“This isn’t about a zoning violation.” Her heart pounded so hard that her ribs shook. “We all know that. If it were, then Ms. Murray would have filed complaints against Mrs. Bashar’s yarn shop for her weekly widows knitting club meeting. This complaint is about me, and more specifically, about Ms. Murray’s disapproval of me.”
“Now wait just a minute!” Karen shot to her feet.
“Ms. Murray,” the chairwoman said. “Please return to your seat.”
“But that is just a lie! She’s lying about me!”
Alexis tried not to roll her eyes.
“Ms. Murray,” the chairwoman snapped. “You are out of order. You had your chance to speak.”
Alexis continued. “In the year since I came forward with my accusation against Royce Preston, Ms. Murray has found almost weekly reasons to complain about something at my café. The state of my landscaping out front. My cat. She even complained about how bright the string lights are around my front window. I have been patient. More patient than most people would be, because I didn’t think it mattered what people like her thought of me. But I realize now that it does matter. It matters because attitudes like hers enable men like Royce Preston to get away with their crimes for so long. It matters because she is now trying to hurt people I care deeply about—women who have already been victimized. And if someone like Ms. Murray is allowed to use the zoning system to carry out some kind of vendetta, then the laws are meaningless.”
A round of applause interrupted her, and Alexis looked over her shoulder. It wasn’t just Jessica who was clapping, though. Strangers had joined in too.
“I didn’t ask for any of this,” Alexis said. “I didn’t invite women to come to me to share their stories or to start gathering at my café to find support and strength in other survivors. But it happened, and I am so grateful for it. They have healed me, and I will make it my mission to ensure these women have a safe environment. And if that violates the zoning laws of this city, then the city needs to change its zoning laws. Because I am done hoping that I can change what is in Ms. Murray’s heart.”
The applause thundered as Alexis turned away from the podium. She met Karen’s eyes and smiled. Not out of spite. Not out of forced politeness. But because she honestly no longer cared what Karen thought.
The chairwoman pounded the table with her gavel and asked the audience to please quiet down. Alexis’s legs trembled as she walked back to Jessica, who yanked her in for a tight hug.
Tears threatened behind her eyes. “I need to go,” she whispered.
“Don’t you want to stay to see what the board decides?” Jessica asked.
Alexis shook her head. She’d done what she needed to do. She’d said what needed to be said.
Now there was someone else she needed to talk to.
* * *
* * *
The grass at the cemetery was soft beneath her shoes.
Damp and soggy. Every footfall sank heavier than the last.
The gas station bouquet in her clenched hand grew heavy, petals wilting and drooping upside down. It had been several weeks since she’d been to her mother’s grave. The urn next to the gravestone bore the dried, brown remnants of last summer’s geraniums. Neglected by her absence.
Alexis placed the bouquet on the ground, the vibrant colors a stark contrast against the darkened granite bearing her mother’s name. Behind her, she sank onto the concrete bench that café patrons had donated so Alexis would have a place to sit when she visited. It used to warm her to sit here and talk with her mother. Today, though, the cold seeped through her clothes and chilled her entire body.
Alexis tugged her coat around her and stared at the ground.
She didn’t even know what she was going to say until she opened her mouth.
“Why—Why didn’t you tell Elliott about me?” she whispered. Her voice sounded weak. Pitiful. “All those years, you could have told me the truth. I could have handled it.”
Her mind imagined her mother’s answer. Because it was for the best.
“Best for who? Me? You? Don’t you remember how hard things were?”
But we got through them together.
“But it could have been easier. He had money.”
Which isn’t everything. We had each other.
“You could still be alive. If we’d had more money, you wouldn’t have had to work so hard, and maybe—”
You know that’s not true. I had cancer. I would have died with or without his financial support.
“But—” Her voice cut off as her mother took control of the imaginary argument.
Say what you really want to say, Alexis. Tell me what’s really bothering you.
“I’m mad at you, Mom.” Her voice shook with the weight of betrayal and, yes, anger. Anger that had festered for too long, been ignored and avoided. Anger that had been unleashed last night at Elliott’s house, anger that had burned all night and all morning, anger that erupted into hot flames at the zoning board meeting. Anger that threatened to consume her whole. “You left me alone, Mom. And maybe I didn’t have to be. How could you do that?”
Headlights from an oncoming car behind her illuminated the headstone. She sniffled and wiped her face, hoping the car would slowly pass. It didn’t. She heard the soft crunch of tires draw closer. The car stopped, and the headlights went out. Of course. Of course someone else would be here at this exact time to visit someone in the same section as her mother’s grave. Because she couldn’t even get a moment to herself in a cemetery.
Behind her, a car door opened and shut with a gentle thud.
“I thought I’d find you here.”
Alexis turned on the bench, heart in her throat. Elliott stood twenty feet away, hands shoved in the pockets of a winter coat.
She turned her back on him. “What do you want?”
“I was worried about you. Candi and I have both been trying to call you.”
