Page 89 of The Renegade Billionaire

“I don’t think that will be possible.” My words sound strong even if the piece of my heart held for human decency scolds me. “But life doesn’t have to be this hard for you either.”

He shakes his head because he knows what’s coming—we’ve had this conversation so many times, he probably has it memorized.

“Sometimes you mess up life so horrifically, there is no other life to be had.” He’s staring at a point far beyond me, and I shake my head.

“You still have people that care for you. Your dad loves you. Coach B. is obviously still holding out hope that you’ll get your life straightened out.”

He snorts as though he doesn’t believe me.

“He wouldn’t let you help with the team if he didn’t have some kind of fondness for you, Harry. But you have to stop drinking. All it does is hurt you and those who love you.”

“Have you seen how everyone in town looks at me, Madi?”

“I have,” I say, my voice rising with my frustration. “But you know why. You know why they look at you that way. You know what you’ve done to hurt not only me but so many people who loved you in this town, and you’ve never once apologized. You’ve never once taken accountability.” I bite my tongue before I say more because I feel the anger taking over.

“Mads.” His voice wobbles back to shame. “If you can’t forgive me, how the hell do you expect anyone else to? What’s the fucking point?”

“The point? The point?” I’m nearly shouting and don’t care. “The point is you don’t have to be his horrible version of yourself, Harry.”

“I told you I would try to be better, for you I would try.”

Old emotions cling to my throat. “That’s the problem, Harry. You can’t try for me, or for your dad, or anyone else. You’ll never change if you don’t do it for yourself. It’s a choice you have to make for yourself.”

“It’s not that easy,” he shouts.

I take a step back, an icy chill making me shiver. “I never said it was easy. I said it was a choice. Every time you pick up that bottle, it’s a choice. Just like every time you picked up a football instead of calling to tell me you’d be late was a choice. When youchose to cheat on me, it was a choice. When you chose to tell lies about me in order to save yourself, that was a choice too. Until you start making the right choices, life will feel like an endless pit of misery.”

“If you know all of this, then why won’t you help me?” he cries. He’s volatile and shaky as the high of his alcohol abuse wears off.

He won’t last long before he opens another beer. I’ve learned the signs well.

“It’s not my job anymore, Harry. All I’ve done the entire time I’ve known you is give, give, and give some more, until I didn’t even recognize who I’d turned into. All I did was try to help you, don’t you see that? I don’t have anything left for you anymore.”

“But you have time for that rich asshole.”

“Don’t do that, Harry,” I say, defeated that once again I thought we might make some progress with this conversation. “Don’t even try to compare my life now to what it was when I was with you. Braxton has never once asked anything of me. Not once.”

“Mads, I’m sorry. That’s not what?—”

“Just stop drinking, Harry. And yes, I’m aware that it’s an addiction, but there are people and places that will help you get sober, but you have to make that choice. Don’t you see everything you’re losing? Everything you’re missing out on by drinking your fears away?”

“I didn’t come here to fight with you, Madi.”

“Then why did you come? It’s exhausting to fear you one moment and?—”

“You fear me?” He chokes out the words as though they shock him.

“Are you serious right now?”

He can’t be this oblivious.

“Why do you fear me?”

“Harry, you were inches away from punching me in the face when you attacked Braxton. If he hadn’t pushed me behind him, you would have broken my nose, or worse.”

He turns green before me and shakes his head in denial. “No. That’s not— I would never hurt you, Madi.”

My sad, disgusted chuckle hits the air like an atomic bomb. “Hurting me is the only thing you’ve ever done well between us, Harry, and every time you pick up a bottle, every time you verbally or physically attack me or someone I care about, you continue to hurt me.”