“Sam.”
He turns immediately, a smile beaming across his face like I am the sun and he has been living in the darkness.
“Becca.” His voice is steady, but I see the way his shoulders square, the way his eyes scan my face like he’s trying to read what kind of storm just walked in.
I don’t waste time. “What is this?” I hold up my phone with the open banking app.
“I sold some things.” He shrugs.
My laugh is sharp and disbelieving. “Some things? Should I have gotten all my belongings before leaving? Is there anything left?”
“No! Of course not, I would never. I deserve that, though. I uh … sold my cards.” He scratches the back of his neck sheepishly. “And some other stuff I made.”
“Your baseball cards?” I ask before I can stop myself. “All of them?”
A flicker crosses his face. “Most. The ones of any value.”
My chest tightens. “Even the Griffey?”
A pause. “… Yeah.”
God. I didn’t even like those stupid cards, but I know what they meant to him. I’ve seen the way he handled them. The way he cataloged them, as if they were history, as if they were treasured memories. Like they were part of his upbringing.
I force my expression to remain neutral. “So what … You liquidate your childhood, and suddenly we’re even?”
“No.” His answer is immediate. Firm. “Not even close.”
Good. At least he’s not delusional. “Then why,” I press, taking a step closer, “is this in my account? Why didn’t you just put it back in our savings?”
Silence stretches between us. Then he responds quieter, calmer. “Because I don’t get to touch that anymore.” He takes a breath, like he’s choosing each word before it leaves his mouth. “And I don’t get to decide what happens to your money.”
Something in my chest shifts. Not softens, but I feel a change. “That’s not how this works,” I retort, even though my voice isn’t as sharp now. “It wasours.”
“I know.” His eyes meet mine, with no defensiveness or arguing. “I already took from us. I’m not taking from you again.”
My throat tightens. I hate the part of me that understands exactly what he’s trying to do. And I hate even more that this is the first thing he’s done that doesn’t feel like he’s trying to smooth it over.
“I went to an open house today,” I say, almost like an afterthought. “The agent, Carolyn, she warned me about Rick.” I pause, gathering my thoughts. “She said he moves fast. That people don’t always come out ahead.”
Sam goes still for a second, his face hardening. “Thank you for telling me. You didn’t have to.” He drags a hand over his jaw. “I know it looks … messy right now. Well, itis.But I’m working on it. I’ll handle it.”
“You think this fixes it?” I demand.
“No.” No hesitation. No hope in his voice, only the sad truth. “It doesn’t fix anything,” he says. “It’s not supposed to.” He reaches for his phone and types for a few seconds.
I get a ping on my phone. Sam had sent me a link; I pull it up and see it’s a spreadsheet.
“$59,200 is what I have left after this deposit. I’m tracking all my planned savings and expenditures here. Everything that doesn’t go to paying the crew or bills is going straight to your account, until I pay back the $75,000.”
I blink, unsure how to process this information. Sam … is the one tracking? He always supported me in my efforts to save, but he never fully understood theneedto track every dollar. When you grew up never worrying how money was coming to you, it’s hard to imagine it leaving.
“It’s still not enough.”
“I know,” he sighs, “It only begins to address how I failed you financially. What I said … about you and the money—I was wrong. When I think about that ‘favorite girls’ thing … and what I said about you not having anywhere to go—” He exhales hard. “That was careless. Stupid, and it wasn’t true.”
God, I hate that he’s not fighting me on this.
I blatantly ignore his words and focus on the facts. “I didn’t ask you to do this. To pay it back, I mean. That’s what the postnup was for. Giving me the land.”
