Page 128 of For Wrath and Redemption
She doesn’t answer, and I frantically search the board. “Could I be in checkmate right now?”
She shrugs coyly. “I’ll never tell.”
I shake my head and fight a smile. She’s brilliant. She’s brilliant, and I’m in love with her. I’m in love with her, and it fucking hurts. I nod back to the board.
“Your move. Again.”
She purses her lips and taps her chin. She’s pretending, I realize. This whole time, she’s been pretending to play. She’s probably seen ten different paths to victory, but she’s drawing it out just to distract me.
“My eating disorder hit an all-time low just after college. The truth about the letter came out. I’d kept it to myself for years because I wasscared and misguided, and after it came out, my fiancé left me. I found out later he was only with me because he was still in love with my stepsister.”
A pang of jealousy overwhelms me. She was engaged. She’d said yes to someone once. Accepted their love only for them to leave her.
I’d never do that. I’d never leave her. But...
I can’t be with an addict.
I breathe through the need to scream and instead make a joke.
“This is the stepsister who is also your ex-best-friend and your brother’s baby mama?”
Claire scrunches her nose playfully and nods.
“That’s the one.”
“Your fiancé had dated her?”
She cringes. “Not really. He was into Lennon, but Len was always into Macon. Eric never stood a chance. When he realized that, we ended up getting into this huge fight and he confessed that he’d never loved me. He just thought I’d bring Lennon back into his life. Then he took back the ring and kicked me out. Kind of set me on this path of self-destruction, I guess. Ended up with pretty bad ulcers in my throat. Had to be hospitalized for a couple days to receive IV fluids.” She smirks. “Upside of making myself vomit for over a decade, though, is that I barely have any gag reflex. You’re welcome.”
I bark out a laugh. “Thank you.”
“Anyway, after I was discharged, I checked myself into a treatment facility. Then I got my teeth fixed and moved to New York to start fresh. Met your dad a few months later. Relapsed a couple months after that. And now I’m here. A statistic.” She moves her piece, then looks back at me. “Hooray for me.”
I shrug. “I’m glad you’re here, Claire. Even if you had to fuck my dad to get here, I’m glad for it.”
Claire sighs. I wait for her to say she’s glad, too. That she’s happy to be here with me. She doesn’t. Her brow furrows as her eyes fall back to the board.
“Something Mabel and Sav said has been sticking with me lately. Sometimes you have to cut away the worn-down parts of yourselfso you can move forward.”
“What if there’s nothing left?”
She flicks wide eyes back to mine. She opens her mouth twice but says nothing.
“What?” I ask, but she shakes her head.
Then she gives me a sad smile and answers on a whisper. “You have to have faith that you’ll grow back better.”
I glance down at the board.Grow back better. I can’t even fathom it.
“What if I don’t deserve to grow back better?”
Her hand rests gently on my cheek, and she guides my eyes back to hers. She’s crying again. So am I.
“You do, Jonah. You do.”
34
CLAIRE
