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First, however, we had to deal with her parents. Marissa and Wroth couldn’t be let off the hook for how they had used me to control their daughter’s life. They knew I would do anything to make Doe happy, and that’s what I’d thought I was doing.
Now, I was at risk of losing her forever.
LJ stopped in his parents’ driveway and killed the engine just as Aspen turned off the truck behind us. There were a few other vehicles already parked there, and I realized that more than just Piper had shown up. I glanced at Bryant, but he just shrugged, unsure of what was going on any more than I was.
Jackson opened my door since he’d been smart enough to engage the child safety locks before we’d gone in to pick up Doe at Aspen’s apartment. The golden three, as so many people called them, knew their sister well. Otherwise, she probably would have been able to make a break for it back in the parking lot, and it would have taken more than gentle coaxing to get her to come with us to West Bridge.
Still holding her hand, I helped Doe out of the back of my car. Once her feet were on the ground, she tried to pull away, but I interlocked our fingers and guided her to the Nialls’ front door. Without bothering to knock, LJ and his brothers walked in, with Aspen following them. Doe glanced at her friend’s back and paused, but none of us could hide from this confrontation; there was no use prolonging the inevitable.
“I can’t believe you two would do something like this.” Liam Bryant’s voice rang out, and we followed the sound into the family room. “Especially you, Rissa. You were playing with your own child’s future. Her happiness, for fuck’s sake.”
He stood at the fireplace, glaring at his sister and brother-in-law. A quick glance around showed me that Liam’s wife, Gabriella, was also there, as well as Piper, Pixie, and even the fucking mayor. The sight of Teller caught me off guard, but it would only make things easier since I could tell him to his face to shove the police chief job.
“Jenner makes her happy,” Marissa argued. “And I thought that if she had her own home near the farm, she would be even more so. I had no idea that the people of this stupid town were making her miserable. No one ever gave me a hint that she was being bullied by grown adults!”
“That isn’t the issue at the moment,” her brother countered. “You should have let the boy make his own choices. You shouldn’t have stuck your nose in their lives and convinced him it was for Doe’s own good. They’re together, and that means they’re partners. When you conspired to get him to keep this shit from her, you essentially broke their partnership and Doe’s trust in him. That’s manipulative and beneath you.”
“She was getting ready to leave us!” Wroth interjected. “What the hell were we supposed to do, Liam? Doe is too soft for the real world. They will gobble her up and spit her out without a care for her tender heart. I couldn’t risk her getting hurt.”
Beside me, Doe let out a sharp gasp, and all eyes turned to her. “Is that what you really think of me?” she demanded angrily, jerking her hand from mine to move farther into the living room. “Am I truly so weak in your eyes that you think I can’t make it in what you call ‘the real world’?”
Wroth squeezed the back of his neck. “You’re not like your brothers, Doe. You’re sweet and kind to everyone. We’ve sheltered you from the worst of the bad things in the world. Things that would break your heart. I trust Jenner to keep you safe, but not even he could protect your bright soul from the darkness.”
“I know exactly how dark the world is, Dad,” she gritted out. “I’ve been living in a town where everyone—every fucking person—has treated me like a pariah. If none of them could tarnish my soul, I doubt anyone or anything else could.”
“You should have told us about that—”
“Really?” She lifted her brows at him. “And become an even bigger outcast because you raged out on anyone who so much as looked down their snotty noses at me? Should I have let their words not only hurt me, but destroy the people I love? I refused to allow anyone to drive me to the point that I came crying to any of you. The farm is here. The boys still had their baseball dreams. Everyone was happy, and I was happy because of that alone.”
“They hurt you!” he shouted angrily.
“Yeah, they did,” she agreed. “But you hurt me more, Dad.”
He blanched and stumbled back a step at her heated words. But she wasn’t done. “You played with my life. And it is mine, Dad. I’m the only one who gets to say where I live. To whom and where and when I get married. But you and Mom both manipulated Jenner into thinking everything he did was for my own good, when all along, it was so you could keep me close and control me.”
“We just wanted to protect you,” he said softly, which was an odd contrast to his harsh voice.
“Stop lying to yourself! You’ve always treated me differently from the boys. But I can assure you, I’m a hundred times stronger than they are. I can protect myself from the people I know will hurt me. Too bad I didn’t see until it was too late that I needed to protect myself from you, Mom, and Jenner.”
“Doe, sweetheart,” Marissa tried to break in, but Doe turned wounded eyes on her mother.
“I always thought you were the best parents. I’ve seen how bad it can be for some kids. Aspen is standing right there, and he can give testimony as to exactly how big of a contrast you two are compared to his own. Maybe you never physically hurt me, and you tried not to harm me emotionally, but this thing with Jenner? That’s manipulative as fuck. By using him, you hurt me in a way no one else had the power to.”
“That wasn’t our intention,” Marissa whispered.
“Bullshit!” I’d never seen Doe so angry in all the time I’d known her. Not even the rare occasions we’d argued in the past had she exploded like she did then. “You knew what you were doing, Mom. Don’t lie to me or yourself and pretend like you didn’t. And Jenner trusted you. You are the two people he expected to have only the best of intentions where I’m concerned. Should he have told me what was going on, regardless of how many times you told him your idiotic surprise would make me happy? Yes. But he didn’t suspect that you were trying to use him to control me. And now…” She scrubbed her hands over her face, and it was only then I realized she was crying. “Now, I’m lost. I don’t know what to do. The people I love and should be able to trust the most have broken something inside me.”
“Honey, I’m so sorry.” Marissa was openly crying too, and she stepped forward, intent on hugging her daughter, but Doe took two steps back, holding up her hands to warn the older woman away. “Doe, what can we do to make this up to you? How can I fix this, sweetheart?”
“You think this has an easy fix?” Doe shouted. “Do you honestly think you can turn my life upside down, and after a few days, everything will go back to normal?”
“No, but I want to try to fix what we broke!” Marissa cried.
“Well, you fucking can’t!”
“Okay,” Gabriella said, moving between mother and daughter. She grasped her niece’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Emotions are high right now. You both need to take a deep breath and rein it in.”
“Maybe I should give you some privacy,” Mayor Teller mumbled, backing toward the door.
