Page 28 of Lovers Like Us

“Maybe three months after your birth,” he tells me, “I started actually believing I could be a halfway-decent dad. But that fear never really went away. It’s still there. I’ve been terrified that you’d make the same mistakes as me. The same mistakes as myfather.”

This is where wediverge.

“You know me,” I refute. “You know I wouldnever—”

“You haven’t lived in my house for four years, Moffy,” he interrupts with quick-paced words. Eyes on mine again. Intensity laces his voice that silences me. “We talk, but you’re not around all the time. I’ve been more concerned with Luna, Xander, and Kinney. And I know who you are. You’re kind and compassionate, and I’m so goddamnproudof the man you’vebecome.”

My eyes burn. I know there’s abutcoming.

“But I thought somewhere in those four years you could’ve become someone different, and I missed something. People change.” He gestures to me. “You canchange.”

I shake my head. “I don’t feel like Ican.”

My dad looks like he wants to reach a hand out, but his face twists as he keeps to himself. He shakes his head once. “You’re stubborn like Ryke. He thought that too, but he’s not the same as he was at twenty-two. You haveyearsto grow and be someone different. Someone you like more or less, and it’s terrifying. I know it is. Because at twenty-two, I was shitting myself thinking aboutit.”

I don’t blink as I take itin.

“I know you’re a lot like my brother. But you’re still my son. You have allthe best parts of Lily—thank God for that. But there’s a chance you could have the worst parts ofme.”

I open my mouth, but everything I’d say next to appease him would be alie.

“You know it, too,” he says. “If you didn’t think there was a chance, then you wouldn’t be as careful aroundalcohol.”

A chill bites my exposed skin, maybe by the weather or his words. I drop my shoulders beneath the hot water, and I listen intently as he keepsgoing.

“The thing about addiction is that it changes you,” he tells me. “You don’t care about the people you love. All compassion and kindness dissolve in the face of your own wants andneeds.”

He extends an arm in the freezing air to point towards where Ryke disappeared. “I was that person lying to my brother. To my family. To your mom, a woman who has half mysoul. That’s how bad it gets. And when we confronted you at the summer camp, all I could see wasmyself.”

My stomachknots.

“I wish I handled it differently,” he says. “In hindsight, I should’ve given you more time to speak, but if I never questioned you, I would’ve hated myself every goddamn day. Because I was raised by a father who didn’t give a shit where I was. And your mom was raised by parents who couldn’t care less abouther.”

He sits forward. Closer to me. “The moment I held you in my arms, I vowed to always care. In my world, that means questioning you when I sense something’s wrong. Even if I turn out to be the jerk in theend.”

I stay completelystill.

My dad has always been candid with me, but this is different. How he’s speaking—it feels like he’s reaching to a place he rarely touches and he’s splitting himselfopen.

He’s fallible. Imperfect. He’s been telling me that since I was little, but my dad had always been a superhero in myeyes.

He’s so human. Ithurts.

“Me and your mom, your aunts and uncles—in almost every circumstance, we wouldn’t trust the media over your word. But security’s intel about your NDAs and the ‘mystery girl’ that we wouldn’t approve of—it aligned with the media. Something wasn’t adding up. We thought it could be anything, not just the rumor. You could’ve been drinking or…” He takes a giantbreath.

I was lying aboutFarrow.

I take fault forthat.

“Interrogating each other,” he tells me, “it’s how we deal with lies. Your aunts and uncles have done it to me, and I’ve done it to them.” He pauses. “We were all worried you and Jane were in trouble…and I just needed…” He turns his head away, but I catch sight of his pained face. “I’msorry.”

“It’s alright.” A lump lodges in my throat, and a question gnaws at me. I ask as carefully as I can, “What would your dad have done if he were in yourposition?”

He drops hishead.

“You don’t have toanswer—”

“I can. Easily.” His jaw sets sharp. “The Jonathan Hale damage control handbook. First, he takes away your trust fund. Then he conducts a meeting where he lists all the steps you have to follow to rebuild your image. Mainly for the sake of the family companies. The trust fund iscollateral.”