Chapter 4
Layla
Since asking my mom, stepdad, or brother for help isn’t an option I’m willing or able to explore, after pawning the engagement ring, I have enough for the security deposit I’ll need to rent the studio apartment I saw advertised on a banner hanging from the railing of a small apartment complex on my way to Violet’s house. It’ll be the first time I’ve lived on my own, which I’m loath to admit scares me almost as much as Steven’s behavior.
Violet and I stay up late sitting on her purple velvet sectional, calculating the cost and how many more hours I’ll need to pick up in order to afford the apartment by myself after dipping into my savings to pay the first and last month’s rent required to move in.
Violet pats my arm when I slouch, rubbing my tired eyes after staring at the budgeting spreadsheet we made on her laptop. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay here? We can turn the nursery into a guest bedroom, and you can stay as long as you need.”
I turn to look at my best friend and sometimes employer. Violet left Granny’s when she started her small business shortly after I helped her plan Dolly and Wyatt’s wedding, currently working out of one of her three bedrooms until her business grows large enough for her to need a brick-and-mortar office in town. We’re just as close as when I saw her every day at the diner, though, and I help her from time to time with weddings when she can afford to hire me—just one of the many, many odd jobs I’ve picked up over the years.
I reach across and rub her baby bump, her second round of IVF having been successful after years of unexplained infertility—something else we’ve bonded over. “I love you so much for the offer, but you know I can’t.”
Violet bobs her head, laying her hand on top of mine, lending me silent support with tears in her light brown eyes.
With endometriosis, my chances of getting pregnant without the help of outrageously expensive medical intervention—which Violet and Jared pinched pennies for years to afford—is lower than the general population. And since Steven and I stopped using condoms when I turned eighteen and started trying for a family without a single positive pregnancy test, I’ve all but given up hope that it will happen naturally.
Violet knows it would be too painful watching her belly grow up close. Painful watching her loving husband and the father of her unborn child dote on her as she deserves. It’s the same as it would be if I were to stay at Dolly and Wyatt’s house, now that they have little William and are expecting their second child.
Faye was kind enough to offer to let me stay with her and Harold, who she fell in love with and married not too long after Dolly and Wyatt tied the knot—no surprise there, given how deeply they’d both blush whenever they spoke to each other—but they’re living in a tiny RV on their property while their house is being renovated.
Steven had never been a violent person before today, but I don’t want to chance living with someone, putting them in danger in case there’s any blowback from calling the cops on him, not when he’s shown me I never really knew him at all.
And so, after a total of two hours of sleep on Violet’s couch, I apply for an apartment as soon as the complex’s office opens. Another hour later, I hand over a cashier’s check from my bank for the full amount needed, plus a little extra cash on the side to waive the three-day waiting period.
Ms. Theresa, the new owner of the recently updated two-story complex, leads me to one of the twelve units, her long black braids swaying with her steps. My unit is smack dab in the middle on the ground floor between the two stairwells, with a concrete walkway separating the small parking lot from the complex. She unlocks the freshly painted sky-blue door and leads me inside the off-white apartment, which is one big open concept room with a lone window to the left of the door.
On the right is a small kitchen with new appliances, then a closet and bathroom just past it with updated fixtures and a stackable washer and dryer. The left side of the studio is big enough for a full or possibly queen-sized bed, a console and TV if I put them in front of the window, and maybe a bookshelf or two.
There’s a spark of optimism within me for the future after the two-minute tour of the quiet, clean space. It’s small, and I only have two suitcases of personal items to fill it, but it’s all mine.
I find I’m able to match Ms. Theresa’s warm smile when she hands me the key and a spare and says, “Welcome to Castaway Paradise, Layla.”
* * *
Russell
“You look like shit,” Jared says as soon as I open the passenger door and climb inside his SUV after it took forever and a boatload of cash to catch a flight with an available seat to Dallas.
He was kind enough to make the two-hour drive to pick me up from the airport, so I skip past his insult and ask, “How’s Layla?”