“I didn’t want to talk to you.”
“I understand.”
“Then you’ll understand when I tell you to get back in the car and go away.”
Elliott walked closer and gestured toward the bench. “May I?”
“No.” But Alexis scooted sideways anyway to make room for him. She’d ask herself why later.
Elliott placed his hands on his knees and stared at the gravestone. “I came here once last year.”
Alexis looked over at that. “Why?”
“I had some things I needed to say to her.”
Alexis ground her teeth. “You should’ve said them when she was alive.”
“I know.” He focused his gaze on her. “Do you want to know what I told her?”
“Not really.”
“I told her that I missed her.”
Alexis stood up. “Jesus, not this bullshit again.”
“I told her that she’d raised an amazing young woman, and I wished I had been part of it.”
Alexis hugged her torso and stared at the gravestone. She felt her lip tremble and hated him for it. “You had three years to contact me. Why didn’t you?”
“Because I was a coward, and I was ashamed.”
Alexis snorted. “Points for honesty and self-awareness, I guess.”
He didn’t respond.
“It’s not fair,” she said, staring at her mother’s name etched in stone.
“No, it’s not.”
“She was all I had.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to know the things I know now. I don’t want to be sitting here like this, mad at her because of you. Do you understand that?” She turned back around to face him. “You made me mad at my own mother. You stole something from me. Something so fucking precious. You stole my peace.” Her voice choked and cracked. Elliott’s hands twitched as if he wanted to reach for her, comfort her, but he wise
ly kept his fingers curled around his knees. She sniffled again. “And now, because of you, I’ve lost Noah too. You made me doubt him, and I hurt him so badly.”
“I’m sorry, Alexis.”
“Stop saying that. Just fucking stop apologizing!” Alexis tightened her arms around her torso, a barrier against the crashing wave of emotions. Of anger. “What are you really doing here? What do you want?”
He stood. “A chance to make things right. A chance to be a father.”
“I don’t need you to be a father.” She advanced on him with rage in her steps. Rage she had tried to bury for so, so long. “Do you hear me? I don’t need you to be a father! I don’t fucking need you! I’ve never fucking needed you!”
She punched his chest. Once. Twice. He took the assault without a flinch, which pissed her off even more. She wanted him to wince. To cringe. She wanted him on his fucking knees. She wanted him to hurt like she hurt, to know the emptiness that gutted her now.
“She was enough. You were a sperm donor who never existed. Do you hear me?” She pounded his chest again. “I was fine without you!”
“I’m sorry—”
“Stop. Saying. That.” Every word was another punch against his chest. “I don’t need your apologies and your regrets.”
“Then tell me what you need, Alexis.” He gripped her arms. “Tell me, and I’ll do it.”
“I need you to apologize to her!” She yanked from the hold of his fingers and pointed at the headstone. “I need you to stand here and tell her you’re sorry for breaking her heart. For using her as a summer fling that meant nothing to you and then walking away. I want you to apologize to her for the dreams she had to give up. For making her work two and three jobs at a time to take care of me. I need you to apologize to her for letting her die without ever knowing that you actually fucking cared about her.”
“I can’t,” he said, his voice thick. “I can’t do that, because she’s gone. She’s dead, Alexis, and if you think that doesn’t tear me up inside, knowing that I can never say those things to her, you’re wrong. All I can do is make sure you never feel alone again.”
“Then take my fucking kidney, you asshole. Because if you don’t, you’ll die. And I’ll be left to stand in front of another goddamned gravestone, and if you think I’m angry now, just fucking wait until you die.”
“Which is exactly why I can’t go through with this. I want you to be part of my life of your own free will and because you want to be. But if you do this now, you’ll always wonder if I’m a father to you out of a sense of obligation or gratitude, and not simply because I want you there.” He tilted her chin up with his finger. “And I do want you there. I want you to be my daughter.”
A dam burst inside her. Horrified, Alexis buried her face in her hands. Sobs became a torrent of ugly sounds and snotty breathing and angry, ragged gasps. He reacted instantly. His arms came around her, and he held her. For the first time, father held daughter, and it was as strange and awkward as it was healing and new. He was warm and smelled like a blanket fresh out of the dryer. Her hands fell away from her face, and she let her arms dangle at her sides. Not returning the embrace but not rejecting it either. Hugging him back would have felt wrong, like a betrayal of her mother, and she just wasn’t ready to go that far.
Elliott must have felt her resistance, because he stepped back. Alexis became fascinated with the grass at her feet as she wiped her cheeks again.
“Can I ask you something?” he asked, shoving his hands back in his pockets.
She shrugged.
“What about Noah?”
Her battered heart took another beating. “What about him?”
“Where do things stand between you two?”
She looked up. “That subject is still a little above your pay grade, I’m afraid.”
“I understand. But can I ask you something else?”
She shrugged again.
“Do you love him?”
Heat rose on her neck. This was officially on the high side of embarrassing.
