Drown in You, page 22
Luke
The equipment manager got the video taken down as soon as I reported it to him, but the damage was already done. Ma called me and Sienna home after three hockey moms asked her if she knew about the sex tape featuring her son and his new stepsister.
Bud is blissfully unaware of the tension in the family room as our parents sit facing us on the opposite couch. He drools on our hands and his tail wags hard enough to knock over an empty mug on the coffee table.
Sienna’s mom has already driven up from Wakefield so we can all figure out how the hell we’re going to handle this situation. Videos like that don’t get posted to social media for even five minutes without getting uploaded to porn sites. Who knows where that video is floating around the internet by now.
On the couch beside me, Sienna is stiff as a board. This is her worst nightmare—our secret being revealed. Now everyone knows what we’ve been doing behind closed doors. And right out in the fucking open, apparently.
What the fuck is wrong with me? Why didn’t I think to lock the fucking door? I screwed up. Even if Marcus was the asshole who filmed that video and hacked the Devils’ social media page to share it for all to see, I’m the one who failed Sienna. I failed to protect her.
All I do is hurt her.
Ma is nursing a dark liquid in her hard liquor mug. Mike is perched on the edge of the opposite couch, dragging his hands over his face. Sienna’s mom paces in the room between all of us. Not exactly how I was hoping to meet her for the first time. Definitely not the first impression I wanted to make. She’ll never think I’m good enough for her daughter now.
Her brown hair is the same shade as Sienna’s but cropped just past her shoulders. Sienna got her willowy build from her mom, but her green eyes came from her dad. As she paces, her mom tucks her hair behind her ears over and over like a compulsion.
“You two are very, very lucky I have connections in law enforcement.” Ma sets her mug down on the coffee table. “We’ll make sure that video is wiped from the internet. We might be able to find out who posted it, but that will be difficult. Best-case scenario: We may be able to charge them for distributing revenge porn, but it’s hard to get justice in these types of cases.”
Sienna shifts uncomfortably at revenge porn. I can’t believe I’ve gotten her roped into this fucking mess.
“What the hell were you two thinking?” Sienna’s mom bursts out. Beside me, her daughter flinches. “This might actually be the stupidest thing I could imagine you doing. Hooking up drunk at a party? You grew up in the age of social media. Even I knew not to do that shit at your age, and we didn’t all have cameras in our pockets.”
“I’m sorry,” Sienna murmurs, gaze glued to the hands clasped tight in her lap.
God, I can’t fucking stand to see her like this. I squeeze her leg, even as she stiffens. “It’s my fault. It was all me.”
Her mom lets out a frustrated sigh. “It doesn’t really matter whose fault it is at this point. You both were there; you both screwed up. What we need to focus on now is getting that video taken down.”
“We’ll get it taken care of, Sarah,” Mike assures her, voice warm and soothing.
He’s practically entranced by her. Now that he’s not dragging his hands over his face, his eyes don’t move from Sarah.
She nods at him, managing a weak smile. Pain lingers in her gaze when she meets his.
Mike looks at Sarah the way my father looked at my mother. The way I look at Sienna.
I still wasn’t really over Sienna’s mom. I wasn’t ready to love again. That’s what he told us when I asked why he and Ma broke up all those years ago.
I’ve spent the years since trying to become better for her, to deserve her. But it wasn’t until I found therapy last year that I was able to really start trying to be the man I’ve always wanted to be. By then, I knew it was already too late.
My hunch was right. Mike doesn’t love Ma the way I love Sienna.
Because he’s still in love with his ex-wife.
And by the looks of it, the feeling is mutual.
“What about these two?” Ma points between me and Sienna. All three of them fix their gazes on us.
Sienna’s leg stiffens beneath my palm, but I don’t move. I’m not letting her go. I’m not letting them rip us apart. This isn’t some fling. We love each other, way more than the married couple in the room.
“I’m in love with Sienna.” I glance at her, but she refuses to look at me. Refuses to look anywhere other than her lap. “I know we screwed up. What we did was stupid, what I did was stupid, and I’m sorry for the mess I made. But you’ll have to pry her out of my cold, dead hands if you want to keep us apart.”
Ma covers her mouth, eyes shimmering.
Mike glances at Sarah, deferring to her to make the call. She frowns at us. My confession doesn’t seem to have warmed her to me. That’s fine. I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to win her approval if that’s what it takes to keep Sienna.
“For now, let’s focus on getting that video removed from the internet. After that, we’ll discuss your relationship.” She folds her arms. “You two will stay here until we can get this sorted out. In separate rooms.”
Chapter 26
Sienna
When my phone lights up on my bed beside me, I expect it to be Luke asking me to sneak over to his room. Not a chance. We’ve already made enough of a mess today.
But the text isn’t from Luke. It’s from Deb.
Deb
Hey, honey. Can you come downstairs?
My heart is in my throat the entire way. Is sweet Deb finally going to chew me out for getting her son embroiled in a revenge porn case? Accuse me of being the succubus who lured her son off the right path? He was a well-behaved hockey goalie until he met me.
