On the Way Down

Chapter Fourteen

His mention of Len pulls the question that's been at the back of my mind since last weekend straight to center stage. After the roses and text messages this morning, I'd almost talked myself out of bringing her up today.

"Can I ask you something else?"

"Ask me anything you want to know. Nothing is off limits." Phoenix tilts my chin up so I have to meet his eyes. His gaze is as gentle and open as it was when I asked about North Node.

"What happened to Len? You told me you lost her, but you didn't say how."

If the subject change catches him off guard, nothing in his face or posture shows it. He answers without faltering. "No one knows. She went missing one day and didn't come back. The last sighting of her was on someone's home security camera, when she was walking down the street she lived on."

My pulse speeds up with each word. By the time Phoenix finishes his last sentence, I'm certain of what I suspected when I saw Elenna's missing person poster on Nash's Instagram and read the caption where he called her Len.

"That sounds a lot like the last sighting of Elenna Ilke, the woman who went missing from Aliso Viejo." I watch him as I speak. Nothing in his expression changes.

"That's because Elenna was Len. Or is, if she's still out there somewhere."

He sounds casual about it, and unfazed that I've made the connection. Now I wonder if I had it wrong, and if he didn't know Elenna's unsolved case inspired my book.

"When you overheard Ava telling Torin about my book, did she say it was based on Elenna's disappearance?"

"She didn't mention her name, but what she described was too similar for it not to be. I assumed it was."

"You didn't say anything when you mentioned my book, or when you told me about Len."

"I didn't," he agrees. "You seemed spooked I even knew the basis of your book and I didn't want to make it worse or come across like a stalker. Then when Len came up, I was more concerned about you and how you felt at that moment. It didn't seem like the right time to bring it up."

He says it so matter-of-factly, I almost feel foolish for letting this fester in my mind all week. Of course it didn't seem like the right time. I was in tears for the second time in twenty minutes and asked him to talk about something else.

"Do you think she's alive?"

The shake of his head is so slight, it's almost imperceptible. "I wish I could say yes. I've accepted she might not be."

Anyone who doesn't know Phoenix the way I do would take one look at his face and think he was unaffected by what he just told me. They would assume he's past the grief that came with losing Len and not knowing what happened, or if she's dead or alive. But I notice when the corners of his mouth droop and his body stiffens, and how his hand trembles when he raises his glass of sparkling cider to his lips to take a drink.

It hits me then, what he's struggled through and overcome since our world together fell apart. I've had tunnel vision the last two weeks, focusing on how I felt, the questions I had, and what I went through after we weren't in each other's lives. I may have tiptoed through purgatory after we broke up, spending weeks bawling my eyes out and months going through the motions of my life while I oscillated between sad and angry, but he has also been to hell and back. He lost his career, got and stayed sober, and dealt with the disappearance and presumed death of a close friend. And yet, all he's done is focus on me since he said hello at Nebula. Phoenix has done everything but move heaven and earth to make me feel like the sun orbits around me, and like my emotional needs and comfort come first and are all that's important.