Page 103 of Dirty Husband

"Is she?"

He shakes his head. "She wouldn't."

"She's drunk."

"She's been drunk before."

"Encouraging."

He tries to hold my gaze. "She won't say anything. I promise."

"You can't make promises for other people."

"Do you want to talk to her? She'll promise."

My skin crawls. No, I don't want to talk to her. Lizzy is fine. I'd go so far as to say I like her.

She's a good fit for Nick. A great conversationalist. Witty and smart with a repository of knowledges when it comes to film, TV, or tech.

She can talk business or culture or food. Or fucking life.

But I don't want to think, for a single second, about the horrible truth.

Someone else knows what happened.

Someone else could tell the entire fucking world. Does her sister know?

Her sister's friends? Classmates? Every student at Columbia?

Every one of their parents?

Every employee at every company one of their parents owns?

Gossip travels fast. Especially something like this.

"This has something to do with him?" Nick asks.

"Is that why you wanted to talk to me?"

"Not exactly." He goes to move closer, but he doesn't. "I know you're still angry with me. That you'll always be angry with me. I'd feel the same."

Great, another speech that ends inI'm sorry. "Shit happened. You fucked up. You were just a kid. You shoved me into therapy because you were worried. You're still worried. Now, I'm a dry drunk. I've heard it before. Let's not do it again."

"Covered a lot of ground in ten seconds."

I barely stop myself from rolling my eyes.

"I am sorry. For not protecting you. For not coming forward. For not stopping him. I am sorry, but I'm not going to ask for your forgiveness again."

"Good."

"I'm not going away either."

"Do you have a point?" I turn to the window. Press my palm into the cool glass. It does nothing to temper the anger raising my body temperature. I want to throw a fucking chair through this window. Then throw my brother through that.

Fuck hisI'm sorry.

Fuck his talk.