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“There’s nothing delicate about blaming someone for being cheated on. Maybe if your wife knew her daughter—”

My sharp inhale gets covered up by my mom’s even sharper voice.

“I know my daughter better than you.”

Khaos’s deep chuckle is so out of place in this room, around these people, it makes me cringe from my head to my toes. Please don’t elaborate on that.

“That silver-spoon motherfucker—”

“Son!”

“—publicly humiliated your daughter, the only fucking one you got, and you had no idea. None.”

Regarding her stepson with zero emotion, my mom gives her wine one long continuous pull.

“And now you’re trying to put the blame on Kota?” He scoffs. “Like it could ever be her fault Guy fucking Humphries is nothing but an insecure little puss—” Khaos stops abruptly before finishing with, “Punk.”

Wineglass nearly empty, my mom sets it down, twirling it by the stem as she asks me, “Everyone knows?”

Remembering what Khaos told me about Guy being all over Lisann at my party, I nod. Apparently, I was the last to find out. Like Tina said, all you had to do was look at them and see what was going on. I didn’t look hard enough. I didn’t look at all. I buried my head because it felt safer than seeing what was happening around me.

I give Khaos and his father another inspection. This…strain between them started the morning my car had a flat. Why?

“I’ve worked closely with the Humphrieses for years. Anytime we need a new property, they’re our go-to realtor.”

I brace myself for an all-out explosion. If she defends them, Khaos will blow up, I know it.

“I’ll kill all contracts with them first thing in the morning.”

As hard as I try, I can’t keep the absolute shock from my voice when I ask, “You will?”

“Mm-hm,” is said so easily, but I don’t understand how. Just like that?

“Won’t that piss them off?”

“I should certainly hope so. They make millions off us every year.”

“But, Mom, that’s business. This is…”

“This is how you play hardball. Whereas you’re forced to applaud your competition with that toxic positivity BS cheer teaches you, I was taught in softball to take mine out.”

She makes softball sound so much more dangerous than it is and cheer so much wimpier than it is. I bet none of her teammates ever got kicked in the face, dropped from ten feet up, smacked into walls, suffered multiple concussions.

We are taught to cheer on others, yes, even our competitors, not because we’re weak but because we’re confident in ourselves enough that we don’t have to tear anyone else down. That’s the difference between winners and champions. If you have to stand on someone else’s neck to feel like you won, you were never on top to begin with.

Picking up her glass, she drains the remnants in one swallow before standing and telling her husband, “It’s time for bed.”

Graham doesn’t move right away, and when I glance at him, he’s paler than he was a moment ago. Is he sick?

I almost miss my mom leaning down so we’re eye level before she says, “Not everyone that gets cheated on deserves it, but your father did. I only stepped out on my marriage after he did. The only reason why everyone found out I slept with his best friend…is because I wanted them to.”

Mouth slightly agape, I watch them go. She’s not ashamed of that being public knowledge? She’s proud?

I never even considered that being a possibility.

“What just happened?”

“I think your mom just proved she has the biggest balls in this house. Shit. Maybe even the state.”