Broken by Love (The Basin Lake Series Book 2)

by Stephanie Vercier

  “I understand,” she says, standing after I do. “You’re one of my best friends, John, and I worry about you. I know you’re upset with me for saying this, but just don’t rush into anything you might end up regretting.”

  “Do my due diligence?” I say in lawyer speak.

  “Something like that,” she says, sounding resigned. “Anyway, it was good to see you. Take care, okay?”

  “Will do,” I reply, my body tense and my headache worse. As I’m heading back into the building I toss the coffee and my half eaten cookie into the trash.

  EMMA

  Sorry I missed you today.

  Jennifer texts me just as I’ve crawled into bed, waiting for John to get home after another late night.

  Me: No prob. UR a busy girl. Everything good with you?

  Jennifer: Yep. You?

  Me: Better than yesterday. Not letting my teacher bum me out, and showed Burk some of my designs. He liked them.

  Jennifer: Nice!

  Me: Will I see you tomorrow?

  Jennifer: Yes. I have news about Mr. Thatcher BTW.

  Seeing his name typed out on my phone is like just going over the ledge of a rollercoaster and feeling like your insides have fallen up and out of you, and it takes me a few minutes to recover from the sensation.

  Jennifer: Emma?

  Me: What is it? The news?

  I’m somewhat fearful of her answer.

  Jennifer: Mom heard back from Detective Marshall. Apparently, Thatcher has agreed to meet with you, but they have to get a court order because you guys aren’t supposed to have any contact.

  Emma: Yeah. Okay? I don’t know. Maybe I don’t want to do this.

  Jennifer: You don’t have to. Just think about it. The ball is in your court.

  The ball doesn’t feel in my court. It never has. But I have to be strong now. I have to push through.

  Emma: Thank you Jennifer. TTY tomorrow.

  Jennifer: No problem. See you then.

  I’m just setting my phone on the nightstand when John comes into the room, his face drawn and fatigued. He offers a brief smile before he goes to the closet, turning away from me and taking his clothes off. Part of me feels guilt for my conversation with Jennifer, knowing that I have to face a man and a past I’m sure John would rather I didn’t have.

  “You look tired,” I finally say after he’s stripped down to his boxers and tossed his shoes in the closet.

  “Gee, thanks,” he says with an edge of annoyance.

  “I didn’t mean it like that.” I force a smile as he crawls into his side of the bed.

  “Sorry.” He gives me a quick kiss on the lips. “Just a stressful day.”

  “They run you ragged at that clinic?” I turn toward him and attempt to snuggle up to his warm body, to feel the comfort in his touch.

  “I have a huge headache,” he says, taking the hand I’ve wrapped around his stomach and gently moving it away from him. “I just really need to sleep. I’m sorry.”

  “Okay.” I feel like I’ve just touched a fragile piece of china and had my hand slapped away from an overzealous shopkeeper.

  I turn on my side, away from him. I consider jumping out of bed in a huff, throwing some clothes on and telling him I’m taking a bus to my mom’s. Because why would I want to sleep in the same bed with a man who is so obviously upset with me, who doesn’t even want to be touched by me and chooses to just go to sleep instead of discussing it?

  But I don’t.

  If I did that, it would only make things worse, wouldn’t it? And so I lie as still as I can, my thoughts keeping me up into the wee hours of the morning until I finally succumb to sleep.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  JOHN

  Post-Thanksgiving

  “Your mother and I missed you at Thanksgiving,” Dad says over an impromptu lunch in his office.

  I’d brought a couple of burgers over after he’d asked to meet. Before I’d relented, I had considered telling him no in a variety of not so kind ways I might have later regretted. But, in all honesty, I was starting to miss my dad, and I also figured if he and Mom were up to something with Emma, then he might just slip and let me know before they could do any real damage.

  “You know why I couldn’t be there, Dad.”

