Page 47 of Bad Medicine

Everyone was headed out to the patio now, Francesca, Enzo, and Enzo’s mom moving slowly through the kitchen as they talked. I didn’t know much about their marriage, but I had the sense that it was both quick and unconventional. That didn’t seem to be hindering them in any way, however. The two of them were ridiculously in love.

I would have been jealous if there had been any room in my life for those sorts of feelings.

“Hey, Masi,” Enzo called as I entered the kitchen and retrieved my previously abandoned wine glass. “Turn that up, will ya?”

Grabbing the remote from the coffee table, the guy—Masi, I guessed—increased the volume until the voice of the news anchor filled the house and everyone paused to listen.

“What started as a night out with coworkers has ended in tragedy for one Las Vegas man. City councilman, Jeffrey Sanderson, was found dead this week of an apparent drug overdose, after what appeared to be an alcohol and drug-fueled binge around Las Vegas. Sanderson, who was forty-seven, had held his seat on the city council for over eight years. He leaves behind a wife and three children.”

“Oh, shit,” Enzo muttered, darting a glance at Frankie that she clearly understood.

I, on the other hand, was once again completely on the outside, and I turned back to the TV to hopefully get some clarity.

What I got instead was a punch to the goddamn guts.

“And in related news, local man Greg Belmont has added his name to the ballot in the bi-election being held to replace the recently deceased Councilman Sanderson.”

I gasped, dropping the glass in a loud clatter, the whole room spinning as the implications of what I was seeing slammed home.

No. It couldn’t be. It was absolutely impossible.

My heart pounded in my chest, my lungs gasping for a breath that I couldn’t seem to catch.

He was gone. I had been so sure he was fuckinggone.

“Hey, Doc?” Rocco called, but I could barely hear him, his voice sounding like he was at the bottom of a deep ocean.

Except I was the one who was drowning.

“You alright?”

I wasn’t. I might never be again.

“I have to go,” I said simply, pushing my way past Frankie and heading for the door. “I’m sorry, Frankie. I am, but I need to leave.”

“Mia,” she called as I reached for the door, but I raised my hand to halt her.

“Don’t, Frankie,” I said, hoping my face conveyed the apology I felt, because there was no way I could ever explain. “Not right now.”

“Alright, but I’m here.” She paused, her head turning to where Rocco had stepped up behind her, both of them looking at me with concern I couldn’t possibly hope to process right now. “We’re all here if you need anything.”

I could only nod as I looked at Rocco, wanting so desperately to tell him everything, and at the same time, feeling like I needed to run as far away as I possibly could.

“Doc?” he asked again, and the concern in his voice almost broke me.

Unable to face him—unable to face any of them—I did the only thing I was capable of in the moment: I turned and left, slamming the door shut behind me.

Chapter twenty-one

Mia

StandinginLinny’sbathroom,I undid the zipper in the back of the dress and slid it off, taking care not to tear it as I stretched it over my hips. When Linny had pulled it out of her closet earlier today, I wasn’t even sure I’d get it done up, the difference between my butt and hers fairly pronounced. But she had assured me it would work and wouldn’t rest until I’d tried it on.

To be completely honest, I loved the dress. An A-line silhouette with wide straps, it had actually fit like a glove, and I had felt like a million bucks when I walked out the door earlier.

Now I just felt like a fraud.

There really were no words to describe the fear I had felt when Greg’s face had appeared on the TV in Frankie’s living room earlier. In an instant, flashes of the last time I had seen him, standing over the body of a man whose throat he had just slit, poured through my mind, creating a riot of panic and anger within me.