Fractured Hearts (Shattered Lives, Book Three) Read Online Free PDF Page A

know. I’m so fucking sorry. I’m struggling. I’m an alcoholic. I need help, Elaina, but I have no idea where to find it or how to go about it.” And then the floodgates opened.
    “I know, lover, and yes, you are an alcoholic. But I’m going to help you, okay? We all are going to help you through this.”
    My forehead rubbed against her thigh as I nodded. She lifted my face to hers. From her despondent facial expression, she reflected that what was overwhelming me was invading her soul.
    I didn’t want her to have a sense of loss, but it was inevitable. She grabbed me and held me close. “We will beat this together. I’m going to help you every step of the way. I’ve been waiting for you to come to this moment. To understand you need to change. This behavior will kill you and I don’t want to see you succumb to it. You are so much more than you believe, Henry. I wish you could see that.”
    This was a task bigger than life and I wasn’t sure she was strong enough to take it on. I wrecked her spirit, crushed her dreams, and made her feel hatred.
    I wrapped my arms around her and, collapsing into her, I fucking cried at great length about everything that had affected all of us…Elaina, me, Nick, Claire, Willow, Sophie, everybody. My meltdowns usually consisted of some sort of violent outburst, but this was emotional turmoil.
    Once the emotions drained from me and exhaustion riddled my entire being, Elaina helped drag my trembling body back to bed. She knelt next to me, brushing away the few stray hairs clinging to my sweaty forehead.
    “Are you okay, lover?”
    “Yeah, just… I don’t know,” I groaned as I rolled onto my side, wrapping my arms around my gut as it twisted.
    Running her fingers over the dark edges of my tribal wing tattoo, she murmured, “You need to sleep off some of this. I’m going to leave you to rest. I’ll come back to check on you in a while, okay?”
    Acknowledging her with a moan, I felt like road kill and had no desire to chat anymore. Nor did I want to make her feel like she had to hover over me like I was a sick child. Elaina set the bottle of water next to our bed. I thanked her quietly, my eyelids deciding they had no more strength to stay open. Before she even made it to a standing position, the blackness sucked me in.

    The soft snore coming from Henry made Elaina smile. She missed the little things about him. His genuine smile, laughter, strength, and calm demeanor… All the things she thought she understood about him before the world fell apart. He had such a good nature, but he was lost within a nightmare that made him who he truly was.
    Being physically, mentally, and emotionally tired, she didn’t want to deal with his pressing issues anymore, but she loved him with everything she had. She was torn between her feelings for him and what she wanted out of her own miserable life.
    After she lowered herself into the chair next to the bed, she pressed her elbows to her knees, chewing her thumbnail. Watching him sleep for a bit, she contemplated what she needed to do to help him. Things felt bleak. With no resolution in mind, Elaina sat back and rubbed her face for a moment before deciding to leave the room.

    Using both hands, Gunther threw the side door of the school open. He grumbled over Henry’s drunkenness, and Cora’s inability to see he loved Silas and was trying to step in as the father figure he and his two sisters needed.
    He stormed off to the storefront and yanked the door open with fury, making it scream against its hinges. After looking around, he figured all the booze had to be in the back room. He pushed open that door and on the shelves, waiting and taunting, was a decent supply.
    It was bizarre. They were all organized by type, size, and bottle shape. Perfect rows displayed for the abuser. There were several empty bottles in boxes stacked on the floor.
    “Bloody hell. He has been drinking a lot more than I suspected,” Gunther muttered.
    He grabbed