Begin With Goodbye

By Kelly Walker

Revenge is best served cold, but their passion burns as hot as ever.

Home for her sister’s funeral, Samantha knows the truth: for all intents, her sister died three years ago on the night of her senior prom and Julian Ashburn–her sister’s husband and Samantha’s former lover–is to blame.

He took her virginity, and he took her sister. Will he at least let her escape with her heart?

Although Begin With Goodbye has numerous romantic elements, it is not strictly a genre romance. (It's more of a romantic thriller.) If you're looking for the slow burn of two people falling in love, this is not the book for you. On the other hand, if you're looking for a whirlwind of crazy, a love that won't quit, and a deeply held grudge, you may enjoy it immensely. Intended for mature audiences due to language and content.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kelly Walker
• Release date: Jul 2, 2014
• ISBN: 9781501445781

Kelly Walker

Kelly Walker is a YA and NA author of several romantic titles, including the Souls of the Stones Fantasy Romance series. She has an unhealthy appreciation for chocolate, and a soft spot for rescued animals. Her best lessons on writing came from a lifetime of reading. She loves the fantastical, and the magical, and believes a captivating romance can be the most realistic magic of all. Kelly, her husband and her two children share their Virginia home with three dogs who walk her, and two cats who permit her to occasionally share their couch. For more information, please visit www.kellywalker.net

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Begin With Goodbye

By Kelly Walker

Previously published as a serialized novel by Lilly Wright

Now, reformatted and with additional content added.

For Anna, and Elsa,

who reminded us what sisters are supposed to be.

1

It took my sister’s funeral to bring me home.

Never mind that I’m surprised she made it this long, which is the very reason I’ve stayed away. Or one of them, at least. My GPS app yells at me from where my phone rests on the faded passenger seat as I make my way down a tree-lined alley. It wants me to make a U-turn, but I know more of the roads in Harborhaven than it does, so I stay the course, straight ahead, hands tense on the wheel. I’m honestly not even sure why I’m using the damn thing, maybe just as an excuse to not answer the phone. I stopped counting after the fourth time my mother tried to call.

Only once I drive past my parents’ house do I understand. The GPS was right, and I’ve taken the long way to my sister’s. I think maybe I just wanted to see if it would look different, but it doesn’t. I’m the only one who’s changed. Ignoring the gated, tree-lined drive, I make a few turns and then I’m back on the only two-lane highway in town, speeding away from the house where I grew up, heading toward the land of (more) wealth and (more) privilege.

And secrets, my subconscious adds. Always secrets. The only way to appear clean is to hide the dirt. That’s the way it’s always been around here, and that’s the way it will always be.

My dinged and dented sedan putters along the picturesque road, past the town limits, eventually making its way up the winding drive. When I park it at the edge of the grass, it looks about as at home beside the fancy Range Rovers and Bentleys as an Orioles fan at a Yankees game.

I resist the urge to nervously chew my lip as a black-suited gentleman I don’t recognize ushers me through the enormous entryway, down a hallway and out the back door. The exorbitant level of money dripping from the throng of people milling around my sister’s backyard is literally blinding. Late afternoon sun glints off enough diamonds to fill every case at Jared, and then some.

What the fuck? Is this a funeral or a party?

My mother steps quickly into my line of sight, and in the midst of gaping at the ostentatious guests, I’m caught off guard, with no hope of avoiding her.

Samantha, she greets me, in her standard clipped tone that makes it sound as if she has a rod jammed beneath her chin, preventing it from opening enough to give her voice any meaningful inflection. Her lips fall into a familiar curve of disapproval as her eyes glide over me from head to toe.

Hello, Mother, I sigh.

My mother pats her hair, ensuring every strand is tamed. Unlike her unruly daughter. We were expecting you sooner. She manages to pack three years of disappointment into five little words. One of my mother’s many talents.

I could make a career out of failing to meet my parents’ expectations, but I decided journalism pays better. I had finals. My excuse is true, even if it isn’t absolute. I’m fairly certain that if I’d explained the situation, most if not all of my professors would have let me take my exams early so I could be at my sister’s side to say goodbye.

