But our love was stronger by far than the love of those who were older than we—of the many far wiser than we—And neither the angels in Heaven above Nor the demons down under the sea Can ever dissever my soul from the soul of the beautiful Annabelle Lee. —Edgar Allan Poe
Ash
Ten months later…
Shit always hits the fan when the storm is calm.
And I’d like to think that I was finally able to calm the hurricane inside—mostly. At least now I wasn’t suicidal.
At least now, I wasn’t drinking my way through the day and hallucinating that Claire was an angel sent by Heaven to give me one last moment—one last time with her—closure.
Glimpses of that night—those memories—haunted me on a daily basis. Had she really been there? Had I been that far gone that I’d seen her face? Felt her kiss?
I’d woken up with the hangover from hell and puked my guts out most of the day. I literally had to go to Sergio, our resident doctor, and ask for an IV bag.
Junior, my best friend, still refused to let me live that down the fact that I had walked around the pool house rolling an IV pole.
Miserable.
I’d been fucking miserable.
And now?
Now at least I didn’t want to slit my wrists every second of every day—nah, it was more like every other second.
See? Progress!
“This came for you.” Dad tossed a package onto my bed and leaned against the doorframe. “You know her plane lands in an hour.”
“Yup.” I didn’t look up at him. I knew what I’d see.
Disappointment.
We weren’t at odds with each other anymore, but that didn’t mean my dad wasn’t still looking at me like I shit on the unicorn that was Annie Smith and sent her running away screaming.
Mom was still pissed.
Violet.
Safe to say, my entire family wanted to burn me alive for fighting with her that next day.
Again, I’d had a hangover.
I wasn’t in the mood to talk about my feelings.
She’d come over to check on me.
Her eyes haunted.
And the skin around her wrists slightly bruised.
I still wore the scar from the cut I’d made against my skin—and still remembered waking up in a bloodbath of my own making wondering how the hell I was still alive with all that blood—again, confirming I’d dreamt up the whole thing.
When I’d asked Annie about the bruises on her wrist, about the blood in my bed, she’d just stared at me like I’d run over her favorite puppy and laughed.