Path of Destruction (Broken Heartland, #2)(48)

“Well now I have to know. Why did I what?”

Ella Jane took a deep breath and asked a question that had been weighing on her for nearly a year.

“Why did you let Dad just move back in here like nothing had happened? Like he hadn’t done anything wrong?”

Her mom regarded her for several long seconds as if deciding whether or not she could handle the truth.

“In light of everything that happened,” she began slowly, “what he had done seemed like a very small thing. He made a mistake. He apologized. In the end, I had to admit that having him here was better than not having him here.”

Ella Jane allowed her mother’s words to sink in. In light of everything that had happened meant after Kyle’s death. Her mother had obviously discovered a superhuman capability for forgiveness. EJ must not have inherited that gene. Just because she didn’t blame Hayden for Kyle’s death didn’t mean she could just forgive him for the pain he’d caused. Seeing him with someone else, waiting for him, losing her brother because she’d gotten stuck while waiting for him—they weren’t memories she could just erase.

She knew he was sorry. The incident with Cameron, all the incidences with his ex actually, seemed to be “misunderstandings” in which EJ just happened along at the wrong time. He didn’t make it to the ridge because he had wrecked his granddad’s truck and broken his arm. She’d seen him wearing cast at school so she knew it was true.

But even still, even with all the facts and the knowledge that her heart raced just at the sight of him or even the thought of seeing him, that didn’t change the fact that when she looked at Hayden Prescott, she saw something his eyes that made her wish it had been her that lost her life on that ridge instead of her brother.

Disappointment.

Hayden wanted her to be that girl, the sweet innocent one who let him in both literally and figuratively. The Hope’s Grove hillbilly with a heart of gold. That chick was long gone. Hayden needed to let her go. As did everyone else.

“But…” She tried to put her feelings in to words. It felt like forever since she’d tried to actually explain how she felt to her mom. They’d been close once, but not anymore. Ella Jane didn’t feel close to anyone anymore. “Don’t you think that what dad did and what happened with the storm…and Kyle…don’t you think those things changed you, mom? I mean really changed you. He just came back like nothing had happened, like nothing had changed. But we have.”

Her mother nodded. “If your dad’s extramarital affair and losing Kyle have taught me anything, it’s that no one is perfect and that I am more forgiving than I ever knew I could be. I’ve also realized that there aren’t guarantees in life, Ella Jane. You can do everything right and your life can still go wrong. Or you can make a million mistakes and somehow still end up where you’re meant to.”

Ella Jane swallowed hard, trying to digest what her mother was saying but feeling as if maybe she just didn’t understand what she’d meant exactly.

“I can’t just pretend,” EJ whispered, looking at her reflection in the mirror. She didn’t even look the same anymore. Her eyes were even darker, as if the sorrow or all the tears she’d cried had deepened their color. “Not for him. Not for anyone.”

“No one is asking you to,” her mother promised. “But for the sake of peace in this house, please try to understand that this is for the best right now. It’s best for the business, best for me, and if you let it, you might even realize that forgiving your father would do you a world of good, too.”

Any man who would run out on his family is a selfish coward, Kyle had said half a dozen times that summer. Where Ella Jane had been wounded, Kyle had been angry. Now she understood why. Holding onto anger felt good in a sick sort of way. It provided much-needed warmth in the cold hollow place where pain lived.

“I’ll try my best,” she assured her mom, knowing that her best likely would not be good enough.

“That’s all I ask.” Her mom smiled while placing the last bobby pin in the side of EJ’s hair she’d swept over one shoulder. “There. All done.”

Ella Jane forced a smile, blinking back any traitorous emotions before they could show. “Okay, let’s get this over with.”



Prom was held at a hotel beside the mall in Summit Bluffs. Ella Jane parked her truck in the lot beside the salmon-colored balloon archway entrance and watched several tuxedo and cocktail dress clad couples running in laughing and holding hands. One couple paused to make out beside their limo. The sight wrenched something loose inside her.

Hayden. The guy kind of looked like Hayden.

His face angled toward her and she saw that it wasn’t him after all. She exhaled an involuntary sigh of relief.

Why do I even care?

She didn’t know why, just that it hurt. Seeing him with Cameron Nickelson was hard, but knowing that whether she wanted to admit it or not, Cami had spent the summer with her brother, made it a little easier to take. For whatever reason, she hadn’t been with Hayden. But seeing him with anyone else would gut her and she knew it.

One day, you will have to.

Ella Jane knew that Hayden would eventually move on, get tired of baggage and find a girl more like him. Gorgeous, funny, carefree, and without the ghost of her brother haunting her every second. He should get to move on. He deserved that. She’d told him to.