To New York's Attorney | Completed

Chapter Seventeen

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You're close to the truth, but then again, nothing is ever as it seems.

With a stick of citrus L&M cradled between her fingers, the words of the note invaded her. She was letting it, she wanted it, anything to keep from listening to the cracked record of Barron Harrington's confession, his words that had her knees threatening to buckle underneath her. Her eyes fluttered shut.

Did that mean there was more to Lawrence Harrington's death? That Terrence's involvement wasn't by mere convenience?  Was someone trying to set him up for the murder of Lawrence Harrington? But if so then who?

Questions swarmed like restless flies over an aged fruitcake. Her eyes snapped open, ears perked to the sound of approaching footsteps. Grace.

"You really shouldn't be doing that, you know what the doctor said." Christina shrugged balancing the stick between her lips. Her drag was long, exaggerated to upset her cousin. In a single breath, Christina puffed the cloud of orange scented smoke in Grace's path. "If at the very least you don't care about yourself care about me." Grace urged using a single hand to fan the puff of smoke and another to cradle her growing stomach. Christina's shoulder's fell.

"I'm sorry." She whispered. Grace nodded.

"Please put that out, you're only hurting yourself, you can't have cancer and smoke." Christina shook her head. It was the first time Grace had said it out loud. It was the first time anyone had said it outside the confinement of the doctors office, it felt like a confirmation, one that had Christina Gresham's blood running cold. Her fingers tightened around the single stick, her eyes squeezed shut.

"I don't have it." Christina chimed, unsure whether she were trying more to convince herself or her cousin. She felt strange. Vulnerable, her eyes stung and her jaws clenched.

"I thought we went over this with Dr. Maxwell? Denial is only a defense mechanism, it doesn't make it any less true." But Christina didn't want to hear it. She didn't want to be known as that girl with cancer, she didn't want to stop smoking because of it, she didn't want her life to change, why couldn't Grace understand that?

"Just leave me alone, okay?" Christina snapped, hickory eyes glaring at an indifferent Grace Gresham. The stick was back between her pink lips. It had only been a year since she'd started relishing in the pleasures of a smoke, and despite the fact that she wanted to believe she could stop on her own, she was beginning to doubt that.

"I won't leave you because you're family and I know you're just stressed and you don't mean that." Turning to face her cousin, Christina once more puffed a cloud of smoke in Grace Gresham's face, a macabre grin spreading on her face. She was buzzed, slightly intoxicated, alive with nicotine.

"I don't care. I don't care if you stay or leave, If you want me to stop smoking, because I'm going to die anyway. People hardly survive cancer, the sooner you can come to terms with that, the better." The stick between her fingers slid to the concrete ground. Without a second thought, she stumped on it, easily striding ahead of her startled cousin and into the hospital.

"Your hurting, Christina, you know you don't mean that." Grace called out catching up with Christina by the reception.

"I thought denial was a defense mechanism?" Christina mimicked. Grace frowned.

"I'm not denying shit." She paused, hyperaware of peeking eyes and listening ears. "You know what, leave, don't come for my ultrasound and don't you dare show up at my wedding."

Christina released a breath. Wasn't that what she wanted? To push everyone away? To save her father and die in peace? Why then did it hurt so much? Why then did Grace Gresham's reaction sting?

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thαnk чσu sσ much fσr rєαdíng thís.

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