Page 56 of Crossroads of Love

I don’t know how much I can really trust Mike at this point, so it’s best to pretend to be clueless right now.

It’s taking everything in me to check myself and remain calm. I’m a stoic guy, but I’m finding it really hard to be that way right now.

“Well, it’s easy to put up a front for a few hours every now and then.”

How could I not see that my brother was acting, lying straight to my face?

“I had no clue.”

“He put on a good show for the rest of the world. Most people didn’t know.”

“Did Dad…?”

“The year before your brother passed away, his relationship with Henry was…explosive at best.”

“I didn’t know.”

“How would you? You weren’t here, nor really talking to either one of them.”

Ouch.

His words just add salt to my already hemorrhaging wound. All of this is a shock to my system. I’m only feeling a lot of anger right now, but I’m certain more will come soon.

“What is the next step with all of this? Is there a way for us to do what needs to be done without Jayla or Lena ever finding out?”

“Not telling them would just be prolonging the inevitable.” He shrugs. “They need to know. They need to be able to grieve and move forward. Lena has to show that she was still married to Aaron now. That’s where we’re at with everything. This woman is claiming otherwise. Regardless, Jayla and the child will receive death benefits, but Lena may have to pay back some of what was paid to her by the county. She and your father have driven themselves into bankruptcy while cleaning up the debt your brother left behind.”

“Lena is an intelligent woman. How does she not know about any of this?”

“Your dad thought he was protecting her and Jayla by not telling them. He didn’t want any of this to mar Jayla’s memory and send her down a bad path. Lena struggled a lot when she caught him cheating, obviously, but it was hard to pull her out of that, and…I think Henry was worried about losing her.”

My gut clenches thinking about Lena hurting so much. I rub the back of my neck as I fight the urge to hit something.

“Then what do I need to do next?”

“Keep looking through the paperwork and see what else you can find out. Things aren’t adding up, Gav, and I’m not figuring out why on my own.”

“I’ll keep looking through it all. I don’t want to tell Lena until I have physical proof, okay?” I ask.

“Of course not.”

How dare he?

How dare my brother do this to Lena and Jayla?

I’m so angry that I can barely see straight. I leave the office a few minutes later and go directly to my car. I sit in the front seat, staring at the road ahead of me for almost twenty minutes trying to calm down before I put the car in drive.

Had my dad not intervened, Lena wouldn’t be living with this mess.

Had I just said fuck it and come back for her, she wouldn’t be living in this mess.

As soon as I get to the farm, I go to the wood pile to start splitting logs for the fireplace.

I need to beat something into submission to curb this anger.

How in the hell did my brother have a whole other family, and no one knew about it?

It feels gross to think that he used my life to lie to this woman. It all feels dirty and wrong.

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