“He’s already verbally agreed to sell it to me when he’s ready,” I growled.
I didn’t hit women.
But in that instant, when she smirked at me like she’d gotten the upper hand, I wanted to.
“Oh, I know.” She smiled. “I went and had a little chat with him. He’s agreed to sell it to the developers.”
This. Fucking.Bitch.
“Why would you do that?” I asked. “You know what a ski resort would do to our land here. You know it would mess with the ranching operation. Not to mention, this is a direct fuck you to your children that want to run this place when they’re older.”
Juliana’s smug smile slipped a little bit. “They don’t want to work this farm for the rest of their life.”
“Yes,” I growled. “They do. All three of them. They’ve all come to me talking about it. Why would you take that from them?”
“I don’t want them to be stuck here like I was,” she countered, changing tactics. “If this land stays like it is, and you’re able to expand, then that’s exactly what’ll happen to them. They’ll get stuck here. They’ll never make a life for themselves. There’s still a chance for Catalina and DeAnne now that Josephine’s ruined everything for herself by getting knocked up.”
“Is that how you really feel, Mother?”
I looked over my shoulder to see all three girls standing in the mouth of the barn, thankfully no dogs in sight.
I hadn’t heard them come back.
“I…” Juliana started, but quickly stiffened her spine and lifted her chin. “You don’t know yet, but having children that young will ruin your life.”
“Is that how you feel about us?” Catalina asked. “Do you feel like we ruined your life?”
I crossed my arms over my chest and wondered how Juliana was going to dig herself out of this hole.
The girls were already hating on her pretty hard due to her abrupt departure from my life.
But they’d kept in contact. Still visited her regularly.
Now, though…
This was going to be terrible for her.
“That’s not what I meant…” Juliana started. “Georgina, hey. Didn’t see you there. What are you doing here?”
The way she was so desperate to change the subject would’ve been comical had she not all but ripped my kids’ hearts out.
“Girls, why don’t y’all go get those apples from the house,” Holly suggested.
“But…”
Holly looked over at Catalina and gave her a look.
Luckily, they all obeyed.
They went to the house and never once looked back.
“Why are you giving my kids orders?” Juliana asked. “And why do you look so comfortable here? What’s going on?”
“What’s going on is that I’ve moved into the apartment over the barn because I needed a place to stay. Denver so graciously made that space available to me. Though, the not having a shower thing kind of sucks. But he’s working on that.” Holly leveled her gaze on Juliana. “Do you know why my mother left, Juliana?”
Juliana frowned. “No?”
“She left because she felt like her kid brought her down. Felt like by having a child, it meant that she couldn’t be the person that she wanted to be. She couldn’t have the life she wanted to live. Couldn’t go out and party like she wanted to. Couldn’t perform the jobs that she wanted to. And never once in all my years on this earth has my mom let me forget that I ruined her life. That I ‘ruined her body.’ Or that I ruined her twenties. She’s let me know, in many ways, that she chose her happiness over me. And that I’ve been nothing but a burden to her. Do you want to know how many times I’ve talked to my own mother in the last year?”
