Chapter 20 #2
She waves him off. “Xander and I have some cookies to make. You aren’t supposed to be home yet anyway.”
“Let’s go,” he says to me.
I know I should argue with him. It’s one thing to hear what my living situation has been, but it’s another to see it in person. Things have been growing between Knox and I, and I don’t want to ruin that. Then a voice says inside of me that if he can’t handle this, it’s better to know now.
“Let’s get this over with,” I agree.
Knox sent his driver home when we arrived, and neither of us want to wait for the service to send someone else. He leads me over to one of the cars he has in his private section of the garage. It doesn’t look like they’ve been driven in a while.
He rolls his eyes when he sees me assessing his collection. “I know it’s a bit much, but I went a little crazy with my spending early on in my career.”
I shake my head. “I wasn’t looking at the size of your collection, just the fact I’ve never seen you drive.”
“I still have my license. Gerry just doesn’t want me driving much to try and save my shoulder as much as possible. Not sure what he thinks can get worse with me turning a steering wheel, but I didn’t fight him. I don’t think one trip is going to do much damage.”
We get into a sleek Mercedes and he programs my address into his GPS.
The miles between his high-rise penthouse and our modest home might not be great, but it feels like we venture into a different world.
The quality of the roads deteriorates with every mile we move.
Even the luxury vehicle can’t hide the roughness of the ride as we rock over the potholes caused by the ravages of a Pacific Northwest winter.
It might not snow a lot this close to the coast, but freezing temperatures are the bane of all road crews.
He pulls into the driveway about a half an hour later. I knock on the door to alert my father that he’s got company, even as I let us in with my key.
The smell hits me immediately. It is a mixture of stale beer and spoiling food. I turn to Knox. “You should wait out here. It’s bad in there.”
“If you have to deal with this, you won’t be doing it alone,” he says in a tone that doesn’t allow argument.
I shrug. “Fine, but if you have to burn your fancy clothes after this, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
I roll my shoulders back and enter the house. The sounds of a game blast from the living room. There’s plates of half eaten food everywhere mixed with some takeout containers. We don’t have money for food delivery, which means my dad probably spent the mortgage on his dinners.
“Dad?” I call out.
There’s movement from the living room. It takes him a minute to lift himself out of his recliner.
He looks like he hasn’t showered in days.
His hair is limp and greasy, making his dark brown locks look black.
He’s wearing a white shirt that is more gray with continuous wear, and has stains down the front from spilling food on himself.
“Sloane? Where have you been?” he slurs.
“On a work trip,” I say without giving more information than necessary. He won’t care anyway, so why bother?
He laughs. “A work trip? The grocery store sends you on trips now?”
“I came to check on you,” I say instead of engaging with him.
He snorts. “I’m still alive, unfortunately.”
“Don’t worry, I’m sure something is growing in all of this mess that will help you out with that,” I grumble.
“What is that, girl? Show me some respect. I am your father.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. I won’t throw a teenager fit and validate his delusion that he’s still the adult in our relationship.
“This place is a disaster, and it looks like you’ve spent all the bill money on takeout,” I say.
“Had to eat somehow. You left, so what did you expect?” he accuses.
“I don’t know, for you to step up and be an adult. We can’t go on this way, Dad. I can’t always be here to take care of you. I’m going to take Xander to live with me. It’s time you figure out how to take care of yourself,” I tell him.
If Knox weren’t here I’d probably sink into old patterns and start cleaning up for him. Instead I’m just tired. The bone deep kind of exhaustion where everything piles on you at once and you don’t have the strength to push it off.
“You promised your mother you’d take care of me,” he says, adding a heap of guilt to my already heavy burden.
Knox puts his arm on my shoulder and squeezes reassuringly.
My father suddenly realizes I’m not here alone. His eyes widen when he recognizes one of his favorite athletes.
“You’re Knox Rennick,” he says in awe.
“Yes, sir,” Knox says without elaborating.
Dad blinks. “What are you doing here with my daughter?”
“She has been working for me. I brought her so she could come and check on you. I think this is a bit too much responsibility for a young woman, wouldn’t you agree?” Knox replies.
My father is nodding. Apparently hearing one of your sports idols call you on your shit carries more weight than the daughter you’ve neglected for almost a decade.
“So, here’s what we’re going to do. I understand you’ve had a rough time since your wife passed, but your children shouldn’t carry the burden of that anymore.
I am going to have a crew come out here tomorrow and do a deep clean.
Set you back on a clean slate. Then you are going to start seeing a therapist that I will pay for.
You are going to do the work to fight your depression.
When you are able, I will set you up with a job. I understand you drive a truck, yes?”
More nodding from my father.
“Mr. Cordero, I need you to understand that this is your last chance. I won’t let Sloane keep burning herself out to keep you afloat. If you fail this time, you will lose everything you have left. As it is, Xander is going to live with us permanently.”
My father finally seems to grasp some sense of what is going on. “What do you mean, live with us? I thought my daughter worked for you. It sounds like she’s more than your employee.”
Knox doesn’t bother trying to deny it. He smiles at me. “She’s much more. That’s between us though. I don’t think given the way you’ve treated her the last several years you deserve more information than that.”
Like usual, my father doesn’t care enough to press. “Go ahead and keep the boy. He killed my wife. I don’t want him.”
I wish hearing him say that shocked me, but it isn’t the first time he’s blamed Xander for my mom’s death.
It was her decision to postpone her treatments when she learned she was pregnant.
We can’t even know if she would have done better had she started chemo earlier.
She lived for years after first learning of her cancer.
If she’d had to abort Xander to try and save herself, I don’t think we’d have had those four years with her to tell the truth.
I think the heartache would have killed her faster than the cancer.
Knox puts his hand on my back and starts to guide me out the door. Before we made it outside my father shouts after me, “Are you really just going to abandon me, Sloane?”
I look over my shoulder. “You abandoned me first. I’m just returning the favor.”
Once the door is shut behind us, Knox turns me to face him. “When there’s a weight around your ankle pulling you down, you have to cut it free. It’s either that, or drown with him.”
I know he’s right. The guilt is still there, but I have to start choosing myself. I have to think even my mom would understand.