28. Cara

Chapter twenty-eight

Cara

T he air in the courtroom is thick enough to choke on, pressing down on me like a weighted shroud. I squeeze Judith's hand, clinging to her like a lifeline as June's words flay me open, one agonizing syllable at a time.

"She unmade me." His voice splinters, and I feel the cracks spiderweb through my heart. "Ripped me apart and reassembled the pieces into something monstrous."

Bile scalds my throat. I press a hand to my swollen belly, to the tiny life fluttering beneath. Our child, blissfully innocent of the horrors their father is reliving.

I want to scream, to lunge across the room and rake my nails down Elaine's smugly impassive face until she weeps crimson contrition. I want to fold myself around June, shield him with my body the way he's shielded my heart all these years.

But I don't. I can't. Because this is his battle, his truth to tell. So I sit, spine straight and jaw clenched, and I bear witness.

The gavel's crack is a gunshot, jolting me to my feet. I'm moving before the echo fades, shouldering through the crowd, desperate to reach June. But the officers are already leading him away, the clank of his shackles an obscene chorus.

For one splintered second, his gaze meets mine. A thousand unspoken words crackle between us, a live wire of grief and fury and love so fierce it steals my breath. Then he's gone, swallowed by a sea of uniforms.

"Breathe, honey." Judith's arm anchors around my shoulders, steering me through the throng. I suck air into my lungs, the fluorescents flickering like strobes, nausea churning in my gut.

"I'll kill her," I rasp, tasting blood where I've bitten through my lip. "I'll strangle her with my bare fucking hands, Jude, I swear to God-"

"I know." Her grip tightens, bruisingly gentle. "But you have to keep your head, Cara. For June. For the baby."

The baby. A tether, yanking me back from the precipice. I press my forehead to the cool stone wall, breathing through the red haze. She's right. Of course she's right. Judith Deveaux, ever the voice of reason.

The ride home is a smear of shapes and colors, my heart rattling against my ribs like a caged bird. Only when we step into the house, into the mingled scents of fresh linen and Mom's homemade sauce, do I let my mask slip.

"There's my girl." Mom folds me into her arms, her embrace an instant balm. I sag against her, knees buckling, a high keen building in my throat.

"I've got you, Cara mia." She rocks me like I'm small again, stroking my hair. "Let it out, honey. You're safe now."

Safe. What a farce. I'll never be safe again, not with Elaine Deveaux's talons sunk deep in my life. But I let my mother hold me, let her love seep into the fractures of my composure.

Venturing into the nursery, Louis and Sonya's playful squabbling envelops me, their good-natured barbs and harmonized laughter a soothing balm to my mangled heart as they apply finishing flourishes to the whimsical mural June and I once daydreamed over.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in!" Louis, a Cheshire grin splitting his face, slaps down a paintbrush. "For a hot minute, we wondered if you'd eloped with a drop-dead gorgeous ambulance chaser."

I cobble together a wobbly smile, praying my bravado eclipses my fragility. "And forgo the grand unveiling of Louis Avery, nursery decorator extraordinaire? Not a chance, bucko."

Sonya, abandoning her artistic efforts, pulls me into a vanilla-and-turpentine scented hug. "How're you holding up, Cici?" she murmurs, scanning my face.

I shrug, the casual motion belying the effort it takes not to splinter apart. "As well as can be expected, considering. June, he - God, Sonya, those sick fucks, the things they did -"

She squeezes tighter, the pressure of her body communicating everything language can't encompass. "June's a goddamn warrior," she soothes. "Strongest motherfucker I know. You two will power through this, come out swinging on the other side."

I melt into her solidness, into the consoling familiarity of her unique essence. "From your lips to God's ears," I whisper, my words quavering.

As I really take it all in, the breath leaves my lungs in a rush.

It's perfect. A riot of color and whimsy, every brushstroke infused with love. Song and Louis stand back, twin expressions of anxious anticipation on their faces.

"Well?" Song demands, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "What do you think, sis?"

I take it in - the rolling green hills, the grinning zoo animals, the fluffy white clouds drifting across a periwinkle sky. It's every dream June and I ever whispered into the darkness, brought to vibrant, dizzying life.

"It's..." I swallow hard, scrubbing at the tears that slip down my cheeks. "God, you guys. It's absolutely perfect."

Louis's face splits in a relieved grin as he reaches out to pull me into a hug. "Good, because we poured our blood, sweat, and tears into this masterpiece. Mostly Song's tears, but still."

"Hey!" Song protests, launching a stuffed giraffe at his boyfriend's head. "I'll have you know those were very manly tears of creative frustration."

Their familiar back-and-forth washes over me, loosening the knot in my chest by a fraction. For a tiny, shining moment, it almost feels normal. Like the world hasn't spun off its axis, like my heart hasn't been cleaved in two.

But then Sonya's phone rings, the cheerful chirp an obscene intrusion into the fragile peace we've carved out. Her face pales as she answers, her gaze darting to mine in silent warning before handing it to me.