Hi Sam. My dad appears, hovering at my mother’s side like a useless but pleasant hummingbird. He’ll never shield me from her crushing judgments, but he’s occasionally nice to have around.

Her name is Samantha, my mother insists, causing my father to give an apologetic shrug.

I can see small lines of grief crinkling at his eyes, and although he’s done a good job of masking it, I know my sister’s loss hit my father hard. Perhaps I should feel more sympathy, but all I keep thinking is that this is their fault. Theirs and his.

My eyes scan the crowd, involuntarily looking for him. Finally, I spot him near the front, talking to his parents. Julian. My sister’s husband. The man who took her from me just as surely as he took my virginity. I’m not fooled by his impossibly perfect chin. Or his piercing blue eyes. His devilishly mussed hair is the only outward sign of the snake I know lies within. Bastard.

White folding chairs have been arranged in several rows, with a center aisle between them, headed by a pulpit and my sister’s white-rose-draped casket. A lump forms in my throat and I quickly look away. She was lost to me long before she lay in that box, but there’s something final about it that brings my grief surging to the surface. I’ve been mourning my sister for years, even as she kept up the charade of life.

It looks like the reverend is ready to start. My father guides my mother and me toward chairs in the front row.

I’ve barely gotten myself situated in the hard plastic chair when a pint-sized child barrels toward me, launching herself into my lap. My three-year-old niece wraps her arms around my neck, burying her face against me. Aunt Sammie!

Hi Mel-bell, I whisper, drinking in her abundant warmth. She reminds me so much of Chloe, it hurts. And yet it helps too. Melody is the epitome of everything that was good and innocent about Chloe. Before she wasn’t. Before she was lost to me.

Melody giggles, and the sob I’ve been holding back spills free.

Julian turns—I’m not sure if it’s because of my sob or his daughter’s giggle—and our eyes meet for the first time. He looks like he’s trying to force back his own sob, which I highly doubt, because I don’t think he’s capable of feeling anything.

No-no Melody. You don’t want to get Aunt Samantha’s pretty dress sticky. He crosses to us in two easy strides, his eyes never leaving mine while he gently tugs on Melody’s arm. Sorry.

He should be sorry for a lot of things. This isn’t one of them. She’s fine, she can sit with me. I tighten my arms possessively around her, hugging her close.

Melody lifts her head, beaming a smile at her father. You sit too! she points at the empty seat beside me.

The girl just lost her mother; I really can’t blame him for complying, even though he’s the last person in the world I want to sit near.

And I definitely don’t want his leg pressed lightly against mine, separated only by pantyhose as he leans close, whispering, You look good, Sam.

I flinch away, scooting to the far side of the small seat, though it only gains me about an inch.

Julian Ashburn is every girl’s dream. Unless that girl is me.

The reverend up front clears his throat and the crowd quiets.

Remember, we have to be quiet so we don’t interrupt Mommy’s party, okay? Julian whispers to Melody.

The little girl nods solemnly as my eyebrows raise. Mommy’s party? What the hell? I guess maybe it’s an easier way to explain it to a three-year-old, but still. Does she even realize her mother isn’t coming back?

One by one, guests come forward and talk about their memories of Chloe. My father talks about taking us for our first ballet lessons, and how graceful and beautiful she was, and how for days afterward she wore nothing but her tutu, dancing around the house. Of course he doesn’t mention how Chloe hasn’t danced in three years.

My mother speaks of the hours that my sister dedicated to serving the less fortunate, working at a local soup kitchen first, and then at the animal shelter. She doesn’t mention that Chloe switched to helping animals instead of people because so many of the homeless people at the shelter wanted to touch her, craving any human contact, and that it freaked her out to be touched by anyone.

Julian recounts the day Melody was born—almost two months early—and how beautiful and brave Chloe was through hours of complications, and how she never gave up. Even when he was afraid, she had faith everything would be okay. He fails to mention that by then, my sister was only living for Melody.

