Page 85 of His to Cherish
Soft footsteps hit the stairs behind me. I knew she was coming and I straightened my back, preparing for the pain I was about to inflict. I’d make it up to her later.
I had to do the one thing I’d been dreading doing for weeks now and then get this bitch out of my life.
“Nobody important.”
It was the worst thing I could have said. I heard Chelsea’s gasp, and when I looked back at her, saw her face had gone ashen. Her skin so pale it matched my white shirt she’d thrown on. Her fingers curled around the banister and I knew in that moment I’d just majorly fucked up.
I knew her insecurities. I knew how her ex had treated her.
“I see,” Mandy said, and regained my attention. I’d dismissed Chelsea, so now she was inconsequential to Mandy as well. God. What a fucking mistake. “When do I get to see Derrick?”
Tears burned in my eyes. At the reality crashing down on me, at the fucking gifts on the entryway floor, mocking me with their silence and bright-colored papers. At the pain I felt radiating off Chelsea even as she stepped closer to us.
Damn it. I had to end this.
I opened my mouth to speak when Chelsea’s quiet, pain-filled, and wretched voice whispered through the air.
“He’s gone, Mandy. He passed away.”
Shit!Her eyes came to rest on mine and she slowly arched an eyebrow.
“Derrick died, Mandy.”
Mandy blinked. Her head jerked back, and then she looked at me. “What?”
The color drained from her face. I imagined she looked similar to Chelsea, who was now next to me, a hand on my back, offering me comfort even though I’d just broken her. I could feel it seeping off of her. All I wanted to do was apologize, to explain, and if I could get this over with, I would.
“He died two months ago,” I spit out when shocked silence thickened the air. “You weren’t around, and like usual, I didn’t have a number to reach you.”
Mandy flinched from the cold anger in my tone.
“I’ve been busy.”
“And while you were busy finding a new pocketbook to sink your teeth into, your son died.”
My vehemence was palpable, a living, breathing thing rolling off my heated skin. Chelsea’s hand fell from my back like I’d burned her. I was done with this shit.
She stepped away from me and I reached out, gripping her wrist as Mandy said, “I’ve been working.”
I pulled my eyes off Mandy long enough to see Chelsea planning her escape, her eyes wet and focused on the front door. “Wait. Please.”
I didn’t deserve it. When she turned to me, I knew she wouldn’t. I could already see I’d lost her.
She showed me everything. How those two fucking careless words had raked through her skin. Pain, sorrow, anger. I saw it all, and when she blinked, I saw that everything she’d felt for me had just been crushed in my fucking idiotic palm.
I threw a Hail Mary pass. Something she’d said to me long ago. With my eyes, I pleaded with her, not caring that Mandy was watching.
“Whatever I need,” I whispered, barely above a breath.
She yanked her hand out of my grip and scoffed. “I think we’re past that.”
I wanted to argue with her. Pull her to me and not let her go, but Mandy’s shrill voice cut through the thickness.
“Whoareyou?”
Chelsea flexed her fingertips, taking a step back and down the stairs, closer to Mandy and away from me. I could no longer blame her.
This had been a cluster fuck of epic proportions and I’d handled all of it in the worst way imaginable.