No. No no no, not again, please god not again-

"Cara." It's Judith, and there's something in her voice that has my blood turning to ice in my veins.

"What is it?" I demand, my hand clenching white-knuckled around the phone. "What's happened?"

She draws in a shuddering breath, and I can picture her expression. That porcelain mask she wears when she's trying to be strong. "It's June. He's been hurt. Stabbed. They're taking him to Bethesda General now."

The world tilts, goes gray at the edges. This can't be happening. It can't. He was safe. He was supposed to be safe in custody.

No. No, this can't be happening. It's a mistake, a misunderstanding. June is fine, he has to be fine. We've come too far, fought too hard for it to end like this.

But even as the desperate denials whirl through my mind, I'm moving. Running, stumbling, I have to get to him. I have to see for myself.

"I'm on my way," I hear myself say, the words distant and tinny. "I'll be there as soon as I can."

The trip to the hospital is a smear of color and light, Sonya's knuckles white on the steering wheel, Louis a grim-faced statue in the back seat. Everything feels surreal, like I'm walking through someone else's nightmare.

They won't let me see him at first. I pace the waiting room like a caged animal, my muscles vibrating with the need to do something. To fight, to scream, to tear the world apart with my bare hands.

The next hours pass in a sickening blur. The stark white walls of the hospital. The cloying scent of antiseptic. The steady, merciless beep of machines counting down the seconds of my husband's life.

Sonya is a pillar at my side, her arm around my shoulders as we keep our grim vigil. Song paces like a caged animal, wearing grooves in the waiting room tile, while Louis slumps bonelessly in a plastic chair, his head in his hands.

Natalie arrives in a whirlwind of designer silk and barely leashed panic, little Legacy clinging wide-eyed to her hand. She takes one look at my ravaged face and pulls me into a fierce, desperate hug.

"I came as soon as I heard," she murmurs into my hair, her arms like steel bands around me. "Oh honey, I'm so sorry. What can I do?"

A jagged sob claws up my throat, tearing through my chest like barbed wire. "I need to see him, Nat. I need to tell him to hold on, to come back to us. I can't-" I choke on the words, on the unfathomable loss yawning ahead. "I can't do this without him."

Legacy toddles over, his sweet face creased with confusion and worry. "Aunt Ci sad?" he chirps, patting my belly with a clumsy, chubby hand. "It's okay. Don't cry, Uncle June my superhero. "

A moan rises in my throat, my knees threatening to buckle under the weight of each word.

Natalie scoops her son up swiftly, brushing a tender hand over his curls. "That's right, bambino. Uncle June is the bravest superhero there is. And he loves your aunt Cara and the baby so much."

Her voice breaks on the last word, her composure slipping for the briefest instant. In that unguarded sliver of a moment, I see my own grief reflected back at me - the raw, screaming anguish of a woman watching her friend unravel.

But then she straightens, steel glinting in her eyes as she turns to Sonya and the boys. "Stay with Cara. I'll find out what's going on, see if I can get her in to see June."

It's a perk that comes with the Corleone name, to the power Dante wields in this city, that scarcely ten minutes later I'm being ushered down a maze of stark white corridors. Natalie's threats and bargains fade to background noise, my entire being dedicated to one sole purpose.

I'm running again, following the tide of medical personnel, my heart a jackhammer in my chest. I can't breathe, can't think. All I know is that I need to be with him, need to hold his hand and beg him to stay with me.

And then I'm there. On the threshold of the most terrifying moment of my life, staring down at the broken body of my soulmate.

Oh god. Oh god oh god oh god.

He's so pale. So bloody and bandaged and still, a shell of the vibrant, vital man I love with every shattered shard of my heart. Tubes sprout like perverse blossoms from seemingly every inch of his flesh, machines whirring a discordant dirge at his bedside.

I sink to my knees at the edge of his bed, my legs failing as I reach a trembling hand to brush a lock of hair from his clammy forehead. "Junebug," I rasp, the pet name we only ever whisper between the sheets sticking in my throat. "I'm here, baby. I'm right here."

I'm dissolving, flying apart, a supernova of grief and terror. This can't be real, can't be happening. Any second he'll open those quicksilver eyes, flash me that crooked grin and crack a wildly inappropriate joke. He has to. This can't be how our story ends.

But June remains still, silent, his chest rising and falling in shallow, mechanical increments. I clutch his hand like a lifeline, my tears dripping onto our twined fingers as I try to will him back to me through sheer desperation alone.

"You promised," I whisper brokenly, bringing his knuckles to my lips. "You promised you'd always come back to me, June. Don't you dare leave me now."

But for all my begging, all my bargaining with every deity I can name, the end rushes forward with brutal, unstoppable force.

