Powerless (Chestnut Springs, #3)(88)

My gaze flits over his shoulder to Cordelia, whose eyes are boring into mine. She looks angry but not at me. It’s the type of anger that could brim over into hot, quiet tears.

I know that anger. I know those tears. They taste like regret, and that’s what’s written all over her face.

She looks so much like her daughter, it’s hard not to see the parallels between them. It’s hard not to see her as living the life that Sloane could be years from now. Having to watch her own daughter get pawned off like chattel.

I shake my head. What fucking year is it? I guess I really must be from the wrong side of the tracks because these business transaction marriages are just not a part of my world.

“Is that so, Sloaney?” Robert peers around me, bending down condescendingly, looking far too amused by his daughter’s distress.

I want to deck him in the face and watch him crumple to the floor. But despite my lowbrow upbringing and being an orphan who works in the entertainment industry, I’m not dumb. He’s the type of asshole who will waltz into his fancy lawyer’s office and fucking cry about it.

Sloane’s fingers link with mine as she steps close to me, holding her chin up, refusing to cower. “You need to leave. When I’m ready to speak to you, I will. And my name is Sloane. Not Sloaney.”

Robert blinks once as he straightens. He expected her to roll over and show him her belly, not curl her lip at him.

I’m proud of her. Of how much she’s grown in the last couple of months.

The beefy man tugs at the lapels of his jacket. “I’ve made us a dinner reservation for your birthday on Wednesday. If you deign to grace us with your presence, it would be lovely to have the birthday girl there.”

He slips into being a condescending asshole so easily. My teeth grind, and my fingers curl tightly around hers while the opposite hand balls easily into a fist.

“Jasper has a game that night,” she says matter-of-factly.

Robert smiles. “That’s fine. He isn’t invited. Not if he wants to keep that gig.”

Sloane’s chin dips and her shoulders roll inward. Disappointment paints every crevice of her body, but she doesn’t offer a response.

He’s almost out the door when he turns back and delivers his killing blow. “Think hard, Sloane. If you’re going to be master of your own destiny or whatever this new phase is, you have to consider some things. Do you want to be the reason Jasper Gervais goes back to where he came from? That’s a long way for a man like him to fall.”

With that he raps his fingers against the doorframe and strides away like he owns the fucking place.

Cordelia’s haunted eyes are a shot straight to the chest. The look of pleading she hits me with is heavy and uncomfortable.

Almost as uncomfortable as the silence that descends over Sloane and me in the aftermath of that conversation.

I want to tell her that I love her. The words practically scorch the tip of my tongue as I hold them back. But it’s not enough. Or maybe it’s too much.

Of course, I love her. I always have. But this? Now? I love her so much differently than I’ve loved a single other person in my life.

A truck, a hotel, a snow-covered runaway lane, it doesn’t matter—she’s home.

She’s the air I breathe and that fucking terrifies me.

Because no matter how fiercely I love someone, I know they always leave.





34

Sloane


Dad: 7 p.m. Wednesday at The Frontier. Make the smart choice.

Sloane: Smart for me? Or smart for you?




We drive in tense silence, clutching one another’s hands. I don’t think I’ve let Jasper’s hand go for longer than a few seconds here and there.

And he’s been the one to reach for me. Every time.

After years of reaching for him, he’s reaching back. I just don’t know if taking his hand is the smart move anymore.

I went from elated and horny, bursting with all the mushy feelings, to worrying my love might ruin this man’s life.

My dad pulled the rug out from under me with such force that I’m toppling. I’m Alice down the fucking rabbit hole into Wonderland where absolutely nothing makes sense.

Except nothing about this situation is charming or quirky.

We pull up in front of the little bungalow I’ve worked the hardest on updating. The one we’ve been playing house in. The one he bought just to give my dad a solid fuck you. And now I’m seeing why.

I sit stunned, seeing the house in a new light. It felt like we were building a home here. We’ve made a point to make love in every room. I’ve put a wreath on the front door and twisted Christmas lights around the patio banisters.

My dad has managed to tarnish even this for me. Chestnut Springs. Jasper. My love life. I’m once again plunged into that ice bath of realizing I’ve been the perfect little pawn and haven’t been smart enough to notice.

“I have to go back into the city early for practice in the morning,” Jasper says.

I nod. When he asked me where I wanted to be, I said, “Take me to Chestnut Springs.”

I had zero desire to stay in the same city as my dad.

“You okay?” His warm fingers squeeze mine, pulsing like a heartbeat.

Jasper has always been my heartbeat, and I still wonder if I’m his. If he feels this as intensely as I do.