  As long as my parents insist that I’m making a terrible mistake with Emma—a sentiment that is being spread like a cancer through my friends, Court having already expressed concerns and Meg doing the same in hushed whispers after our Thanksgiving dinner at Stephen’s house—I’ll be staying away from Medina.

  “Yes, you’ve made your feelings very clear,” he says, his demeanor calm, “but it would have been poor form for us not to invite Madison and her family after all these years. Just imagine the embarrassment if you’d arrived with Emma?”

  “I’m willing to be friends with Madison and her entire god damn family, Dad, but she and Mom… and you… are hell bent on destroying what I have with Emma because what… she wasn’t born with the right pedigree?”

  “I’m sure it appears that way to you, son,” Dad says like he’s already prepared a canned answer for this. “But I think the major issue right now is the speed with which you’re taking this whole thing. You were with Madison for seven years, son, and then you’re suddenly engaged to a girl you’ve known for a few months, a girl with some fairly major issues I might add?”

  I push my food away, having just lost my appetite. “So, what, I’m supposed to pretend I don’t love Emma just because she might have a little baggage, then leave an opening for some other guy because I’m too much of a coward to deal with it?”

  Dad puts his hand to the back of his head and winces. “I would hardly call it cowardly, son. And as long as your focus is on Emma, you aren’t seeing the people you’ve hurt.”

  “Who am I hurting?”

  “Madison for a start.”

  I grimace. “Madison was basically leading me around on a leash. You all think she’s so hurt, but she doesn’t even love me… says she does, but is it love when someone can only accept you so long as you’re following their lead?”

  Dad shakes his head. “She simply wants to bring the best out in you. It’s what we all want to see, and beyond that, your mother had been so looking forward to helping plan the eventual wedding—”

  “So, let her!” I say with exasperation, Dad missing the point about absolutely everything. “If Mom wants a wedding to plan, then she can help Emma and I with ours!”

  “What’s all this arguing about? I can hear you both all the way down the hall.”

  I turn, but I certainly don’t need any visual confirmation to know that voice belongs to my mother, the scent of lilacs wafting in with her. She closes the door behind her and walks into Dad’s office as though this is part of her daily routine, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

  Both Dad and I stand out of habit, and I make sure to give Dad an accusing glare. He answers with a shrug, as if to say he’s not sorry for tricking me into seeing Mom.

  “What do you think?” I turn to her, not even trying to be nice. “We’re talking about the one thing that you just can’t accept.”

  Mom narrows her eyes at me and then sits quietly in one of the more comfortable chairs in Dad’s office.

  “Good to see your, dear,” Dad says, he and I both sitting down now.

  “Likewise,” she replies, coolly. “And you, Jonathan. It’s been ages. And the first thing you do is accuse me of something.”

  With school and the legal clinic, I’m beyond tired, and I don’t have time for this crap. “You know damn well what you’re doing, Mom. And it’s only going to make Emma and I stronger.”

  Mom turns to Dad for a moment, something unspoken between them, before she eyes me again.

  “I hadn’t wanted to do this, Jonathan, but you’ve left me no choice.”

  “Do what?” I ask, unafraid of whatever it is she has planned for me.

  “Do you realize that Emma had an ongoing affair
with her high school teacher? The man went to prison for it.”

  “Yes, I know that,” I say. “Jesus, Mom, it’s practically old news, so don’t pretend you’re shocked I know. You obviously bled that information to Madison weeks ago, and she’s already trying to poison my friends with it.”

  Mom holds her head high, looking perturbed but not beaten.

  “And you know about the recordings? That this teacher took video of he and Emma together?”

  Dad sits back in his chair and sighs, rubbing at his temples.

  “I know that too,” I say with a stone face. “What else have you got for me, Mom?”

  “And that doesn’t worry you? That there are recordings of the girl you want to marry having sex with her teacher out there?” She looks aghast.

  I shake my head. “What worries me is that my mother knows things that only the court system and people close to Emma should know. If you’ve gone and procured evidence on her with unseemly methods, then you might just be in deep shit, Mom.”