I'm holding his hand when it happens. Talking to him, telling him about the mural, about the crib Judith helped me pick out, about all the dreams we painted in the soft, secret dark. I trail off mid-sentence as the beeping stumbles, falters, my heart seizing painfully even as June's beats its last.

No. Nononono-

The machines scream a flatline. Nurses rush in, pushing me back as they swarm June's bedside in a flurry of barked orders and controlled chaos. I stand on the fringes, numb and dazed, a distant star watching the world end.

Fragments filter through the fog, cruel and clinical. Asystole. Not responding. Call it. Those two words, so final, so utterly inhuman. Time of death 3:47am.

I'm screaming. A feral, animalistic howl wrenching past my cracked lips as I claw my way to June's side. This isn't right, this can't be how it ends, not like this, not now, not when we were so close-

Hands pull me away, gentle but implacable. Natalie, I register dimly, her voice murmuring broken endearments as she crushes me into her chest. I thrash against her hold, an unhinged litany of pleas falling in a cascade.

Please. Please please please, I'll do anything, I'll give anything, just bring him back, please god bring him back-

But god isn't listening. No one is listening as I sob and shatter, as everything warm and bright and vital is leached from the world. June is gone, ripped away by the madness of the mother who should have cherished him most, and I...

I'm adrift, numb and lost in an endless void. A high, keening wail fills the room, an animal sound of pure anguish. It takes me a moment to realize it's coming from me

Natalie cradles me against her like a broken bird, her tears mingling with mine. "I'm here," she rasps, rocking me gently. "I'm so sorry honey, I'm here, I've got you."

But she hasn't. No one has. The only person who ever truly had me lies cooling on starched white sheets, deaf to my cracked pleas for him to come back, just come back.

There's nothing left. No warmth, no joy, no reason to keep breathing. My heart is a gaping wound, raw and bleeding. June is gone, and he's taken all the light in my world with him.

I'm fading. Shutting down, powering off, circuits cutting out one by one. In the end, it's Sonya who drags me to my feet, who pulls my head to her chest and talks me through breathing, through standing, through putting one foot in front of the other. She bundles me into a car, guards my catatonic silence on the endless ride home.

Home. What a joke. This isn't a home anymore, just an empty shell, a mausoleum to a life cleaved brutally in two.

Bile rises in my throat, hot and acrid. I can't do this. I can't walk back into this sunlit domestic dream turned nightmare, knowing he'll never cross this threshold again. Never kick off his boots by the door, never spin me through the kitchen in an impromptu dance party as dinner burns unheeded on the stove. Never nuzzle his nose against my belly and whisper his love to our child.

A moan builds in my chest, low and keening. I dig my nails into my palms until blood blooms, the small bright pain a pitiful anchor against the howling vortex of loss. Dimly, I'm aware of Sonya's arms around me, of Louis frantically demanding answers in the background, of Song's ashen face as the news lands like a body blow.

But it's all distant, muted, filtered through a thick pane of glass. Nothing is real, nothing matters, nothing will ever be okay again because June, June, June is gone-

"It was Elaine." The words rasp out of me, dull and lifeless. "She did this. She killed him."

A beat of shocked silence, a collective intake of breath. Then Natalie is there, her eyes flashing murder even as she cradles my face in gentle hands. "We'll make her pay," she vows, soft and vicious as a knife between the ribs. "I swear to god, Cara, we will burn that bitch's empire to the ground."

And oh, there it is. The spark, the ember, buried beneath the miles of cold hard emptiness. Vengeance, bright and vicious, a crimson thread to follow through the labyrinth of grief. I cling to it, let it flood my veins like acid, like napalm, until it burns away everything else.

Elaine Deveaux stole my future, my love, my beautiful, broken boy. She broke him in ways I'm only beginning to fathom, snuffed out his light with her poison and her perversion. The pain of it is bigger than my skin, than my bones, a screaming, unholy mass devouring me from the inside out.

But beneath the pain, rising from the ashes, is an inferno of pure, crystalline rage. It hardens in my belly, sharpens my shattered edges into a blade forged for one purpose and one alone.

Revenge.

I am a black widow now. A creature of shadow and wrath, a king cobra coiled to strike. Elaine took everything from me, cut out my heart and left me bleeding - but that's her fatal mistake.

Because she forgot the cardinal rule. She forgot that a woman with nothing to lose is the most dangerous creature of all.

I can still feel the chill of June's hand in mine, still smell the copper of his blood beneath the antiseptic. I can't unsee the slack finality of his face, can't unhear the flatline's awful shriek. He was my north star, my entire world - and Elaine snuffed him out like it was nothing.

So I will raze her to the ground. I will salt the fucking earth with her ashes and laugh as she chokes on the dust. I will dismantle every poisoned brick of her kingdom until nothing remains but the bones, and I will do it all with a smile painted scarlet.

June, my love. My warrior poet, my gentle phoenix. I could not save you. I could not bring you home.

But by every god in every heaven, I will avenge you.

I'm coming, Elaine.

And hell is coming with me.