The Last Invitation (29)
She’d convinced herself she was protecting the family unit. All of them. A disastrous choice that made her silently resent Baines. Seeing him after being with Liam cracked the sheen and uncovered who her husband really was and what he was willing to do to get what he wanted.
Yet she stayed. For years, she stayed with Baines. She would have continued as his wife, with her secret about Kennedy deeply buried, until she hit a breaking point where even she could no longer swallow the shame.
“You didn’t give me a choice in any of this. I never would have walked away from you or from a baby if I’d known,” Liam said.
“I’m so sorry.” Empty words. Not nearly enough, and she knew that.
“You picked Baines and asked me to support you, but I did it based on false information. I thought the baby was his.”
She closed her eyes, trying to block out the thump of anger in his voice and the horrible realization that she’d picked the wrong side more than fourteen years ago and had been paying for that ever since. “What we had was only a short fling.”
“Not for me.”
The words broke her. She fell into the stool next to her. She couldn’t even muster the energy to fight back.
Kennedy walked into the room without any fanfare. She might have been hovering outside and listening in or just storming back and forth. Gabby didn’t know, and the last thing she could worry about now was someone hearing too much. They’d blown past that point when Kennedy received the note.
“I can’t stay here,” Kennedy declared in the dramatic way teens said ridiculous things and believed them.
“Kennedy, this is—”
“Not the time. Not the place. Not the right answer.” Kennedy mimicked Gabby’s voice. “But that’s just it. You don’t get to tell me that anymore, Mom.”
Gabby couldn’t take much more. “Kennedy, stop. You’re fourteen.”
“She lied to us. To Dad.” Kennedy half pleaded and half argued with Liam as if she wasn’t sure how much blame to spread and how far to extend it. “And you. He was your brother.”
Gabby tried to deflect the anger back to her. “It’s not that simple, honey.”
“Explain it to me, then.” Kennedy stopped as soon as she started. She held up a hand. “Actually, don’t. I can’t trust a thing you say. You are a stupid liar.”
Every word bore right into Gabby’s heart and ripped a piece out. She was the mom, so she’d played the bad-guy role before, but this was so much bigger. This might not be fixable. “That’s not true.”
“Okay. Let’s do this.” Liam let out a loud exhale. “Kennedy, come to my house.”
“I don’t want to be with either of you,” she shot back.
“I get that, and I’m as pissed and confused as you are, but we need to know you’re safe.” He winced as if he knew he’d waded out into dangerous waters but had no choice. “I’ve been doing some work from home since the funeral. We can coexist there.”
Without her. That’s what Gabby heard. “Liam, please.”
“You don’t really get a vote tonight, Gabby.” He shot Kennedy a struggling half-smile. “Go wait for me in the car. We’ll figure out the school part tomorrow.”
Gabby waited until Kennedy headed for the front door to drop her voice and try one more time with Liam. “We need to talk about this and where we go next.”
“You had fourteen years to talk.” Liam started to leave but stopped. “Did Baines know the truth?”
“Eventually, yes.” There was so much more to it, but this secret was enough. Unloading the rest might be too much even for Liam’s strong shoulders.
Liam shook his head. “And you think Baines was the asshole in your relationship? Sounds to me like you were perfect for each other.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Jessa
No time for lunch out. No time for a talk. No time to figure out what Retta was trying to say the other night. That’s exactly how Jessa thought of her day: as one big rush of nothing. But she needed contact with a nonlawyer to preserve her sanity. Someone rational, who didn’t think in terms of wins and losses all the time. So she begged Faith to come to the office and share a sandwich.
“I looked up Rob Greene after you told me about him stopping you.” Faith sat on the opposite side of Jessa’s desk, stabbing her fork into the container of potato salad. “Stay away from him.”
Jessa had seen the same articles and warnings, and she got it. “That’s the plan.”
“I’m serious. In addition to the dangerous and unstable part, which you should not ignore because damn, you don’t want to be seen with him and have his putrid reputation spill over and splash onto you.”
“What a lovely visual image.”
The door opened as someone knocked. Jessa’s assistant stuck her head in the room. “Excuse me.”
“I’m at lunch.” A fact Jessa thought should have been obvious.
The door opened wider, and Detective Melissa Schone walked in. “She’s warning you I’m here.”
Jessa dropped her sandwich. “And that kills my appetite.”
“I’ve heard worse.” The detective stared at the assistant until she backed out of the room and closed the door behind her. “Good afternoon.”