by Katie Cross
“I . . . I think my heart is going to break,” I whispered. “And it’s all my fault.”
Lizbeth folded me against her, and I cried.
The next day, I clutched an official-looking letter from an attorney. The coffee shop purred quietly in the background, the air thick with the scent of a new brew Lizbeth had started advertising on our shiny new Facebook page.
My stomach churned as I stared at the return address through bloodshot eyes. Riverdale.
“Oh no,” I muttered.
This could only be from Jim.
Lizbeth didn’t look up from the laptop, where she was putting together a post about the Fourth of July sugar cookies we’d bought from the Jackson City bakery.
“What is it?”
“A letter. From your father’s lawyer.”
Her head snapped up. I stared at the words swimming on the page, my brain suddenly mush as I comprehended what they meant.
I tossed the letter at her. “He’s threatening me through his attorney.”
“To send us back?”
“No. Just you.” I shoved away from the table and started to pace. Ellie was curled up on the bed upstairs, watching a movie with Devin while the hot, afternoon sunshine warmed everything with choking heat.
My brow furrowed. “It doesn’t make sense. He’s only claiming you, though. Why?”
“Because he isn’t Ellie’s dad.”
Lizbeth said it with all the emotional inflection of a rock. Her expression didn’t waver in the slightest as she stared at the letter, although my jaw almost dropped to the floor.
“What?” I screeched.
Lizbeth sighed, hugging her book to her chest. She looked at me uneasily, then pushed the letter my way again.
“Mama had a . . . thing . . . for the neighbor. He was a widow. They’d talk every now and then when he came to borrow a tool from Dad or something. She’d cook big dinners and take some over to him. That kind of stuff. She didn’t act on it at first, but then . . .”
“She did.”
Lizbeth nodded with a sigh. “Yeah. For a while. Dad didn’t find out until right before Mama died. The night she died, in fact.”
My already-aching heart sank a little deeper in my chest. “Is that why she was driving away?” I asked, puzzling out what I’d learned at the funeral. Mama had been in a terrible car crash, pulling out in front of a semi that her car couldn’t outrace.
“Yes. From fighting with him,” Lizbeth confirmed, a flash of something appearing in her eyes again. “She was angry; he was angry. They were both screaming for hours. When he found out the truth about Ellie, he went ballistic. Ellie and I hid in the forest for a while, until we heard the cops calling for us. That’s when we found out that Mama had died.”
I let out a long breath.
“Wow. Does Ellie know?”
Lizbeth shook her head, then shrugged. “At least, not that I can tell. I pulled her away before she could hear what they were arguing about that night. Mama never told her. Maybe Dad did. But I don’t think so. He was never able to say the words, to admit it out loud. Even in his drunk rages, he never brought it up. Just blubbered and cried.”
“Think he feels responsible for Mama dying?” I asked. “That’s why he’s drinking so much?”
Lizbeth shrugged.
“Wow.”
Even though I tried to block it, Maverick’s voice rose in my mind. Expectations. Mama had shattered her marriage vows for another man on her second marriage, defying expectations of fidelity. Maybe she was to blame for the situation we were in.
No, she didn’t ask Jim to be drunk and abusive. If I knew anything, it was that.
But she sure hadn’t helped anything, either. The memories flashed through me. The fear. Those long nights living in the car, waiting for Mama to come back.
No wonder Maverick ran from the depths of this crazy. From the carefully unraveling tapestry that Mama had built and left behind for us to bear the burden of. But that was Mama. In her mind, long-term consequences were for the birds. She had the here and the now, and that was it.
So many pieces clicked together. Jim’s harsh treatment of Ellie. His sullen silences. His drunken rages. The way he took so much of his anger out on her.
“Mama was sick,” Lizbeth whispered, terror in her voice, “and so is Dad. If I have to go back there, you’ll never see me again, Bethie.”
Gathering as much courage as I could, I pulled her to me, clutching her tight. “It will be over my dead body that he takes you, Lizbeth. I promise you.”
“Maverick isn’t here anymore. He was . . . he made me feel safer.”
“I know.” My heart cracked. “But we’ll be fine. You’ll never go back. This is just a formality, and it tells me that we need to get legal action going now. The business is profitable, even if by a small amount. Still, it’s enough. I believe that.”
She relaxed only slightly. Several moments later, she pulled back, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Can I go back upstairs and read for a little bit? The post is up.”
“Of course.”
Silently, she slipped up to the apartment. Seconds later, a pair of thudding feet appeared at the end of the hallway, and the back screen door slammed shut. Ellie and Devin must have escaped outside at some point. As if she could sense something bad had happened, Ellie stared at me in wordless question. New fly-fishing lures filled Devin’s free hand, while a sleeping kitten was tucked firmly under Ellie’s arm. She ran the tips of her fingers down its shaggy stomach, regarding me with wary suspicion.
Grief, when had she found a cat?
Devin stood next to her, one hand around her shoulders as if to protect her. They both had strangely somber expressions.
“Everything is fine,” I said brightly, acting like I didn’t see the new animal or the health code nightmare it would create. “You can keep playing.”
