"Get out."
The words came out cold.
She blinked, confused. "What?"
"Get the fuck out of my house." I stepped toward her, and she backed up instinctively. "You don't get to talk about her. You don't get to stand in this house and say her name like that."
"Oh, so that's where you draw the line?" Angela's voice rose. "You'll fuck me but I can't mention how boring she was in?—"
"Out. Now."
Something in my voice must have gotten through because she stopped. Then she grabbed her purse from the counter, hands trembling.
"You're such an asshole," she said.
"Yeah," I said. "I am. And so are you. We're both assholes, Angela. We fucked up. We destroyed our marriages. We hurt people who didn't deserve it." I opened the front door. "But I'm done with this. With you. With all of it."
"You think this makes you better?" She stopped in the doorway. "Walking away now doesn't change what you did."
"I know." I looked at her. "But it's a start."
She stared at me for another moment, then walked out into the night.
I locked the door behind her, then stood there with my forehead pressed against the wood, listening to her car start up and pull away down the street.
Silence again, too much of it.
I walked back to the kitchen. The bottle of whisky sat on the counter where we'd left it, the two glasses beside it like evidence. I picked up the bottle and poured myself another shot. How easy it would be to just keep going, to drink until I couldn't think anymore, until the weight of everything I'd done felt a little lighter?
I set it down without drinking. Then, without really thinking of what I was doing, walked to the bedroom. My dress uniform hung on the back of the door where it had been for days, the fabric still crisp from the dry cleaner. The brass buttons caught the dim light from the hallway and gleamed.
I reached out and touched the fabric.
I remembered my father helping me with the buttons the first time I wore it. Graduation from the academy. His hands had been steadier than mine, and when he'd stepped back to lookat me, there'd been something in his face I'd never seen before. Hope, maybe pride.
My hand stayed there a long time.
The uniform felt steadier than I did. I thought about all the men I’d been—the one who wore it proudly, the one who ruined everything, and the one standing here now.
I didn’t know which version of me was real.
Maybe none of them were.
CHAPTER 17: ELENA
THREE YEARS LATER
Iwas good at building things now.
The sun wasn't up yet when I unlocked the front door of Millbrook Veterinary Care, but that had been my routine for three years. First one in, last one out.
I flipped on the lights and the clinic came to life around me. My clinic. Not Dad's anymore—not the small-town practice that had limped along on farm calls and the occasional house pet. I'd expanded the building, hired two more vets and three techs, brought in equipment that made the county hospital jealous. We served Millbrook and three neighboring towns now, booked solid six weeks out.
I’d poured every dime from the divorce settlement into this place—sold the house, sold the furniture, hell, sold half my life—but it had worked.
Dad had retired two years ago, handed me the keys with a quiet nod and a "Make it yours, Ellie-bug." I had. And some mornings, when I unlocked that door and stepped inside, I felt something close to pride.
My office was exactly as I'd left it the night before: desk clear except for my laptop and a white coffee mug, filing cabinet organized by month, the small window overlooking theparking lot still dark. Certificates and thank-you cards from clients covered one wall, along with the framed article from the Millbrook Gazette about the mobile clinic proposal I'd submitted to the county last month.
