Chapter Thirty-Four
LILY
“Not that bad,” I said quickly, not wanting her vibrant imagination to scare her. “He just…didn't love me. And I was too stubborn to admit I was wrong. Then he brought home Adam, and I couldn't leave him.”
“He's a beautiful boy. Sweet.”
“He's the best. I'm sorry I—”
She straightened and said sharply, “No, Lily. Don't be sorry. There's enough sorry on both sides. We can't go back. Let's not waste any more time on things we can't change.”
“That's what Knox says.”
“He sounds like a smart man.”
“He is. I—” My voice hitched in my throat. Why is it so hard to admit when I'm wrong? Sucking in a quick breath, I spit it out. “I made a terrible mistake with Trey.”
“Lily—”
“No, let me say it. You and Dad were right. I should never have married him. He—I think he married me out of rebellion, and maybe I did the same thing. Once we were together— His parents hated me. He blamed me for keeping them apart, and then they died, and nothing was ever the same again.”
“Those bigoted assholes.”
My laugh was watery with tears.
My mom never shied away from criticizing me. I wasn't outgoing enough. Confident enough. I had no ambition.
She could be my harshest critic, but she was always first in line to defend me. She was allowed to criticize her daughter, but God save anyone else who tried. She knew it had been hard growing up in this mostly-white town as one of the very few children of an interracial marriage.
I think she'd always felt a little guilty they hadn't chosen to raise me somewhere with a more diverse population. A place where I might have looked around the classroom and seen anyone else who looked like me.
There were times when I wondered who I would have grown into if I'd lived in a place like that. Somewhere I fit in. Somewhere I wasn't always other. My father said everyone has challenges, and this was mine. He wasn't wrong, but that didn't mean I hadn't struggled.
My mother smoothed my hair back from my forehead. “And Knox? How long have you been together?”
Crap. Another awkward conversation. The truth wasn't pretty, but I wouldn't lie about Knox. Not about Trey either. The time for covering Trey's ass was long gone.
“Like Knox said, Trey's business had…issues.”
“Are you in trouble?”
“I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't know about it. But Trey's business partner was Knox's father, and he is in trouble. Because of Trey, some of that trouble is after me and Adam. Knox came to help, and we, well, you know.”
My mother winked. “You saw that fine young man and decided you owed yourself a little fun?”
My face went hot. That was my mother. Never one to shy away from anything, including teasing her only daughter about sex.
I couldn't even talk about sex with Knox. I wasn't going to talk about it with my mother.
Feeling like a kid, I took a quick sip of my iced tea, watching Adam on the swing. “Something like that, yeah.”
She raised her hand, her fingertips brushing the raw spot where Dave had ripped out my hair. “What happened here?”
In the worry over seeing my parents again, I'd almost forgotten the injury. “Oh, that.”
“Did Knox do this?” she asked, leaning forward as if ready to find Knox and drive him from the house.
“No, Mom. No. No. This was the deputy. And it's my fault.” I tried to think of an explanation that would satisfy my mother and not take the next year to get through.
“Trey's best friend is a town deputy. Turns out he's dirty, part of the problem Knox is helping with. He came by this morning, and I got too close. Dave grabbed me, got my hair.”
“Why didn't Knox keep him away from you? Isn't that his job?”
“He had his eye on Adam. Honestly, it was my fault. I promise. Knox has been great. Really great. Adam loves him, which is nice because his father never bothered with him.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Knox and my father in the side yard. Knox leaned over and attached something to the fence. A motion sensor? My father stood behind him, hands on his hips, glowering.
My mother followed my gaze to the two of them. “We missed you so much, Lily.”
“Dad barely said hello.” I couldn't hide the bitterness.
My mother sighed. “He missed you. You know how stubborn he is. It's an Adams trait, that stubbornness.” She raised an eyebrow at me, and I squirmed.
Her eyes moved to him again. “I don't know that he'll admit he was wrong. Or tell you how much he regrets everything he said the last time you were home. But he does, Lily. I know he does.”
I didn't know what to say to that. Did it matter? If he couldn't tell me he loved me, couldn't tell me he'd missed me, did it matter? It was the emotional equivalent of the old, 'If a tree falls in the forest and no one sees it…'
If he never says he loves me, never shows it…
I looked away from my father, still glowering at Knox as he moved down the fence. Whatever. I wasn't going to bang my head against the wall over my father's emotional unavailability.
