Page 69 of That Time I Kissed My Beachfront Boss

“Nope. No pity.” He bobs his head. “Just a chance to get something off my chest.”

“I’m not sure that’s going to help me feel better about my situation.”

“Maybe it’s not about helping you feel better,” he says. “Maybe I find you easy to talk to.”

“You think I’m easy to talk to?”

“Believe me.” He arches a brow. “I’m as surprised as you are.”

A small laugh escapes me, and I appreciate the fact that he’s trying to keep things between us light. And anyway, I’ve got nothing to lose and only information about Hudson to gain. So I lift my chin. “All right. Hit me with your big bad secret. I’m ready.”

“I don’t know if you are.” He flashes me a smile that doesn’t quite light up his face. “My deception lasted almost a decade.”

“Hmm.” I plant my palms flat on the table and try on a smirk. “So this is a confession competition now? And you think yours is worse than mine?”

“Absolutely not,” he says. “I was just a kid too, and I stand by the fact that age makes a difference.”

“Ah.” I splay my hands. “In that case, I’ll try not to judge you too harshly.”

He huffs out an almost-laugh, and I’m hoping I’ve eased the tension enough for him to go ahead and spill. “You probably should judge me,” he says, glancing around, lowering his voice. “Because I kind of killed off my mom.”

“Ha ha.” I take a beat. But when Hudson doesn’t laugh back, I feel my face wrinkling in confusion. “Wait. What?”

“Yeah. Sorry. It sounded weird saying it too.” He scrapes a hand over his chin. “But it’s true. When I was in boarding school—for more than ten years—I told all my friends my mother was dead.”

I nod, without saying a word or reacting to what Hudson is saying now. I shouldn’t have ha ha’d him in the first place, and I won’t make that mistake again.

“I got a lot of sympathy and special treatment,” he continues. “People were extra nice to poor, motherless Hudson. But my mom was totally alive. She just had no interest in me. To be honest, she still doesn’t.”

I nod again, hoping he can’t tell I’m totally biting my tongue.

“I’m over it now,” he says, “but back then, it felt a whole lot better pretending I didn’t have a mom than admitting she didn’t want me. So, yeah.” He shrugs. “I killed her off.”

My stomach twists, and I feel a little sick, so I try to keep my voice even when I finally speak. “What made you think she had no interest in you?”

“I didn’t just think it. I knew.” His jaw ticks. “She left me and my dad to pursue her career as an artist when I was eight years old. And she stayed gone ever since.”

Wow. I draw in a slow breath, hold it for a few seconds, then I exhale, but I still stay silent. I can’t imagine my mother abandoning us. Losing my dad was hard enough, and I was practically an adult. Plus it wasn’t even his choice to leave.

“Before you go thinking I hate my mom,” Hudson says, “it’s the opposite. I still care about her, even though I tried not to for years. And the fact that she never cared back is kind of the worst. Like, think about it: How bad a kid must I have been that my own mom not only walked out, but stayed away?”

Suddenly I picture Hudson as a little boy. Crooked teeth. Shaggy hair. Skinny legs. Missing his mom. My heart cracks down the middle.

“Still,” he continues. “Lots of kids really do lose their moms. And I was just faking it. So I feel pretty awful about that now.”

“Life is complicated,” I say. “And I’m guessing her leaving wasn’t about you.”

“Yeah, except I heard the words from her own mouth.”

“What words specifically?”

“She told my dad she never wanted to be a mother.” He clears his throat. “That our family was a mistake. That I was a mistake. And she wouldn’t let us hold her back any longer.”

Okay. That’s pretty specific. I work to swallow the emotions bubbling up for me. Hudson thinks I’m easy to talk to, so listening is the least I can do for him. I don’t want to make things more difficult by inserting my own reactions into what he’s sharing.

“I shouldn’t have been eavesdropping,” he says, “but I couldn’t stop listening once I heard my name.” He pauses again to swallow hard, like he’s just a little kid again, finding out something terrible. “And to be honest, my mom was being so loud, I almost think she wanted me to know.”

“That must have been incredibly hard,” I say softly.

---