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The two women spun around, their eyes going wide at the blood dripping down onto my shirt. One clutched her friend’s arm, and they hurried away.
It was just another reason I hated this fucking town and would never have come back here if I’d had a say in it. It had been a decade since I’d last set foot in Providence, and nothing had changed. It was still full of judgmental old gossips and police officers on a power trip. I’d already had the displeasure of giving them a statement and been warned not to leave town.
That had really pissed me off. I’d planned on getting out of here the minute the wedding reception had been over. Not that I had anywhere to go, but hanging around in Providence wasn’t an option either.
Though apparently, for now at least, I had no choice.
The doors to the courthouse opened, and two gurneys were slowly wheeled out.
On top of them, two black body bags.
Around me, the click of camera shutters and flashes exploded, and gasps rang in my ears.
My father was in one of those bags.
Dead.
I hadn’t even gotten to say goodbye.
Hurt stabbed through me, hot and sharp as I remembered his last words to me the night before. He’d called to tell me he couldn’t make it to dinner, but could I still go and have a meal with my new stepsister. He’d wanted her to have a good night and told me to charge our meals and drinks to his room.
I’d tried to weasel my way out of it, not interested in babysitting some teenage brat, but then he’d gone into a big, long speech about how much he loved Miranda and how he desperately wanted her daughter and I to get along so that maybe I’d consider coming home more. He rambled about Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up and how he really wanted me home for them. How he desperately missed having a family.
I hadn’t had the heart to say no. When he’d sent me a photo of my new stepsister, and she’d been a hot-as-fuck woman around my age and not a thirteen-year-old with braces, it had seemed like a fun way to kill an evening.
Now I wished I spent the night with my dad. That I could have just had one nice night with him and left on that memory. Instead of all the ones that had come before, where he’d tried and tried, and I’d held him at arm’s length.
I ducked beneath the police tape and ran toward the waiting ambulance. “Stop! Wait!” I didn’t know what I was going to do or say, but I couldn’t just let them wheel my father’s body away and take him to some morgue. It wasn’t right. He was one of the good guys. He was supposed to live ’til he was ninety and be surrounded by family and grandkids. Though how he was going to get those grandkids when I was his only child was beyond me. Maybe that’s part of why he’d wanted to marry Miranda. Rebel could have given him the grandbabies he’d always hinted about.
Two police officers stopped me before I could get to the ambulances.
“My father is in one of those bags,” I begged them.
“I know, but you can’t be over there right now. You need to let them do their job.”
The fight went out of me. “Can I at least go inside and see my mother? She hasn’t come out yet.”
The officers looked at each other, and one shrugged.
“We’ll have to take you, though.”
I stepped back with a nod, and they let me go. I trailed behind them back inside the courthouse. It was still a hive of activity, and the officers pointed to my mother and stepfather who were deep in conversation with a plainclothes detective.
“You’ll have to wait until they’re done being interviewed.”
“Of course. I’ll just wait here if that’s okay.”
One of their radios spit out a babble of static-laced instructions that were indecipherable to me but clearly made sense to them.
He reluctantly eyed me. “We have to go, but I’ll leave you here if you promise not to get in the way, and to leave once your mother and stepfather are finished.”
I put my hand over my heart. “Scout’s honor.”
With a curt nod, the officer stepped away. He was only a few steps down the hall though, when he glanced back. “I’m really sorry for your loss. He seemed like a kindhearted man.”
I swallowed thickly and turned away before the officer could see the tears welling in my eyes. Fucking hell. Even a complete stranger could see just how kind and generous my father had been.
I’d taken it for granted. Assumed I’d always have more time with him. Made him come to me, because I was always too busy to come to him.