“And?” Rhett prompts.
“And it’s a joke.” She sounds pissed. “He gave you the land for a dollar. A dollar. He let you build houses. He let you run the ranch. He trusted you with everything.”
She looks from Rhett to me, her eyes blazing. “He never trusted me. He told me I was incompetent. He told me I would run this place into the ground. All the while, he was handing it over to you.”
“Saramaria,” Rhett says, leaning forward. “He didn’t hand it over. He leased it. We work for it. We maintain it. We kept it alive when he couldn’t.”
“You kept it for yourselves!” she shouts. “You built equity. You built lives. What did I get? A pile of debts and a house that smells like mildew.”
“Is that what this is about?” I ask, unable to stay silent. “The fire? The burning? You’re angry because he helped us?”
“I’m angry because he lied to me!” she yells, slamming her hand on the table. “He made me feel guilty for leaving. He made me feel like a traitor. But he replaced me! He found a new pack. A better pack. One that wasn’t broken. One that wasn’t an Omega.”
She spits the word out like it’s poison.
Rhett sits back, his face calm. He doesn’t react to the outburst. He just watches her.
“He didn’t replace you,” Rhett says. “He filled a void. You left, Saramaria. You ran away and didn’t look back for eight years. What was he supposed to do? Die alone in that big house?”
“He had me!” she cries. “I was his granddaughter! I was his blood!”
“But you weren’t here,” I say, the words blunt and harsh. “We were.”
She glares at me. Tears well up in her eyes, but she blinks them away angrily. “I had to leave. You don’t know what it was like. You don’t know what he said to me.”
“Then tell us,” Rhett says.
She shakes her head. “No. I don’t owe you an explanation. I don’t owe you anything. This is my house. My land. And I want you out.”
She stands up, her chair scraping loudly against the floor. “Eat your food. Sleep in my house. But don’t think this changes anything. As soon as this storm passes, I’m going to find a way to break those leases if it’s the last thing I do.”
She turns and storms down the hallway, disappearing into her bedroom. The door slams shut with a finality that echoes through the house.
Silence falls over the living room. The fire crackles. Outside, the wind begins to howl in earnest, rattling the windowpanes.
Knox lets out a long breath. “Well. That went well.”
I look at Rhett. “You were going to talk to her?”
Rhett rubs his temples. “I tried.”
“She’s not listening,” I say, finishing my burger. I crumple the foil wrapper and toss it onto my plate. “She’s too far gone. She sees us as the enemy.”
“We are the enemy,” Knox points out. “From her perspective, we’re squatters who stole her inheritance.”
“We didn’t steal anything,” I say. “We earned it.”
“Tell that to her,” Knox says.
Rhett stands up. He walks over to the window, looking out at the darkness. “She’s hurting. That much is clear. This isn’t just about business. It’s personal.”
“It’s always personal with her,” I mutter. “Everything is a fight.”
“She’s scared,” Rhett says. “She’s feels backed into a corner.”
“She backed herself into it,” I say.
Rhett turns to look at me. “Did she? Or did Anthony do that to her?”
