Page 4 of Save You (Maxton Hall #2)

She bites hard on her bottom lip and lowers her gaze to the floor.

At this second, I don’t care that we’re not close, that we barely know each other.

I stumble up the last few steps and give her a hug.

Her body starts to shake the moment I put my arms around her, and I can’t help thinking about Wednesday.

If I’d known what had happened and what state she was in, I’d never have left her alone.

“I’m so sorry,” I whisper again.

Lydia digs her fingers into my jumper and buries her face in my collarbone. I hold her tight and stroke her back as I feel her tears soak into my clothes. I can’t imagine how she’s feeling at this moment. If my mum died…I don’t know how I’d survive.

Meanwhile, Lin has quietly closed the front door. Her eyes meet mine as she stands a few feet from us. She looks as shaken up as I feel.

Eventually, Lydia lets me go. Her cheeks are flushed a deep red, her eyes are bloodshot and glassy. I lift my hand and stroke a few wet strands of hair from her cheek.

“Can I help you at all?” I ask cautiously.

She shakes her head. “Just get my brother back for me. He’s totally out of it. I…” Her voice catches, hoarse from so much crying, and she has to clear her throat before she can go on. “I’ve never seen him like this. He’s killing himself and I just don’t know how to help him.”

Her words make my heart pound painfully again. I feel an overwhelming urge to see James and hold him in my arms, like Lydia—but I’m scared of meeting him.

“Where is he?”

“Cyril and I got him up to his room. He passed out just now.”

Her words make me flinch.

“I can take you up, if you like,” she continues, nodding toward the staircase that curves up to the first floor. I turn to Lin, but my friend shakes her head. “I’ll wait here. You go.”

“The boys are in the sitting room, if you want to join them. I’ll be down in a minute,” Lydia says, pointing across the entrance hall to a corridor that leads to the back of the house. Lin hesitates a moment, but then she nods.

Lydia and I walk up the broad, dark brown staircase together.

I notice that the Beauforts’ house is way friendlier on the inside than it looks from outside.

The hall is bright and inviting. There might not be family photos on the walls, like there are in our house, but at least there are no oil paintings in golden frames, portraits of long-dead ancestors, like the ones at the Vegas’.

The pictures here are colorful and impressionistic, and while they aren’t particularly personal, they at least convey a welcoming atmosphere.

At the top of the stairs, we turn down a dark landing; it’s so long that I can’t help wondering what’s hidden behind all the doors we pass. And how it’s possible that a single family lives here.

“Here we are,” Lydia murmurs suddenly, stopping outside a large door. For a moment, we both stare at it, then she turns to me. “I know it’s asking a lot, but I get the feeling he really needs you.”

I can hardly untangle my thoughts and emotions. My body seems to know that James is on the other side of that door—I’m drawn to him like a magnet. And even though I’m not sure that I can help him in the way Lydia is clearly hoping for, I still want to be there for him.

Lydia touches my arm for a moment. “Ruby…There was nothing between James and Elaine except that kiss.”

I stiffen.

“James came straight out of the pool and collapsed onto a chair. I know he can be awful, but—”

“Lydia,” I interrupt her.

“—he wasn’t himself.”

I shake my head. “That’s not why I’m here.”

I can’t think about that at the moment. Because if I do—if I allow myself to think about James and Elaine—the rage and disappointment will win out, and I won’t be able to walk through that door.

“I can’t listen to that right now.”

For a moment, Lydia looks like she wants to say something else, but she only sighs. “I just wanted you to know.”

Then she turns away and walks back down the landing to the stairs. I watch her until she reaches them, a long shaft of light cast over the expensive carpet. Once she’s out of sight, I turn back to the door.

I don’t think I’ve ever found anything as difficult as reaching for that handle. It feels cool under my fingers, and a shiver runs down my spine as I hesitantly turn it and open the door.

I hold my breath while I stand in the doorway to James’s room.

It has high ceilings and I’m sure it would take up the whole top floor of our little terraced house.

On my right, there’s a desk and a brown leather chair.

To my left, the wall is lined with shelves filled with books, notebooks, and the occasional ornament, which remind me of the statues I saw at Beaufort’s that time.

As well as the door I’ve just come in by, there are two more, on either side of the room.

They’re in solid wood and I guess that one leads to a bathroom and that the other, which is a little smaller, is to James’s wardrobe.

In the middle of the room, there’s a seating area with a sofa, armchair, and coffee table, arranged on a Persian rug.

Cautiously, I cross the room. There’s a king-size bed right opposite the door, at the far end of the room. On each side of the bed there are large windows, but the curtains are almost completely shut, so that only two thin strips of light shine onto the floor.

I see James at once.

He’s lying in bed, with a dark gray duvet over most of his body. Tentatively, I come closer so that I can see his face.

I gasp for air.

I’d thought James was asleep…but his eyes are open. And the expression in them sends an ice-cold shiver down my spine.

James’s eyes—normally so expressive—are lifeless. His face is entirely blank.

I take another step toward him. He doesn’t react, gives no sign of having noticed my presence.

Instead, he stares right through me. His pupils are unnaturally wide, and the stench of alcohol lies heavily on the air.

I can’t help thinking back to Wednesday evening, but I suppress the memory.

I’m not here to muse on my wounded feelings.

I’m here because James has lost his mum.

Nobody should go through a thing like that alone.

Especially not someone who—despite everything—means so much to me.

Resolutely, I cross the last gap between us and sit cautiously on the edge of the bed.

“Hey, James,” I whisper.

He winces, as if he’d been falling in a dream and has now landed with a painful bump. The next moment, he turns his head slightly toward me. There are dark rings under his eyes, his hair hangs limp over his brow. His lips are dry and split. He looks like he’s been living entirely on booze for days.

When he kissed Elaine, I wished him nothing but ill.

I wished for someone to hurt him as badly as he’d hurt me.

I wished for revenge for my aching heart.

But seeing him this broken doesn’t bring me the satisfaction I’d been hoping for.

Quite the opposite. It feels more as though his pain jumps over to me and pulls me down into the depths.

I’m flooded with despair because I don’t know what I can do for him.

All the words that occur to me at this moment feel meaningless.

Tenderly, I raise my hand and stroke James’s red-blond hair out of his face. I run my fingertips gently over his cheeks, then lay both palms on his cold face. It feels as though I’m holding something desperately fragile in my hands.

I pluck up all my courage, lean down to him, and press my lips onto his forehead.

James catches his breath.

For a moment, we’re frozen in that position, neither of us daring to move.

Then I sit back up and pull my hand away.

The next second, James grabs my hips. He digs his fingers into them and kind of plunges forward. I’m so startled by the sudden movement that I freeze. James wraps his arms around me and buries his face in the crook of my neck. His whole body is shaken by a deep sobbing.

I put my arms around him and hold him tight. There’s nothing that I can say in this moment. I don’t know how he feels in his loss, and I don’t want to act as though I do.

All I can do right now is to be there for him. I can stroke his back and share his tears. I can empathize with him and let him know that he doesn’t have to go through this alone, no matter what happened between us.

And as James cries in my arms, I realize that I’d gotten the situation totally wrong.

I’d thought that after what he’d done to me, I’d be able to put him right out of my life. I hoped to get over him as fast as possible. But now that I grasp what his pain is doing to me, I know that that’s not going to happen any time soon.