Finally, the door creaked as my mom stepped out, ice tinkling in the cups as she approached. She wore capri-length slacks and a purple cap-sleeve t-shirt. She’d cut her short hair shorter recently, it was almost pixie cut length. It suited her better than the blunt bob she’d maintained for the last ten years. There was more gray in it than the last time I saw her though.
She handed me a glass and smiled. “I love this porch.”
I gave a breathy chuckle, fighting to appear relaxed. “Me, too.”
“What do you think about the ranch?”
I let out a breath, puffing my cheeks. Where to begin?
Jesse.
His name made a cut on my heart.
“Well…” I said. “I love it.” I shrugged, unsure of how to communicate the depths of my love or even sort out what my love truly centered around. “It’s beautiful, the horses are great, it feels like a family here. I get why Bea stayed. Do you like it?”
She took a sip of her tea. “I do. There’s a lot of magic here.”
I nodded. The silence instantly felt uncomfortable and I wracked my brain for a topic.
“I’ve loved being with the girls the last two days.” As I was recovering, the girls tagged along with Mom quite a bit, stayed the night with her in Bea’s cabin, and helped her in the kitchen. She smiled. “They are just so precious, Hollie. I know you know that, but it’s clear you’re doing a great job with them.”
Tears welled in my eyes and I blinked them back. “Thank you so much.”
“You’re a good Mama.”
She was, too. But I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. On the heels of her compliment, it would feel placating or fake. “But not a good daughter.”
Mom’s glass of tea halted half-way to her mouth. Her voice softened. “Hollie.”
Thank goodness for this sweaty cup, because my cuticles would be oozing blood right now if I wasn’t holding it. For all the pep-talking I gave myself, here I was, all trembly and teary and we hadn’t even begun our conversation yet.
“You’re not a bad daughter.” Mom’s voice shook too.
“Yeah, well, I’ve spent a long time feeling like it.”
She gave a watery scoff. “I’ve spent a long time feeling like a badmom.”
I glanced up and our gazes held—my brown eyes a mirror of herown. “You’re a human. And you’ve made mistakes just like I have. But…I feel like we should talk about what happened between us.”
She gave me a slow nod. “Yes. We should.”
I drew a breath through my teeth. “After what happened between you and Lance, it didn’t feel like you were on my side anymore. I felt like you were angry at me for doing the right thing. So, when Garrett came along, you ‘turning Dad against him’”—I used air quotes—“fit the narrative in my head. I thought you were seeking revenge.”
Mom nodded as her thumb moved up and down the side of the glass, catching the droplets until they rolled down her finger. “I wasn’t angry atyou, honey. I was angry atmyself.” Her voice cracked over the last word. “My entire world was upside down and I was reaping consequences everywhere I turned. But I promise you, my warnings about Garrett weren’t vengeful at all. I truly felt he was not good for you.”
I gave a wry laugh. “Trust me, I know that now.” Her eyebrows lifted at that. “How didyouknow though? When you tried to tell me, I wouldn’t even hear you out.”
She sniffed. “No, you wouldn’t. But, I had lost all credibility at that point. You were smart to question everything I said.” Her inhale shook. “I got an off feeling the first time I met Garrett because…this is going to sound crazy…but it was his eyes. There was darkness in them, Hollie. Something made the hair stand on the back of my neck when I met him.”
Myhair stood on the back of my neck when she said that.
“And he was too smooth. Almost unhuman in his precision. I saw this near-perfect man wooing mychildand I got an off-feeling around him. That hardly seemed like a basis to forbid it, but sometimes, moms just know. And I had to follow my intuition. I’m sure it felt like I was trying to ruin your life though. I didn’t know how I was going to make you see what I saw. I didn’t even know how to explain it.”
“Well, you don’t have to convince me now. I’ve seen it plenty.”
Her voice softened. “You have?”
“Yeah.” I swallowed the shame gathering in my throat like a boulder. “We actually got divorced in October.”