“You don’t have to answer that,” he said quickly. “But if I can offer some unsolicited advice? From someone who has been married a long time?”
She rejected the urge to tell him to shove it, but only because she did want some advice, and that pissed her off.
Which actually felt kind of good. Being pissed off, that is. God, she was so messed up.
“People screw up. A lot. The key to a lasting relationship is the ability to forgive over and over again.”
A lump became lodged in her throat.
Alexis kicked the wet grass with the toe of her boots. “I don’t . . . I don’t think I know what forgiveness actually is. I thought I did. I thought it meant being at peace and never feeling anger. But I . . . I think maybe that’s not really forgiveness. I think I’ve just been avoiding feeling anything bad for a long time. And it’s not the same thing, is it?”
A smile decorated his voice. “Are you asking for advice this time?”
“Not if you’re going to make a thing out of it.”
He chuckled. “No, it’s not the same. You have to let yourself feel all the bad things. Anger has its place. It protects us from being taken advantage of. But eventually, you have to let yourself stop hating whoever hurt you. Forgiveness means recognizing that you are a different person because of the pain but realizing that so are they because of the pain they caused. I think it’s deciding that the new people you are are better people and that together you’re worth something.”
A low rumble of thunder in the distance was followed by a shift in the wind. A storm was coming. Alexis faced the headstone again. “I’m sorry I worried you and Candi.”
“I’m sorry I stole your peace.”
“Does that make us even now?”
He came to stand at her side. “Not even close. I have a lifetime to make up for.”
“Then take my kidney and prove it to me.”
“Well played.” There was affection in his voice, a warm undertone that snuck beneath her skin and wrapped around the cold place in her chest.
She dared to look at him. “I think I forgive you.”
His eyes shimmered with a sheen of tears. “I’ll try to be worthy of it.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow morning at the hospital?”
He smiled softly. “See you tomorrow.”
She watched him walk back to his car. He turned just before getting in. “What about after tomorrow?”
“Maybe,” she whispered.
He winked. “I can live with maybe.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Noah knew he was in trouble when he was jolted awake at—fuck, he had no idea what time it was—and found four pairs of angry eyes staring down at him.
Mack, Colton, Malcolm, and the Russian crowded around his couch like an offensive line. Mack cracked a knuckle. “Wake up, donkey dick.”
Ah, shit. Noah closed his eyes and threw an arm over them. It didn’t help the throbbing. “What day is it?”
“Christ,” Colton said, disgust dripping from his tone. “Are you serious? How long have you been drinking like a loser?”
“Not long enough.”
“It’s Thursday night,” Malcolm said, grabbing Noah’s arm and hauling him up against his will. “And you have a lot of explaining to do.”
“Leave me alone.” Noah tugged his arm free and flopped back down.
“Not until you tell me why Liv got a panicked message from Jessica saying that Alexis told her the surgery is off and you guys broke up.”
You guys broke up. So it was real. Not some horrible dream. He’d really said those horrible things to Alexis, and she’d really said she needed space again, and now she was telling people they’d broken up. But what else would she think? She’d broken his heart with her lack of faith in him, but he’d broken hers by no
t accepting her apology. And now they were officially broken.
“Also, what the fuck happened to your face?” Colton asked, leaning down.
Noah flipped him off.
“Seriously, dude,” Mack said. “Get up. We can’t help you like this.”
“I don’t need your help.”
The guys snorted in unison and backed up. Noah tried to swallow and met only dry resistance. Jesus, he felt like shit.
“You didn’t finish the book, did you?” the Russian asked.
“For fuck’s sake.” Noah tried to roll over, but a massive hand clamped down on his shoulder and held him back. He knocked it away. “I’m not talking to you about the goddamned book. In case you haven’t noticed, it has caused nothing but problems.”
“Fine,” Mack said way too casually. “Then talk to us about this.”
Noah cracked open an eye. It took a moment for his vision to clear, but when it did, he shot up so fast that he pitched completely off the couch. “Give that back,” he ordered, trying to stand on legs that barely worked.
Mack backed up. “Not until you talk to us.”
“Give me back the fucking letter,” he growled. “I’m not messing around, Mack.”
He’d never shown it to anyone before, not even Alexis.
“Why?” Mack asked. “Is it something important? It must be, because we found it on your chest while you were passed out.”
Noah’s hands curled into fists. “Give me. The fucking letter. Mack.”
Mack held it aloft and out of Noah’s reach. “What happened with Alexis?”
“Are you fucking kidding me right now? Give me my goddamned letter!”
“Malcolm,” Mack said. “Why do you suppose this is what Noah turned to after apparently fucking things up with the woman he loves?”
“I don’t know,” Malcolm said, leaning in the doorway to the living room. “Maybe because it holds the key to his entire life and the reasons why he keeps pushing her away.”
“I didn’t push her away,” Noah shouted. “She—” His voice gave out, and he sank back to the couch. He was officially all out of fight. He was nothing but fuck-its and whiskey.
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