  “Son!” Dad barks. “Do not talk to your mother that way.”

  Undeterred, I continue. “You guys say that you love me, and yet here you are trying to ruin my chance at happiness and destroy an innocent girl’s life right along with it.”

  “She’s not innocent,” Mom snarls back. “And there’s more to this. I’m sure of it. You may think my methods unseemly, but I don’t really care when it comes to your welfare. That girl is hiding plenty, and when it’s all out in the open, you’re going to thank me.”

  “Doubtful,” I say, feeling like I’m in a really bad movie where my mom is the soon to be clichéd monster of a mother-in-law.

  “Oh, I don’t think so,” Mom says as though she’s gained the upper hand. “And even if there isn’t more, what do you think would happen if those recordings got out, available for public consumption?”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” I warn.

  “I wouldn’t, but how do you know someone else won’t? And even if people don’t see the tapes, what would they think of you and your future wife knowing they even exist?”

  “Perhaps we’re going a bit overboard, Patricia,” Dad says.

  “Oh, are we?” Mom eyes him sharply before settling back to me.

  “If you push this, keep digging, keep spreading things about Emma, then I’ll never speak to you again,” I say through clenched teeth.

  “You will,” Mom says with a smug tone. “Just like you did after Alicia.”

  I’m stunned for all of a second because it doesn’t shock me that she brings Alicia up—it only reminds me what my mother, in fact what both of my parents, are capable of.

  “Perhaps such drastic measures aren’t needed this time around,” Dad says.

  I hear him, but my eyes are locked onto my mother’s, trying to imagine just how far she’d go to break Emma and I up.

  “At least I have his attention,” Mom says, talking to Dad but looking at me. “Alicia was leading you down a very dangerous road, Jonathan, a road that would have ruined you had you continued on it. And let me just say that what I did to her will pale in comparison to what I’ll do with Emma.”

  “You’re sick.” I want to throw up. I want to find Emma and get as far from my family as humanly possible. “And whatever you’re planning… if you even step an inch across a legal line to hurt her, I won’t hesitate at turning you in.”

  “I don’t care,” she says, her voice as cold as ice. “I don’t give a damn as long as I’m protecting you and our legacy, as long as I know that my actions will allow you to marry someone who knows how to conduct themselves and will extend our legacy to your children, my grandchildren. That’s something I’d even be willing to go to jail for if I had to.”

  “You’re just going to sit there and let her talk like this?” I ask my silent father.

  “All you have to do is break things off with her,” Dad says resigned, as if doing so will save him the inconvenience of supporting Mom’s witch hunt.

  “God, I’m ashamed to be your son.” I’m up and out the door before either of them can say a word, or maybe I just tuned them out.

  It doesn’t feel as though I can even breathe properly until I’m outside of the building downtown, able to suck in the chilled early December air. This coming Christmas was supposed to be my first with Emma, she and I a united front. But as long as my parents remain hell-bent on keeping us apart, what will be the final cost to Emma?

  I hadn’t loved Alicia, not in the adult, full throttle kind of way I love Emma. At fifteen, I’d willingly followed Alicia into trouble, perhaps tired of the rigid life I’d lived, one that was full of school and sports and a constant sense that I was being primed to be just like my dad. And just like my father, I would be expected to make my family proud, to accept the path they’d chosen for me, to turn my back, as he had, on a chance at true love or the forging of my own destiny.

  “You ever done blow?” Alicia had asked one night in her room after I’d snuck in through her window.

  “Blow? Like cocaine?” I’d asked, having only heard that word used in the movies.

  “Yes, like cocaine,” she’d said, sounding so worldly. “You want to do some with me?”