Expecting him to start handing out hugs and vows of love was setting myself up for pain. I'd had enough of that. So had he.
That's how we got into this mess—expecting the other person to be who we wanted them to be instead of who they were. Maybe I could decide to believe my mom and take his love on faith. Isn't that what love is? Faith?
If I could trust Knox, love Knox, after such a short time because I believed in him, couldn't I do the same for my dad?
“It's okay if we stay tonight?” I asked, tired of dwelling on my dad. “I don't even know if you had plans.”
“We didn't, and it wouldn't matter if we did. Of course, you can stay.”
“I wasn't sure—” I mumbled.
“I deserve that. We deserve that. We should have come up there. You're always welcome in your home, Lily. Always.” Her voice hitching a little, she said, “I don't know how I'm going to say goodbye to you tomorrow.”
“It won't be goodbye, Mom. I promise. Just see you later. The situation with Knox's dad is complicated. It's going to take time for us to resolve. But once we do, we'll come back. I promise.”
Adam spotted Knox and my father and abandoned the swing, running over to follow Knox as he checked the property line, placing more sensors here and there.
With a quick look at her watch, my mom noticed the time and went in to finish making dinner. I followed. We moved in an easy routine in the kitchen, my mother cooking and me setting the table.
I entertained her with stories about my failed attempts at baking. She pretended to gasp in horror at the idea that I used real sugar in my cookies, offering her recipe for carob-hemp bars.
I wrote it down, but I was a lot more interested in taking another crack at those salted caramel brownies. The first batch had been good, but they were long gone. I needed another taste test. And more chocolate.
Dinner was awkward despite my mom's attempts to keep the conversation moving. My father sat stiffly, entering the conversation only to jab at Knox with questions.
“What exactly do you do for a living?”
“Where are you from?”
“How long have you been seeing my daughter?”
Knox absorbed his questions calmly, answering them all. He didn't let my dad ruffle him, didn't get impatient or annoyed. Knox did a much better job under the inquisition than Trey had.
Trey met my parents at school a few times, but the night I brought him home to announce our engagement, my father had peppered him with pointed questions until Trey lost his temper and stormed out in a huff. I'd followed, furious with my father for picking on my fiancé.
I watched Knox's lips curl at my dad's latest surly inquiry and thought about all the ways I could thank him for putting up with my dad.
We lingered at the table over a bottle of wine, my father finally deciding he'd grilled Knox sufficiently. Instead, he regaled us with the details of his latest paper on globalization and its impact on entrepreneurship in developing countries.
I'm sure his graduate students found it fascinating. Economics was not my thing. I'm not going to say that hearing about his research was as good as a sleeping pill, but I started trying to hide my yawns a few minutes in.
My mother smiled as I pressed a hand to my mouth for cover and glanced at her grandson, taking in Adam's drooping eyes and exhausted slump.
“We can pick this up over breakfast, can't we Louis? I don't know about Knox, but Lily and Adam look like they're about to drop.”
“It's been a stressful few days, Mrs. Adams,” Knox said.
“I told you, call me Rose. Let me show you to your rooms.”
Knox waited until we were upstairs before saying to my mother, “I'm staying with Lily and Adam.”
It was rare that I saw my mother completely flummoxed. She stared at Knox, her mouth gaping open before she snapped it shut. “Knox, I understand that you and Lily have an adult relationship, and I'm not a prude, but Adam is young and impressionable, and this is—”
“This is our house. In our house you follow our rules,” came my father's unyielding dictate.
Out of habit, my spine went stiff. I hated that tone, the assumption that his word was law and everyone around him would fall into line.
When I was a teenager, I always lost my temper when he talked to me like that. Knox, much like he had been at dinner, was completely unruffled.
He leveled an equally unyielding look at my father. “I appreciate that, Mr. Adams. If our arrangements don't suit your needs, we'll find somewhere else to stay. Until this situation is resolved, Lily and Adam aren't out of my sight. Understand?”
“This house is safe,” my father sputtered. “I watched you augment the security. No one is getting in here.”
“Probably not,” Knox agreed. “Nothing is more important to me than Lily and Adam's safety. I'm not taking any chances. If you can't accommodate us, we'll leave and come back for breakfast.”