Page 43 of Fierce Love
I shake my head. “It’s not like that.”
“You’re not fucking him? Bullshit.” She gives me a disgusted look. “I’ve heard about the two of you, fucking horny as hell all over the neighborhood. Heard he stood on a table and declared his love for you.” She makes my relationship sound dirty, as though there’s nothing real about it. “If you’re not fucking him and you got that declaration”—she eyes me again—“good on you, I suppose. But you really should not waste this opportunity. Nailing adecentTucker is like winning the lottery in Bellerive.” A small smile plays on her lips. “Is he decent?”
I bite my lip and scan her face, trying to determine her mood, what might come from any admission or denial. If it seemed like the best way to handle it, I’d make Nate look bad to her, awful, even. But I just can’t tell what she’s after. She can’t force me to get pregnant.
“He’s decent,” I admit, thinking that’s the biggest understatement of my life.
“Perfect,” she says, planting her hands on her slender thighs and rising to her feet. She sashays to me, a walk that probably lures in men but only makes me tense with impending trouble. My mother is always most relaxed before she lets loose. “Your father and I have a new investment, but we need some capital.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I need you to ask good ol’ Nate for a cash donation to the Thompson-Davis bank. An investment, if you will, in our newest venture. He’s so keen to be part of the family, so he might as well drop some cash into the well as a goodwill gesture.”
“I’m not asking Nate for money,” I say, the words spilling out of me before I can consider their full impact. I should have lied, told her I’d ask. Or admitted that Celia still controlsallthe purse strings.
Her hand snakes out, grabbing a fistful of my hair, the careful waves I just finished crafting before she arrived crumpling. “You fucking will, you little whore. I need fifty thousand dollars, and that’s a drop in the bucket for your boy. He’s probably got that sitting in his personal bank account right now.” She tightens her grip, making me cry out.
“No,” I say, tears springing to my eyes. Nate is the one good thing I have, and I’m not tarnishing it for her.
“He bought this for you, didn’t he?” Her other hand seizes my necklace. She pulls hard, and when the necklace doesn’t break, she spins it around and unlatches it with a deft flick of her fingers. When it drops to the ground, she brings me down with her, her fist still firm in my hair. “Probably worth a couple grand.” She measures the weight of the gold and jewels in her hand, and then she forces me to meet her gaze. “You don’t want to see what I’ll do to get what I want.”
I’ve seen it plenty of times.
The buzzer on the door sounds to signal Nate’s arrival to pick me up, take me to his parents’ house. Except I’ve started crying,my makeup smeared, and my hair will have the indent of my mother’s hand.
“If you get pregnant, you won’t even have to ask him for the money. It’ll be your money too.”
“Stop,” I whisper. “Please stop.”
She lets go of my hair, flinging me back onto my ass. My dress hiked up my thighs. “Best get yourself cleaned up. Don’t want the pretty boy thinking he’s slumming it.”
“He’ll ask about the necklace,” I say as she heads toward the apartment door, leaving me sprawled on the floor.
“Tell him you gave it to me as a push present, for giving you life.” She faces me, her lips quirked up into a half smile, her hand on the door. “And then ask him for my money. You won’t like what I do to get it otherwise.”
My phone starts ringing in the clutch Nate bought me, the one resting on the coffee table. He’s probably wondering what’s taking me so long. I just hope Mickie went out a side door and not past him at the front.
Taking a deep breath, I go to the buzzer, and I ring him in without a word. My throat still feels tight with tears. I leave the apartment door unlocked and head to the bathroom.
“Hols?” Nate’s voice echoes through the apartment as he enters.
“Out in a minute,” I say, injecting false brightness into my tone. In the bathroom mirror, I frantically fix my makeup and try to wrangle my hair back into the careful waves I constructed.
Then I stare at myself, take in my whole face, still a bit unsteady from the confrontation with my mother, and I know in my gut that I’ll never drag Nate into this mess, that I’ll do anything to keep him safe from them, even if that means I have to let him go.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Hollyn
Fourteen years ago
“I’ve never lived in a house,” I say as we drive down the long laneway to his place that’s perched near ocean cliffs.
“What would your dream house be?” Nate asks.
He asked about the necklace when we got in the car, after he commented on my bracelet and earrings. When I told him the clasp broke, he offered to get it fixed. I asked for the receipt, said I’d do it myself, and the whole time I was sure he’d realize I was lying, think I’d pawned the necklace for money or that I didn’t value what he’d given me. But so far, he hasn’t detected anything odd in my behavior, hasn’t sensed my frazzled nerves.
“There’s a house near Victor’s Campground,” I say. “On the other side of the national park.”
