Page 51 of Love is Angry (Love is Everything #2)

Madison

It’s not you who’ll lose everything, Maddie. It’s your dad.

Julian had the audacity to write that. I guess he’s not even afraid that any of these texts will ever end up as evidence in court. He probably doesn’t see this going to court or even going public. He’s got the power, and I’m the runaway deer trying to avoid the headlights.

Rhue promised he’d try to help me, but I’m not sure how much he can even do.

By the time I reach the city, my anxiety levels spike and I cannot shake this feeling, this obnoxious feeling that I’m being followed.

I pull over outside city hall, unwilling to lead an unseen stalker uptown to my house. Minutes pass in tense, cold silence as I watch other cars drive by. None linger. I don’t see any eyes on me. It must be paranoia.

Loud music whizzes past me, blaring out of an SUV and accompanied by laughter.

It’s a Saturday night, and I’m looking over my shoulder, afraid that I’m being followed.

Shaking my head, I fight off a wave of self-pity.

I’m in college. My only concerns should be higher education and hormones.

Nothing more. Yet here I sit, behind the wheel of my Prius, knees weak, sweat seeping into my sweater as I try to figure out how I’m going to warn dad without destroying him.

I never wanted him to know the full truth about Julian.

I take a deep breath and pull back into traffic, heading home.

I still haven’t figured out exactly what I’m going to say by the time I pull up in front of the house.

I’m kind of hoping the words will just come to me, somehow.

I grab my weekend bag from the backseat and lock the Prius before I head inside.

“Maddie!” Dad greets me as I close the door behind me. “I didn’t know you were coming down this weekend.”

“I’m sorry, I should have called—are you busy?”

He opens his mouth to say something, then pauses as he studies my face. “No,” he says. “Just let me make a quick call.” He steps into his den. I don’t mean to eavesdrop, but I’m still on high-alert and everything seems just a little louder, a little brighter, a little more important.

“Hey, Noelle. Yeah, about that—look, Maddie just showed up. Yeah, usually I would—but there’s something going on with her. I need to—yeah. You’re a sweetheart. Thanks, babe. Yeah, I will. Love you, too.”

Damn and double damn. Not only have I ruined his date night—I’ve also completely failed to hide my issues from him.

But he never once pushed the issue—never tried to force me to talk to him.

I’m overwhelmed by a rush of love for my Dad and it makes tears spring to my eyes because I know, no matter how I go about this tonight, he’s going to end up hurt.

He comes back, smiling as he slides his phone in his pocket.

“Tell Noelle ‘sorry’ from me,” I say with a chagrined smile. “I didn’t mean to ruin your night.”

“Don’t be silly,” he says, putting an arm around my shoulders. “A night where I get to see my girl is never a night ruined. But since you heard all that, there’s no reason to tiptoe around this—what’s going on, Maddie?”

I lean into him and take a deep breath. I’ve said it out loud so many times over the last couple weeks—it should be easier, not harder.

But my heart is doing flips and my stomach is tying itself in knots, and the words are trying to wind through that maze to make it out of my mouth.

Before I manage to say anything at all, the doorbell rings.

“Oh, crap. First, I should have told you already, but Rhue’s meeting me here. That’s probably him.” God, I hope so.

Dad frowns as we walk toward the front door. “Does Rhue have something to do with whatever’s going on?”

“Adjacently,” I say vaguely. “But I’m hoping he’ll have something to do with the solution.”

Rhue looks troubled when we open the door and shoots a glance over his shoulder before he comes inside. I wonder if he’s feeling it, too—that sense of being followed.

“Hey Mr. Willis, Madison,” he says. “How’s it going?”

I shut the door behind him. As soon as it’s closed, his casual tone disappears. “Did you tell him?”

I shake my head. “I just got here.”

“What’s all this about?” Dad asks, alarmed.

“Let’s sit down,” I suggest. “There’s a lot.”

We sit around the table and I close my eyes, willing my words to find my mouth. “Julian Echeveria is about to make your life hell,” I tell him. “And it’s my fault.”

There’s silence for a beat and I open my eyes. Dad is gazing at me pensively. Rhue looks pissed.

“Maybe you should start at the beginning,” Dad says.

