While you’d been fucking your way through each state, your family had been here.
“Lewis is a good man. He loves Mom.”
“You want me to divorce your mother?”
“Why not? You left without a word. You could have been dead, and it would be no different from a divorce.” Ryan shrugged. “You know, I was angry with you for leaving, and now I’m angry at you for being back.” He shook his head. “I used to think you were the shit.”
“Ryan?”
“No, Mom, I won’t be silent anymore. I’ve hurt people who didn’t need to be hurt. I pushed my anger everywhere else but at the person it needed to be directed at.” Ryan stared Dane in the eyes. “I hate you. I don’t want you in my life, and I wish you were dead.”
With that, Ryan left the kitchen.
“I think we need to talk about this some more,” Dane said.
“You need to go,” Lucy said.
Nodding, he didn’t see a reason to argue. Getting to his feet, he made his way toward the door. When he made to kiss Lucy’s cheek, she jerked away from him. “No.”
Everything was falling apart. Dane had never expected this to happen. He’d always assumed that Lucy and his life would be waiting for him. Who would want a woman with three kids?
He was an asshole.
Dane had lost the woman he once loved, and there was no chance of him ever winning her back.
****
The following day Chloe woke up from her coma. She was still sick, and being intravenously fed the medication, but she was awake. The doctor wouldn’t let her go for a couple more days, maybe even up to a week.
“Do you have any idea how much you scared me?” Suzy asked.
“You’re just worried in case you had to pay the rest of the rent.”
Suzy chuckled. “Yeah, totally, that was my main concern. How would I pay the rent?” She rolled her eyes. Leaning forward, she wrapped her arms around her friend, holding her close. “I love you, you know that.”
“I know that.”
“You scared the hell out of us,” Pixie said.
They had already brought Chloe up to speed, letting her know about their relationship.
“Richard’s outside,” Suzy said.
“He is?”
“Yeah, he was here.” Suzy reached out, pushing some hair off her face. “You put me down as the next of kin.”
“I know. It made sense to me. I was living in the apartment with you. Why wouldn’t you be my next of kin?”
“It was kind of weird having to make decisions for you. I just wanted to force you to wake up to tell me what to do. We’ll have to have a talk about that.”
“We’re getting serious, Suzy. Relationship standard.”
“Don’t talk to me about relationships. I’m entering uncharted territory. I’m frightened.”
Chloe laughed. “You’ll do great.”
“Do you want to talk to Richard?” Suzy asked.