“She just got the keys to her apartment.” Jared dives into a break in the heavy airport traffic, and I press my foot to the floorboard, wishing he would speed up.
“Where?”
“Castaway Paradise.”
“Where’s that?”
He gives me a sideways look. “In town. The old complex where Wyatt used to live.”
I’m about to go apoplectic. “Oh hell, tell me you’re lying. That place is a dump. Not good enough for—” I almost say my darlin’ , and no one can know that’s what I call Layla in my head.
“Not anymore. Ms. Theresa bought the place and fixed it up real nice.”
I grumble, irked by the idea of Layla living even a few minutes farther away from the diner, and thus, farther away from BT and me. And with neighbors just a breath away, someone’s bound to notice me sitting in my truck overnight every night now that she’s living on her own. “I don’t like it.”
Jared huffs a laugh. “Figured you wouldn’t. But she does.”
Squirming in my seat, I ask, “Do you think she’ll be happy there?”
He sucks his teeth, taking a long time to answer. “Don’t know that she’s ever been happy since her dad died, so I hope so.”
I look sharply at him, and my efforts to curtail my cursing fly out the window. “The fuck does that mean?”
He sighs deeply. “Listen, you didn’t hear this from me, but…Violet told me some upsetting things she found out after going through Layla’s budget with her.”
“What. Things.”
He gives me a nervous glance from the corner of his eye before he swings his attention back to the road, the blasted interstate under construction since the dawn of time. “I don’t want you going to prison, so you gotta promise not to kill Steven if I tell you.”
“I ain’t promising shit. You tell me right now, or I swear to God, I am going to unleash unholy hell—”
“Fuck! Ok. So, you know how she’s been working two, sometimes three jobs at a time? And how she never seems to get ahead?”
I grit my teeth. “Yes.” It drives me crazy how hard she has to work when I’ve cash tipped her under the table in the thousands since meeting her, hoping she would finally slow down. Pick one job. I’d give her more than that, enough for her to quit working altogether and go back to school if I thought she’d take it.
“Well, she’s been at it since she was fifteen when her mom and stepdad kicked her out, and she moved in with Steven.”
“Fifteen fucking years old?” My head pounds as my blood pressure skyrockets. At fifteen, my son was playing football and goofing off with his friends. He worked part-time at the warehouse during my half of the summers with him to earn extra spending money—his choice—but he never had to rely on it to pay bills. It should have been the same for Layla.
“It gets worse. Steven was eighteen at the time.”
Oh, I’m definitely going to kill him now . Her parents, too. “That’s illegal.”
“Not in Texas.”
“Well, then it should be! That motherfucker—she wasn’t even old enough to drive and he was a grown man!”
“Preaching to the choir.” Jared hesitates, then says, “There’s more. She thought they’d been going fifty-fifty on the bills.”
I’m gonna kill him twice over . Steven makes a good living at Berenson, enough for them to get by on his salary alone if they live within their means, which is why I never fired him. All her money should have been going toward savings—school, a good car, medical expenses—and then put toward their future.
Jared clenches the steering wheel, his knuckles turning white, just as pissed. “She talked to the landlord who owns the house. Told him she needed to take her name off the lease. Found out Steven’s been telling her the rent is higher than it is, so she’s been paying the majority of it. Most of the bills are in his name, not hers, so who knows how many others he’s been lying about.”
I can’t take hearing any more. “Hit the fucking gas, Jared.”
“Nah, man. I’ve got a baby on the way. Violet will bring me back from the dead if we wreck, just so she can kill me all over again.”
The father in me approves. The animal in me rages.
“Shit, Russell. Gonna have a heart attack if you don’t calm down.”
Lordy, I try . In and out, big, deep breaths. “It ain’t working.”
“Yeah, no shit.” He keeps looking between me and the road, nudging the gas pedal until we’re going five over the speed limit. Goddamn responsible bastard.