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I gave her a rueful look. “I wouldn’t expect you to.”
Chapter Forty
Sonya
I’d gone too farthis time.
I hadn’t thought through the consequences of getting Drew and Gabriel in the same room in front of Loretta. But when I found out he’d sold my jewelry, all I’d seen was red. Deep, dark crimson.
And I’d wanted to make him pay in the worst possible way.
I hadn’t considered how painful the truth of Gabriel’s parentage would be for Loretta. She’d been an innocent bystander, just like Gabriel. I cared about her, but not enough to think about how my plans would affect her.
These people had let me into their home. Loretta had treated me like a daughter from the second we met. She’d never looked at me with disdain or judgment.
If this was my version of caring about people, I had a serious problem.
I’d screwed up royally. There was no undoing this mess, but I was sorrier than any of them would ever know.
“If Drew wants your sorry ass, that’s on him. But you stay away from Loretta.” Mulaney lit into me as soon as Gabriel had disappeared in the elevator. “How could you do this to her?”
“I don’t have an excuse, and even if I did, I don’t owe it to you.” I snapped at the wrong person, but when she was the closest target, I’d take it. The one I was angry with was myself.
“Be gone in an hour.”
Mulaney stormed into the stairwell, and I cracked the front door to peek inside.
Every word of Drew’s torrid story broke another piece of me. He’d been a bastard to Holly. There wasn’t any excuse in the world for what he’d done to her, yet I understood. His actions had come from a place of pain and fear. I heard it in every syllable yanked from his throat.
“There’s a rooftop deck,” Holly said quietly. I jumped, not realizing she’d hung back when everyone else went to Muriella’s. “Take the stairs from the top floor.”
“Thanks.” I moved toward the stairwell door.
“I wanted Mrs. Carter and Gabriel to spend time together. That’s why I accepted your invitation to dinner.”
The strength behind Holly’s words stopped me in my tracks.
I turned around to find her spine straight and shoulders back.
“I didn’t know what you were up to,” she said, one brow arched, “but I’d been looking for a way for the two of them to see each other more often. I thought they’d be good for each other. This was the opening I needed.”
I nodded, uncertain what to say. They were good for one another, but that didn’t justify that I’d used a little boy and a woman who’d been kinder to me than anyone had in a long time.
Holly left me on my own.Was she trying to tell me she forgave me?
Drew trudged out the door before I could think on it any further, as closed off as I’d ever seen him. His head hung, shame and disappointment radiating from his posture.
I could leave now. Disappear from his life, from the mess I’d helped create. We’d forget about each other and go on doing whatever it was we’d been doing before. Except I didn’t think I could go back.
He’d wormed his way inside me and done something to me because I had a conscience now. I should be doing my dance of victory. I’d hurt him far worse than what he’d done to me by selling that jewelry. But it didn’t feel good. I was rotten and disgusting.
The elevator doors slid open, and Drew stepped inside without so much as a glance at me. I followed him, pressed the button for the top floor, and the doors closed before he could react.
“Congratulations,” he said coldly. “I have to admit, I am way out of my league with you. Not sure I can top that move.”
“Drew—”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
