Page 199 of Dear #47, You're the Worst
I laugh once. “You stopped being that a long time ago.”
“I can change.” Her voice breaks. “Just give me a chance. Don’t let them leave me here. It’s…it’s hell, Hunter. I can’t sleep. I can’t think. The women here… they look at me like I’m nothing. You don’t know what it’s like.”
She’s sobbing now, the sound scratchy and desperate. Once, it would have cut me in half. I would have scrambled to soothe her, to fix it, to believe her. But now all I feel is tired.
“I can’t get you out,” I say flatly. “It’s not up to me.”
“You could try.”
“Not anymore.” I look over at Juliet again. She catches my eye, her expression steady, grounding. My chest eases. “I have a wife now. A life you’re not part of. And that’s not changing.”
She goes quiet. Just the sound of breathing, wet and broken, echoing through the receiver.
Finally she whispers, “Do you hate me?”
The question slams into me. I think about all the years she shaped my anger, taught me that love was something you earned by bleeding for it. About the stolen money, the interviews, the humiliation. About the letters I wrote to her and never sent.
“No,” I say. “I don’t hate you.”
“Then why won’t you help me?”
“Because hating you would mean I still care enough to fight with you. What I feel now is worse for you. I feel sorry. Sorry that you don’t have what I have.”
“What’s that?” she snaps, defensive even in chains.
“Someone who loves me wanting nothing in return.”
I glance again at Juliet, who has set her laptop aside and is watching me carefully, her head tilted, her eyes soft. My throat loosens.
“I feel sorry for you, Mom,” I say. “Because you’ll never know what it’s like to be loved like that.”
She makes a strangled sound. “Hunter, wait?—”
The line goes dead.
I stare at the phone in my hand.
Juliet crosses the room and slips her hand into mine. She doesn’t ask questions or pressure me at all. Just her touch, grounding me in the present. She leans into me, her head resting against my chest. I breathe her in, citrus and warmth and the faint perfume she always wears, and my heartbeat steadies.
I wrap my arm around my wife and let the weight of the call fall away. For the first time in years, I don’t feel chained to anyone. I feel free.
Chapter47
Juliet
Four months later, people fill our apartment from wall to wall, and I’ve never loved the chaos more.
Hunter’s teammates sprawl across every available surface, mixed in with my girls, who showed up with wine and attitude in equal measure. The noise is incredible. Laughter, clinking glasses, overlapping conversations, and Jett’s terrible attempt at karaoke in the background.
Scout’s on the couch with Wren and Ivy, laughing about something. Across the room, Silas is definitely not watching her, which means he absolutely is. Scout throws back her head, cackling. Silas’s expression tightens and his fists clench. If his posture got any more rigid, he’d snap in half.
What is going on there?I make a note to ask Hux about it later. There’s definitely a vibe between those two.
I stand in the kitchen, ostensibly checking on the lasagna but really just taking it all in. Watching Hunter’s teammates rally around him without hesitation. The Patrick drama is old news now, barely mentioned except as a proof that Hunter’s the man who stands up for people he loves.
I watch him with his brothers across the living room. Silas claps him on the back while saying something that makes Hunter throw his head back and laugh. Jett makes some dry comment that has them both grinning. Hunter doesn’t have to be the loudest or the angriest to earn respect. They trust him. Even without his fists.
“You look happy.” Ivy says, appearing beside me with an empty wine glass.
