Page 25 of Truly (Peachwood Falls #2)

L aina

I have an emotional hangover.

My body feels like I’ve run a mile, and my face gives me an idea of what it might be like to be in a street fight. Puffy eyes. Blotchy skin. A scowl that runs deep.

I’m in no mood for bullshit, yet I’ve caused my fair share of it recently. I lay awake in bed for most of the night and replayed everything Luke said.

“You know how much I fucking love you. You know my heart. Yet when things gethard, you expect me to hurt you.”

The look on his face when he spoke those words is imprinted in my brain. I hate myself for making him feel that way.

He was right when he said my instinct is to assume the worst. That’s such a shitty thing to do to other people, and it’s an even shittier thing to do to myself.

Luke’s note is on the kitchen table, telling me he was running to Chase’s and that we would talk when he gets back. He signed it with an I love you , which has to be a good sign.

I want so badly for it to be a good sign.

We need to talk. We need to stop ignoring the writing on the wall and pretending we can live in this bubble for the rest of our lives. Because we can’t . Our relationship will have complications, especially under the circumstances, and we need to work them out.

I need to stop punishing Luke for other people’s sins.

Hopefully, he will forgive me for my knee-jerk reaction. He didn’t deserve to be placed in the same basket as my dad and Tom.

I make a second cup of coffee and sit at the table with my phone. It finally powers on after charging all night. The pings begin immediately. I want to turn it back off, but I have to pull myself back to the land of the living. To the land of reality .

My inbox is a sea of unread messages. The sheer volume makes me anxious, but I’m determined to go through them. It’s the only way to know what’s going on in my business—especially now that I don’t have a business manager.

I take a sip of my coffee when my phone rings. I touch the screen to decline it, but my finger slips against the green one first.

Fuck .

“Hello?” I say, tapping the speakerphone.

Please be a wrong number .

“Are you finally going to answer your damn phone?” My dad’s voice freezes me in place. It’s hostile. Ice-cold. Furious . “What the hell are you doing, Laina?”

“I’ll get your attorneys to work, but you’ll need to touch base with them before they’ll do too much. And no one will be alerted until you give the signal.”

Surely, Anjelica didn’t tell him my plans …

“I just got off the fucking phone with my attorney, and do you know what he said?” Dad booms. “He said that you were firing me as your business manager?”

Oh fuck .

I don’t know how to respond, and I don’t know what to say. I thought I had time to put together a response before he found out.

“Is that true?” He laughs hatefully. “Are you going to try to pretend to be a big girl and take care of every facet of your business—the one that I built from the ground up? You don’t have a fucking clue where to start.

And do you think anyone is going to do business with you after you just humiliated yourself with that farce of a wedding? ”

Today is your lucky day .

I already know someone who wants to work with me. And I’ve heard from two good men, men I respect , that my actions showed bravery and wisdom.

“Maybe if you would’ve learned how to talk to me with the slightest bit of respect, we could’ve worked something out,” I say. “But you sealed the deal when you played golf with Tom, and he gave that asshole statement about us still getting married. What the hell was that?”

“That was called keeping you from destroying your life.”

“No, Dad, I think that was called covering your own ass.”

“I’m trying to keep your options open, Laina. It’s taken everything I can manage to get Tom even to consider talking to you again after you humiliated him in front of the whole world.”

I laugh. “Why would you do that? I don’t want to talk to him.”

“ Don’t be ridiculous .”

“It’s not your problem anymore. You’re not on my payroll, and it sure as hell isn’t like you act like my father.”

“Do not talk to me that way.”

I spring to my feet. “No, how about you don’t talk to me this way.How about you don’t talk to me at all. Your loyalties lie elsewhere, and that’s fine. But keep them over there.”

“You can’t just fire me. I built that damn company.”

“That’s funny. The papers to terminate your employment are already in the works.”

I can feel his anger pulsing through the telephone. “Listen to me, you ungrateful, entitled little bitch. I’ve put too much time and energy and money into this thing for you to drop me off on the side of the road like I’m disposable.”

Ungrateful, entitled little bitch? That’s how my father sees me?

Oh, fuck that.

“Do you want to know what’s hilarious?” I pace the floor.

“It’s hilarious that you think that I owe you anything.

You’ve taken from me in every way. Financially.

Emotionally. You’ve stolen my energy and almost worked me to death.

You’ve depleted me in every way so you can get ahead in life.

This happens to people every day, and most people aren’t in a position to do something about it. But I am . Kick rocks, asshole.”

“You realize that your business was built by me, right?”

“How? Because without me, there is no business . I write the music. I record the songs. I sell the albums, and I sell out the stadiums and sell the merch. So my business was built by me. Whatever you’ve taken from me?—”

“Taken from you? How dare you insinuate that I’ve taken anything from you!”

I laugh in his ear. Don’t mind if I do .

“Did you think I wouldn’t find out about the bonus you paid yourself at the end of the first quarter?

Five million is a little excessive, don’t you think?

