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“Sabella.”
“I don’t know what came over me,” she says, refusing to look at me. “Fucking the murderer of my—”
“Stop it.”
My harsh tone shuts her up. I make an effort to soften my voice. “Choose me. That’s all that stands between you and happiness. You can have everything you ever wanted, everything you dreamed of. All you have to do is say yes.”
She spins around. “Choose you?” She laughs, the sound cold and mocking. “How can I choose a man I hate?”
“To hate or not to hate,cara, can also be a choice.”
Observing me with a too perceptive gaze, she says, “Tell me you don’t hate me, not even a little, for what my family did to yours.”
I clench my jaw. I can lie, but I don’t want to. Not to her. Not about us.
Her smile is victorious. “That’s what I thought.”
When she makes to turn, I catch her wrist. “Choose me now,cara, while you can.” My words hold a warning. “Because there will come a day that you won’t have a choice any longer.”
“Never,” she says, jerking free from my hold and walking like a queen with her head held high from the cave as if we didn’t just fuck like animals.
ChapterThirteen
Sabella
The mug of tea I’m cradling between my palms where I’m sitting on the veranda doesn’t warm me. Neither does the blanket covering my legs. I showered and changed into a cashmere sweater and sweatpants, but the heat burning on my skin doesn’t come from my clothes. It comes from shame. Inside, I’m frozen.
Mattie exits from the lounge, wearing a black wool dress that shows off her round belly. How does she manage to look so classy and unruffled in the midst of everything that’s happening?
She walks over and sits down next to me. “Hey.”
I scoot to the side to make space for her and offer her half of the blanket.
“Thanks.” She draws the blanket over her knees and heaves a sigh as she looks toward the sunset. “It’s pretty, isn’t it?”
Even though I haven’t noticed the view, I nod. I’m not out here to admire the rose-gold reflection of the sun on the water as it sinks like an orange ball below the horizon. I’m hiding from what I did and from the despicable person those actions make me.
“The police closed the investigation,” she says. “The pathologist released his body. At least now we can set a date for the funeral.”
I look at her quickly. “They did?”
“They concluded that the strain of Dad’s affair and keeping hisotherfamily hidden from us and the world was a very likely motive for suicide. I suppose it helps that the police are understaffed and that the high crime rate keeps them busy.” Her expression is grim. “The media is already running headlines that living a double life finally took its toll.”
Feeling sick, I stare at her in horror. “How did the affair leak out? From Dickson’s office?”
She sighs again. “Laura Remington came clean. She told her story in an exclusive media interview.”
“What? When did this happen?”
“She went straight to a local newspaper after the reading of the will. It’s breaking news. I wanted to tell you before you saw it on social media or on television.”
“Oh my God.” I set my mug on the table. “Why would she do such a thing? I don’t expect her to give a damn about us, but why ruin whatever dignity Dad had left when she claimed to have loved him so much? And why would she expose herself and her daughter to public scrutiny?”
“She told the journalist the same thing she told us, that she has nothing to be ashamed of. She said she respected Dad’s wishes while he was alive, but now that he’s dead, she wants recognition for Daisy who grew up under exceptionally difficult circumstances.”
“Whose fault was that?” I cry out. “Didn’t Laura consider the hardships of being a part-time single mother before she decided to have a child with a married man?”
Mattie wipes a hand over her brow. “Laura is evoking sympathy by telling the country how Daisy was teased in school for not having a father. She’s using the bullying card. She wants the world to recognize Daisy as Ben Edwards’s daughter and not just another bastard child.”