I can’t look at him. I can’t bear to see the pain in his eyes when he hears the words. I look into my lap instead, balling my sweater sleeves in my fists.

“Julian raped me last year after a tutoring session,” I tell him quietly.

“He told me if I ever told anyone, that he would ruin you and me both. But I’d already told Roxanne—she wrote it in her diary a few days before she died.

She said, in the diary, that she was going to do something about it. She said the same thing to me.”

My throat tightens and the silence grows thick with emotion. I press on while I still can. “Laura found the diary. Last week, she showed it to me. Rhue saw it, too.”

Rhue clears his throat. “Sorry to interrupt, Madison—but this is where I may be at fault. I came home yesterday as my father wanted to discuss some business with me. We had a couple disagreements—they got a little out of control—and I called him a rapist. He’s already pissed off that Laura and I are openly spending time with Madison, and that she and I are taking the same classes at school—I’m afraid he put two and two together. ”

Dad still hasn’t said anything.

“This morning—after that altercation, I assume—he began texting me from a random number, threatening me. Eventually he gave me an ultimatum: either I sign an NDA and leave school and never talk to his family again, or he destroys you.”

Dad snorts, and the amusement startles me into looking up at him. The passionate fury in his eyes, the tightness of his shoulders—he looks like a different person.

“Dad,” I whisper and he turns to me, his eyes glistening. Without a word, he pulls me to him and just holds me. Somehow, it makes me wish I’d told him sooner because this hug feels like it’s locking some of the broken pieces of my heart back into place.

When he releases me from the hug, I promise that we’ll talk about this more. That this is the last secret I’ll keep. I mean it, too.

The conversation moves back on course, but that ticking anger I see in dad’s jaw remains.

“This feels a lot like a twisted brand of revenge,” dad hisses. “Julian and I, we got off on the wrong foot right from the start. Roxanne and I used to be sweethearts in high school before Julian got his growth spurt. Junior year. Well, I stayed friends with her after the breakup.”

“Ohhh,” Rhue says, his eyes wide. “Oh, that explains a lot.”

“What?” I ask.

“When mom told him that you were going to be tutoring me, he asked a lot of questions. I’d never heard him interested in any of the staff like that before, but he grilled her about your last name and seemed really upset about the whole thing.

They kept getting in fights about it until you finally showed up—fights where he kept accusing her of cheating, which is still the most hypocritical bullshit I’ve ever heard. ”

Dad nods. “Thing is, Julian could never really let go of the fact that Roxanne and I used to be together, even though we were just kids. He wasn’t outspoken about it, but I could always tell that it bothered him, especially since Roxanne and I kept in touch.

We used to meet for coffee every other month.

She actually came to your baptism,” Dad says, his gaze dropping as he remembers.

“Roxanne and your mom were best friends.”

I don’t know that much about my mother, and I’ve decided that I want things this way. She left. Her career was more important, and we were holding her back. While I may never truly get over the chronic feeling of rejection, I won’t feed it with snippets about her, either.

“So, then, it was only a matter of time before Julian would snatch the rug from under your feet? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?” I ask.

Dad nods once, but the fury in his eyes has melted into tears. He’s looking at me and his lip trembles. “I’m just so sorry that he took it out on you,” he says, reaching out to stroke my cheek. “That bastard doesn’t deserve to so much as look at you.”

I press my cheek into his palm and let the tears flow, tears which I’ve kept locked away for so long. I needed my daddy, and I locked him out.

“The problem, Mr. Willis, is this—he gave her a five o’clock deadline to agree to his terms. If she doesn’t, he’s going to take action. That’s all we know—we don’t know what sort of action he’s thinking of.”

“What did he say specifically?” Dad asks.

“He said you’ll lose everything,” I tell him.

Silence falls over the table for a long moment, broken only by the click of the little clock in the kitchen.

It’s like we’re all holding our breath. I spoke the horrible secret out loud and the world didn’t end—but it’s not over.

Not even close. There’s a sense of impending doom, like a giant shoe coming down and us three stupid little ants with nowhere to run.

“Have you had any therapy?” Dad asks.

I shake my head. “Kind of figured that would be a dead giveaway, and wouldn’t do me any good anyway, since it would still be telling. Guess that ship’s sailed.”

He nods. “How ‘bout you, Rhue?”

