Free A Love So Deadly by Lili Valente Page B

with this shredded, ravaged feeling, like my soul has been sliced apart and left bleeding in the still, gray fog that is a world without Gabe.
    Gabe. Gabe is alive. He has to be alive.
    I have to see him one more time. I have to hold him, kiss his stubble-covered cheek, inhale the scent of his skin, and promise I will never forget. I have to swear to him that—if we made a child our last night together—I will love our son or daughter enough for both of us. Because Gabe loved me enough in six weeks to last a lifetime. I don’t want to move on without him, but I can, and I will, if there is no other way.
    But inside, I’m hoping for a miracle, praying with everything in me that I will find something in Gabe’s parents’ house that will prove his mother lied, and that the grief, that has threatened to devour me whole, can be put away. At least for a little while.
    I need more time, if only to make sure I give the most important person in my life a proper goodbye.
    “Do you need something?” Sherry asks later in the morning, nudging my hip with hers as we stand side by side at the kitchen counter making peanut butter sandwiches to take to the park.
    “Like what?” I slap jelly on Ray’s sandwich and reach for the honey for mine and Emmie’s.
    “Like a Xanax? Or a stiff drink? Your hands have been shaking all morning.”
    I let out an uneven breath, willing my arms to relax. “No. I’m good.”
    “Are you sure?”
    I nod. “Yeah. I don’t want to be out of it in the middle of the day.”
    And I don’t want a sedative impairing my motor coordination. Gabe and I broke into half a dozen buildings together and I’ve practiced with his lock-picking tools enough that I’m quick with a simple mechanism, but I don’t know what I’ll be dealing with at Darby Hill. I never thought to check the locks on the servants’ entrance door the few times Gabe and I had dinner with his parents.
    “Remember, it could be nothing,” Sherry cautions for at least the fifth time since she first told me that Gabe’s body was nowhere to be found. “Someone could have made a mistake at the hospital, or I could have missed a funeral home, or—”
    “You didn’t.”
    “I know I didn’t.” She brushes her wild red curls from her forehead with a sigh, barely avoiding getting the peanut-butter-streaked knife in her hand stuck in her hair. “I’m just scared for you, C.”
    “Don’t be scared. I know what I’m doing, and I have the security code memorized. I won’t get caught.”
    “No, I mean…” Sherry casts a glance toward the living room where my twelve-year-old brother, Danny, is helping the little kids clean up toys, before turning back to me and continuing in a softer voice, “Are you going to be okay if it turns out Gabe’s mom wasn’t lying? If he really is…gone?”
    I press my lips together and concentrate on cutting the sandwich in front of me into two perfect triangles, wondering how many peanut butter sandwiches I’ve made in my life. I’m doing the math—adding up the days since I took over raising my younger brothers and niece when I was seventeen, multiplying by three, and dividing by five to get an average of how many school lunches I’ve slapped together, anything to keep my mind off that awful question—when Sherry’s fingers close around my wrist.
    “Caitlin, seriously.” She gives my arm a gentle squeeze before letting go. “If you fall apart at Gabe’s house and get caught, his parents could call the cops. They could charge you with breaking and entering. You could go to jail, or at least have to pay a fine and—”
    “I’m not going to fall apart,” I say in an even tone. “I’m tougher than you think.”
    Sherry’s brows draw together. “Well, I think you’re a gladiator, so that’s pretty tough.”
    I blink, surprised. I assumed no one but Gabe saw the strength in me.
    “Don’t look so shocked,” she says, rolling her eyes. “I mean, for years you’ve been raising four