Page 186 of The Casualty of Us
“I could have excused you not loving him.” I narrow my eyes at her with the words that make me sick but are still the truth. “As impossible as I find that.” The pain not just in my body but my heart too—both because of and for him—and it makes me hiss at her. “But I will never forgive the abuse that he endured because of you.”
“The boy is perfectly fine,” she spews bitterly, beauty visibly distorting again. “He’s alive, isn’t he? He wasn’t molested or kidnapped—”
“He wasn’t loved either.” I stand suddenly, righteous fury blooming that pushes me to take a step toward her. “He wasn’t cared for or nurtured, and you couldn’t even be bothered to have enough basic empathy for your own child to give him to the one parent who might’ve given half a shit.”
“You have no idea.” She stands when I’m about halfway to her, seeming to tower over me in her heels. “No idea what my lifeturned into after I got pregnant and then Drake got bored and the fire—”
“How many times do I have to tell you thatI do not care.” I gasp for a breath, coming to a stop as she moves closer. “And if you make me repeat myself again, you will not like the world I drop you into.”
“I can’t help but wonder.” Her gaze narrows with a familiar calculation, dropping to my neck and staring at the mark there. “Why is it that my normally flagrant son has been so quiet when it comes to you?” Those green orbs lift back to mine with obvious cruelty there. “The girls have always come and gone with him, but the thirty million dollar girl is quite a feather in his cap, isn’t she?”
I can’t help the sickness that turns my stomach at her words, even knowing that they’re the furthest thing from the truth. It’s still too fresh after everything from last night, and I watch as she sees the hit land, the joy that lights up her eyes even more.
“Even if you don’t come close to the rest in anything other than value.” She laughs loudly. “So why is it that he’s been hiding away with you like he’s ashamed? What are you two hiding,Ophelia—”
I close the distance between us before she can get another sound out, getting right up in her space to stop the poison she’s dripping.
“Let me be crystal clear here.” Her shocked gaze locks with mine, and I blink, making sure she can see just how much I mean it while whispering viciously. “If you go low, I will drag us straight down to hell, and I’m not sure you’d share my appreciation for the flames there.” I barely resist the urge to scratch at her for the pain she caused the person who completes my heart. “Be grateful to whatever god Hayes believes in that I wasn’t your child, because I would have left you there to burn that day and never looked back.”
She takes a step back, true fear flashing across her face, and I follow despite the pain that shoots up inside of me with every step. Right up until she’s backed up against the sofa to make sure she fully understands.
“You will not contact him ever again without an explicit invitation,” I order, voice dead with the instructions I’ve been mulling over for months now. “His father will be receiving notice after Christmas from my lawyer as to the change of his permanent residence and that any further money designated for him is to be set outside of your control.” A scoff leaves me at the horror that fills her face at that more than anything else I’ve said. “I’ll leave it up to your son to decide what to tell him as to the why of it all, but since you’ve been essentially blackmailing him for over a year now, I wouldn’t have high hopes if I was you.” Her mouth falls open, and I let my eyes roll over her face with a quick perusal. “I’d say it was nice to meet you, but Hayes keeps telling me to be more honest.” I lift my lips, bringing my gaze back to hers, “So you can get the fuck out of my house now.”
She stands there, shocked eyes unmoving from mine for a couple seconds, and I start counting. Deciding I’ll give her until ten given the circumstances, her gaze finally falls from mine and she steps to the side, walking past me for a few steps before coming to a sudden halt that has me glancing back. My eyes land on where Ollie is standing in the foyer and staring into the living room with my parents on either side of him. His mouth hangs open as my father takes it all in, and my mother stares at me carefully. Talan is slightly behind them now and looking equally as surprised because I should have known the snoop wouldn’t leave without seeing the show.
Fuck.
