Page 36 of My One

“We don’t know for sure.”

“Then the person can leave a voicemail.” Avery grabbed my hand again, and we continued down the beach. A few seconds later, he stopped and pulled the phone from his pocket again. “It’s the same number.”

“Just answer it. You can always hang up,” I suggested.

He slid his finger across the screen and then held the phone up to his ear. “Hello?” Avery was silent for a few moments as he listened to the other end. I couldn’t hear who it was or what was being said, except for his words. “Yes, this is he.” A pause. “What?” I watched all the color drain from his face, and my heart rate picked up. “Are you sure?” Another pause. “How?” He nodded, a blank look on his face. “Yeah. Can you call back and leave the address on my voicemail? I don’t have a pen and paper handy at the moment.” There was another pause. “The soonest will be Monday.” A final pause. “Thank you.”

He hung up the phone.

“Who was it?” I asked.

Pain I never wanted to see in my husband’s eyes looked back at me. “My parents ... They ... My parents were in a car accident. They ... They died.”

After I uttered the words out loud that my parents were dead, I crumpled to the sand. I wasn’t sure how long Nicole and I sat on the beach, but she held me while I cried. Even after the way my parents treated me my entire life, my heart still broke to know that I would nevereverhear from them or see them again. A part of me thought that I would eventually get answers from them, find out why they hated me so much, but now that would never happen.

Because they were dead.

My parents had fucking died.

“Can I ask you a question?” Nicole asked as I opened the door to our hotel room.

“Of course.”

“What’s happening on Monday?”

I sighed and shut the door behind us. “I have to go identify the bodies.”

Nic gasped. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. I need to fly there on Monday once we’re back in the city.”

She walked over and wrapped her arms around my neck. “Do you want me to go with you?”

“Can you?”

“Of course. I’ll call my boss in the morning and let her know. I’ll also book our flight if you want.”

“Yes,” I whispered on another sigh.

“Okay. Let’s grab dinner, and I’ll do that when we come back to the room.”

As we sat at a nearby restaurant, eating local seafood, the shoe-dropping feeling had returned. Maybe deep down I’d known all along that something life changing was going to happen.

Although, should the death of my estranged parents really bethatlife changing?

We made it to the Crawfords’ on Sunday in time for dinner. I didn’t want to go, but I knew I needed to tell them what happened, especially Easton since I needed to take more than the weekend off from Halo.

“What’s wrong?” Jane, Easton’s mom, asked the moment she saw Nic and me walk into the kitchen where she was cooking dinner.

I rubbed the back of my neck. “I need to wait until everyone is here.”

“Are you pregnant?” she asked Nic as she sucked in a hopeful breath.

“No.” My wife smiled. “I’m not pregnant.”

“Then what is it?” Jane inquired.

“It’s better if we wait for everyone,” I replied.