Chapter 27
One Week Later…
“Jason?” Haley said, gasping for breath.
“Haley?” said the last person on earth that she’d expected to call.
“Dad?” Haley said, sitting down on the arm of her sofa and doing her best to calm her racing heart.
She’d been outside weeding her garden, trying to make it through another day without crying when she heard her phone ring.
Hoping that it was Jason calling, she ran inside, desperate to hear his voice.
One whole week without a word and that wasn’t from a lack of trying either.
She’d called his phone about a dozen times a day, sent him text messages, and harassed the hell out of his friends and family.
So far, no luck. Nobody had any idea where he was.
Up until yesterday, she’d convinced herself that he just needed some time and that he’d be back, but that was before the realtor, the same realtor that failed to sell her house, pounded a “For Sale” sign in his front yard.
Now, Haley was desperate to find him. She needed to explain some things to him and probably grovel. Jason wasn’t the only one that screwed up. She needed him back here so that she could fix this before it was too late.
“Do you have a moment?” her father asked.
Frowning because she couldn’t actually believe that he’d called her, Haley nodded woodenly, then remembered that he couldn’t see her. “Yes. What’s going on?” she asked, wondering why he hadn’t asked his secretary to call her to relay whatever message that he needed to give her.
“Your grandmother told me that you took a vacation last week. How was it?” he asked casually, but Haley couldn’t help but feel that there was more to it. This wasn’t like her father to actually take an interest in her life.
“It was fine,” Haley said, wanting to kick her own butt all over again. It could have been great if she hadn’t overreacted in the first place. Yeah, Jason had screwed up, but it hadn’t deserved the level of drama that she’d created.
She was an idiot.
“I heard that Jason went with you,” he said, followed by an expectant pause.
“Yes, Jason went with me, Dad. I told you that we were dating,” Haley said, walking over to the bay window and looked out. Her eyes narrowed as she watched Barbara, her ex-realtor, gesture for a middle-aged couple to follow her inside Jason’s house.
“It’s nothing serious, I hope,” he said, drawing Haley’s attention back to the conversation that she’d never expected to have.
“What?”
“You and Jason. Your grandmother said that you were serious, but I didn’t think you’d be foolish to waste your life on someone like that,” her father said, stunning her into silence. Although by now, there really wasn’t much that her family could say or do that would shock her.
Except call her, that is.
“What do you mean by ‘a man like that’?” Haley asked, insulted on Jason’s behalf.
There was a heavy sigh, and then, “Haley, do we really need to get into this? We both know that you could do so much better.”
“No, I really couldn’t, Dad. I love Jason.”
“Sweetheart, I know that you think that you love him right now, but in time, you’ll realize that...well, he’s not good enough for you.”
“And why is that, Dad?” Haley asked tightly, for the first time in her life she didn’t bother pretending that she didn’t care. “Because he works for a living?”
“You know that I don’t have a problem with someone that works, Haley. I work for a living,” he pointed out.
“Then, I don’t understand the problem,” she lied because she knew exactly what her family’s problem was the first moment they’d laid eyes on Jason.
“He’s not one of us, Haley. He’ll never fit in. Surely you must realize that, sweetheart. When you stop pretending to be someone that you’re not, you’ll come to realize that Jason just doesn’t meet our expectations for you,” he said soothingly.
She laughed without humor. “Oh, now you have expectations for me? Isn’t that convenient. The one time you show concern for me just happens to be when you’re worried that I’ll sully up the bloodlines and marry someone who might embarrass you.”
“Haley, that’s ridiculous and you know it. I love you and care very deeply for you,” he swore. “I’m just watching out for your best interests, sweetheart. In a few years, you’ll see that. Maybe you should give Robert another chance, so that the two of-”
“What do I do for a living?” Haley bit out between clenched teeth, cutting him off.
“Excuse me?”
“I asked if you knew what I do for a living,” she repeated.
“You run a daycare,” he said with such conviction that even she almost believed it.
“I teach history at Latin Scribe High School,” Haley informed him, trying not to cry. She had absolutely no doubt that if she’d asked what committees Rose or Martha were on that he would know the answer, mostly because they were a reflection of him.
