Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 137077 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 685(@200wpm)___ 548(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137077 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 685(@200wpm)___ 548(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
That question stops time for both of us, and we stare at one another, panting and angry and wild-eyed.
I’ve been replaying the doorbell video in my mind, over and over. But every time I do, Riley’s determined face is replaced with Grace’s scared one. And then her voice on the phone echoes in my head.
“Cameron, I’m sorry. I should’ve told you,” she says, her voice filled with pain.
“Yes, you should’ve, right from the beginning. If I’d known, I never would’ve hired you. I never would’ve risked…” I slide my jaw right and left, fighting the tension there so I can say this, even though the rest of my body is coiled tight. “Grace.”
That’s not what I want to say. What I want to say is that I wouldn’t have risked my heart. But in the big scheme of things, my heart is unimportant, unlike Grace. My heart has been broken before, shattered and shredded, and I lived on. Grace, though? I’ve spent her whole life protecting her so that she would never know that pain, that fear, and yet, here we are.
The most important thing in my life was almost stolen from me, the same way Michelle was—by someone else’s mistake.
“I told you up-front that she is my priority, has always been, and will always be first for me.” My voice cracks, and I clear my throat. “I choose her. Her well-being, her happiness, and most of all, her safety. So I’m sorry, but you need to leave.” I stare past her, unable to meet her eyes as I say the words.
She surges to standing, the blanket that had puddled in her lap now falling to the floor, and she drops the tea mug to the table with a clatter. “You’re firing me?”
This is so much more than that.
A firing. A break-up. A death of a sort. It sure as fuck feels like I’m dying. Like someone is ripping my heart right out of my chest.
“Riley—”
“No, I’m not leaving. That’s what I told Austin, and I meant it. No more running away. I’m not leaving you, and I’m not leaving Grace. We’re a family.”
I can see the determination on her face, and in so many ways, I’m proud of her for fighting the hold her past has on her and being willing to dream of a future now. But I can’t. I’m stuck in the moment… the one where she lied… where she willingly and knowingly endangered the most precious thing I have, Grace.
I thought I could do this thing with Riley. Hell, I thought I was doing it… moving on, living life again, feeling hope. Falling in love. But not like this. Not at the expense of my daughter.
I can’t. I won’t. Ever.
“Yes, you are. It’s what you’re good at, right? Leaving?”
It’s a low blow, throwing her own past back at her, and she recoils as though I slapped her. I want to take the words back so badly, but I don’t. Not because they’re true, but because I think it’s the only way she will actually go. So I bite the insides of my cheeks, punishing myself while forcing myself to remain silent.
“I might be the one packing my bag, but I’m not the one leaving this time. I fought for this family, for you and Grace, and for the first time, even for myself, because you let me have hope that I could have a future here, something someone like me doesn’t get.” She laughs bitterly. “Guess I was right. I don’t deserve this.”
But she doesn’t glance around at the fancy trappings of my life. No, she looks right at me, saying that she doesn’t think she deserves… me.
“You’re like everyone else, leaving me eventually, one way or another.” She puts her hand over her heart. “Tell Grace I love her.”
She strides past me, putting so much space between us that not even the wind brushes me as she walks out. I don’t know how long I stand there, stuck in a loop replaying everything from tonight, but it’s long enough that Riley comes back down the stairs.
I hear her at the front door. “Bye, Cameron.”
And I’m alone.
Again.
I scream as loud as I can, the intense sense of loss too much to contain. Then I destroy everything that I haven’t already demolished, starting by chunking the damn tea mug at the wall. I see the splash of brown liquid on the white paint, and then all I see is… red.
RILEY
I’m numb.
Maybe it’s a defense mechanism my body’s activated to keep me from falling apart, or maybe it’s because I’m cold. The car’s heater is on, keeping things toasty despite the chilly December night outside, but I’m cold on the inside. Frozen. Dead.
That’s what it is. Not numb. Dead.
Still, I keep driving, the other headlights a blurry show I mostly ignore.