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He looked relieved, which just pissed me off more.

“Aunt,”he said with a smile on his face. “Is Sara visiting too, then?”

Annabelle tightened her hold on my hand and then wrapped her scrawny arms around my waist.

“Go back inside, Ana. I’ll be in soon, okay?” I kissed her on the head while she nodded and ran back into the house.

The minute the door shut, I unleashed. “Do you really think I would hide a kid from you? Especially if it was yours?”

“It could have been his too,” his response.

“You really are a jackass!” I screamed, shoving him backward toward his house. The man was so built he barely moved an inch, but it still made me feel better.

He reached for me.

I jerked away.

Sighing, he hung his head. “Look, I’m sorry. Again. I just thought, maybe that’s why—”

“Maybe that’s why I left?” I finished for him. “I cheated on you and got knocked up by one of your friends? Did you even know me?”

“Apparently not, since it was so easy for you to jump into bed with one of my best friends then run away with him the day after breaking off our engagement.”

My hand went flying.

He closed his eyes as my palm stung his left cheek.

“Shit!” I shook my hand and then held it.

“Let me see—”

“NO!” I screamed at him in outrage. “You don’t get to touch me. Take your assumptions and your lit up lightning ass back to your house.”

He smirked. “Still got that spunk.”

“So help me God, I will run you over with your own truck, Jason. Don’t tempt me!”

His eyes brightened, and then they went dark. “A little violent since I last saw you. Then again, I didn’t really see your face. It was more of your tight ass as you got into his Jeep and didn’t look back.”

“If I’d looked back, I wouldn’t have gone!” I roared. “Now leave me and my family alone.” A part of me remembered that I needed to apologize, that part of my grief included building bridges that I’d broken in the past, but that part was so pissed off, it raged for justice.

“You’re reminding me of your sister,” he finally said. “Tell her I said, ‘hi.’”

“I would,” I said in a quiet voice, “if she wasn’t on some bender. For all I know, she’s dead.”

With that, I walked back toward the house, only to hear footsteps behind me.

Jason grabbed my wrist and turned me around. “What do you mean she’s on a bender?”

“I mean, she got pregnant by one of her druggie boyfriends and gave up her daughter the minute she started doing drugs again. What? Did you think I came back for you?” It was true, but he didn’t need to know that. “I’m helping raise Annabelle, because Sara won’t. Goodnight, Jason.”

I slammed the door behind me and leaned against it. My mom and dad were both quietly sitting in the living room, pretending to be watching the news.

I groaned. “I know you heard.”

“Honey…” Mom didn’t take her eyes off the TV, “…the whole neighborhood heard.”

Dad winced. “Weren’t you a little hard on him?”

I grunted. “Not hard enough. Not by a long shot. I’m going to go read a story to Annabelle and say goodnight.”

They both nodded.

And I was suddenly thankful they weren’t handing out free advice, because I was in no state of mind to take it now, or maybe ever.

Damn you, Jason.