And then it’s my turn. I’m supposed to walk up front and tell half-truths, something that will comfort these people who are only going through the motions of grieving for someone they barely knew. Melody has fallen asleep in my arms, and Julian reaches over to take her as he walks back from the podium. Instead of sitting back down with her, he carries her toward the house, mumbling something about putting her down for a nap.

The tender way he holds her is in stark contrast with the cold-hearted bastard I know he can be.

I take my time as I make my way forward, resting my hands on the podium as I watch Julian receding down the aisle. Expectant faces are turned upward, waiting for me to say something sweet, or even sorrowful. They want me to share some cherished memory that will ease their minds, giving them some confidence that my sister lived a fulfilled life, so it will seem slightly less tragic that she’s dead at twenty-one.

I part my lips, taking in a slow, steadying breath. Swallow once. Twice. Then let my shoulders relax as I stare out at the crowd.

My strongest memory of my sister is the night of my senior prom.

At the back of the aisle, Julian freezes on his way back from inside the house, his face stricken. He knows damn well what I’m about to say, but surprisingly he doesn’t move to stop me. If I didn’t know better, I might even think he looked relieved.

Colton Thomas needed a date, because he’d just broken up with his girlfriend. The crowd nods. In a town as small as Harborhaven, everyone remembers things like the mayor’s son very publicly dumping his girlfriend. He asked me, and my mother begged me to go with him. I keep my eyes straight ahead, locked on Julian’s face, resisting the urge to watch for my mother’s reaction. I don’t have to tell them why she begged me. Everyone in Harborhaven knows my mother is a certified social climber. Around here, the mayor’s family is the top of a very short ladder.

Chloe knew I already had a date; I’d only told her. My eyes search Julian’s, wondering if he remembers. So she volunteered to go with Colton, and I let her.

I can’t help turning my gaze in my mother’s direction. Her expensive rouge isn’t enough to cover the way her face has paled at my words. She grips my father’s arm with tiny, white-knuckled fingers. Stop her, Louis, she hisses, but she’s too late.

With a clear, loud voice I set free the words I’ve held in for so long. That night, my sister was raped by Colton Thomas.

A shocked gasp rolls through the crowd, as the elite of Harborhaven struggle to accept that the darkness of the world could touch them, even here. The mayor and his family are untouchable, and my words could very well turn my entire family into social pariahs. My father’s mouth is set in a thin, mortified line.

Trying to clear the dryness of my mouth, I wet my lips, then continue. Most of you don’t really know my sister, because the brilliant, carefree girl that she once was died three years ago, and she’s only been a walking husk ever since. The weight of her secret killed her, but she held it in rather than damage your perceptions. It wasn’t cancer that killed her, it was all of us, and our twisted expectations and dirty secrets. Cancer saved her the way I didn’t.

Tears stream down my face as I rush away from the podium, stumbling blindly down the aisle. Julian reaches out a hand to grab my arm, but I brush past him, refusing to be stopped and scolded.

2

I manage to make it into the house without tripping on my heels or my pride, and pause to steady myself against the kitchen counter. It’s loaded with food brought by well-meaning guests. Some of it looks quite perishable, and it’s warm in the kitchen, thanks to the open door and the early summer heat. Sighing, I grab a container of potato salad and open the fridge, wondering if there’s even enough room for all of this stuff.

The sight of the barren fridge sends a wave of dread rolling through me, settling in the pit of my stomach. I pull open drawer after drawer, finding nothing but a few cheese sticks and a bottle of wine. I don’t particularly care if Julian starves to death, but where’s the food for Melody?

My mind races through possibilities as I seal all the food with some plastic wrap I find in a nearby cabinet. Julian is more than well-off—his family is what my mom would call ‘new money’—and despite Chloe’s medical bills, I’m fairly sure he can afford food. Does he just not care enough to buy any? I get angrier by the minute, each dish being shoved into the fridge with more force than the one before it.

When the counter is clear, I stomp down the hall, seeking answers without really being sure of my question. Family photos line the hallway, each one protecting the lie that a happy family lives here. In each of them, Melody is smiling the carefree grin of a child. But if you look closely enough, the set of Julian’s mouth isn’t