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Mom called two days later.My heart sank as I tried to decide whether to pick it up or not. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore and did.
“Mollie! Thank God. I wasn’t sure if you would answer.”
Neither was I. “Hey,” I said, trying to keep my voice level. “How are you?”
“How am I?Not great, honestly. Your father told me he gave you an ultimatum at my party.”
“Yeah, he did.”
She scoffed. “I told him it wasn’t the time. I had a whole plan ready to make you feel comfortable at home, and both he and Trevor got impatient!”
I winced at the mention of Trevor. “Listen, it’s fine. I don’t think it would have changed my decision.”
“Come on, Mollie. Something has to.”
“I like it here, Mom. It’s charming and nice?—”
“It’s a hellhole.”
“What? No, it’s not. Areyouokay? You don’t sound like yourself.”
“I’m worried about my daughter! You know how much I hate where I came from. You know how hard I worked to get out of there, and you gowillingly?”
“And I’m happy that you’re happy where you are. I need you to understand that I’m happy where I am.”
“There is no understanding it because it makes no sense!” she snapped.
“Mom—”
“Listen, if you come back now, I bet your dad will go back on everything he said.”
I’m sure he would. One puppy-dog-eyed look from me and everything would be back to normal.
But that wasn’t what I wanted.
“I’ll be fine here. The farm earns money?—”
“Not enough!”
“There’s enough to live off of. Prices aren’t that highthanks to some small-town grant, and I already have ideas to make the farm bigger and better.”
“And is that boy gonna go along with it?”
“Cain? Why wouldn’t he?”
“I know a thing or two about him. He has a record.”
“Papa Bennie—wait, how do you know that?”
“Trevor did some digging on this Cain Smith.”
I closed my eyes, holding back a groan. IfTrevorhad found this out about Cain, then he would have twisted the truth and made it sound far worse than it really was.
“Papa Bennie trusted him,” I repeated.
“My father had a habit of trusting anyone with a sob story.”
“Mom,Itrust him. A lot, actually. We can make it work.”