All those wasted years.
And now his mom had taken up drinking?
Seb had questioned her about it this morning as she’d clung to her cup of coffee with shaking hands. Celeste had promised to seek more counseling, but like Uncle David had said, Seb should check in on her more often. Duty bound, Seb had therefore promised to fly back to Ottawa as soon as he finished up with Get Living, before training started.
The impromptu trip would cut his time short with Helen, which Seb thought he could handle, until he reached the bumpy lane toward her cottage and a huge sense of homecoming engulfed him. He couldn’t wait to see Helen again, couldn’t wait to hold her and feel her arms around him, hugging him tight like she always did. He parked the car and hurried to the kitchen door.
“Helen?”
The house was quiet—and messy. Seb smiled at the dirty dishes next to the sink and the shoes strewn across the floor. She never put anything away, always leaving traces of where she’d been … sprawling and seeping into his heart and soul. Seb paired the shoes, placed them neatly by the door, and made to find her in the backyard when he paused in the doorway. Slowly, he turned to study what had caught his eye.
Money.
There were three piles of cash on the kitchen table next to Helen’s laptop. He blinked at the code and script displayed on her screen, similar to what she’d been working on the other day when she’d holed herself up in her room.
Had Helen found more work?
Seb walked over and picked up a wad of cash. There must be at least a couple thousand in each one.
But who would pay her in such large amounts?
He shifted some of her papers around, then found a jotted note.
Jaxon 12 p.m. Monday.
Jaxon Bates?
Seb’s gaze shifted to the cash then back to the screen.
I’ll do anything to keep this house.
No!
No fucking way.
Seb shuffled the paperwork, found an envelope with the cottage’s address on it—and another thick pile of cash inside.
He was sending her money here, broad as day through the frickin’ mail?
Helen was often getting packages. She’d always said they were from Alexa.
How long had this been going on?
The police could still be watching her. What if she got arrested?
Oh, man, he had to get out.
When this ship went down, he wanted nothing to do with it.
Nothing to do withher.
He grabbed a pen and scrawled a note on her papers, then he got in the car and screeched the hell out of her drive.
Out of her property.
Out of her life.
Engine revs and crunching tires had Helen popping her head out of the chicken enclosure. She placed the egg basket on the ground, ran through her garden and up the lane, seeing the back of Sebastian’s car as it rounded the bend.