“Perfect,” Miranda spits out, eyes on my parents like she might finally get her way now. “Maybe one of you can explain how you raised a child so disrespect—”
“Did she lie?” my mother cuts in, her eyes moving to Hayes’s mother with a quick smile. “My daughter is many things, but she is not often wrong when it comes to facts.” She takes a step forward while tipping her nose into the air, calling up every bit of the socialite she usually likes to keep tucked away at home. “So I will ask again, did she lie?” She barely gives the silence a beat before stepping to the side and waving her hand toward the front door. “Then please follow her advice and remove yourself from our home. Hayes is over eighteen and does not need your permission to be here. If you stay any longer, I’ll consider it trespassing and call the police.”
The two women hold each other’s gazes for a long moment before Miranda eventually gives ground, looking away and continuing her walk to the front door without another word. Leaving all of us holding still until we hear it close, but even then my mother holds up a hand, demanding silence while motioning for Talan to check that she’s really gone. Ollie mouths a quick “What the fuck?” at me right before Mia pokes her head out of the kitchen with wide eyes, really just making it a party as Talan calls back, “She’s gone.”
“Ophelia,” my father starts off instantly, staring at me with a chastisement that I understand considering that I wasn’t counting on them coming home early and catching all that plus my freshly fucked look. “Would you like to explain what all that was about?”
“Um.” I flick my eyes between him and Ollie, trying to guess from my twin’s look of panic and not getting anywhere. “How much did you hear?”
“Enough to know you’ve had people on payroll, darling,” my mother hums. “Now please answer your father’s question.”
So all of it then. Fuck.
“Well,” I drag out, shifting on my feet and trying not to wince from the pain. Not that it’s not already very apparent whathappened, but it doesn’t hurt to try and maintain some dignity. “Hayes’s mom has been basically blackmailing him and—” I take a breath while deciding what to tell them. “I didn’t like that. She’s not a good person and has never been a mother to him, and I wasn’t about to let her keep using him as a paycheck.” Giving them all a nod, I cross my arms before dropping them just as quickly to add, “I did have to take a little under three hundred grand out of my trust but—” I hold up my hands as my mother’s eyes blow wide, and my father’s mouth falls open to join Ollie’s. “I sold off a few of pieces of jewelry to cover the cost of everything after that.”
“What—” My father tries, face filling with censure as he recovers first. “How did you even access the trust?”
I purse my lips at the instant dread that fills me, eyes flicking to my mother before coming back to him with guilt lacing the confession. “I pretended to be Mom’s PA and forged her signature, transferred the money to a separate account I opened, before paying whoever, uh, needed paying that month.”
“C’estlebordel!” my mother hisses at me, making me take a step back in recognition of the spike of temper. Knowing she only falls back on the childhood curses her father used instead of the American versions when she’s truly pissed at one of us.
“I’m so sorry!” I beg, some part of me falling back into a five-year-old at the rare display. “I know it’s a lot, not compared to what’s in there but still—” Her single step has me hurrying. “I started selling jewelry after that.”
She takes a deep breath, and my eyes drift to find Ollie’s instinctually in search of help, barely meeting them before her voice brings me back. “What did you sell?”
“Uh.” My brows fall at the forced patience in her tone, everything about it suddenly a lot on top of the rest of my current trauma and the vulnerability lingering from last night. “The vintage Tiffany diamond and pearl studs that I got forgraduation, the sapphires you gave me when you finally let me pierce my ears, and the Cartier tennis bracelet that you gave me for my sixteenth birthday.” Her face falls with surprise, and I quickly make sure she knows. “Nothing passed down through the family or anything, but yeah.” My lower lip starts up that stupid tremble and I breathe out sharply, “I couldn’t leave him there, Mommy.” Her face fills with concern and I move my gaze over to my father to escape it. “I am sorry, though.”
Because if I look at her too long, I’m going to start blubbering about love and stalkers and virginities being given away.
My father stares at me for a long moment before sighing wearily. “Why didn’t you just come to us for help, Princess?”
