Page 93 of Beautiful Defiance

Tired of fighting the fight inside me alone, I lean into him and rest my head on his shoulder. “Thank you for being my friend. For giving me a ride back from the shop.”

Surprise, surprise, Shay works at the auto store too.

“Anytime. That’s what friends are for, isn’t it? To be there for one another?”

Then where is Seven in all this?

* * *

Mid-week,I get news I’m not ready for. What Maddox tells me sets my world off-kilter. Makes me believe less in love. Makes me question my beliefs of what my parents had. Has me questioning whether what my mom told Alistair is the truth, that Thomas is my biological father.

“Leigh.” Maddox shoves his fingers in his hair. We’re on video chat, and in the window behind him is a view of the Golden Gate Bridge.

“Leigh, I’ve got shitty news. Leigh, you’re going to hate me. Leigh . . .”

God, when he keeps saying my name like that, with pity, I know the news is really, really bad, like vomit-inducing bad.

“Leigh, your mom filed for divorce. She and Tony planned on getting married.”

“That’s a lie.”

“Leigh, my guy talked to Tony’s brother. He said your mom and Tony were in love. They met when Tony answered a call of a break-in at the shop your mother worked at sewing those pretty dresses of hers.”

“He’s lying. My mother loved my father. She said he was her soul mate.”

“Believe what you want, kiddo, but your denial doesn’t make the divorce papers go away.”

I swallow down the bile in my throat. It wasn’t my obedience that got my mom and Alistair killed. It was my defiance, going back on my promise to my mom that I would never tell my dad about Tony.

If I hadn’t told, Alistair wouldn’t have driven us to the police station, confronted Tony, and got him and Mom killed when he pulled out his gun and Mom shielded him, getting shot too when the officers returned fire.

Oh, God, my defiance cost my parents their lives. “What else?”

“Tony and that kid Seven, his dad, Six . . . Six is Tony’s half-brother, Leigh. Six is the result of an affair, a bastard child, but no less an heir to the McCabe empire.”

Seven is related to the man who destroyed my family?

“I looked into the woman who was in the hotel room with Six. They were engaged. Word is she’s looking to reconnect.”

“In his hotel room? He’s married.”

“She’s not, and old flames die hard. I’m sorry.”

Hearing all this, finally processing that falling in love hurts and true love is never a guarantee, what my mom taught me when I was a little girl, the floodgates open. I burst out crying. Poor Maddox tugs at his collar.

“Leigh, please don’t cry.”

I cry harder. I want Seven. Long to tell him how wrong I was about my parents. That they were never in love the way I thought they were, happily and unconditionally.

My mother cheated on my father. Was divorcing him. She lied to me. Lied to all of us. Lied and misled my kindhearted father. The father who spent time in prison because he knew I needed my EpiPen, a medication we couldn’t afford. He stole for me. He died for love. What did my soft-spoken mother do? She betrayed me. Got her and my dad killed for love and betrayal. Damn her.

“Leigh, kiddo, please, you’re breaking my heart seeing you cry like this.”

“I hate this. Hate him.”

“Who?”

“Seven. I hate him for making me feel things. For believing in something that doesn’t exist for me.”

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