Lana exhales heavily through her nose. “And your mom…”
“I’ve been coming up with a plan to buy her out,” I tell her. “I just haven’t been focused on it since I got here because you’re my priority right now, Lana.”
Her thumbs brush up and down across my stubbled cheeks. “So what will happen if you buy her out?”
“I get rid of her for good. I’ll have nothing to do with her and she’ll have nothing to do with me. The only thing we’ll have in common is a last name.”
“You hate her?”
Lana always told me,hate is a strong word.And she’s right, obviously, it is. But the more time I spent with my mother in New York, and the more I got to see how much of a money hungry monster she was, I lost the last ounce of respect I had for her. She was a business partner, not much else. And even now, she means nothing.
She and I never had a connection.
I was always just a means to an end. Someone to give inheritance too, pass on the torch of their “Calloway Legacy.”An afterthought.
“A bit,” I whisper.
“Can I tell you a secret?”
“Yeah, baby.”
Lana scrunches her nose up. “I kind of hate her too.”
“I’m sorry I let her win.”
Lana holds my face in her hands. “She didn’t. She only thought she did, but you’re here now.”
“And I’m yours.”
“You are.” Lana takes a breath. “I’m sorry I thought youwere drinking. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you last night. I think when you… My head…”
“I know,” I rasp. “The store.”
“Yeah,” she breathes sadly. “But I do trust you, Christian. I love you and I trust you. And I’m sorry for the way I reacted. It wasn’t fair to you.”
“I love you, Lana,” I say. “I forgive you.”
She smiles.
My hands on her back move up to her cheeks, my thumbs pressing into her dimples. “I missed these,” I breathe out with a smile of my own. “I think these are what made me fall in love with you.”
She gapes at me, still smiling. “Mydimples?That’s it?”
I laugh. “Everything.”
“Hmm.” She kisses my jaw. “Promise me something.”
“Anything.”
“Promise me you’ll stay.”
“I promise,” I say, holding her face in my hands, “I’m not going anywhere. Ever. I’m staying.”
“I believe you,” Lana breathes. “I trust you.”
And I swear everything that was broken and stained is somehow fixed. The cracks are mending and the stains are erasing.
“You do?”
