Page 105 of Never Alone
"Will," Quinn said, "do you want to wash your hands? The bathroom's down the hall."
"Yeah, sure."
He went down the hall. I waited until I heard the door click.
I turned to Cole.
"Hey."
He looked at me.
"Be nice."
He didn't say anything.
"Quinn's standing right here. He's her boyfriend. He came to a barbecue.Be nice."
Cole looked at Quinn. Something passed between them—a long-running conversation I had walked into the middle of. Quinn's face didn't change. She didn't argue with me. She didn't argue with him.
Cole set his beer down. He nodded once at me, the smallest nod, and walked out the back door.
I watched him cross the patio. He stopped at the grill, put the beer on the side table without drinking from it, and picked up the tongs.
"He's been like that ever since Shelby died."
"His ex-girlfriend?" I said.
Had Cole lied to me?The thought came before I could stop it. He had told me, in his truck, that he had never been witha woman. And here was Quinn naming a woman he had been carrying for years.
"No." Quinn shook her head. "His older sister. The one who raised him."
The kitchen was quiet. Down the hall, the bathroom door opened.
"He doesn't talk about her," Quinn said. The words came faster now—Will's footsteps were coming down the hall, and she had decided to give me this before he got to the kitchen. "He never does. But I think you should know. Their dad died when Cole was little. Their mom—she was a mess. Wasn't around. Shelby raised him. That kitchen he grew up in? It was hers."
I felt something settle in my chest in the wrong way.
"Her husband killed her," Quinn said. "She was going to leave him. She'd told Cole. He was working on getting her out. And then one night, her husband—and Cole has blamed himself ever since. He hesitated. He had defended a girl before, and she'd told him she hated him for it. He thinks if he hadn't, she'd still be here.
"He's been carrying her ever since."
Will came around the corner.
"Hey," he said. "Did I miss something?"
"No." Quinn turned her face on like a light. "I was telling Tessa about my mom's lasagna."
"Oh, the lasagna's incredible."
Quinn looked at me. Her face was Quinn again—the bright one, the cousin, the woman who had walked in with a bottle of wine. But her eyes weren't.
"You're good for him, Tessa. He's calmer. I haven't seen him like this in a long time."
She said it the way a sister says a thing she's been wanting to say. Not knowing.
I couldn't answer her.
"Babe," Quinn said to Will, "let's get you a drink. Cole's got something on the patio."
