Page 90 of City of Liars

She turned toward Theo’s mom, never letting go her sister’s hand. “Joan, there’s something I’d like to do for you. Whatever you owe on your apartment, I’d like to pay it off. And”—she turned toward Will and Abby—“I’d like to set up a trust for Caiden and the baby.”

Abby’s mouth fell open. “That’s not necessary,” she began, just as Will said, “No, you don’t have to⁠—”

My grandmother shook her head, exasperated. “I know I don’t have to. I want to. It’s something I can do. Something I’d like to do, for my family. That is, if you’ll accept it.”

Theo’s mother dropped her head. “I’m so embarrassed,” she muttered. “After the way I treated all of you…”

“That’s over and done with.” My grandmother’s voice was firm. “I intend to tell my sons the same. Whether they’ll listen is up to them, but I really hope you will. Consider it a sort of recompense. Without the kindness of Divine Grace, the family that took me in, and the Carters, I could have wound up like that poor anonymous girl, dead on a slab.” Her voice caught. “Or I could have wound up like the child who was born Ella Carter, lost who knows where. The point is, there but for the grace of God go I. Paying it forward like this is the least I can do.”

Will had gone into the kitchen to get Abby some water. Now he swept the half-empty glass from her hand and raised it. “To Ella Carter,” he said. “Wherever she might be. And to family.”

“To family,” we all echoed.

From my spot by the bookshelf, I watched Theo’s mother sit down beside my grandma, tears in her eyes. Next to them, Susi shot me a grateful look. Caiden had produced a remote-controlled T-Rex from somewhere and was making it attack the table leg, while Abby tried to bribe him with a cookie. On his way out of the kitchen with another glass of water, Will ruffled Theo’s hair, grinning. It was beautiful chaos, and I loved every second of it, especially when Theo wrapped his arms around me and pressed his lips to the top of my head.

A bone-deep sense of rightness settled inside me. Finally, in this sugar-scented apartment, with people who’d found each other against all odds, with a man who loved me and would stick by me no matter what, I’d found the place where I belonged.

57

Three Weeks Later - Liv

“You’re gonna want to see this,” Theo said.

I turned my head to look at him, my heart thumping overtime as it always did when I realized that this gorgeous, brilliant guy was actually mine. He was sprawled out on my living room couch, his dark hair falling into his eyes as usual and his laptop propped against his knees. I’d been sitting across the room, doing case notes for my clients, but as my gaze flickered over Theo’s face, pausing on the hazel eyes that had drawn me in the moment I met him, it occurred to me that we’d both done quite enough work for one day.

His mouth quirked up. “Don’t look at me like that. I have something to show you. Besides, with Chloe at Tessa’s, we’ve got nothing but time.”

Hearing him say her name, I softened. Since Theo and I had come back from New York, we’d rarely been apart. And contrary to his belief that he’d be a crappy role model for my daughter, he’d been nothing but solicitous and thoughtful where she was concerned. He’d even gone shopping with us tonight to pick up snacks for Chloe’s sleepover with Tessa’s twins, which Gray wouldn’t have done if he’d had a gun to his head. I could just hear him now: Doesn’t Tessa have food in her own refrigerator? How much sugar do those girls need, anyway? Go if you want, but I’m staying right here. She doesn’t need two parents to pick out Twizzlers.

Over the past few weeks, Theo had navigated my complicated family with grace, showing up for Chloe and even being polite to my ex. I’d tried to run interference between them at first, but Theo had assured me there was no need, then gone on to prove it. The last time Gray had dropped Chloe off, his tattooed flavor-of-the-month in tow, the four of us had even managed to have a beer together without bloodshed. “Be happy,” Gray had whispered in my ear when he hugged me goodbye. And for once, I’d taken his words at face value.

The more time I spent with Theo, in a healthy romantic relationship, the clearer something became: I’d always thought Gray and my father—the wayward artist and the uptight financier—had nothing in common, but that wasn’t true. They both expected the world to bend for them rather than the other way around. Both of them had always dismissed my needs and blamed me for anything that went wrong between us. In turn, I’d contorted myself into whatever shape I thought might appeal to them, trying desperately to fix things. But it was impossible to heal someone else, or to fix a relationship when I was the only one trying.

