Take a Chance(44)

“I need to go into the other room a moment,” I told him as my eyes filled with tears.

“Go on,” he said as he turned Emily back around to face him.

“We’re going to let her get a drink and rest. She’s traveled a long way to see you today,” I heard him explaining to her. Did she even understand him? Was he just talking to her to make himself feel better because he missed her so much?

By the time I walked into the sitting room area, tears were streaming down my face. I covered my mouth to hold in the sound of my sobbing. My strong, hard, powerful father, who loved to tell the world “fuck you” and live like he had no worries, was sitting in there holding my mother’s hand and treating her like a queen. As if she were the most precious thing in this world. I had always known he loved her. He made sure everyone knew that the day he lost her marked him for life. But the scene I’d just witnessed? Oh, God, my heart hurt so much.

People saw him as a legend. He had it all. They worshipped him. Yet none of them knew. I hadn’t known. I had always seen him as strong and impossible to hurt. I knew that wasn’t true anymore. That illusion was gone. My father hurt. He hurt more than I could have ever imagined.

I sank down onto the sofa and buried my face in my hands and cried. I cried for the woman in there whose life was cut too short. I cried for the little girl who never got to know her. But mostly I cried for the man who would always love her, even if she would never again be the one he fell in love with.





Grant


The moment I got into the rental car my phone rang. I reached for it and saw Nan’s name on the screen. I started to ignore it but decided it was time to deal with her. I wasn’t going to hide the fact I was seeing Harlow. Besides, she was with August.

“Yeah,” I said. She must’ve had some reason for calling, so I’d let her get that out.

“Where are you?” she demanded.

“Why?”

“Because Harlow’s gone, you’re gone, and Mase is gone. Where the fuck are you?”

“You need to keep up with your roomies better,” I drawled, bored already by this conversation.

I needed a cigarette whenever I talked to her. I was doing good. I hadn’t had a smoke in two months. I wasn’t about to let Nan send me backpedaling.

“I don’t give a shit where those two are but I want to know if you’re with them. I won’t let that happen. Do you understand me?”

I understood that she was delusional, as always.

“Nannette, if I start sleeping in Harlow’s bed, there ain’t a damn thing you can do about it. So back the fuck off. It’s over. I’m tired of being your backup.”

The boiling rage implicit in her silence made me smile. I liked pissing her off.

For so long I had just wanted to make her smile. I had wanted to save her from herself. But she’d made sure to destroy all those feelings in me. Sleeping with one man after another and rubbing it in my face, then calling me the moment she needed someone. I had let her use me, and slowly it had eaten away at me. Being needed was something I thought I wanted. I thought it would make me feel like I had a purpose. What I hadn’t realized was I had become Nan’s bitch. That was a sour pill to swallow. Backing out of her life hadn’t been easy, but once I had managed to kill my feelings for her and accept that she was bitter and angry, and that I could never change that, I had been a happier person. Sleeping with her when I was drunk was just easy. I knew what to expect in the morning. I knew I was no longer in danger of falling in love with her.

“Is this because I’m screwing around with August? You’re being childish. I told you I just wanted to do the friends with benefits thing for a while. I don’t like serious, and you wanted serious.”

I’d been fucking insane. She’d saved us both from hell—I should thank her for that.

“I’m bored, Nannette. The benefits thing is over. We’re in the past. I don’t want it from you anymore. You can fuck whomever the hell you want to, and I’m okay with that. Hell, if he needs a condom I’ll tell him where I left my stash.”

Nan squeaked in disbelief. “You think she’s sweet and pretty, but that’ll get old, too. She’s uptight and boring. When you’re done trying to fuck Harlow, don’t come running back to me when you realize it wasn’t worth the effort.”

I didn’t take the bait. She was fishing. I wasn’t stupid and I wasn’t about to give her anything to throw in Harlow’s face later. Nan played games. Mean, brutal games.

“Who I decide to spend time with is my business. I’m not yours, Nan. Never was. Now, if you’re done I have important things to get to.”