Lucky Charmed by Sharla Lovelace

Author:Sharla Lovelace [Lovelace, Sharla]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2017-06-14T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

“Tell her, Sully,” Dean said. “Tell her how you bailed on her because her mom paid you off.”

I jolted like I’d been struck by lightning. No way my mother would have—

“What?” my mom said, letting go of me, her attention fully on my ex-husband. “There was no money.”

“You’re full of shit,” Sully said to Dean. “Her mother never gave me a dime.”

My mouth opened, but no words came out. There was nothing. How—why—nothing. All I was, was more naked, if that was possible. I’d always been under a spotlight in this town, and now I was more bare, more stripped, more everything, because the people I thought I knew had kept something life-altering from me.

“Right,” Dean said. “Because you’d just leave a girl like Carmen behind without something to make it worthwhile. Just because her mother asked you to.”

My mind reeled. The life wasn’t for you.

“Yes, actually,” Sully said. “That’s exactly what I did.”

He turned and what looked like him pulling gravity out of the ground to do it, looked at me, a million apologies in his eyes.

“Where on earth would you think I would get money to pay off some boy?” my mom was asking—screeching—yelling. “Honestly!”

Sully held out a hand to quiet down, but she was Gerry Frost. She was having none of being outed, insulted, and shushed in one sitting.

“Put your hand down,” she said. “I’m not a child. I’m a grown woman and a mother, and if any of you ever have kids one day, I hope you never have to make a decision like that. But you do what you have to do to protect them.”

Several older people in the crowd nodded in agreement. It was surreal.

“You!” she said, pointing at Sully. “She would have followed you to the ends of the earth and jumped off with you, to hell with anything else.” Her voice cracked at the end and she stopped to gain her composure. “She was eighteen. And maybe it broke her heart and maybe I was wrong, but she was too young to make that kind of choice. To live that hard of a life.”

“I know,” Sully said. His eyes glazed over.

Her shoulders drooped. “I know you do,” she said, grabbing his hand.

It was like I was dreaming. Or dead. And watching it all on some afterlife rerun. Lanie stood next to me and took my hand.

“Honey, you’re shaking,” she whispered, squeezing my hand.

“Please tell me you don’t have a secret, too,” I whispered back, my voice trembling.

“You know all my secrets.”

“And you!” Mom said, letting go of Sully to point at Dean. “You sorry excuse for a human being.” I straightened up. Even though I felt gutted a hundred different ways, I didn’t want to miss this. “How convenient that you throw everyone under the bus but yourself, Mayor Crestwell.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dean said.

“Of course you don’t,” she said. “You’re a politician. And a bad one, by the way. You talk too much and think your petty little underlings don’t pay attention.

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