Everything I’ve ever cared about, he’s found a way to ruin it.
My first car—a vintage Challenger my father had restored specially for me. We had a love of classic cars (one of the few things we ever had in common), and that gift meant the world to me. I hadn’t owned it more than a week when Errol took it out for a joy ride … and somehow managed to wrap it around a tree while walking away with a handful of cuts and scrapes.
The first serious girlfriend I had my senior year of high school—Errol came home from college for the summer, latched onto me like he’d missed me, when in actuality he was trying to impress my girlfriend with his older, wiser, more worldly ways. The weekend after the Fourth of July, I found him sneaking her up to his room through a side entry (unbeknownst to them), and I heard the springs of his mattress and her over-the-top moans all night.
My signed first edition of Fredrich Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil—a gift from our late grandfather, with whom I was considerably close … used it as kindling for one of his infamous bonfire parties.
I’m one-hundred percent convinced that the only reason he’s so thirsty for a spot on the board of directors at the corporation is so he can ruin that, too.
I won’t let him ruin this.
“Where the hell did you find her anyway?” he asks. “She’s got to be batshit-fucking-mental if she’s hooking up with you. You sure that’s the kind of mother figure you want around the kid? And how long until you get sick of this one and kick her to the curb?”
“For the record, she’s amazing with the kid, but that’s the point. That’s why I’m keeping her around. She’s more for Honor than me,” I lie. As long as he believes I’m indifferent toward her, he won’t waste his energy. “She helps out with Honor and it’s a nice arrangement we have, but it’s only that. An arrangement. There’s no love. No expectations. Certainly not a future. If she gets sick of me, she gets sick of me. In the meantime, she’s good for Honor.”
“Does she know that?”
“She’s a smart woman.”
“So basically you’re playing house.” He huffs, hands on his hips like he has any room to chastise me. “It’s just like you to use people. You know how women are. She’s going to get attached to the kid, attached to you, and eventually the whole thing will blow up in your face and who’s going to get hurt in the end? Not you, you coldhearted prick.”
“I don’t see how any of this concerns you in the end.” I shrug and check my watch. Honor should be home any minute. “Anyway, we’re done here. Discussion’s over. If you have half a brain, you’ll leave here and head straight to your attorney’s office and have him drop the paternity suit immediately. If the suit isn’t dropped by the end of the week, I’m pressing send on those emails.”
I hook my hand on his thin shoulder, give it a squeeze, and guide him out of my study, only once we reach the end of the hall and come around the corner, I find Astaire standing in the middle of the foyer.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
Errol takes his sweet time showing himself to the door. Before he goes, he turns back to shoot me a cruel smirk.
Honor’s backpack rests at her feet and the sound of cartoons plays from the living room.
I was so invested in my conversation with Errol that I didn’t hear anyone come home.
“Eulalia …” Her voice is broken and her eyes are glossed with tears. “I sent her to the store … told her I’d take Honor home … I … I have to go.”
“Astaire, wait.” I reach for her, but she swats me away.
I don’t have to ask how much she heard.
“It’s not what it sounded like,” I say as she twists the door knob. “Seriously, let me explain.”
She says nothing. She won’t look at me. When she turns to pull the door closed behind her, tears dampen her cheeks, and finally, she peers up at me through wet lashes.
“I wanted this to be real.” Her words are hushed and shattered. “But in the back of my mind, I always wondered if it was too good to be true. Now I know.”
Before I have a chance to respond, she shuts the door.
I won’t make a scene and I can’t chase after her, not with Honor here.
Leaning against the door, I let her go.
And it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done—but I’ll get her back.
I’ll do whatever it takes to prove that what we have isn’t too good to be true—it is true.
Forty-Seven
Astaire
* * *
Tears cloud my vision the entire drive home.
Giant snowflakes melt on my windshield, smearing as my wipers drag them away.
I had this whole evening planned—I wanted to take Bennett and Honor to the park to build a snowman. I’d even scrounged up buttons and a carrot for the nose as well as a spare hat and scarf. When Eulalia showed up at pick up, I asked if she wouldn’t mind running to the store to grab a few things for dinner and told her I’d take Honor home.
It was going to be a surprise.
But it turns out the surprise was on me.
Bennett’s words dominate my every thought, playing again and again, to the point I can still hear them as clear as the first time. “For the record, she’s amazing with the kid, but that’s the point. That’s why I’m keeping her around. She’s more for Honor than me … She helps out with Honor and it’s a nice arrangement we have, but it’s only that. An arrangement There’s no love. No expectations. Certainly not a future. If she gets sick of me, she gets sick of me. In the meantime, she’s good for Honor.”
Everything between us has been a lie.
Everything.
All he needed was a stand-in mother figure for his niece … and the ass on the side was nothing more than a perk seeing how his bachelor weekends filled with casual sex are out of the picture for the next thirteen years.
I’m halfway home when I think about what Beth said last week, about Schoenbach men ruining their women.
Errol was a monster in his own way, but there’s a chance Bennett is cut from similar cloth.
They share the same blood, after all.
And Schoenbach men clearly have a thing for using women.
As soon as I get to my apartment, I head to the bathroom to splash cold water on my face, avoiding the light because I don’t need to look in the mirror to know what a fool looks like.
So many things I could have said to him, but I’d have been wasting my breath.
Every conversation we’ve ever had, has been a lie—a complete waste of him.
The spoken words have no effect on him, whether they’re given or taken. He does what he wants, to whom he wants, and that’s that.
I change into comfortable clothes, silence my phone, and curl up on the couch while Gentlemen Prefer Blondes plays in the background. My eyes are on the screen, but I’m not watching. It’s just on to fill the void. To keep me company. To remind me that there are still things in this world that I love.
Even if Bennett can no longer be one of them.
There’s an ache in my chest, a deep void that wasn’t there an hour ago.