“When did he change his will?” I whispered to Derek.
It couldn’t have always been this way; Molly must have been included once. Gordon had thought Molly was his daughter for the first half of her life, until my mother asked for a divorce. When he sued for custody, she revealed Molly wasn’t his biologically. He wanted her anyway, but the courts sided with Kathy. She claimed she didn’t know who fathered Molly, but I didn’t believe her.
“To add me, I mean.”
“Six months ago.”
When Gordon got sick.
I hadn’t known he was sick, and at the funeral, I learned I wasn’t the only one. By the time Gordon found out about his diagnosis, treatment options were limited. He opted to quietly tie up his affairs in the time he had left rather than put his body through treatment with low odds.
And this—Nathan and me taking over his house and business—was his dying wish.
“We can sell in six months,” I said, addressing Nathan. “We’ll hire someone to clean out the house and fix it up. Same with the café. It’ll take a few days to arrange everything, then we can both go home and deal with the rest by email.”
Derek cleared his throat. “You can’t. Gordon stipulated that any efforts to flip the house or business would need to be directly overseen by the owners.”
Owners. Nathanandme.
Gordon made me a co-owner with his son—my childhood best friend, my first love, the boy who shattered my heart. I’d cried myself to sleep every night when our relationship ended. Running was the only time my thoughts didn’t succumb to sadness, because I was too focused on trying to breathe to remember Nathan was no longer in my life.
“Jesus Christ,” Nathan muttered. “This keeps getting better.”
“Derek, how is this legal?”
Derek rested a hand on my forearm. I tried—and failed—to ignore Nathan’s eyes tracking his movements. It transported me back to dinners with the two of them death-glaring across the table during senior year of high school.
“You can fight it if you want, but it’ll be expensive and take longer than dealing with the stipulations.”
Move back to Middlebury for six months and leave Molly to fend for herself or give up ownership and the possibility ofgetting enough money to fight my mom for custody of her. I couldn’t leave Molly to fend for herself again, but I also didn’t know how long I could live with Kathy Quinn. Pause my life while I built a case against her.
Relive the emotional torture of growing up with my mom.
“I don’t know if I can stay here,” I said finally after untangling my mess of thoughts.
“Can’t stand being parted from Mr. You Too?” Nathan asked.
I hadn’t even been sure he’d been listening these last few minutes.
I wasn’t about to bring Molly into this conversation. She’d always been a sensitive topic. Instead, I answered, “I have responsibilities I can’t leave behind. Not all of us have offseasons.”
Nathan scoffed. “Look, I don’t want to be stuck in this situation either. I want to be back in Houston tonight… but that’s a lot of money to turn down.”
My heart squeezed at yet another reminder he wanted to be through with me as soon as possible. Even though it was better this way. Nothing good could come from the two of us being in the same place.
“You want to work… together?” My voice wobbled.
“What choice do we have?” Nathan shrugged, unaffected. I hated that I couldn’t hide the way he affected me. “I’ll reschedule my flight to tomorrow morning. If I don’t hear from you tonight”—he turned his attention from me to Derek—“this mess is all yours to deal with.”
“I hope you stay,” Derek said, his gaze locked on me. It was partly to get under Nathan’s skin, but I also detected truth, surprising given the way we ended. Like Nathan said,Some things change, some don’t.
“Are there any more bullshit conditions you haven’t told us about, Ellis?” Nathan asked.
Derek shared a nervous glance with Tiffany.
“Just one.”
“Are you all right?” Derek asked me as soon as we were alone.