“Oh,” he said, sounding surprised. “Congratulations, sweetheart. Why didn’t you tell me that you got the job? We would have held a dinner to celebrate.”
She opened her mouth to remind him that they celebrated her job at her grandmother’s insistence five years ago, but what was the point? He was never going to change and he was never going to care about her until she started living the life that he wanted.
He’d start giving her attention and some of his precious time if she decided to ask for her trust fund back and started dating men like Robert.
It wouldn’t matter that Robert would drop her as soon as she slept with him.
Her parents only cared about their image.
It was kind of funny that her father started out in life by sharing a room with his two brothers in a small two-bedroom cabin, or that his parents worked their asses off so that he could go to college and never have to worry about money.
He’d been spoiled and she knew that was Grandma’s biggest regret in life.
“I got the job two weeks ago when I turned thirty,” Haley lied, wondering if her father was going to remember this time.
Of course, he didn’t.
“Oh, um, did you get my birthday card?” he asked before he covered the phone with his hand from the sounds of it. She heard him mumble to someone, probably his secretary, to send her birthday card out right away.
It looked like she’d be getting three grand in a few days, Haley thought, biting back a sigh. She’d keep the money this time since she already knew what she could use it for.
“Look, sweetheart, the reason that I’m calling is that your mother is having a dinner party next week and we’d like you to come,” he said, not surprising Haley that her mother hadn’t bothered to call her. It just wasn’t worth getting upset about.
“I’ll think about it,” Haley said, not really sure that she wanted to put Jason through that again.
“We’d really like you there. Robert is very excited to see you again. You know he’s been trying to call you, don’t you? I really think that you should give him another chance, Haley.”
Since Haley doubted that her father knew that his precious Robert had been calling and leaving messages offering to take Haley away for a weekend and “have some fun and prove that his theory that she was wild between the sheets was correct,” she didn’t bother arguing.
Then again, her father would probably just laugh it off if she did because it was someone he approved of.
“I’m not interested in him, Dad,” Haley said firmly, hoping he’d just let it go. “If I can make it, I’ll be bringing Jason.”
“He’s not good enough, sweetheart,” he said, sounding tired.
“Then, neither am I,” she said, hanging up.
She took one last look at the couple going inside Jason’s house before she walked over to her stereo system and turned it on.
She found a heavy metal station, and cranked it up all the way until she could actually feel the bass vibrate throughout the house.
She pulled off her shirt, threw on a very revealing bikini top, grabbed a bottle of beer and dumped half of it out before heading for her front door.
After mentally promising herself aspirin for the headache that was already forming, she slapped a huge smile on her face and yanked open the door in time to see the realtor and the couple stumbling out of Jason’s house with their ears covered.
When they glared in her direction, she held up her beer and asked, “Who’s thirsty?”
“If anyone has a problem with the new computer system, please let my office know immediately,” Headmaster Jenkins said, reaching for his briefcase. “Have a good first day, everyone.”
Jason grabbed the handouts Jenkins piled in front of him and headed for the door. He wasn’t surprised when Haley jumped in front of him. She was a persistent little thing.
For the past two weeks, she’d been harassing everyone that he knew, looking for him.
Nobody would tell her where he was, not because they were on his side.
No, they were all on Team Haley and they made damn sure he knew that when they’d managed to get him on the phone.
A week ago, he’d finally had enough and threw his phone out his car window somewhere along a back road in New Jersey.
When he’d left Haley, he’d been on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
He knew that if he’d stayed, he would have gone back to Haley on his hands and knees, begging her to give him another chance, and he almost had.
The only thing that stopped him was the knowledge that Haley would never want him the way that he wanted her.
“You put your house up for sale,” Haley said accusingly, pushing her glasses back up her nose as she glared up at him.
He simply stepped around her and walked out of the teachers’ lounge. Of course, that didn’t stop Haley. In seconds, she was walking right beside him.
“Jason, we need to talk.”
“I think we said everything we had to say two weeks ago, Haley.”
“No, we didn’t, Jason. You left before I could talk to you. Look, would you slow down?” she asked, doubling her efforts to keep up with him.
“No.”