As much as he loves me, I’m not sure I’ve actually made his life better since I showed up. All I’ve done is brought the dark shadows of my past to his doorstep. Now I’ve gotten him wrapped up in this nightmare with me. That sex tape could jeopardize his spot on the Diamond Devils team. It could ruin his chances at the NHL.
The dream he and his dad shared. Lost because of me.
Mom, Dad, and Deb are probably all waiting for me so they can come up with some secret plot to get me out of town overnight. Send me somewhere before Luke can find out and follow me. Or Marcus.
In the kitchen, Deb sits at the table with Bud snoring softly at her feet. I halt in my tracks. I didn’t expect to find her alone.
From the family room, the grandfather clock ticks. A bouquet of the flowers Luke got me wilts in its vase on the counter. Deb has traded her mug for a wine glass and dark red liquid that stains her lips when she smiles at me.
Relief floods through my veins. She can still bring herself to smile at me, even after all I’ve put them through. All I’m still putting them through.
“Have a seat, honey.” She pours wine into the glass waiting for me.
I do as she requests, swirling the wine in my glass before taking a sip just for something to do. “I’m really sorry, Deb. For everything.”
The gentle smile never leaves her face. “When did you know you were in love with my son?”
“Um.” My brain scrambles. Is this some reverse psychology? She can’t actually want to know about her son’s relationship with his stepsister.
She swirls the wine in her glass. Maybe she’s drunk and she’ll forget this entire conversation in the morning. “It’s okay. Your parents might not condone it, and though I might not be thrilled about the circumstances either, I know that true love is an unstoppable force. No amount of reason or logic will talk you out of it. I’ve noticed the way my son looks at you for a while. He’s never looked at anyone that way.”
I swallow around the lump in my throat. “When I felt like I could finally tell him about the incident with Marcus . . . that’s when I knew I was falling for him. But when he protected me when Marcus showed up on campus . . . that’s when I knew I’d already fallen.” I grip the wine glass tight, trying to hold back the tears. “Except when I look back, I’m pretty sure I’ve been falling for him since he gave me that disposable camera.”
When he knelt and kissed my bruises in my hotel room. When he told me, I knew this is how it would be with you. When he insisted it wasn’t my fault my parents split up. When he bought me ten dozen flowers, simply because I told him it would make me feel better.
I’ve been falling for him for a long time. As long as he’s been falling for me. It just took me longer to realize it. To admit it.
“Did Luke ever tell you how I met his father?” Deb’s voice is tender, full of nostalgia.
I shake my head, eager for a story I hadn’t even thought to ask for. “Luke doesn’t really talk about his dad much.”
She sighs, gaze drifting up to the ceiling like she can see the memories playing out on a screen. “We were at the grocery store, and we both reached for the same bag of chips. The last bag. We spent the next ten minutes insisting that the other could take it until he finally bought the chips and split them with me.” A soft laugh passes through her lips. “We sat in that parking lot for two hours after we finished those chips, just talking and laughing. That man could make me laugh like nobody else. It wasn’t love at first sight or anything; I didn’t believe in that. But I had a gut feeling that he was special, and I was right.”
I can’t help but smile with her, even as a small twinge settles in my chest that I’ll never meet the man she and Luke loved so much. “I saw a picture. They looked so much alike.”
She beams. “Oh, exact replicas. If they’d been the same age, you’d guess they were twins.”
Silence falls between us as I debate when I should ask about the giant elephant in the room. I clutch the wine glass in front of me. Deb might be opening up to me and she may have welcomed me into her home with open arms, but we also don’t know each other that well and I don’t want to step on any toes. Except I also didn’t ask Dad the questions I wanted to for years and that didn’t do either of us any good.
Luke would tell me to ask. To be his brave girl.
“Deb?”
“Yeah, honey?”
“Do you love my father?”
The question falls between us. Deb hesitates for a beat too long. “I care about him.”
That’s not how I would answer that question about Luke. “I know. But . . . do you love him?”
She didn’t want to tell me the story about how she met my father—she wanted to tell me the story about how she met Luke’s.
Deb takes a gulp from her wine, draining the glass before sighing. “I think Mike still loves your mother.”
I shake my head quickly. “No, he loves you—”
“Sarah’s always been the one for him. He always wished he could win her back, but he never felt like he deserved her.”
I can’t deny it anymore because that’s almost exactly what my father told me when I confronted him about leaving us behind.
“Loneliness brought us together. But I’m not sure it’s enough glue to keep us that way.” She turns to me. “Do you think your mom still loves Mike?”
“She hasn’t said anything to me.” But even though my mom might not have ever admitted anything out loud, I know her.
I know the pain she’s suffered in the years since the divorce. How poorly she’s coped with the demise of their relationship. I could lie to spare Deb’s feelings, but I know what Luke’s lies have done to me and mine to him.
Deb deserves to hear the truth. We all do. “But I do think she’s always been searching for his replacement, and she’s never found one.”
In the family room earlier, she’d looked at Dad with longing in her eyes. For a love they once shared. For a life they once lived together. The same way I’m sure my friends have caught me looking at Luke. For a future we’ll never get while our parents are married.
“If I had to guess . . . I’d bet she’s still in love with him.”
