Page 56 of Starfish and Coffee
Alex tilted his head as if he hadn’t heard her. “Excuse me?”
“I’ve got ten thousand dollars cash in my purse.” She patted it to make her point. “That’s quite a bit of money for someone like you.”
Insulted, Alex pulled back. “Someone like me?”
“I’m not playing games, boy.” Her eyes narrowed. “I know you think it’s amusing to take advantage of Matthew. To seduce him with your debauched lifestyle, but the fun is over. I’ll give you this money right now. All you have to do is forget my son ever existed and move on to your next conquest. Go ruin someone else’s life.”
Alex shook his head, feeling hurt on so many different levels. “That’s not really how it happened. I’m not trying to ruin anyone’s life.”
“Once you’re gone, he’ll be normal again.” She sounded almost manic. “This is a phase!”
It didn’t help things when Alex laughed, but he just couldn’t help himself when he was so desperate for an outlet for the anxiety. “I thought that once too, but I don’t think it’s a phase, Mrs. Tarrington. We’ve been together for a while now.”
She placed a hand to her forehead and turned away, taking a shaking breath as she tried to compose herself. “I will not let you destroy everything I’ve spent my entire life working toward. Matthew will take over for his father like he’s supposed to, and you will disappear out of our lives forever.”
“You can’t just buy me off,” Alex said with another laugh of disbelief. “I know this is hard for you to grasp, but some thingsaren’t for sale.”
She huffed and looked around his house once more. “You have a price.”
“I love him,” Alex said firmly, almost feeling sorry for her. “There’s no price for that. I’m sorry.”
“He won’t be worth anything if you stay with him. I’ll cut him off.”
Alex opened his mouth, looking for a comeback for something that made his stomach feel like the bottom had just dropped out of it. “You can’t—”
“Oh, I can. And there will be no job waiting for him in Atlanta. They’ll never allow someone who lives your sort of filthy lifestyle be the face of Tarrington department stores. You think you can keep him happy working at that seaweed-covered shack on the beach? How long do you think your love will last when he’ll have to look at you every day knowing you ruined his life?”
“I’m going to ask you to leave now.” Alex fought the bile rising in the back of his throat from the fear that washed over him. “And I don’t want you to come back.”
Surprisingly, she turned to leave, and Alex found himself breathing a sigh of relief. He walked to the door to close it when she stepped outside, needing a physical barrier between them.
She turned back before he could get it shut. “If you love him, youwill notdo this to him. Without you, he’ll have anything a man could want—a wife and children and respect from everyone who comes into contact with him. With you he’ll be poor, mocked, and in danger for the rest of his life. You think about that, Mr. Hunter. You think about what you’re doing to my son by holding on to him. This was never supposed to be his life. You did this to him, and he will hate you for it when the honeymoon ends.”
“I don’t think the honeymoon will end,” Alex said, because that was the only thing he was sure off. “It doesn’t wear off for us, Mrs. Tarrington.”
“How young and stupid you are,” she spat at him furiously. “Italwaysends, and you two will have nothing but regret to stand on when it does.”
Alex swallowed hard, letting that sink in. When it did hit him that she was probably right, he shut the door in the face of the richest, most powerful woman on Mirabella Island.
* * * *
If his life were a movie, Alex would’ve ignored Matt’s mother and run off into the sunset with the man he loved.
Unfortunately his life wasn’t a movie.
Alex started having nightmares. Every night horrible scenarios unfolded in his mind that usually ended with Matt getting killed in the worst kind of hate crimes. Alex had woken up every morning for the past week covered in sweat, shaking and crying over Matt’s bloody, beaten body. It took him a long time to figure out it wasn’t real because the seeds of fear and doubt Cecilia Tarrington planted in his mind were so infectious the nightmare started to bleed into his reality.
The first night after the confrontation, Alex slept at Matt’s out of sheer necessity. They made love and not once did Alex mention the earlier visit. Matt’s mother had ripped open Alex’s soul and exposed all his worst fears, the ones that had been festering in the back of his mind this whole time and telling Matt about it felt like showing him a mirror.
If you love me, this is what will happen! You’ll hate me for making you poor. For all the jeers and comments. You’ll hate me every time someone says faggot in jest, and you’ll really hate me the first time someone says it to your face.
Her words were already true for Alex. They became a reality the moment she put voice to them, and he couldn’t escape the vivid illusions. All Alex could do was try to hide from them before they swallowed him whole.
He woke up screaming from the first nightmare. Actually screaming at the top of his lungs and looking at his hands wildly for Matt’s blood that had been clinging to them just moments before. Alex never thought he’d feel that type of fear again, because everything about it reminded him of the night two police cruisers and a woman in a white social services’ car pulled into the dock parking lot. Grim-faced, the trio had knocked at the door to number five and then told Will their parents had been killed on the way back from date night by a drunk tourist.
They’d tried to take Alex to his aunt’s that same night, even though he was sixteen and perfectly capable of taking care of himself. They’d thought Will was too young to provide for him, but Alex didn’t need much.
All he needed was his family and the ocean to heal him. Matt had become more than family to Alex. He was more than the beach on a spring day too. He was happiness and freedom and a dream that was dying before his eyes. Even though Matt held Alex after that first horrible dream and told him whatever he was screaming about wasn’t real, it was very real to Alex.