I was a therapist; you’d think I would’ve recognized that my father was a narcissist, then gone out of my way to avoid repeating the pattern with my choice of husband. But that was the way of things. The more familiar something was, the harder it was for us to tell it was dysfunctional. We replicated home, even when home hurt, and made excuses for the ones we loved, hoping one day they’d see how hard we were trying and repay the favor.

Theo, by contrast, was willing to accept blame for his flaws, perhaps to a fault. More importantly, he was willing to do the work it took to deal with his issues, and he always, always put me first. If I cried, he didn’t tell me I was being hysterical and manipulative. He stopped whatever he was doing and wanted to know what was wrong. If I had to work late, he helped Chloe with her school projects and rubbed my feet when I got home, rather than blaming me for neglecting him and my daughter. I didn’t take his emotional temperature before I spoke, or spin a scenario to make it acceptable to him. I just told him what I thought, and instead of twisting it back on me, he listened. He wasn’t perfect, but neither was I. And together, we were making it—us—work.

Choosing Theo meant choosing myself. And for once, that didn’t make me feel selfish. It made me feel valued and real.

In the meantime, my parents hadn’t spoken to me since the truth came out. I’d called my mom, trying to thaw the ice, but saying our conversation hadn’t gone well would be an understatement. My mom had snapped at me that knowing the truth made no difference—that there was nothing to be gained. Yes, Susi and Lily had found each other, but was that worth all the disruption I’d caused? My father had locked himself in his study and refused to come out; she’d resorted to leaving meals outside his door. If he had a heart attack from the stress, I would only have myself to blame. And if the media got hold of this, what would happen then?

I’d assured her that I had no intention of going to the press. That no one in Theo’s family did, either. All we wanted was to heal the rift between our families, to unite sisters that had been separated long ago. This wasn’t about revenge—it was about reconciliation.

But my mother hadn’t bought it. Even the news that Theo’s mom had dropped the lawsuit hadn’t made my parents budge. For all I knew, they still intended to disinherit me, even though Grandma Ella had been Lily all along.

I’d been right to pursue this, I’d told myself, trying to dismiss my flare of guilt as my mother had disconnected our call with a stern warning not to reach out again until she was ready. Saying my dad would have a coronary from the stress was an empty threat. This was just an adjustment period; that was all. They’d come around—they had to. They were shallow, status-conscious human beings, not cartoon villains. They needed time.

I was sure they were struggling to make peace with the fact that half of our family was descended from the Dresslers. The us-against-them world the Carters had constructed, the one I’d lived in all my life, had been a myth. No matter what happened between me and Theo, our families were bound together, down to the strands of their DNA. My dad was related to the people he’d spent so many years impugning. As Theo would say, it had to be a mind-fuck.

At least Krista had apologized to me for the way she’d acted and was considering the genetic testing I’d mentioned. Uncle Jamison was off gallivanting in a remote corner of Malaysia, with his thirty-seventh wife, so his reaction was yet to be seen. We’d even called Diane Hayes, keeping her in the loop about what we’d learned, making her promise not to say a word to Ethan Polk, for fear he’d use it in his newest book.

I was happier than I could ever remember, except for the hole in my life where my parents should be. But there wasn’t much I could do about that, until they were ready to reach out.

Across the room, my boyfriend cleared his throat. “Ground control to Major Tom.” Amusement laced his tone. “Still alive over there?”

I blinked, coming back to the here-and-now—the crackle of the fire, the simmering, earthy aroma of the pot roast that was the only thing Theo knew how to cook with any degree of success, the glow of the lights on the Christmas tree the three of us had picked out together. “Yes. Sorry. Just spaced for a minute. What did you find?”

I figured it would be a present for Chloe—he’d been driving me bananas, trying to find the perfect thing for her. No matter how many times I told him that gifts weren’t the way to her heart, that she liked him for himself and all he had to do was show up, he couldn’t quite believe it yet. But instead, he patted the couch next to him, then turned his screen to face me.