Page 120 of The Love Ambush
My throat gets tight at the thought of Emily crying all night.
“Let’s go into my room and talk.” I gesture her in ahead of me, and she turns on me, eyes blazing as soon as I step inside.
“And that was after I spent two hours convincing Emily that it wasn’t my entire goal to make Dad leave. That you and your family weren’t purposely trying to drive him away.” She runs a hand through her hair, looking impossibly exhausted. “Thank God, Sophie’s on my side. But it was still hard to convince Emily, because it sure as hell seems to me like the entire goal of your little plotwasto get Dad to leave town.” She slumps, sadness overtaking anger. “Why, Levi? Why did you want to drive him away?”
I sigh, not at all sure she’s going to believe me. “Because he was always going to leave, Gentry. He and Trisha were never planning to stay.”
That stops her. She goes very, very still, but there’s clearly a storm inside her. I lead her to my bed, and she sits next to me without any urging.
“Your dad changed the deed to the house last month. I can’t prove it, but I’m pretty sure he faked your mother signing it over to him. I’ve used every resource I have, and I can’t find your mother. There’s no way he found her.”
She bows her head, as if the weight of all of this is too much for her. “I should have known Mom would have never given him the house. What was his plan?”
“It took me way too long to figure that out. I flew all the way to Cheyenne and found nothing useful, when all I had to do was look into Trisha’s family.”
“Trisha?” she asks.
“That furniture they put in your house?” I say. “It was on loan from the company Trisha works for.”
“She’s a hairdresser,” Gentry says, her voice hollow.
“She’s a home stager, honey. She gets houses looking good for sales. She took that furniture on loan, promising her bosses she’d pay them their going rate plus a bit more after your house sold. All of Trisha and Harley’s actual possessions are in a storage facility in Des Moines.”
“Iowa?” She shakes her head. “I don’t understand. He said they were moving to Pensacola.”
“He lied.”
She jerks like I’ve hit her, and I wrap an arm around her shoulders. If I’m ever in the same room with Harley Lendew, I can’t promise I won’t at the very least try to cause him as much pain as he’s causing his daughters right now.
“I hate that I’m the one who has to tell you this,” I say, my chest aching for her and her sisters.
"I knew we couldn’t trust him, but I’d hoped…” She looks up at me, the pain in her eyes slicing me nearly in half. “I hoped he might decide we were worth sticking around for.” She leans in, our faces so close I can feel her breath on mine. “Please. Tell me the rest.”
“Harley and Trisha are deeply in debt, and they saw the house as a way to get out of it. Trisha’s got family in Des Moines. She’s already got a job with a home staging company. Harley’s goingto work with one of her cousins at his investment firm.” I shake my head. “Apparently, references don’t matter when it’s family.”
“What references?”
I tell her about Harley’s job at the bank and why he lost it. I explain to her that around the time the police started investigating him and his loan sharking, he got the invitation to Brodie’s wedding. Something Brodie regretted sending almost immediately when his father actually RSVP’d that he wanted to come.
I’m pretty sure Harley saw a reunion with his wealthy son as an opportunity to make some money before he headed to Catalpa Creek for the bigger payoff he’d get from the house sale.
We’ll never know for sure, because Harley’s never going to tell us the truth.
“How did you find all of this out?” Gentry asks. “Did you have to do anything illegal?”
“No,” I say, so fucking grateful it’s the truth. “It turns out people like to talk, and a lot of my educated guesses paid off.”
“You’re easy to talk to,” Gentry says, her eyes dropping to my lips before bouncing back up to my eyes. Desire shoots through me, and I squeeze her shoulder. She looks away, her gaze going distant. “I guess I should be glad to know my mother never lied to me about Dad, but right now it hurts too much—” She presses a hand to her mouth and tears spring into her eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me all this sooner? You said you wouldn’t cut me out of the loop again.”
My heart stutters. This could be where I lose her for good. “There was no time. I found out about Trisha and your dad’s jobs in Iowa less than two days ago, and I had to prep Daisy, so she’d play her job well.” I swallow hard. “Also, if you’d known…” Shit, I don’t know how to word this without making it seem like I’ve manipulated her again even if that’s the last thing I ever wantedto do. Even if she never forgives me, it was worth it to get Harley out of their lives. “If I were in your situation and I—”
“I get it,” she says. “If I’d known, there’s no way I could have kept cool and played along with Daisy. If Dad thought he had even a chance of getting away with selling the house…”
“Exactly,” I say. “I hated not telling you, but your house could sell in less than four days with an agent who’s actually trying to sell it. Possibly even faster. If your dad thought for even a moment that he could get a new real estate agent and get the sale done before anyone at CPS found out about it—”
“He would have done it.” She shakes her head, new tears brimming. “How can my own father spend any time with Emily and Sophie and walk away like that? How could he have even considered leaving us all homeless and broke?”
“He’s a selfish person,” I say. “He’s hurt a lot of people, and I doubt he has the ability to truly love anyone more than himself.”