After a stressful day of phone calls, hushed conversations, and outbursts, Deb has managed to get her lawyer and team on the case so they can figure out who did this and expunge the video from the internet.
But I already know exactly who’s behind this. “It was Marcus.”
All three of them turn to face me from where they’re hunched over computers and phones at the kitchen table, Deb with folders and a fan of printouts at her side.
Dad sits across from her while Mom stands nearby with her palms flat on the table. She frowns at me. “How would Marcus have gotten that video?”
“He filmed it himself.” I bite my lip. I never told her about the run-ins with Marcus on campus because I didn’t want to worry her after she’d sent me away to escape him. And after the Devils confronted him, I mistakenly thought Marcus wouldn’t dare to mess with me again. “I thought I saw him at that party, but he was wearing a mask and I was drinking, so . . . I convinced myself I was imagining it.”
Mom fixes her glare on Dad. “Did you know about this?”
He shakes his head, morose. “This is all news to me.”
Mom’s eyes fall shut. I’ve never disappointed her more than I have in the past two days. “How did he find you?”
“Luke found a tracker on my car. He attached it to the undercarriage where I wouldn’t see it.”
“Why didn’t you tell any of us, kiddo?” The words leave Dad’s mouth defeated. Like he’s somehow the one who screwed up, not me.
I bite my lip. “I didn’t want to worry you.”
“The only thing I need to do is worry about you, Sienna.”
Mom’s features soften at his words. Until Luke enters the room behind me, carrying his laptop to add to the cause. His empty hand brushes against the small of my back and I flinch, even though everyone already knows about us. Our parents are doing damage control after our sex tape hit our team’s official social media page. We shouldn’t exactly be reminding them of how we created this shitstorm.
“Now that we’re getting all of this settled, we need to talk about the two of you.” Mom folds her arms.
The thick knot in my stomach tightens. This is the moment I’ve been dreading—the moment our parents tell us we need to split up. That I’m being sent back home, or at the very least, far away from Luke. That it’s wrong for us to be together, even though nothing has ever felt more right.
When Luke flattens his hand against my back, I let him. I need his comfort right now more than ever. This may be the last time I ever get it. “Mom, please—”
“I love Sienna. We’re adults—”
“You can stay together.”
Everyone turns to Deb, her hands folded together on the table. A few beats of silence pass as her words register.
Mom’s head tilts in confusion. “Deb, what are you—?”
“I want an annulment.”
Luke’s hand on my back slides around to my waist to tug me to him. Behind his glasses, Dad’s eyes widen. But he doesn’t jump up and protest.
What the fuck is happening?
“Deb—what?” Mom stutters. “What’s going on?”
Deb manages a small smile at my parents. “I see the love between the two of you. If I could have a second chance with my late husband, I’d jump on it. I care about you, Mike, and I want you both to be with the one you really love.”
Mom shakes her head adamantly. “Mike loves you, Deb. He married you.” She turns to Dad, but when he stays silent, she prompts, “Right?”
But Dad’s mouth remains shut. He can’t meet either of their gazes.
Oh my god. Luke was right. Something has been off about their relationship this whole time.
Dad and Deb aren’t in love. They may care about each other, enough to convince themselves that they could settle for each other and escape the loneliness, but neither of them has felt for the other what they felt for their former spouses.
My parents are still in love. All these years later, even after a broken marriage, they’ve never stopped loving each other.
“It’s really okay.” Deb’s smile is impossibly warm. “I want what the two of you had. What me and my husband had.” Her smile grows when she turns to me and Luke. “What you two have.”
Luke squeezes me closer, and maybe now, he’ll never have to let me go. Deb obviously took what I said to her last night to heart. I never expected it would lead to this.
“I’m not going to be responsible for ruining another marriage.” Mom’s voice wobbles, eyes glistening.
“I hope you don’t actually believe that.” For the first time since Deb dropped the annulment bomb, Dad finds his voice. But it’s not to comfort Deb or convince her to stay with him—it’s to comfort my mom. “You’re not responsible for ruining this marriage, and you certainly weren’t responsible for ruining ours.”
Mom can’t say anything as his words choke her up more.
Dad nods to me and Luke. “Could you two give us a moment?”
Luke takes my hand and leads me out of the room, my mind still spinning. Still catching up on the sharp detour my life has just taken. All of our lives.
Behind us, Deb murmurs, “I’ve already filled out the paperwork.”
Chapter 27
Sienna
Luke and I rush upstairs, my heart thundering as Luke shuts his bedroom door behind us. “Holy shit! Did that really just happen?”
Deb wants an annulment. Our parents are splitting up. Because my parents still love each other.
“Yeah, it did.” Luke is just as shocked as I am.
“I feel awful. I told Deb last night that my mom still loves my dad. I shouldn’t have said anything.” If I’m the reason they’re breaking up, I’ll be crushed. I’ve already lived years of my life believing I was responsible for destroying one marriage. I don’t want to live with the knowledge that I broke up another.
“Don’t feel bad. It’s good you did. They’re not right for each other.” Luke rubs my arms in comforting strokes. “Do you think your parents will get back together?”
