She will try to ruin me more if she stays, and I’ve already been ruined enough.
“Trust and believe,” I release, shoving my hands into my pocket, so she doesn’t see them fisting, my nails nearly digging into my skin, “—you don’t want to know the answer.”
Every step he takes, I have the urge to run up to him and jump on his back and just punch the ever-loving shit out of him.
Hunter Prince has always known which buttons of mine to push, and the very first one at the top of my list has always been: don’t say I can’t do something.
Anyone can tell me I can’t do something, or I need to do what they say, and I’ll bust a gut just to prove them wrong.
Hunter wants me to leave? Sucks to be him because I can’t. I refuse to toss my son’s future up into the air because his dad doesn’t want me around. Such a little bitch move. And that’s not something I pegged him to be.
Hurt because I left? Yes. I fully approve and support that emotion. Call me petty all you want, but I wanted Hunter to miss me, to sulk through his high school years feeling like a true asshole. Because, well, he freaking deserved to feel like that after the way he treated me.
But anger? Why is he pissed when he’s the one who ruined everything we had together? I didn’t tell him to cheat on me with Cassandra. Nor did I tell him to treat me like I was nothing more than gum on the bottom of his shoe, irritating and disgusting.
That’s all on him. He’s the only person who gets a say in how he reacts to someone. And that night, I had the most wonderful news to tell him.
Glad I didn’t now. No way will I ever subject Maverick to someone like that—a person so vile and uncouth, they would end up teaching him deprecating behavior. Nope. Not my little boy. He’s going to be a refined, intelligent, generous southern gentleman to whomever he comes across. That is my promise to my baby boy.
Muttering filthy expletives under my breath, I don’t even bother going back inside the auditorium, and instead, walk back toward my abandoned car.
As I make my way across campus, people give me side-eyes and wide berths. Good. Right now is definitely not the time to be even remotely forward with me. And just to think, today was going so wonderfully. I’d gotten Maverick to stop crying and be a big boy about my relocation. His bottom lip didn’t even quiver when he told me to “take care now.”
My baby boy. I smile despite the roaring emotions shifting through me. I miss him so much. Even though I know that I’m doing this for him, I can’t help it. It’s always been him and me. Of course, he had my dad and brother, but there was no one to him like me.
Mom never did get to see him. Didn’t even make it past Fourth of July the year Maverick was born. No one, not even my dad, knew the cancer had metastasized in her vital organs. Shit, none of us even knew she had cancer, to begin with. It rapidly spread, and by the time we found out, she was already one foot in the grave. There was no coming back from that.
All within a span of eight months, our lives changed forever. We lost our backbone—the glue that held us together—even though we fought like cats and dogs. And a new, little person joined the Rose pack.
Maverick is the reason Dad, Duncan, and I are still as well-rounded as we are. He saved us. And he’s the only reason I can’t fully hate Hunter, no matter how much I want to. It was Hunter who gave me the chance to be Maverick’s mom. Hunter unknowingly gave me a built-in best friend, and I will forever feel sorry for him because he’ll never know how delightful his son is.
I sigh, stepping up to my car. That’s his loss, I guess. Not going to beg someone to be in my son’s life, regardless of who he is. Maverick deserves more than that.
Hunter may not know that he even has a son, but that’s not entirely my fault. A large portion of it is, sure, but not all of it. He disposed of me, and in turn, he inadvertently disposed of his son. How can someone redeem themselves from something like that?
They can’t.
Unlocking my car door, I slip inside and grab my purse. About time I find where I’ll be staying for the next four years so I can unpack, maybe order some take out, and call my baby boy before he passes out on his poppy.
I sure hope everything is okay there. Maverick is probably reeling about me getting off the phone so quickly. He’d probably be freaking out even more if he knew it was his dad who forced me to.
We haven’t broached that topic yet, and I dread the day it comes around. While I may not want Hunter to be part of Maverick’s life, considering how he is and the way he’s treated me, I won’t keep my son from his dad. I mean, I’m not that cynical yet. A little scorned and a lot broken, but I’d never deceive my son like that.
As I pass by the on-campus apartment complex, I search my paperwork and then look for building three. When I had called, they said that it’d be close to the bottom of the hill. That way, when Maverick comes to live with me, I won’t have to lug him as far to the on-campus daycare.
Flitting my gaze from building to building, I finally spot mine after passing a large, ancient maple tree situated in a rare circle of grass with a tiny bench placed at the base—a small smile blooms on my face. Maverick will love playing there.
When the elements behave, we can go outside. I can read while Maverick plays with … My thoughts stop dead in their tracks, heart falling to the pit of my stomach as nausea churns.
Shit. If Hunter is going here, then that means he’ll eventually see Maverick. There’s no way I’ll keep my secret! He’ll put two and two together and realize that Maverick is his son.
He’ll also realize that his betrayal caused him to miss out on my pregnancy and all of his son’s life, but instead of taking it out on himself like he should, he’ll take it out on me.
Fuck. His family is the richest in this town. There’s no way Hunter won’t go to the ends of the earth, possibly getting the court system involved. With the way Hunter has been acting lately, I doubt he’d be inclined to forgive something as massive as not telling him he had a son.
Just can’t win for losing.
Releasing an exhale, I decide that right now, there’s nothing I can do about it. I need to think about it more when it’s closer to Maverick coming to live with me.
Just because Hunter and I are in the same zip code doesn’t mean he’ll find out about Maverick. Hell, I’ve known of people in this town who don’t even know their neighbors. The same neighbors they’ve been living right next to since they moved into Golden Oaks.
This town may be gossip city, but the rumor mill tends to run slow on some things.
For instance, take Mr. Grooger and Mrs. Shelton. They lived next to each other from 1996, when Mr. Grooger moved in, to 2007, without knowing one another. They both had jobs, so they both had to leave the house and travel. So, they should have been introduced before then, right?
Wrong.
Neither one knew the other, but after they met, within the year, Mrs. Shelton was selling her house because she’d married Mr. Grooger. It was all the gossip. “Quite a scandalous matrimony,” my mom used to say.
So, avoiding the obvious is completely doable. I just need to figure out a way.
Things always have to be so flipping hard. Geez.
Pulling into my designated spot, I shut my car off and allow my head to fall back against the headrest. Different scenarios play out inside my mind, but it’s no use. Every image I’m playing around with, Hunter finds out, and he’s pissed. You’ve never seen the devil until you get a Prince pissed off.