Vanessa narrows her eyes at Leni. “This is a private family matter,” she bites out. “Maybe yourfriendcould make herself scarce?”
“Yeah, of course,” Leni stammers out, trying to pull away from me. “I’m just going to le?—”
“Elena?”
She flinches at her name coming from Dylan’s mouth. When I look at him, he’s leaning forward with his brows creased, staring at her.
“You look different. What are you doing here?” His eyes drift to my arm, then narrow as they snap up to meet my gaze. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Don’t speak like that in this house, Dylan,” I snap, unable to contain my anger over what he did to her. She’s still trying to squirm out of my grasp, but I dip my lips to ear and murmur, “Trust me, Leni. We may as well get this over now so it’s not hanging over our heads.”
Her eyes dart from me to Dylan, to my ex-wife, thenback to me. She licks her lips, then nods, straightening her spine. I press my lips to her temple.
“What the fuck? Dad—” Dylan splutters, but to my surprise, it’s Vanessa who cuts him off.
“Quiet, Dylan.” She eyes Leni again before meeting my gaze. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but we need to discuss our son’s behaviour, and I don’t think it’s appropriate to do so in front of company.”
“Actually, if we’re discussing our son’s behaviour, then Leni has every right to be here. Don’t you think, Dylan?”
His face pales, and he shoots a nervous glance at his mother.
When no one else says anything, I lead Leni to the couch across from Dylan and pull her down to sit next to me. Tension vibrates through her body, but I squeeze her hand to let her know I’m on her side.
“So,son,” I say, placing emphasis on the endearment. “Where should we start?”
Dylan swallows but doesn’t say anything.
“Alright,” Vanessa snaps when no one speaks. “If you insist on having an audience for this… Your son decided it would be a good idea to have athreesomewith a married woman and her eighteen-year-old daughter,” she hisses at me as if this is my fault. “He thought it would be funny to film it and show it to his teammates, only to discover one of his teammates was the son and brother of these two women.”
Leni tenses beside me.
My stomach sinks. So, his behaviour wasn’t a one-off then.
“His teammate was understandably upset and gave himthe black eye. BHU has suspended him for two weeks for the fighting, but we don’t know if the family are going to press charges for the video.”
“What the hell were you thinking?” I ask Dylan, shaking my head.
“They came on to me,” he says with a shrug. “How was I supposed to know she was married, or they were related to Cole?”
“Are you serious, Dylan? Regardless of that, you recorded it and showed your teammates.”
“They were both aware I was filming. They fucking loved it,” he shoots back at me, and I don’t miss the flick of his eyes to Leni, who most certainly wasn’t aware when he took naked photos of her and shared them around. “They don’t have a leg to stand on with the cops.”
I shake my head. “We brought you up better than that.”
He snorts. “Yeah, right. Mum was fucking her personal trainer for years, and you were too busy with your precious team to even give a fuck about what either of us were doing. You didn’t even blink an eye when I applied to BHU. You were just happy to get rid of me so the two of you could finally get a divorce and stop living the lie you’ve been pushing on me for the past twenty-two years. Now you’re fucking my ex-girlfriend. Real classy, Dad. At least Mum had the decency to go for someone a couple of years older than me.”
I wince at the accusation that I never cared what he was doing. As he got older, he spent more and more time in his room or going out with mates. I just thought that’s what teenagers do. It was never my intention for him to feel like he didn’t matter to me. Yes, my relationship with Vanessahas always been strained, but we tried to make it work for him. I guess that’s just another thing we failed at.
“You can’t blame your parents for your actions, Dylan,” Leni says quietly.
He laughs her off. “You think seducing my dad gives you the right to judge me?”
Leni flinches, and I shoot to my feet.
“Don’t you dare speak to her like that!”
“Or what?” he shouts back, jumping up and getting in my face. “You couldn’t handle Mum shacking up with a younger man, so you try to one-up her by fucking my ex? How sick can you get?”
