Page 98 of No Holds Barred

“For choosing him over you. For blaming you. I-I was wrong.”

“You know what, Rach…” Hope shook her head, her fingers clenching tightly around the phone. “Fuck this. You turned everyone against me. You harbored Rex and Eva when I didn’t know where they were. You chose him. Do you know how much that hurt? Do you know how fucking hard it was to go through a divorce with no one there with me? And I blame you for all ofthat. You told Mom and Dad that I was the reason our marriage broke up. You told them I cheated on him. And I didn’t. You lied.”

“I-I didn’t understand it.”

“You didn’t take the time to understand it!” Hope screeched. “And if you think you’re calling now because I’m going to come crawling back to you like you didn’t just spend the last year removing me from your life. Grow up, Rachel.”

Hope pulled her phone away from her ear and she was just about to hang up when she heard Rachel sob. She breathed slowly, pulling herself back together one molecule of air at a time. She’d wanted this, hadn’t she? At some point, she’d wanted to be able to sit down with Rachel and hash out everything that had happened and maybe become friends again.

“Rachel…” Hope started on a sigh as she pushed the phone against her ear again. “I’m not unwilling to work on this with you. I’m unwilling to do that today or even this week. I need to finish filming this season before I can manage that. But you have to realize how much damage you’ve done in this. Because without that, we’re not going anywhere.”

“I do realize that.” Rachel sniffled again.

Just hearing those four words put Hope even more at ease than she’d been before. It was at least some admission of what she’d done.

“Good,” Hope responded. “And one more thing…” She debated whether or not to even say it, but based on the conversations she’d been having with Angelica, she wanted to start this now. “You won’t blame Ange for any of this. She’s not a home-wrecker, she’s not the other woman. And if I hear any of that language coming from you or anyone else in the family, I will walk away.”

She’d never been more sure about that boundary. She’d protect Angelica at all costs, even from the people who were supposed to love her the most.

“Okay,” Rachel agreed.

“Okay,” Hope answered. She stared across the river and closed her eyes as the cool breeze touched her cheeks. “I need to go film now. I’ll call you when I get home, and you and I can sit down and start to work on this.”

“I’ll be there whenever you want to meet.”

Hope sighed. “Okay. Bye.”

She hung up. Hope lifted her chin to the sky and just stood in the quiet of the moment, breathing in the rest of the day as it turned to evening and letting it wash through her.

What a day.

Chapter

Thirty-One

“Ange, got a minute?” Logan stepped into the staging area.

Angelica frowned as she popped up from rustling around in some bags. “That depends on what you mean by a minute.”

“Looking for something?” Logan slid into one of the seats and propped an ankle over his knee.

Sighing heavily, Angelica put her hands on her hips and surveyed the room. “My iPad. I haven’t found it all morning.”

Then again, she’d been thoroughly distracted by Hope that morning when they were in with Ansel and she hadn’t managed to pull herself together since then. And she was supposed to meet with the owners in the next five minutes, but all the questions she wanted to ask were on that damn iPad that she couldn’t find.

“I’d like to talk about Josef,” Logan said, ignoring Angelica’s panic.

She narrowed her gaze at him before looking over his shoulder at the open door. “I’d rather not talk about that right now.”

“Ange… we need to talk about it.” Logan patted the table next to him and gave her a direct look.

Sighing, Angelica sat down, but her gaze kept flitting all around the room as she tried to see her iPad anywhere. “What do you want to talk about?”

“You didn’t call me.” Logan frowned slightly. “You promised me you would.”

“It wasn’t bad.”

Logan sighed heavily, standing up and walking to the door to shut it and subsequently sealing Angelica’s fate into the room to have this damn conversation. She tensed and bit the inside of her cheek.