At First Hate, page 26
“She’s sick, but she’s not dead,” my mom spat. “Not yet.”
I gasped at the words. Maddox winced. But Gra… Gran was devastated. Her face fell. Tears came to her eyes. Her body shook at the words. At the callous way she’d thrown it out there. As if she didn’t even care if Gran died. She’d finally get a portion of Gran’s money. She’d get the house. She’d ruin Gran’s legacy with her obsession with youth and money and men.
“Leave,” Gran said, so soft that I barely heard it.
“What did you say?” Mom asked.
“I said, leave. It’s over, Hannah. You’ll get no more money from me.”
“What? Mom?”
“No. I gave and gave and gave. I respected your choices. I had compassion for your pain. I accepted all of that. But I can’t accept that you would rather have me dead than alive. I can’t sit here and be disrespected any longer.”
“That is not—”
“Go!” she shouted. “I don’t ever want to see your face again.”
Mom’s eyes rounded. “Seriously? Just like that, you’re going to turn your back on your daughter?”
A tear slid from Gran’s eye. She looked away from her. “You’re not my daughter.”
My mom’s jaw dropped at those words. Not because of the pain that she’d caused her own mother, but because she wasn’t going to get her way. Maddox and I stepped in front of her.
“Go,” I repeated. “You’ve done enough damage.”
She opened her mouth again, but Maddox muscled her forward out of the room. “It’s over,” he growled before shutting the door after she left.
I rushed to Gran’s side. “Are you okay?”
Gran vacantly looked off. “No, honey, I’m not. I should have done that a long time ago.”
I agreed but didn’t say so. “What can I do?”
She patted my hand. “Just sit here with me.”
Tears slid down her cheeks, even as I saw her face harden. “Both of my daughters… gone to me. Hannah was always troubled, but I thought if I was there for her, then she’d come around. She never did. And Ruth…” She coughed around the pain. “Well, Ruth never wanted anything to do with me. I haven’t even seen her in over a decade. I’ve tried, but she wants nothing to do with me. I doubt she’s coming today. No matter what Hannah said.” She reached for me and Maddox. “At least I have you two. My two children.”
Maddox came to her other side and touched her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Gran. Mom is the worst.”
Gran looked between us and said solemnly, “Don’t ever mention them in my presence again.”
I swallowed hard at those words. I’d long ago written off my mother and aunt. But hearing that it had finally gotten through to Gran… that was a whole new level of pain. I hated it for her. That she finally saw the world for how it really was. That bad people didn’t change. They kept taking advantage of hospitality as long as it was offered. Seeing that realization on my Gran’s face made everything so much worse. As if it had drained the life from her too.
I held her hand helplessly. It was all I could do.
“We’ll have next semester, Gran,” I whispered once a nurse came in and gave her something to fall asleep. “I’ll be here all the time. You’ll feel better, and we’ll do all the fun things together. I’ll be the daughter you never had.”
37
Savannah
Present — Derek
Ash answered the door already holding a beer. His brow furrowed. “What are you doing here?”
I hefted a bottle of whiskey. “Care for something harder?”
His eyes held mine. Ash and I had been friends for a long time. Our parents had thrown us together as kids. Despite me being two years older, we hung out all the way through college. Only drifting apart when I was gone at Harvard and then hanging out more when I returned without Marley, a brokenhearted idiot. He’d been the best man at my wedding. He knew when something was up.
“Always,” Ash said, throwing the door wide.
That was the best part about our friendship. Neither of us ever had to fucking talk about it. He’d eventually heard what had gone down with Marley. I obviously knew all the nuances of his relationship with the infamous Delilah Greer. But we never made the other talk before he was ready.
And tonight, if I was honest, I’d prefer to get drunk and forget that conversation with Mars entirely. She hadn’t been wrong. It had been impossible to argue. Though I’d fucking tried. I wanted her. I’d always wanted her. One kiss in my parents’ house at a Halloween party had sealed that long ago. But that didn’t change how fucked up our relationship was time and time again.
Was I an idiot for pursuing her while working against her? A hundred percent.
Would I do it all over again? Every. Single. Time.
I opened the bottle of Four Roses and poured us each a glass. I downed mine before Ash even picked his up and then poured another. Ash took the drink, swirling it around and sipping on it. It wasn’t actually for shooting. I just needed something to burn on the way down.
“What are you watching?” I asked instead of answering the look from my best friend. I could hear a game on in the background.
“The end of the Ole Miss-Auburn game.”
I took another sip. “Who’s winning?”
“Auburn has been leading the whole game. Ole Miss is trying to make a comeback.”
“Good,” I said, not really caring either way.
Ash took his drink back to the couch, and we sat in silence for the final five minutes of the game. Auburn clinched their win. Neither of us had been raised on SEC football, but it was hard to grow up in Georgia and not hate both teams. Either of them losing felt like a victory.
Ash polished off his drink and set it down. “I know I’m not exactly one to talk,” he began. “You let me drink the last couple months and never complained.”
“You had a good reason.”
He tipped his head at me. “True. I came out of it on the other side though because you never disappeared or pushed or tried to make me feel bad about slowly turning into an alcoholic.”
