“You’re okay with this?”
He laughs. “It’smyidea, isn’t it?” His expression turns serious. “I hate this as much as you do. So does he. Lucas will be going off to college in a couple of years, not that he’s here much, anyway. When Katie’s old enough to understand and make up her mind about life, if Nolan thinks it’s okay, he can tell her the truth and Jerilyn won’t be able to poison her against him.” He caresses my cheek with his thumb. “We canreallydo this.”
I hug him, unable to stop my tears. Good tears, for once. “Okay. If you guys think we can make it work.”
“Oh, we can make it work, all right.” He kisses me again, a sneaky smile creasing his handsome face. “You might get sick of the two of us.”
I grin. “Never. I lovebothof you.”
* * * *
Once I’m out of the shower, I quickly dry off and pull on one of Nolan’s T-shirts from his drawer. It hangs almost to my knees on my five-five frame. Briefly, the thought of putting on a pair of panties crosses my mind, before I nix that.
They won’t stay on long, anyway, if Nolan gets his way.
Nolan nearly always gets his way.
Withbothof us.
Arlo’s news has gone a long way to helping me feel better despite my headache and the call from Bill.
I grab my bathrobe to fight the slight chill I feel from the AC and head to the kitchen to check on dinner. After giving it a stir and flipping the chicken breasts over, I turn the electric skillet to low and start a pot of water boiling for the pasta. Nolan will arrive soon.
That’s when a commotion in the front yard catches my ear. At first, I think it’s from one of the neighboring houses. Then Arlo walks out, wearing a pair of shorts and nothing else, and opens the front door.
“What the actualfuck?”
It’s his stunned tone more than his words that gets me moving. Belting my robe closed, I join Arlo at the front door. After I get a good look at what’s going on, I push past him and race outside and down our front walk.
“Bill? What thehellare you doing?”
My ex-husband has backed his pick-up truck into our driveway.
Well, correction, half in our driveway, missing the back bumper of my car by maybe five inches, and half in our fricking yard.
He’s busy throwing garbage bags full of stuff out of the bed while Lucas tries to catch them and pleads with him to stop.
Bill finally spots me. His face is red and contorted with a rage I know all too damn well. I hate that, even this many years later, I still feel a momentary urge to cower.
He jabs a finger at me. “You wanted him? You’vegothim. I’mdone. Never should have had him living with me, anyway. If I’d known what kind of a sickfreakhe is, I would’vedisownedhim as a damnedbaby.”
Bill tosses the last bag at Lucas before jumping out of the truck bed. “Mary will be home tomorrow morning,” he says to me. “I’ll be at work. If the rest of his shit isn’t out of my house by the time I get home at two, I’m burning it!”
He gets into his truck and guns the engine. When he floors it pulling out, his tires chew up our grass and kick up a rooster-tail of dirt, leaving a black skid mark on the pavement.
Lucas stands there, trembling and surrounded by at least a dozen over-stuffed bags. Arlo’s standing next to me now, and he stares at me like he’s trying to get confirmationthatjust happened.
Good, so it’s not just me, then.
Finally, breaking shock’s hold on my body, I walk over to Lucas and put my arms around him.
For the first time in a long time, he doesn’t pull away after a second.
He even hugs me back as he starts crying.
My emotional pain from the last two years evaporates. “Oh, sweetie. What happened?”
He shakes his head and sobs, holding me tighter. I glance over his shoulder at Arlo, who stands there now looking enraged and ready to kill. He loves Lucas. But after the last time my son threw us under the bus, Arlo swore he was done trying to protect him from Bill. Unless, of course, Bill started getting physically violent with Lucas.
