Chapter 24
Twenty-Four
C ooper
“Hey, I could play some video games right about now,” I say to Hayes. “Can you guys get it started? Maybe GTA? I’ll be up in a minute.”
Hayes twists his mouth in frustration before agreeing, leading Chandler away. I set my plate of unfinished appetizers on the coffee table and stride from the living room.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sybil says to my brother. She turns to her father. “Say it isn’t true.”
If horrified and heartbroken at the same time had a look, it would be the expression on Sybil’s face. This is worse than when Ethan broke up with her. This is worse than I’ve ever seen.
The silence she’s met with is damning.
My father appears behind them, his anger palpable. “This is not the time nor the place to have this conversation.”
“What’s going on?” I ask, and they all turn on me, then look away. Damn it, I’m tired of feeling an inch tall around them.
“Daddy, tell them it’s not true,” Sybil presses, her pretty eyes filling with tears.
Gregory Laurence, a man I have viewed as a second father, looks like he’s a rat caught in a trap. His mouth is grim, and his eyes shift. Then he leans on his heels and lets out a resolved breath. “I’m sorry. It’s true. I… I loved her, and she?—”
“Don’t,” Ethan growls at Gregory, pure venom in his gaze.
“And she loved me,” he finishes.
He loved who? Who loves him? What is he?—?
Realization hits like a slap to the face.
He loved her, and she loved him.
“How dare you.” My father’s voice is low and guttural. I’ve never heard this tone directed at his best friend. The two face off like they’re about to start throwing punches, their shoulders tense and faces purple.
Sybil turns away, catching my expression.
“Is this about my mother?” I ask, pleading with her to confirm.
Her voice is soft and shattering. “They were having an affair.”
My stomach curdles, and I don’t want to believe it. “They… as in my mom and your dad?”
Nobody answers, and the world stops turning. I turn to Gregory. He’s the one with the answers now. “Were you having an affair with my mother?”
He finally gives me the time of day, looking at me like he’s never looked at me before—like I’m some idiot kid bothering him and not someone who grew up with him as a second father figure. This is not the man I know. This is an adulterer, and one who doesn’t even regret his actions.
“Like I said, I loved her, and she loved me. Is that what you want to hear, Cooper? Then hear it. It’s true. Your mother and I had something special.”
Acid builds on the back of my tongue, my stomach roiling with upset. I whip toward Ethan. “You knew and didn’t tell me?”
“I barely found out myself. I overhead him talking to Vale about it at the viewing last night. I didn’t want to believe it, but Dad told me to drop it, that we needed to honor Mom’s memory and deal with this later.”
I look over at my father, who is standing there, his mind who knows where. Shit .
“You need to leave.” Ethan turns on Gregory.
He laughs. “This is my house.”
“I don’t fucking care. Be somewhere else.”
I glance at Dad, and that far-away mask disappears. Fury twists his features, reddens his neck, and sharpens his jaw. He loved Mom more than anything. It’s unbelievable she’d ever do this, but why would Gregory lie? He doesn’t gain anything by admitting this at her wake.
I close my eyes, picturing Mom over the last few months. She left this earth with such courage, and the whole time she was a lying coward, having an affair with her husband’s best friend—a man married to her best friend.
It’s sick. Imagining them together makes me gag. I step back from the group, pointing at the only person left alive I can blame. “You heard Ethan,” I seethe. “Leave.”
Gregory shakes his head. “I have as much a right to grieve her as anyone else. Our relationship wasn’t some torrid affair. I don’t conduct myself like you do with women.”
My vision goes fucking red, and I swing without thinking, punching the asshole right in his smug face. His nose cracks, and he stumbles away, glaring at me but not fighting back like I wish he would. Blood pours from his nose, staining his white shirt.
I don’t regret it…
Until I see the tears staining Sybil’s cheeks. Ethan holds her as she gives me a sorrowful look, the trust in her eyes now gone.
So much innocence lost.
Gregory-fucking-Laurence took that innocence, and I want to beat him to a bloody pulp. But I can’t, so I turn away.
I make it a single step before I freeze. Amelia Laurence stands behind me, her eyes huge. She’s staring at her husband like she doesn’t know him.
Then Amelia Laurence, always the cool, calm, and collected leader of the Laurence family, turns on her heel and runs from the room. Her daughter rips away from Ethan and rushes after her.
Guilt creeps in when I think of the torch I’ve been carrying for my bother’s girl and the kiss we shared.
Would I have been willing to start an affair with Sybil?
I want to say I would never do that to my brother, but the truth is…
I might not be a good person. I might take the chance if it presented itself.
At some point, my resolve to hold myself back from Sybil might snap.
It’s a cold, hard, bitter truth.
Crack!
Gregory goes down hard, and my father stands over him, rubbing his fist. The entire party has gone silent, literally everyone a witness to Gregory on the ground with blood all over his face and clothes. My hit may not have laid the man flat out, but my father’s punch sure as hell did.
Dad’s voice is frighteningly calm when he leans over his best friend of over thirty years. “You and I are done.”