Chapter Twenty-One #2
She stops. “The third time I drove there, I got all the way to the elevator. The doors opened. I pressed the button for your floor. Then I pressed the lobby button because I imagined your face when I told you, and I couldn’t do that to you, Sterling.
I couldn’t be the person who took it away from you twice. ”
“Took what away from me?”
“The certainty. You were so certain that night. You were so sure you were right. You had the anger, the righteousness, and the absolute conviction that you’d done the hard thing but the necessary thing.
You didn’t have that with Abigail. You were miserable and uncertain, doubting yourself and wondering what you’d missed.
If I told you the truth, I’d be taking all of that away, and then the only thing left would be what you’d done to Casey.
I was afraid that would destroy you in a way even Abigail didn’t. ”
I flinch at that, hating to hear that woman’s name and hating to remember that time in my life. I redirect my anger outward toward her. “What I did to Casey is what I did to Casey whether you told me or not.”
“I know. I know that.” She wipes her face again, flinching at my angry tone. “I’ve been telling myself for four years that protecting you from the truth was the same as protecting you. It wasn’t. I was protecting myself from your face when you found out.”
“Am I supposed to feel sorry for you for that?”
She whimpers and looks away. “No.”
I look at my sister. She was twenty-three when our mother pointed her at my marriage.
I’d been younger than that when my father left, and when Abigail...
Mother had already taught me what to expect from people who leave.
You cut them out and move on. It’s the only way to keep your pride and standing.
Brittany learned a different lesson from the same departure.
Gretchen was the authority, the protector, and the person whose instructions you followed without question.
Understanding how and why she did it doesn’t make it forgivable.
“I need you to leave.” I say it in the most courteous voice I’ve ever used, because if I use any other voice I’ll say something I can’t take back.
I’ll start screaming and shouting, and I allowed myself that kind of breakdown once before. I’ll never go through it again.
Brittany puts Bart down on the rug, carefully, trunk facing up, perhaps instinctively or from having seen Sienna with him.
She stands and walks to the front door. She doesn’t look at me on the way out.
She doesn’t try to talk to Casey, but I wouldn’t expect her to own up to what she’s done to Casey directly.
The door closes.
I remember that night in my penthouse though I don’t want to. Mother in the chair, coffee beside her, Brittany on the sofa, and Casey in the doorway with her bag on her shoulder.
I remember Casey’s face with a clarity I haven’t allowed myself before, because remembering Casey’s face means remembering what was on it, and what was on it wasn’t guilt.
It was shock and devastation. It was the expression of a woman who walked into a room expecting an ordinary evening and found a verdict already delivered.
She said she didn’t do it. She said it once.
She said it clearly, directly, to my mother then looking at me.
I heard it. I let it pass through me without stopping.
I chose Brittany’s version because hers meant I didn’t have to choose between my wife and my mother.
Choosing Casey would have meant my mother was capable of this, and I couldn’t hold that possibility at twenty-nine.
I’d already been betrayed too much. It was easier to believe it could come from again from my wife than my own mother.
I can accept it now. It’s the heaviest thing I’ve ever carried, heavier than the fund, heavier than Richard leaving, heavier than the empty penthouse.
Heavier than Abigail’s betrayal. My mother engineered the destruction of my marriage because she decided Casey wasn’t suitable, and I let her do it because choosing my mother was easier than trusting my wife.
She handed me the knife, put it in my hand, and told me it was protection.
I used it. I told a woman who was carrying my child to get out of my house.
I didn’t ask her a single question. Asking would have meant trusting her.
Trusting Casey would have meant choosing her over my mother.
I chose my mother because it seemed like the only choice after everything in the past.
I chose my mother. Casey drove to Asheville alone.
Sienna was born without a father in the room.
She spent four years without a father, and eighteen months of hospitals happened without me.
The transplant happened because Casey swallowed her fury and wrote a letter to the man who destroyed her life.
Casey didn’t bother to tell me about my daughter because she was sure I’d never believe her.
DNA would have proven Sienna was mine, but I would have always believed she cheated on me.
She was right. Heaven help me, but I wouldn’t have believed her.
I couldn’t until I saw her as she is now and started questioning the lies.
I don’t deserve a medal for finally discovering and confronting the truth or a second chance. I deserve for her to kick me to the curb like I did to her and never look back.
I’m afraid she’ll do just that once Sienna is fully recovered.