“Alice. You will not talk to us like that,” Dad snaps.
I stand while Declan is still sitting, completely stunned at everything I’m saying.
“It’s a good thing I don’t care then.” I hold out my hand for Declan. “C’mon. Let’s go.”
“That’s it? You’re leaving?” Mom asks, her own reaction matching Declan’s.
“Yes.” I look at both of them. “You've made it perfectly clear that unless I bend to your every whim, I don’t have a place here in this family. I’m leaving. Declan and I are leaving. I’m done. Until you two decide that what I do is valuable and meaningfulto me, then I don’t think we have anything to say to one another.”
“Alice!” Mom shrieks as I leave the dining room, Declan hot on my heels. “You can’t just walk out like that.”
“Oh, yeah? Watch me.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
DECLAN
I’ve never seen Alice like this. She’s shaking. Physically shaking after the conversation with her parents.
If she weren’t my primary concern, I’d march right back into the dining room and tell her parents what I really think of them.
How can two people treat the best person I know like that? Like she is nothing more than a staff member of theirs to control with the purse strings.
“Want me to drive?” I ask as soon as the front door shuts behind us.
“No.” Alice’s voice is clipped. “I’m fine.”
Fine. Yeah, right. That’s a lie if I’ve ever heard one.
“Okay.”
She opens the driver’s side door and slides in, slamming it shut with more force than necessary.
Shit. This isn’t good.
In all the years I’ve known her, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her mad. It’s something I know she learned from her upbringing—never to show emotion.
But right now? Her knuckles are white as they grip thesteering wheel. Her eyes are focused on the road ahead. She’s mumbling to herself as she exits the neighborhood.
I don’t take my eyes off her as she heads back to our place.
I can’t believe her parents did that. Went through all that trouble just so Alice wouldn’t inherit her trust and would go work for them.
I’m angry, but right now, I’m pushing that to the side because all I can think about is Alice and how upset she is.
“Do you want a milkshake?” she asks, putting on her blinker and turning into the parking lot of a local ice cream shop.
“Sure.”
At this point, she could ask if I wanted a pet giraffe and I’d say yes to keep her from getting more upset.
“Chocolate strawberry swirl and a vanilla bean caramel shake, please,” she tells the speaker.
“Here.” I pull my wallet out from my pocket and hand over my credit card. “I’ll buy them.”
That turns her ire on me. “I can afford milkshakes.”
“I wasn’t saying you couldn’t. You drove; the least I can do is buy us our shakes.”
