Page 98 of Pallas & Kawehi

"Of course I did."

He shook his head. "You could have gotten someone to work for you. You own the place; you don't have to work like a servant."

"A servant? My family owns it, Nick! We all put in the work to make it a success. That's how a family business runs!"

"You've got a bunch of high school kids working tonight. Another worker behind the counter. You could-"

"We have high school kids because they need work experience. They work for us and go off to school. They're friends come to work after them and the other worker? Cyma is working at a bar down the street. She's helping out tonight so Maile and I could go out together and have some fun."

"Baby-"

"No!" She gave him a shove back, her anger overriding her caution. "You never wanted to understand what it's like for me. You wanted to go away for a weekend and told me on a Thursday. I didn't have time to get coverage and plane tickets were expensive."

"You own a-"

"We don't exactly rake in money, Nick. Until the Marines started to come in for food and bowling, we were struggling to come up with the money for the property tax bill. Thanks to the guys who've been coming in, we have a full house a couple nights a week and make some good money, but it wasn't like that when we were together. Do you get it, Nick?"

"I get it." He puffed out his chest and glared at her.

It was hard to remember thinking he was handsome before.

Seeing what was under it all made him look really ugly.

"Okay, so you want money from me? I don't have any."

"But you were able to buy the house without me on it for credit."

"You mean I was able to buy it even though you had bad credit. I did that because I'd saved a bunch of money. I had a scholarship at UH. I didn't go beyond my bachelor’s in hospitality management and went to work. I don't do much more than work. Something you apparently thought was me withholding love from you. I loved you, Nick. Now, I'm seeing that I didn't even know who I was in love with, but I don't think you ever tried to get to know me.

"You made a lot of assumptions about why I did things instead of asking and then one day, you walked away. What did I do to deserve that?"

The question flew out before she could think better of it.

She certainly didn't expect an answer.

But he certainly gave her one.

"You were boring. And I got tired of you."

Tired of you.

"I came to paradise and thought I'd found the perfect woman. I gave you all the love I had and then there just wasn't anything left, so when they told me they were moving me to the East Coast, I packed my bag like a deployment and walked out of the house."

"A house you want now."

He shrugged. "A house I deserve for all the time and energy I put into you."

She shook her head.

"This wasn't a... a transaction," she told him. "It was a relationship."

"Marriage," he shot back, "is a contract and you... weren't worth it."

If he'd punched her in the face, it wouldn't have hurt as much as the way his words cut into her.

"And now, thanks to that stunt you pulled with the process servers, I'm in some fucking hot water with my wife and her father."

Kawehi stood there taking hit after hit unable to react anymore.

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