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“Bethany changed her mind.”
“Clint and I talked her off the ledge,” Griff assures me. “She was just scared, doing her mama-bear how-am-I-going-to-feed-my-babies thing. We’ve talked through a strategy to restore the reputation of the brokerage. An apology, some groveling, followed by good behavior. And time. It will go away.”
“He’s right.” Maxon pulls back and looks me in the eye. “But don’t ever think we don’t want you around. And don’t you dare give that asshole who gave us half our DNA another thought.”
“He didn’t want any of his kids except as trophies.” Harlow approaches on soft footfalls.
Since she never does anything quietly, the gesture catches my attention. “What do you mean?”
The three of them exchange a long, weighty glance.
Maxon is the first to break the silence. “He pitted Griff and me against one another from the time we were little. As a teenager, I failed to live up to his cutthroat expectations. He ridiculed and belittled me until the day he died.”
“I managed to live up to his fucked-up notions of a good son, and I lost myself so completely, it nearly cost me everything,” Griff admits.
“Don’t ask how he treated his daughters, just be grateful you didn’t grow up with Barclay.”
“But we understand the scars you’re carrying,” Maxon insists. “The doubt, the worry, the anxiety that—deep down—you’re unlovable. Every one of his adult children gets it.”
I swallow back a sudden tightness in my throat. Yeah, I knew their childhoods hadn’t been all smiles and rainbows, but this is the most honest they’ve ever been about their pasts.
“We’ve all suffered in relationships because of him, too.” Harlow sends me an unexpectedly gentle expression. It’s not pity; it’s understanding.
Why is that fucking threatening to undo me? I swallow against the sting in my eyes and glare at them all when I really want to thank them for baring themselves. “What did you do?”
“To get over it?” Griff shrugs. “Understanding. Time. Love. I would still be a hot-tempered, fucked-up manwhore if Britta hadn’t taken me back.”
Maxon nods. “I would still be a miserable, angry workaholic, drinking my dinner and fucking a different woman every night if Keeley hadn’t come along and made me look at myself through a lens other than our father’s.”
I can see on their faces that their respective battles were hard-fought and brutal. But as much as I appreciate their honesty, I don’t know how it helps me.
Corrine is gone, and she won’t even let me tell her what a horrible mistake she’s making.
“You’d be horrified to hear what a mess I was before Noah. I was willing to marry a man I didn’t love, who wasn’t even faithful to me, because I was convinced it didn’t matter. In my head, the institution of marriage was rotten to the core and the best anyone could hope for was a spouse they didn’t want to murder. Since my ex-fiancé traveled constantly, I figured he’d be as good a husband as any. It took a humiliating wake-up call and meeting Noah to make me see I was selling myself short.”
“That’s great. Happy as hell it worked out for you all. It’s not going to for me. Corinne went back to her ex. You got that part, right?”
“And you’re just going to let that stand? You’re not going to fight for her?” Griff looks at me like I’m insane.
“What’s the point? I was the only idiot who thought that what we had was real.”
Harlow shakes her head. “I watched her last night. She’s nowhere near immune to you. Besides, those pictures circulating all over social media of her arriving at the hotel with Riley show her crying. She wouldn’t waste tears on you if she didn’t care.”
I’m dying to believe that. I just don’t.
“Harlow is right. You think love came easy for any of us?” Griff challenges. “That it just landed in our laps and wrapped around us like a warm, fuzzy blanket, making us feel all secure about our futures? No. I had to threaten and grovel at the same time just to get Britta to listen.”
My sister nods. “It wasn’t pretty. He still didn’t know if they were actually getting married the morning of their wedding. And Noah, bless him… He fought for me every day. He fought my attitude, my fears, my disdain for love and marriage. He never once gave up, and somewhere in my thick skull I finally realized he never would, because no matter how much I denied it, he knew I loved him, too.”
“Exactly,” Maxon agrees. “And I… Well, you all know I have a little control freak in me.”
“A little?” Griff laughs. “That’s an understatement.”
“Of the decade, at least,” Harlow adds.
I nod. “They’re right.”
Maxon clears his throat. “I had to give Keeley free rein over our future. To prove I meant it, I sang in public for her. Microphone, audience, the whole nine yards.”
