Chapter 38 #2
Jonathan booms out a laugh, reminding me he’s there. “You got married because someone didn’t show up?” His head drops back with how hysterical this is. “That explains everything.”
My teeth grind.
Nash lifts his beer and says, “We can’t all pull off an engagement that ends without a wedding.”
Cap howls till he wheezes at this, and Jonathan looks at him with concern. “You should get that cough checked out. Rue and I are getting married at a vineyard next month.” I want to whack him over the head with Cap’s cane. “You should come.”
“We aren’t getting married,” I remind him in a whisper. “Are you not listening?”
“That’s just the stress,” he says. “When we get back to Fo—”
“It isn’t,” I argue, quiet as I can.
“Sounds hot,” Sunny says, fanning herself with a menu. “And buggy.” She eyes his suit. “I bet bugs eat yo’ skinny ass alive. Whatchu do to stay so skinny? You scared a meat?”
“I’m a cyclist.” He says it so arrogantly that I cringe for him. Sober Jonathan is such a good man, but the one next to me is the absolute worst. “Thirty miles every weekend.”
I do not look at Nash, whose smirk I can both picture and feel under my skin.
“Mmm-hmm,” Sunny says, judgy. “I bet.”
Cap redirects, asking, “What if Rue finds the gold?”
Jonathan laughs—the only one at the table to do so—until he realizes Cap’s serious. “I guess we’ll see if that happens.”
“Never heard of a man not believing in the woman he’s trying to force to marry him,” Cap says. “You, Nash?”
“Nope,” Nash says, popping his p. “Especially when she’s already married to a man who thinks she can do anything she wants.” I glare at him; he doesn’t placate me. “Not my fault I believe in you and this asshole doesn’t.”
“Let’s not do this,” I say.
“Asshole?” Jonathan laughs, loud. Too loud. “I didn’t say I don’t believe in her,” he argues. “Just—a treasure?” He looks at me like Come on.
Cap grunts. “What’s so bad about treasure?”
“Maybe we sho—”
“There’s nothing bad about it,” Jonathan argues, elbows on the table so he’s in the same shape as Nash, albeit much droopier.
Like a spaghetti noodle that spent too long in the pot.
“It’s great for a hobby. For something fun to do.
But to bet your life on it?” He scoffs. “If archeologists can’t find it, how can an antique seller, some rogue traveling substitute teacher, and a man in a sailor costume? ”
“I’m a captain!” Cap booms out, silencing the tables around us.
“Dad, please.” This is a wildfire that can’t be contained. “He’s right, it’s ridiculous. Can we talk about something else? Sunny?” My eyes plead with hers and she purses her lips. “Tell Jonathan about your dancing. Or the history of the Gullah community.”
“Hell naw.” Her nostrils flare. “This drunk told me I need to floss, I ain’t telling him about where I came from. Nash, you tell that story about the Sword Gate House you love so much.”
Sunny dumps the rest of her drink down her throat then pins Jonathan with a scary look.
So does Cap.
This is a dinner party straight from hell.
Jonathan teeters in his seat; I wish he’d fall over and pass out on the floor.
“My favorite in the city,” Nash says, thanking the waitress for his beer before continuing. “Lot of fun stories there, but my favorite is about—”
“No, no, no, no,” Jonathan cuts him off. “Let me guess, let me guess.”
Nash and he look at each other and a volatile shift occurs.
“You have a guess about the Sword Gate House?” Nash asks, pausing when our food arrives.
When a burger is set in front of me, I realize I must have ordered a burger.
I have no desire to eat it.
Despite the fact I haven’t eaten since this morning, I have no desire to eat anything. I want to flee from this building like it’s on fire and never see any of these people again.
“Here’s what I think happens,” Jonathan continues, cutting into his piece of grilled chicken like he’s using a machete. “I think in this Gate Knife House—”
“Sword Gate,” Nash corrects.
“That.” Jonathan points his fork at him. “I think an immature man lived there who fell in love with a woman, but when he didn’t want to take care of his obligations, he ran away.”
Oh, God.
“That doesn’t sound like a very fun story,” Nash says before taking a bite of his food. “And nothing like—”
“Well—” Jonathan cuts him off, and there’s something about that well that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and the world feel quiet.
The doomed kind of quiet that happens in old war movies when the pin has been pulled from the grenade but before it’s launched to the scene where it will annihilate everything around it.
“I can only hope the beloved hero in your story doesn’t skip out on his responsibilities the way you have. ”
The table goes silent—what I wouldn’t give for Sunny to shout honey child at me right now or for Cap to start coughing or for someone at a nearby table to pull out a gun and rob us all.
“Jonathan,” I whisper, gripping his arm. “Please. Don’t. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The hell is that supposed to mean?” Nash asks, looking from Jonathan to me as the foot he’s been pressing down on mine under the table pulls away.
