“Get the fuck out of here, Charlotte, and don’t come back. I could see you burning in a fierycrash and I wouldn’t piss on you to save your fucking life,” she yelled. “Get the fuck out now, bitch.”
Hurt pulling her features down, Charlotte gasped. “Kendall—”
“Get the fuck out! Now!” Kendall screamed, losing her fucking mind. She picked up the empty mug she’d forgotten to move and threw it, screaming at the top of her lungs and swiping everything off her desk. “Get out of here before I fucking kill you!”
“Kendall, my dear—” Brooks hurried to her, pausing long enough to address his wife. “Charlotte, what did you say?”
“Nothing! It’s Meggie and that man she’s married to. Those children—”
Kendall screamed again.
“Beams!” Brooks yelled. “Is Diesel here?”
“No sir.”
“Call Outlaw or Mortician.”
“No! No!” Kendall cried, wild, blind with pain and rage and tears, not seeing Charlotte or anyone, just devastated. “Johnnie…”
Johnnie, what? She didn’t know. She’d suffered as his wife. Now, Charlotte targeted her children because Johnnie was their father. Kendall screamed again.
Brooks wrestled her into her chair. “Kendall, my girl, look at me—”
“I hate that motherfucker so fucking much,” she sobbed. “How could I have ever loved him? How could he do this to me? To us?”
Brooks took her face between his hands and thumbed her cheeks. “Listen to me, my girl. Listen to me. Charlotte’s gone. Okay?”
Kendall nodded.
“She’s gone.” He puffed out sharp breaths. “I’m getting you in to see your doctor. Perhaps, an overnight stay—”
“No, I need to see Mattie. My sons,” she cried. “They need me.”
“Is that why Charlotte was here? Because she visited the kids?”
Charlotte’s words ran through Kendall’s mind.
“Bitch!” she snarled, screaming again, unable to bear all the pain careening through her. The humiliation and the idea that, despite everything, she’d lost Johnnie anyway. All the fighting she’d done for him and their kids—for herself—all the effort she’d made still blew up in her face.
She’d built her entire life—her entire world—around Johnnie. Her heart broke and she cried bitter tears, barely aware of Brooks hugging her and comforting her, as kind as the father she’d lost so many years ago.
The sound of spurs seeped into her brain.
“Mom?”
Hysteria bubbled inside of her. Rory didn’t wear spurs.
“Maybe you need to wait outside so I can talk to your ma, Rory,”Outlaw said.
“Beams called me, Uncle Christopher. Looking for Dad. I was at Turn Creek.”
Her son’s voice soothed her, and she shuddered, pulling away from Brooks and finding Rory and Outlaw standing side by side in front of her desk. Behind them, Beams, Tabitha, and half the fucking office gaped.
“Out, people!” Brooks ordered. “Beams, close the door.”
“I saw you on camera,” Rory said the moment Beams complied.
Rory’s mouth was swollen, his cheek and chin were bruised, and his lip had a nasty split. He’d gone somewhere and gotten into a fight.