“Are you on the other side of it?” I asked honestly. Glad to not be talking about my own fucking problem.
Ash’s eyes went distant for a moment. A pain crossed his face. “I’m better. I don’t know if I’ll ever be fully over it, but I don’t want to drink myself to death anymore. My work is suffering. My life is…” He trailed off. As if admitting everything that had been his last several months of existence would make it worse. “Look, it fucking sucks. I just want to be on the other side of it.”
“I’m glad.”
“I don’t want you there either.”
I breathed out heavily and downed the last of my whiskey. “Yeah.”
“So, what happened?”
“You’re actually asking?”
“I’ve known you a long-ass time, man. We’ve been through the wringer. And as much as I hated to see it, you and Marley were happy. Today on the sailboat, you were a different man. Even Amelia has been saying how happy she is for you. And she hated Kasey.”
“She didn’t hate her.” I didn’t know why I was defending Kasey when I currently despised my ex-wife.
Ash laughed. “Yeah, she did. She’s just good at hiding it. She has Ballentine-level emotional control.”
Huh. I knew that Mia hated Kasey now, but I hadn’t realized it was the whole time. Maybe she was a better judge of character than I was.
“Marley went back to Atlanta,” I finally confessed.
“Why?”
“Why do you think? I’m representing her mom in a case to take all the money and the only home she’s ever known.”
“Then drop the case.”
I blew out a harsh breath. “It’s a test from my father. This is how I get partner. It’s what I’ve been working a hundred hours a week to get. It’s all I’ve ever really wanted. And she said it wasn’t fair to ask me to quit and that it also wasn’t fair for us to be together with it between us. We’ve had fifteen years to get this together, and it’s not working. I asked her to stay, but she left.”
“I don’t know how to say this gently,” Ash said with narrowed eyes, “but fuck you.”
I laughed. “What the fuck?”
“Let me get this straight. She left because you care more about this case than her?”
“No.”
He continued as if he hadn’t heard me, “And have you considered that working a hundred hours a week is why you lost your last wife?”
I glared at him. “She was crazy.”
“She was. But you were never home, and she found other ways to entertain herself. Not the right ways, obviously, but it can’t be easy to never see the person you’re married to.”
I sat stock-still under Ash’s imperious gaze. He wasn’t wrong about Kasey, but it didn’t make it any easier to hear.
“Well, I plan to work less once I hit partner. It’ll be a moment to breathe.”
Ash raised his hand. “Just shut up for a second. Stop trying to rationalize this bullshit.” His face went suddenly deathly serious. “I would have given up anything to be with Lila. Anything. It didn’t work, and it wasn’t enough. Are you telling me that you can tell your dad to fuck off and drop this case and you won’t do it?”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Yes or no, motherfucker?” Ash asked, getting heated. “Is your job more important than Marley?”
“No,” I ground out.
“Would you be fired for dropping this case?”
“No, but—”
“No,” he spat. “No, you fucking wouldn’t. And even if you were, you’re a goddamn Ballentine. So, who the fuck cares? You’d have another job tomorrow.”
“That’s not—”
“Do you love her?” Ash asked.
I gritted my teeth and then nodded. “Yeah, I fucking love her.”
“That’s what I thought. You’ve been happier in the last couple months than I’ve seen you in years. Kasey never made you happy like this. Not ever.”
I looked back at the last couple years of my life. Had I really not been happy with Kasey? I tried to remember what it had been like when we first met. With all the bullshit clouding our past, it was hard to think about it. But even then, even in the beginning, it had always been that we made sense. Not that I felt young and in love and carefree. I hadn’t. I’d just wanted someone to make me forget Marley.
I’d told myself that I was as happy as I had been with Mars, but it wasn’t true. It was always hard. It was always a problem. I just ignored the issues. It had been easier that way.
Now, I had exactly what I wanted. Was I just going to let her go? Could I live with myself if I did?
I looked at Ash and saw a shell of the person he’d been when he was with Lila. He was just coming out of it and willing to see that he could be someone else without her. I didn’t want to go through that. I didn’t want a life without Marley.
“Fuck,” I spat.
Ash smiled then. “Glad you finally got there.”
“I have to go after her.”
“Yeah, you idiot,” Ash said with a laugh.
I shook my best friend’s hand. He looked happy for me and just a touch sad. Sad that it wouldn’t be that easy for him. But still, he wanted this for me, and I appreciated him saying the things I hadn’t wanted to hear.
“Thanks for everything,” I told him.
His smile widened. “Glad to help.”
“You’re a dick though.”
He laughed. “Yeah. And you’re an asshole.”
“True. We’re quite a pair.”
Ash pushed me toward the door. “Go the fuck after her.”
“I will,” I told him with confidence. “But I have to do one thing first.”
38
Atlanta
Present
Cole Davis pulled me into a hug before Lila could even get inside my apartment. I leaned into my best friend’s boyfriend and tried to keep it together. Lila had known Cole nearly as long as Ash. They had a history that rivaled that whole problem with Ash. If anyone knew what I was going through, it was them.