“You don’t know?” Jonathan almost sobers, looking from Nash to me. “Rue?”
Sunny cocks her head and bares her teeth. “You bes’ shut your mouth, biker boy.”
“Know what?” Nash demands. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Cap grunts. “Means nothing.”
“Nothing?” Jonathan scoffs then gapes at me, and I feel everything start to crumble. “That what we call Bennie?”
“Bennie?” Nash is lost.
“Uh.” Shit. “Bennie is Bee’s name,” I explain. “My daughter.”
“Your daughter,” Johnathan repeats. Then to Nash: “Your daughter. Who doesn’t know her dad because he got married when someone didn’t show up then left his wife when she got pregnant.”
Jonathan shrugs like a bomb didn’t just go off. Like the meaning of his words doesn’t make a sound so loud it creates a high-pitched, deafening ring in my ears.
“She’s a good kid though.” He takes another sloppy bite of his food. “Funny.”
I have no choice but to look at Nash, and when I do, there’s pure devastation. His hurt might as well be one of his tattoos.
“Is that true?” he asks.
My mouth opens and closes.
“Say it, Rue.” He already knows; he’s already furious. “Now.”
“I—” My throat barricades itself closed. “Yes.”
The look on his face shreds my heart into a million pieces.
I wait for him to throw his beer across the restaurant. To yell. To flip the table. The fact he does nothing is worse. His silence might as well be a knife straight through my sternum, plunging in then ripping out, over and over and over.
Sunny and I exchange a look; even her loud mouth is shut. This is bad. This is really, really bad.
Nash stands, quiet—painfully quiet—and drops his napkin on the table along with three one-hundred-dollar bills. He walks out of the restaurant without looking back or slowing down.
Jonathan gives me a look like serves him right, grins like a dick, then takes another bite of his food.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I demand.
“With me?” He scoffs. “I’m here for you.” He holds his knife in the air like a deranged knight. “You came here to prove a point—treasure hunting because I said it wouldn’t work—and forgot who you are. You’re being irrational.”
“Irrational?” I’m stunned and shaking at his excuse.
This isn’t love, it’s a scolding. “Maybe this is exactly who I am.” I stand so fast my chair topples.
“I’m—God! I came here to save the store—which you refused to see as an option—and I’m glad I did.
Even if I don’t find the gold. This was never about you, it was always about my mom and Bennie and the store.
The fact you think I came here to—what? Spite you?
” I almost laugh. “Is ridiculous.” I dig his ring out of my purse and toss it on the table.
“You’re drunk, but we are done, Jonathan. For good.”
He looks at it. “Because of this?”
“Because I love him. Because I’m married to him. Because I’m—” I look at my dad and Sunny, both of them slack-jawed. “Because you are a good man, but we don’t belong together.”
“Rue, wait—” He stands, teetering as he reaches for my hands. “I thought—”
“It’s not just this.” I pull away from him.
“It’s-it’s all of it. It’s—you don’t believe I can find this gold and Nash took off work for two weeks to help me.
To make me laugh. To watch me get arrested in a cemetery even if he doesn’t know if we’ll ever find anything.
He—” I take a deep breath and blow it out fast. “He lights me on fire, Jonathan, and if I walk away from him again, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.
You know it’s not like that for us.” Softer, I add, “And are you really upset that we’re ending, or just mad because I’m telling you no? ”
The way he looks at me lets me know I’m right. He’s not here because he needs me, he’s here because his ego can’t take the loss.
“Louder for the people in the back, honey child,” Sunny says with a snap. “Nash knows what’s what, biker boy.”
“And what happens when you wake up and find out there is no treasure, and he takes off again?” Jonathan asks, the most sober he’s been all night.
If he hadn’t just acted like the world’s biggest jackass, I’d feel sorry for him.
There’s a good chance that what he’s saying might come to fruition, but for the first time in a long time, the risk feels worth it.
If I don’t find the gold and Nash never wants to talk to me again—as scary as both of those things feel—I’ll be okay.
I have Reese and Remy—I won’t be alone. I’ll survive.
“Then I’ll be wrong and sad. But I still have to try.”
Jonathan looks at me like it’s the first time he’s ever seen me.
“Sorry.” I say it again because I am. I’ve hurt him—and everyone.
I look at my dad and he lifts his glass. “Atta girl, kiddo.”
Sunny snaps her fingers over her head. “Sell tickets to the show next time, honey child. We make you a rich bitch even without the gold.”
I laugh despite the Armageddon of a meal we just survived and turn toward the exit. I need to find Nash and have no idea where to start.
As if reading my thoughts, Sunny shouts, “He’ll be at the Sword Gate House.”