Rhue furrows his brow. “Me? What do I need therapy for?”

Dad gives me a knowing look and I smother a smile. Rhue looks back and forth between us.

“Losing a parent so young—and so violently—is traumatic,” Dad says. “Not to mention being raised by that bastard. Not telling you what to do—but you might look into it.”

“Violently?” I ask. “Dad. Roxanne…you said you were friends. Good friends, even. Did she seem like the kind of person who would commit suicide?”

“Completely out of character,” Dad says, unequivocally. “He must have pushed her beyond some pretty crazy limits for Roxanne to do that to herself.” He looks at Rhue, who looks pained. “Sorry, son.”

“My sister still doesn’t think she did,” Rhue confesses quietly. “She thinks—”

Dad’s phone rings shrilly, interrupting Rhue. My heart jumps into my throat and I check the time. One minute after five. Punctual bastard.

“Hello? Hey, Julian, what’s up? Oh, don’t worry about that, I’m not busy.

Hm? Ah. Sold it, huh. Yeah, I think it’s a great space for a dojo.

How long? Two weeks. That’s a little—mm.

Yes, technically that is the end of the lease—no, I understand.

These things happen. Too good a deal to pass up, right?

Yeah. Well, that’s quite the profit, what are you gonna do with all that cash?

Residential investments. I see. Rentals, or—ha!

Townhouses. What a surprise. The whole row, huh?

Well, good luck with that. Some of those owners can be pretty stubborn.

” Dad’s eyes are hard and flinty. I usually can’t picture him getting violent—but right now, I absolutely can.

“Yep, I hear you, I hear you. Right. Two weeks, yep. Uh-huh. See you then, Julian.” Dad hangs up the phone and places it very carefully on the table, as if he’s afraid to lose control and smash the damn thing.

“What happened?” I ask.

“Well, he apologized for calling on a Saturday evening, but said he had reached a decision, that it wouldn’t be fair to hold off on it till Monday,” Dad replies, pursing his lips.

“He’s selling the avenue building. They’ve already drawn up papers.

I have two weeks to empty the store and find somewhere else to run my business.

The store, the workshop, the office, everything.

Everything must go. Oh—and he’s using the profits to buy up a row of townhouses.

” He gestures to our four walls, two of which are connected to our neighbors.

We own our home—but if dad loses his business, debt will eat him alive. He’ll be forced to sell.

It’s a train wreck in slow motion, and I can’t do a damn thing to stop it.

This is Julian. This is what he does. He’s a spiteful, vengeful motherfucker.

He went for the killing blow right out of the gate.

All jugular, no foreplay. I don’t think we have any way of recovering from this.

Dad can’t turn much of a profit if he pays today’s rent rates in an equally accessible space downtown. Fuck.

“Mr. Willis, I don’t want you to worry about that,” Rhue says.

I don’t even have time to process the blow that Julian just delivered.

“I’ve got some central properties purchased with the trust fund that my mother left for me upon her death.

I know of at least two that will suit your business perfectly, and I will gladly have my lawyer draw up a new lease agreement, effective as of Monday.

I’ll charge you the same rate you were paying my father.

No deposit necessary, and no rent till the first.”

“Whoa,” I hear myself murmur.

Dad is speechless. Blank white. A mere sheet of paper cut out to resemble a human. “Say what, now?” he manages.

“Look,” Rhue says. “My dad’s an asshole. You’ve been one of his most loyal residents, and him kicking you out like this is spiteful and woefully unprofessional. As it happens, I can help you out. Given everything he’s already put you both through, it’s the least I can do.”

“Rhue—” his throat gets tight and he gets up and walks around the table. Rhue stands up and they shake hands, then Dad pulls him into a strong hug. Tears trickle down his face. “Thanks, man.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Rhue says. “I haven’t figured out what to do about the townhouse situation.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Dad says, laughing through his tears. “If I can keep my business, I can keep my house.”

Tears are streaming down my cheeks, too. To my astonishment, Rhue is coming through for me in ways I couldn’t even begin to imagine.

Change is coming, and I believe that not even Julian Echeveria can keep it at bay.

Not when someone like Rhue is riding the wave.

He asked me to have a little faith, then went on to save my father’s business and our home in the blink of an eye. Yeah, I have faith. I absolutely have faith in him.