  I hadn’t been sure, but I relented and kind of liked it. And once I’d done that, I tried other things with her until I was going on weekend benders and asking if we could score some acid or ecstasy. Pot and alcohol were backups when we couldn’t, and while I hated the way meth made me feel, I’d do it right alongside Alicia when she was in the mood. Everything I’d done with her, including the sex, had been willingly, even if I knew deep down that making those choices was fucking my life up. Somehow, it was easier to dismiss all the bad because of the way she’d made me feel, alive and in control, even if I really wasn’t.

  But just as Alicia had unexpectedly come into my life, she was unceremoniously removed from it. My mother could have kept the secret as to why Alicia had gone, but she hadn’t been able to contain herself, almost bragging about how she’d gotten rid of her, perhaps a warning to me more than anything.

  “I’m telling you this so you don’t make the same mistake again,” she’d said several weeks after Alicia had left school and I’d been unable to contact her again. “She made some bad choices, Jonathan. It might hurt at first, these things I’m going to say, but you’ll get over them soon enough.”

  “What are you talking about?” I’d demanded, still hurt over Alicia’s disappearance.

  “I had her followed. That girl was cheating on you, Jonathan, with men who were older and should have known better. It’s okay if you don’t believe me because I have the pictures to prove it. I shared those with her parents, and you can imagine their outrage at seeing them, at the implication of how they could destroy a girl’s life.” Mom raised her brows and shook her head ever so slightly. “Alicia balked of course. She lied right to her parents’ faces, said they must have been photo-shopped, but her parents aren’t that stupid. And I think they know what kind of girl they’d raised.

  “She did try to test me,” she continued, methodically. “Came to our house, barged right in the front door and called me all sorts of names. Of course I informed her she’d decided to mess with the wrong woman. And that’s when the pictures made their way onto the Internet. You might see them someday. No nudity of course—I know better than that, and I’m not classless. But there was just enough for everyone to get the idea that Alicia Dowenger isn’t the type of girl any respectable young man would want to be with.”

  I’d sat in stunned silence listening to her, my mother, telling me how she’d gone about destroying Alicia’s life like it had been something on her to-do list.

  “You’ll thank me for this,” Mom had said. “She’s been sent to a boarding school in Houston, and I think her parents will be uprooting themselves as well. There’s nothing for them in Medina, or Seattle for that matter, and they know that. I’ve also told her that if she contacts you, there will be further consequences.”

/>   I hadn’t challenged my mother or begged her to get Alicia back to Seattle. I was hurt my girlfriend had cheated on me, but it hadn’t been devastating because, deep down, I knew I didn’t love her. But I did care about her, and didn’t that necessitate I do something? It didn’t seem fair because there wasn’t any punishment for me except a short stint in a rehab program. I’d done just as many drugs as Alicia, lied about where I’d been going and what I’d been doing. I’d lost my way, but Mom’s answer, one Dad agreed with by his silence on the matter, was to go after the girl they believed led me astray.

  But I had no idea what to do in response. Contacting Alicia to tell her I was sorry might have just exacerbated things more, so I tried to forget about it, forget about her. When I’d found out through a friend who apparently still was in contact with Alicia that she’d tried to kill herself a year after she’d been shipped to that boarding school in Houston, I couldn’t be sure if it was because of what my mother had done or because she’d just been that troubled.

  I’d felt horrible for Alicia, but that pales in comparison to the fear I have for what my parents might do to Emma. Mom barely flinched at the mention of jail or me never speaking to her again, so would I really be able to stop her from hurting her? Just the idea of her being caught in their crosshairs scares the hell out of me, but what scares me just as much is the insidious thought that to protect Emma, I might just have to let her go.

  EMMA

  “You’ve been acting funny all week,” I tell John as we steal an hour or two from our hectic schedules to do some Christmas shopping.

  “I’m sorry,” he says, putting his arm around me as we walk down Fifth Avenue in Seattle, the city around us festive, full of holiday lights, shoppers and revelers, so different from he and I at this moment.

  “There’s something on your mind,” I say, hating conflict and wishing I could brush things under the carpet and just enjoy the holiday season, but I can’t. “I wish you’d tell me.”