I called accounting this morning and am having a forensic audit performed by a third party.

You better hope to God you aren’t as fucked up as I think you are. ”

“If you pull this stunt, you can kiss your mother and me goodbye forever.”

I wait for the tears to cloud my vision and the pinch to squeeze over the bridge of my nose. I swallow, expecting there to be a lump that makes it difficult to breathe.

But none of those things happen. Because I’m not losing anything.

“You guys already kissed me goodbye a long time ago,” I say, shrugging. “And I don’t know if you intentionally tried to push anyone that might love me away, or if it’s a strange coincidence. But you almost had me believing that the best I could do was a man like Tom. Almost .”

“I see. I see . You have someone in your ear, filling it with garbage. That’s what this is, isn’t it?”

“You are so wrong.” I grin. “It should hurt a lot more than it does to have this conversation. And the fact that it doesn’t speaks volumes.”

I lean against the cabinet and look at the barn.

Luke was right last night about so much.

“I would never hurt you. Not on purpose. And every decision I made was to save you pain. Do you think boarding the flight home from Cleveland was easy without you? It was one of the worst days of my life. But I did it. I broke my heart because I believed it would save yours.”

That’s love.

My mother can’t even visit me during the holiday season. Heck, I’m lucky to get a call. She hasn’t reached out once to see if I’m okay. What kind of motherly love is that?

My father thinks it’s okay to betray me multiple times over the past seven years by the sound of it. According to him, he made me and built my company, and I’m just an ungrateful little bitch.

That’s not love. I’ve seen what it looks like, and it’s not this. And I reject it.

I’m not pretending anymore. I’m not hoping for a miracle. I’m not allowing myself to be hurt so they can win.

It’s over. And I’m at peace with that. As much peace as someone can be when realizing just how much your parents don’t give a crap about you.

I expect there will be a crash later when the weight of this lands on my heart. But the beauty in it, if there is any, is that Luke will be there to cushion the fall. He’ll be there to help me stand back up.

“Dad,” I say, my voice calm. “Until you can understand how to be in my life and not poison it, until you can understand what real love looks like, you won’t be welcome around me. I’m sorry.”

“This isn’t over. I’ll see you very soon, and we can discuss this face-to-face.”

“And I’ll have you escorted out. Goodbye, Dad.”

I end the call.

My hand shakes as I set the phone down, and my palms are damp. The weight on my shoulders must’ve been five times heavier than I thought because I’m lightheaded.

And energized .

I need to find someone to spearhead Cotton’s concert.

I need to prepare my Nashville house for my return early next week.

I need to find a new business manager, assistant—because I know her true loyalty lies with my father, and hope to hell I don’t need a new boyfriend.

Because if that’s the case and Luke doesn’t want to make this work, I’ll be alone forever.

I grab my phone again and find a number. Then I hit call .

“Castelli.”

“Hey, Troy. It’s Laina.”

“What can I do for you?”

I smile. “For one, you can stop hiding in the woods like Rambo.”

He wants to laugh but restrains himself.

“For two, I know this isn’t your job, but I feel like you owe me since you basically stalked me for the past twelve days and got my boyfriend to lie to me.”

“I didn’t ask him to lie, Ms. Kelley.”

“You can play word games all you want, Mr. Castelli, but you made him omit the truth to me, which is lying.”

“If you say so.”

I laugh. “The next time you’re working on my security detail, and I’m in Nashville, I’m going to go on the longest run ever just so you have to follow me.”

“That’s great, except that you don’t run, and I do,” he says. “I’m not sure what your point is.”

“Damn. You actually like running?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“What do you hate?” I ask.

“Conversations like this, mostly.”

“I’m going to hire someone to spy on you and learn all the things you hate to eat and do and hear,” I say. “Then I’m going to torture you with all of it as payback.”

“Sounds fun. I’m looking forward to it.”

“Asshole.”

I can hear his smile on the other end of the line.

“Anyway,” I say. “I’m getting ready to fire my assistant, so I don’t have anyone to call. Can you please arrange for the jet to pick me up tomorrow night and have the Nashville house ready to roll?”

“I suppose.”

“Don’t trip over yourself to help me out,” I say, laughing.

“I’m scrambling. You just can’t see me.”

“Maybe if I peer through the trees, I can spot you.”

“Are we done here?” he asks. “I have calls to make.”

I sigh heavily. “Fine. After I get my life sorted, we’re sorting yours, Mr. Castelli.”

“What makes you think mine’s not already sorted?”

“A hunch.”

“I’ll call you with travel arrangements,” he says.

“Or just come on up to the house since you’re already here.”

“Goodbye, Ms. Kelley.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Castelli.”

I grin as I hang up.

My phone slides across the table, coming to rest next to the bundle of rope that Luke used on me a few nights ago. My body clenches at the memory.

“We’re going to be fine, Luke,” I say to the empty room. “I need to make sure you know you belong in my world, and I need to make sure you understand how badly I want to be a part of yours.”

I run upstairs. I do my best thinking in the shower.