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They all had pitiful looks on their faces.
I fucking hated pity.
I pushed myself away from the door and hurried out of the room, down the hallway and through the maze of halls leading toward the library. I just wanted to be alone. Footsteps behind me told me I might not get my wish.
I swung around on my heels, ready to go off on whoever decided to follow me, coming face-to-face with Harper. Any desire to yell at her left my body as soon as I saw the look on her face.
It wasn’t pity.
It was empathy.
Because she knew exactly what it felt like to be betrayed by someone you loved.
“Nathan, I’m so sorry.”
I held up a hand. “Don’t. Please, don’t feel sorry for me.”
“Alright,” she said, speaking slowly and carefully. She took my hands into hers. “I just want to tell you that you did the right thing. Your mom is right—Carly is horrible and you deserve so much better.”
Before I could even think about what I was going to say, the words just slipped out.
“Someone like you?”
Harper’s eyes went wide, and she started to speak, but we were interrupted by more footsteps coming down the hallway. She let go of my hands as Kat rounded the corner.
“There you are,” she said, her voice softer than usual. “I was worried about you. What a fucking bitch.”
“Right?” Harper agreed with her best friend.
“The nerve of that woman to show up on Christmas like that. I only caught the end and Mom was telling her off already or I would have given her a piece of my mind, too. I wanted to punch her in her ugly Botoxed face.”
I had to laugh at that last bit. I had noticed that Carly had gotten some work done, and it wasn’t for the better. She wasn’t the same woman I remembered, not in any regard.
Kat seemed pleased that I was laughing.
My gaze fell on Harper, and we shared a smile. She didn’t answer my question, but she also didn’t seem turned off by my proposition, either.
Which I had to admit, gave me a little bit of hope.
21
Harper
“Breakfast time!” Rose Bishop called from down the hall. “Don’t let that wench ruin our Christmas morning!”
Nathan chuckled. “I’ve never heard Mom use such colorful language.”
“Right? I was cheering her on,” Kat said with a laugh. She looped arms with Nathan and me and the three of us headed back to the dining room.
The smell of fresh cinnamon rolls was a weakness of mine, and my mouth began watering as soon as we were nearby.
“So we usually eat a quick breakfast, then open presents, and proceed to snack all morning as we play with our new toys,” Kat explained to me.
“That sounds amazing.” So much better than what I was used to on Christmas growing up. If my parents even remembered it was Christmas, we might have had some ham sandwiches, but as I grew older, I became the one in charge of most of the cooking. I usually just made pancakes. Gifts became more of a rarity as the years went on and my parents’ addictions got worse.
I pushed back all those memories though and was grateful I could celebrate with my best friend and her family. Nathan seemed more relaxed and feeling better. When we got to the dining room, he went and sat with his brothers, and I sat with Kat who was already reaching for the tower of cinnamon rolls.
Rose sat at the head of the table with a waffle, smiling as her kids and I helped ourselves to breakfast. Everyone appeared to be in good spirits; even Aiden and Jackson were talking, kind of. Jackson looked tired though, with dark circles under his eyes and a five o’clock shadow on his normally clean-shaven face. I wondered what time he got in the night before, or was it this morning?