Ellie wasn’t fooled. I could see it in her eyes. She had a weird sixth sense about these kinds of things. But she said nothing else as she turned away and returned to the sunshine with Devin.
I stared at the letter with a churning feeling in my gut.
Bethany: Hey Kin. I want full custody of my sisters. Can we get the process started? I can promise to pay you $100 next month, and more after. But I’m otherwise strapped for cash right now.
Kinoshi: Of course. Don’t worry about the money yet. Let’s meet tomorrow. We’ll discuss filing an application and start the process. Do you have proof of harm to them?
Bethany: From Jada, yes.
Kinoshi: I’ll contact her to get the documentation. Any neighbors or other people who could also write statements or testify for you?
Bethany: Probably. I’ll call.
Kinoshi: That would be helpful. Gather everything you can. I hate to ask, but can you prove that you’ll be able to give them a better living situation?
Bethany: Yes. I can.
Kinoshi: Then we’ll talk tomorrow.
Bethany: Thanks. Talk soon.
32
Maverick
I left the day after my final confrontation with Bethany, but I only made it as far as Jackson City.
Grandpa’s house would be finished soon enough. The staging team would move in furniture for the photos within the next forty-eight hours. I’d dropped the bookshelf off at Jada’s and told Lizbeth about it when I stopped by the shop.
If I hadn’t been so upset about Bethany, I would have felt proud of the house. Satisfied. But I couldn’t feel much except agony.
If I stayed in Pineville, I’d see Bethany. If I saw her, I’d feel it all again. The pressure. The responsibility. The sense of impending doom that choked me. Her death would be on my hands if it ended the way others had . . . so, like a coward, I bailed.
Although I tried to push farther south, or west, or anywhere but here, dammit, I couldn’t. When I steered toward South Dakota, my car wouldn’t function. Or maybe my courage. Or maybe I just couldn’t keep my foot on the gas long enough to make it onto t
he entrance ramp.
Bethany had given me the worst parting gift of all. Pain. The hurt in her eyes haunted me. Restless nights, fitful dreams, and a cumulative lack of sleep made me feel like a zombie. I shouldn’t have cared this much. She knew this was part of the deal.
But I did care. A lot.
Work would save me. It always had. I forced myself to canvass Jackson City, studying shops from the outside, the way I had for Bethany’s. Public records. Local gossip with other store owners.
Over two days at a nice hotel, I narrowed down three options that were clearly on their last legs, or would be soon. A touristy T-shirt shop that probably had seasonal issues. A restaurant with a limited menu and food that tasted like plastic. A knickknacks shop that appeared to be morphing into a glorified antiques store, but didn’t really know what it wanted to be.
But the same thrill of an impending challenge didn’t come the way it did with the Frolicking Moose. Because that challenge, I realized, had been more about Bethany.
Baxter called daily. Mom called hourly for a while.
Finally, Mallory called.
That one I picked up.
“Hey, Mal.”
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
I winced. Despite the strength of her tone, I heard love in her words. All evidence to the contrary, I had deeply missed her and Baxter. Our board meetings. Late-night dinners of high-end sushi while we hashed out problems with the sales force.
I leaned back, resting my head against the seat, and watched a nightly parade that moved around the town square. Tourists clapped, enjoying the cheeky actors and cheap flares.
“Good to hear your voice too,” I said dryly. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
“Why are you ignoring the family?”
“I . . . needed some space.”
“Bullcrap. You’re running away again.”
“I haven’t decided on the promotion yet. I still have time left on my leave of absence. But I’m definitely leaning toward taking it.”
She paused. “You did decide, Mav. When you took that leave of absence, you already knew. We all did. You’re not coming back to work at Epsilon. Why do you think I was so pissed? My therapist said denial, but whatever. Go with that if it makes you happy.”
“Maybe.”
“Doesn’t matter, anyway. The job is gone.”
I sat up straighter. “What?”
“I gave it to José.”
“José?” I cried.
“He’ll kill it, and you know it. You bloody trained the man.”
I closed my eyes. An unexpected rush of relief pulsed through me. José would kill it. He was made for the CRO position. He had a drive that I didn’t. A love for corporate culture and all its weirdness at times. Despite my own ego, Mallory had made the right move. That meant I didn’t have to go back. There was no proving myself there anymore.
With the elation came a heaping side of guilt.
“I’m sorry, Mal. I shouldn’t have left you hanging.”
“Mav, you needed an out. I get it, all right? This world isn’t for everyone, and you’ve been looking strangled for a while, anyway. Ever since your dad’s suicide, you’ve—”
“Stop. Stop saying it.”
“No.”
My hand gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles.
“He died, Maverick. He took his own life because he was in more pain than any of us could ever comprehend. Avoiding the issue is not going to change it.”
I forced my jaw to relax before my teeth cracked. Trust Mallory to say it outright when the rest of us skirted the issue like old professionals.
Which, admittedly, could have been part of the problem.
“You know what else?” she said. “It had nothing to do with you, either.”
“It did.”
The words came out of me so fast they startled us both.
She let out a long breath. “Why do you think that?”