“Sorry to hear about all this,” he said. “We brought pizza.”
“And ice cream.” Lila held it up and pushed her boyfriend out of the way. “I brought the goods.” She shoved everything into Cole’s hands and then gave me a hug. “We love you, Mars.”
“Love you too.” I sniffled and headed into the kitchen.
I’d gotten back into Atlanta late the night before after talking on the phone the entire four-hour drive back. Lila for the beginning and switching to Josie for the West Coast time on the drive. Lila had insisted she’d come over the next day since it was the Falcons bye week. Josie was jumping on the first flight into Atlanta, even when I’d insisted she didn’t need to fly in from LA when she’d been here last weekend. But she’d laughed at me and bought tickets while we were on the phone.
Now, Lila and Cole were here with pizza and ice cream. They both rolled their eyes when I told them Josie would be here soon.
“It’s just like her to do some grand gesture,” Lila said with a laugh.
Cole shook his head. “Josie is one of a kind.”
“You just like her because of what she did this summer.”
“Hey, I can’t deny that,” he said with a mischievous smile as he dipped his head in for a kiss.
I rolled my eyes at their display. I wasn’t mad that they were happy. They deserved it and all, but sometimes the cute was a lot.
I loaded up a paper plate with pizza and sank onto the couch to watch the Sunday night game. Both Lila and Cole worked for the Falcons and had always loved professional football. Cole’s dad had been a coach for the team since they were in college. I didn’t care much about any of it, but it was mind-numbing enough and had the benefit that I didn’t have to interact.
“Patriots are definitely going to hold on to this one.”
Cole laughed. “Nah, Sunflower. I think the Ravens have this one.”
“They’re undefeated. It seems unlikely,” she said, nudging him out of the way. She pointed at me. “Drink?”
“I’m okay. I’ll take the ice cream though.”
“Your wish is my command.”
Cole went on about how the Ravens were the superior team. He had a list of facts that mostly went over my head, but Lila could keep up with him. She loved football more than anyone I’d ever met, and Cole Davis had played college ball at UGA. Match made in heaven.
Lila handed me the pint of strawberry, and I dived in.
I’d cried on the way home, but I’d been bereft since then. It was like I couldn’t bring myself to cry over Derek anymore. After all, I’d brought the whole thing on myself. I hated him the moment I saw him step up to Gran’s front door. I knew how much of a bad idea it was. Over and over again, we’d hurt each other. If only I’d sworn him off like I’d decided after finding out about Kasey.
But no, I went back for more. I convinced myself that Gran’s death was a new moment for me. She’d wanted me to be happy. She had always wanted that for me. Derek was the one I wanted. It had never been easy to stay away from him. Especially when he was the person who had been there for me after Gramps. A part of me wanted him to be the one to put me back together again after Gran too.
Instead, I’d put myself in an impossible situation and given my mother ammunition. She really had a relentless desire to ruin every single person around her. She’d even sent Gran to an early grave. That argument I’d witnessed in the hospital was the final straw in more than one way for Gran. Unbeknownst to me, she changed her will the next day. Cut my mom out of it for the bullshit she’d pulled in the hospital and Aunt Ruth for not ever giving a shit in the first place. One daughter who only wanted her money and another who lived in the same damn town and hadn’t seen her in more than a decade. Quite a pair.
By doing so, a part of Gran was cut off too. The doctors had bad news about her cancer. It had progressed much farther and faster than they’d thought. Gran didn’t have any more fight left in her. Nothing left after the destruction of her family. She’d given everything to me and Maddox, and then she’d left.
I wished she were still here. It was still impossible to think that she was actually gone. That I couldn’t call and ask her advice. To hear her on the other end, telling me something silly and somehow serious at the same time. The best advice that I never expected.
What would she think of Derek? Would she tell me I was a fool for leaving or that I was her brave little chickadee for having the courage to end it? The worst part was that she was gone, and I’d never have an answer.
I stared down into my ice cream, the game forgotten. My emotions were too close to the surface. Everything too fragile. I needed to get back into the lab and try to lose myself in work. That might help for a little while.
Lila snapped in front of my face. “Earth to Mars.”
I laughed hollowly. “Sorry. I guess I zoned out.”
“You want to watch something else?”
Cole made a sound of protest, and Lila flicked her gaze to him.
“Anything you want,” he said with a perfectly innocent look on his face.
“No, I’m fine. We can keep the game on,” I told them.
Lila opened her mouth to argue, but then the door burst open.
“Honey, I’m home!” Josie announced. She was all decked out in a black minidress and high heels. Her oversize sunglasses obscured half of her face, and her black hair hung down in waves nearly to her waist.
“You wore that on the plane?” Lila asked with a laugh.
“Some people travel in style.” Josie dropped her Louis Vuitton luggage and kicked the door closed. “Now, what the hell is happening here?”
I dropped the tub of ice cream and gave her a hug. “Pizza, ice cream, and football.”
Josie looked between Lila and Cole. She dramatically yanked her glasses off and pointed it between them. “I approve of what is happening here, but you’re entirely too cute for a girls’ night.”
