Chapter 47
TERESA’S RAGE scorched into me.
I thought I’d known pain when I shot Sheila and then Julie. Teresa’s pain etched me even sharper and stronger, a thousand million binding threads that I’d severed, each stump flaring magnesium bright. My skin felt abraded, the tissue beneath soaked in salt. I wanted to scream, but it happened too fast.
And through Teresa’s touch, her voice. That’s what loss feels like.
I did the only thing that came to mind. I bundled up my own loss and shoved it back. I stood in the shower, hot water leaving tracks in the dirt covering me, sobbing over the wedding ring I’d just discovered on my finger. The memory filled my eyes with tears.
Teresa recoiled, but her hand squeezed mine more tightly. She sat on a cold tile floor, hands upraised, gut burning from