“Because I did everything he didn’t want me to do.” I pushed my palm into the steering wheel, grateful for some kind of hard feedback. “I focused on my grades instead of playing football. I didn’t take Kelly Jones to the high school prom, even though Dad thought she was perfect. I joined the ROTC and became an officer instead of going to medical school. Then I blew up my leg in an IED and effectively crippled myself. Just like him. I was everything he never wanted me to be. The biggest disappointment.”
My hands shook. I’d never said these things out loud. Bethany had pushed them to the forefront of my mind too much for me to hold them back now. Even though it sounded insane, I couldn’t help the child-like fear that churned deep in my gut.
Dad’s suicide was on my conscience.
“Dammit, Maverick. Is that what you’ve always thought? Is that why you’re always running away when things get good or big? It’s like you’re afraid to be happy.”
“No. It’s what I’ve always known. Dad had expectations of me. I disappointed them at every turn.”
Mallory hesitated, and in that long pause, I gripped the phone so hard my fingers ached. But I couldn’t let it go, because it felt like all I had left.
“There was a letter,” she finally said.
My brow furrowed. “What?”
“Your dad left a letter.”
“No, he didn’t.”
“He did.”
Stunned, I sat there for a full fifteen seconds. “Mom . . . Mom never told me that. She said . . . ”
Well, she’d never really said anything about it.
“She never told any of you boys. I only found out by accident. She was signing something for me, and I saw it and—that doesn’t matter. You know how she is. Regardless, she didn’t want you to know because of what it said. So, I’m going to risk my own life and potentially make her angry with me and tell you that the note said he thought he had failed you. He felt like a failure as a parent, unable to run with you. To tackle you while you practiced football in the backyard. To . . . help you learn to walk again when you lost your leg. The very same thing you’re feeling now is what your dad felt when he took his own life.”
A long silence passed. It felt as if all the blood had drained from my head. I couldn’t speak. Didn’t know what to say.
“Mav, is it true? Did he fail you just because he didn’t have use of his legs?”
Dizzy, I closed my eyes. “No,” I whispered. “Not at all.”
“The note said that he was so proud of you, his five sons. That you’d kept him going. He lived as long as he did because of how much he loved you. But he was in physical and emotional pain, and he said he couldn’t fight it anymore. To him, it was the most compassionate route for everyone. Even though it wasn’t. Mourning him opened up new wounds. Not sure if you’ve noticed this, but your family isn’t great about talking over the hard things.”
Snatches of my childhood came back to me. The night I told him I didn’t sign up for football my senior year, I found him in the garage, sitting in his wheelchair, nailing a punching bag over and over, grunting with every thwack until he tired himself out. He’d stared at it, panting, his face etched with pain. I’d thought it was because of what I’d told him. Thought I had failed him again. That I wasn’t who he wanted me to be.
But now I saw it differently. Maybe his rage hadn’t been about me.
Maybe he thought I’d said no to football because of him.
“I’d like to point out,” she said, breaking into my thoughts, “that I’ve met Kelly Jones. She brought cookies over after your dad’s funeral. She’s the spitting image of your mother at a younger age. Ever thought of that?”
A cold feeling trickled through my blood. He’d wanted me to take Kelly to prom because he couldn’t dance with Mom anymore. Some subconscious dream of his own had pushed him to it. He hadn’t seen it. None of us had seen it.
His frustration had nothing to do with me.
“You are no failure, Maverick. You are the greatest success of his life.”
&
nbsp; I clenched my teeth, feeling a wave of emotion I’d never given into before. Not since his funeral. It crashed through me. For a second, I couldn’t breathe. Like a rip current, it threatened to whisk me away. I wanted to hit something. I wanted to fall in Dad’s arms and let it all out. Tell him that I’m pissed, I’m sad, and I miss him like the hounds of hell.
I wanted to hold Bethany.
Finally, I managed to swallow and say, “I see.”
“So, what does this mean?” she asked. “What’s next for you if not working for us at Epsilon?”
The change of subject was a lifeline, and I grasped for it. “I’m starting my own company. Correction . . . have started.”
“Competing?”
I snorted. “Of course not. I’ll travel around, find failing brick-and-mortar stores, and resurrect them. Bring money back to the little people. Create success.”
“Blah, blah, blah.”
“Hey, don’t be a hater.”
“I’m not being hard on your idea. Sounds great, to be honest. But you sound as excited as a rock.”
My mind flittered back to Bethany. If she wasn’t part of my day, if I didn’t have her to look forward to, then that adequately described my excitement about the job.
“Yeah. That pretty much covers it.”
“You’re playing small, Mav.”
“I’m trying to figure it out.”
“You’re running. You and your proud minimalism and phobia of commitment. You’re running like a scared toddler, that’s what. And I know what that looks like, because Jameson has been crashing at our place with sweet little Sarah, and that thing is full of fire.”
A sudden grin found its way onto my face. My spitfire niece, Sarah, had just earned her spot of honor on my left arm right before I came. She was fourteen months old, and full of fire was a perfect description. My brother Jameson had earned every second of it after his wild teenage years.