Page 66 of Kissing Kayley

Stella was a completely transactional person with a win-lose view of the world, an overinflated ego, and probably more than a touch of narcissistic personality disorder.

I’d given Elliot advice ahead of his wedding, about how to deal with his sister and her husband, Ellis, going forward, but unfortunately my worst fears had proved accurate regarding the kind of person Ellis was. Stella piggybacked her emotional dysfunction on top of his toxic ego and…

Well, they were both dead now. I considered that pretty conclusive evidence of a dangerously dysfunctional marriage.

And now Elliot and his parents would pay the price for that.

I tried calling Leo but got his voice mail. Then I tried Jordan’s phone and got his as well.

Even tried Elliot’s.

Hat trick of fail.

When I tried calling Elliot’s mother, Norah Woodley, her cell also went to voice mail.

I didn’t even bother calling Elliot’s father, because I suspected their phones had been turned off.

Packing could wait until tomorrow, so I headed into the bathroom to take a shower.

With the water running, I turned to step inside and caught a glimpse of my bum in the mirror, where several bruises in pretty shades of blues and purples speckled my flesh, along with toothmarks both fresh and fading.

Pausing, I ran my hand over them. That’s when stinging tears blurred my vision.

I’d be petty and childish to throw a tantrum that Vic left for DC without me.

But wasn’t it just another data point? Really?

His career came first in his life.

My career came first in my life.

Was there even room for us to wedge a full-time relationship into what few gaps existed after taking our careers into account?

Sighing, I stepped into the shower and prayed the darkness churning my gut didn’t have anything to do with my worry about our relationship.

CHAPTER 23

Kayley

I didn’t sleep well Friday night. I made the mistake of looking up Stella’s video, the one exposing her husband and his asshole buddies as the masterminds behind the attacks, and I knew I’d have to banish that from my brain if I wanted to be supportive for Elliot and his parents.

What I really wanted to do was scream that the bitch got what she had coming for aligning herself with the fuckers in the first place and causing so much death and destruction.

No, that wasn’t charitable.

And also no, it wasn’t a mindset I wanted while dealing with my in-laws. Norah and Oliver Woodley were nice people and didn’t deserve the international grief porn that people wanted to create from their pain.

I finally spoke to Leo briefly late Saturday night, and when I heard his voice, I shelved my plans to ask him to use his pull to get Vic out of working. He obviously had more than enough on his plate already.

“Jordan and I flew down to Florida today,” he said. “George Forrester went with us.” He was a miraculous shipwreck survivor who was the former governor of Tennessee and the husband of Elliot’s deputy chief of staff, Declan. He was also an attorney.

“To Stella’s house?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“You okay?”

“Not really, no. It was… awful.”