Summer's Last Breath

Part 42

I could see the guys through the window from where I was perched on the edge of Jamie's bed. It seemed that was all I had done for the last seven weeks. Sit. Wait. Hope.

Donovan, Tate, Ross, and Lassiter stood stoic, their stances braced, their small cohesive group set apart from the members of Jamie's tribe that had gathered on the beach. They'd all come to say goodbye. They were waiting for me to perform the ceremony. I couldn't think of it as a funeral. I couldn't believe he was gone. How could I believe such a thing when I'd been so happy?

A soft knock sounded at the bedroom door. I wished whoever it was would go away. I refused to participate in this farce. Jamie was coming back.

"Erin." My dad stepped into the room.

My gaze shifted from the window to my lap and the hands I held clasped there.

"I don't want to go," I said. I knew I sounded like a petulant child, but I couldn't help it. He had to know I couldn't go out there.

His sigh was heavy as he made his way over to the bed and crouched in front of me, covering my hands with his.

"I know how hard this for you, but this isn't all about you."

Did he know how hard it was? How impossible? If he knew, he wouldn't be asking me to go out there with all those people who had given up hope.

"I don't want to go," I said more forcefully, meeting his gaze. What sympathy I might have seen in the softness of his features fled with his next words. His blue eyes sharpened over his black shirt and the pressure of his grip on my hands increased.

"Well, that's too bad because you're going."

I started at the command in his tone, the determination in his expression. It was the first time he'd been remotely harsh with me in the seven weeks since he'd told me Jamie wasn't coming back.

"You're not the only one hurting. Lara and Noah, they need this. They need you."

My gaze once again wandered to the window. How could I do this? I felt as if my fingers held to the cliff's edge of what was left of my hope. Going out there with all those people, participating in their ceremony, would be like letting go and falling. I wouldn't survive such a fall. I knew I wouldn't.

My dad rose to his feet and held his hand out to me. The invitation of his fingers wavered in front of my face. But they weren't an invitation. They were a demand. "Erin."

I placed my hand in his as my stomach pitched into my throat and my mind screamed, No. He coaxed me from the bed and from the sanctuary of Jamie's room—a room we'd shared for a few short weeks. My hand clutched the door frame in one last desperate protest until I was forced to let go, and I was swallowed by total bleakness.

Noah was standing by the windows in the living room staring out at the surf. The instant he turned and looked at me, I knew my dad had been right and underneath my grief I felt the stirrings of shame. Noah needed me, but I needed him more. I wouldn't have survived the last seven weeks without him. I walked over to him and he immediately grabbed my hand, holding so tightly I thought he might crush my fingers. I met the despondency in his gaze and begged him not to let go. I couldn't do this without him.

My dad stood with Mrs. Jacobs, his hand at the small of her back. My mother was somewhere out on that beach waiting with the others.

"Come on," Noah whispered and we followed Mrs. Jacobs and my dad out the door, my mind in full denial even as I let Noah lead me onward.

Unlike the day of our wedding, the waves created a different song. They rolled over in a heavy beat that dragged at my legs and drowned my heart.

It was always cold on the beach now, the wind always biting as the sun refused to rise high enough to chase away the chill that seemed to have settled in my heart. I welcomed it. The numbness was the only reason I could face the beach without Jamie.