Written with You (The Regret Duet #2)(24)

“And I’m supposed to believe you now. It’s convenient. Your sister is dead. No one to back you up. Just your word about having a baby in the middle of some epic PTSD episode, making me feel like I somehow caused it.”

“You didn’t cause it. But it is the truth. And for the record, I didn’t do any of those things, but I would have taken responsibility for every single mistake Hadley ever made to be a part of Rosalee’s life.”

His eyes were hollow as he stared back at me. The emotion was gone. The confusion. The betrayal. He just looked…empty. “You know what? I don’t even care about the bullshit you fed me. I can handle it. But I have a daughter. And I trusted you enough to let you into her life, and now, I have to break her heart and tell her you’re gone.” He let out a loud growl. “I’ll never forgive you for that.” And with that, he turned and marched out the door.

“Caven!” I called, hurrying after him. “Please don’t do this. Please. She’s all I have left.”

He stopped when he reached his SUV, his angry, blue eyes finding me with the burn of a laser.

And then Caven Hunt landed a blow far worse than the bullet that had pierced my stomach. “Then you have nothing left.”





CAVEN


I cut the engine and watched in the rearview mirror as the garage door slid down behind me.

Everything hurt.

My body.

My heart.

My brain.

Rosalee’s mother was dead.

The woman I was falling—oh, fuck the bullshit. The woman I was in love with was Willow. The kid who had saved my life. The girl who had forgiven me even when I couldn’t forgive myself. Now, she was the woman who had lied to me and dragged my daughter into the middle of it.

I wanted to be pissed. I wanted to be a vortex of rage. I wanted to hate her the same way I’d been able to hate Hadley.

But this fucking hurt.

I’d expected her to follow me when I’d left or, at the very least, blow up my phone with texts of explanation and profuse apology. But her silence spoke the loudest.

Movement from the interior door caught my attention. Ian was standing there, concern etched on his face. But it was my daughter sitting on his hip that got me to climb out of the car.

“Hey,” I called, doing my best to sound normal even though it felt like I was being torn in half on the inside. “Why isn’t she in bed?”

Ian half shrugged. “She said she missed her daddy. So I distracted her with a movie.”

“What happened to no TV?” I asked her.

Rosalee might as well have had Busted! painted across her forehead. “It was Uncle Ian’s idea.”

“It sure was,” he boasted. “And as we all know, you can’t punish me.”

Rosalee giggled and it nearly stole my breath.

From the day I’d brought her home from the hospital, the longest I’d been away from her was three nights. It was a business trip to LA when she was two and it’d nearly broken me. I’d watched her for hours each night on the camera I’d mounted in the corner of her room while I’d sat alone in my hotel room. Ian had been out painting the town an extremely light shade of red. Meanwhile, I’d been counting down the hours until I could get back to her. It was a tad obsessive; I’d admit it.

It was only three days, but I swear, when I got back, she looked like she was a full inch taller. As far as I knew, she wasn’t akin to a giant, so it was probably just my imagination. But when you see someone every single day, you don’t notice the subtle changes.

I’d never noticed the individual centimeters of her hair growing from peach fuzz to ringlets.

Or when her chunky baby feet had thinned and elongated.

Nor did I remember when each of her freckles had appeared across her nose.

It had all just happened sometime over the last four years.

I could see that she looked like her mother.

But it wasn’t until that moment that I realized just how much she looked like the little girl from the mall—how much she looked like Willow.

My chest got tight and I forced a smile around the emotion as I reached out and brushed her cheek with my knuckles. “I love you. You know that, right?”

She grinned. “I know.”

“Good. Now, get your booty in bed and let me talk to Uncle Ian for a little while. If for some miraculous reason you’re still awake, I’ll stop in for a story when he leaves.”

Her face lit and it slashed through me like the hottest knife. Jesus, how was I ever going to tell her?

Not just about Hadley the art teacher leaving, but Hadley her mother.

And Willow her aunt.

And how Hadley had died.

And why I’d kicked Willow out of her life.

And… And every other fucked-up piece of the puzzle that had created this clusterfuck of epic proportions.

Ian put her down, and she gave my legs a hug before taking off through the kitchen and up the stairs.

“Jesus, Cav,” he breathed, his hand landing on my shoulder. “Come on. Get inside. Tell me everything.”





After leaving no less than twelve scathing messages on Trent’s voicemail trying to figure out exactly what the hell he knew, I told Ian every mind-boggling detail of Hadley…er, Willow’s deception. He nodded a lot but otherwise kept his opinions to himself. Part of the reason Ian and I got along so well was because I was the basket case and he was the basket. Though, that night, there would be no preventing the dam from breaking inside me.