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She turned to her mother and set her mug down. “We could start over. Find a new place. Hell, the prices outside New York are amazingly different. We could probably buy a bigger place for half the money in Utah.”
Lily stood and pulled Kendall into her arms. Kendall just stood there with her arms at her sides. She didn’t want her mother’s comfort. What she needed to do was figure out a plan. Kendall slipped away from her mother and picked up her cell.
“I have a friend in Utah. I should call her. See if the offer still stands to come out there and live.”
“Kendall, you’re not making any sense. Our friends are here. Why would we leave? Why don’t you just call Shane and ask him?”
“I’ll talk to him when he comes ho—when he gets back tomorrow.”
“There are a million reasons to do an appraisal. You can’t make assumptions.”
“The property is worth more than this entire operation, so you’re damn right I want to sell. I will be selling.”
Kendall stopped, meeting her mother’s gaze. “Because he said it. I just didn’t choose to believe him.”
“Are you sure?”
How many times had that same line screamed in her head today?
“The property is worth more than this entire operation, so you’re damn right I want to sell. I will be selling.”
“I can’t be here. I don’t know how you stayed here after Lawrence left. How could you stand to be in the same places, see the same spots after loving him?” She slapped her hands over her mouth and saw the stricken look on her mother’s face. “I’m sorry, Mom. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.”
Lily blinked back a sheen of tears and sank onto the couch. “Because I loved your father more than he loved me. I didn’t have those kinds of memories. I made a home for Larry and tried to make this house perfect so he wouldn’t leave. I held on to him so tightly that I drove him away.”
Kendall pushed away her own pain and locked it into a box. She was good at stuffing her emotions in boxes when she needed to. She sat next to her mother and curled an arm around her shoulders.
“You never ask about Lawrence, so I just never talk about him.” Lily’s voice broke.
“Anytime I asked when I was little, you would cry. I hated to see you cry.” She pressed her cheek to her mother’s. The familiar scent of lavender and vanilla closed around her.
“Knowing a man doesn’t love you back is the worst feeling in the world.”
Her mother’s whispered statement left Kendall raw. She had to agree. Funny how the next generation of Justice would shred the heart of yet another Proctor. Evidently the men were kryptonite to Proctor women.
“I knew he was seeing someone. I felt him pulling away from me when you were really little. He stayed for you, you know. I got five years with Larry because you were the light of his life.”
Kendall’s eyes burned. “Then why did he leave me without a backward glance? Why did he leave us?”
“He fell in love with Shane’s mother. I didn’t know her name, but from what I pieced together, it had to be her. I broke them up, you know? For two years he tried to stay here, and I naively thought having his baby would be enough of a hold. I even tried to have another one, but he was careful. I told him that if he left, he’d have to leave you too. I don’t even recognize the woman I was then. I’d have done anything to get him to stay.”
“Oh, Mom.” Kendall looked down as the first drops of tears splashed against her hand. Lily had loved her father so much. Maybe too much.
“I’m sorry I took him away from you too. Part of our problem had always been how prideful Larry and I both were. Even when I wanted to let you back into his life. When I got over my own stupidity and contacted him, it was too late.”
“He didn’t want me?” Kendall’s chest ached. How much was one fragile organ supposed to take in one day?
“No, honey. He did, but his wife got sick. He had to worry about her, and time just slid by. We both agreed that it was best to leave well enough alone.”
He’d actually wanted her? Kendall stood. All this time she’d thought her father had simply walked away. “You made the decision for me? Don’t you think I should have been in on that kind of discussion?”
“You didn’t want to talk about him. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
Kendall pushed her hair back. She searched for anger, for regret, but she couldn’t find either. Her mother had made a good life for her. A few conversations she and Shane had on the road trip finally made sense. Her father still had chosen Shane’s mother over his own daughter. But if Lily was telling the truth, she hadn’t given Lawrence much choice in the matter.
She tried to reconcile the desperate and unreasonable woman her mother described and the mother she’d known all her life. Lily was bright and warm and sweet to everyone she met, but she rarely interacted with men. Kendall dashed away tears. “I understand. I wish you had found someone else instead of pining for Lawrence.”
“I loved him. I didn’t want anyone else.”
