Crossfire (Cross Duet #1)

13. IVY

13

IVY

“You’ve taken this too far, Ivy.” Towering a couple of inches above me, Mom carried her height with an air of authority. Her blonde hair cascaded to her shoulders in effortless waves, framing her high cheekbones, giving her the aura of an aging model. Despite the elegance she exuded, the moment was tainted with a tone of disappointment weaving through her words.

If only I’d cleaned up the small coffee table in the center of the room. Mom’s attention settled on the avalanche of bills and paperwork, notebooks where I’d jotted down every failed idea I’d had to try to save Grams from this mess.

I took a seat on my living room couch, pressing my fingers to my temples. Just down the hall was the tub that offered my aching body a heavenly escape of warmth and comfort, but Mom had intercepted me, waiting on my front stoop for me to come home, forcing me to rehash the day’s events.

“It is not your responsibility to pay Grams’s bills,” she continued.

She was trying to keep her voice gentle, but this was the last thing I needed today.

A better person would feel nothing but grateful at a time like this. After all, I’d survived a violent attack. But the battle in the garage had fractured parts of my soul, leaving me in an abyss of uncertainty with no hope. Of finding the money so Grams wouldn’t be forced to leave the only home she had left. Of finding answers to why Dad ended his life…

My mind drifted back to that fateful day.

Each step toward Dad’s door felt like wading through concrete, guilt anchoring my body down. Because the more I thought about it, the more I realized how harsh I had been, and looking back, Dad needed a hug, not a lecture.

Bam.

My heart dropped to my stomach, adrenaline rocketed needles through my fingertips, and my feet became immediately paralyzed.

I’d never heard that sound before, not outside of television or the movies, so how could I be so certain of what it was?

Maybe it was a car backfiring…or an out-of-season firework.

I swallowed, my heart racing in my chest so fast, I worried I might pass out because it sounded like it came from…

No.

No, no, no!

I sprinted to Dad’s front door…

“I’m worried about you, Ivy.” Mom’s voice snapped me back into the present.

It wasn’t easy to shake off the memory; it lingered in the recesses of my mind, poisoning my thoughts with steady doses throughout the day and night and sometimes—like now—with a massive surge.

I had to actively focus on the conversation at hand.

“Did Pete call you?” I asked.

No reply.

“He shouldn’t have done that.”

Well, he shouldn’t have turned into a massive dick today either, but here we were.

Come to think of it, the only non-horrible part of my day was meeting Grayson. There was something about his energy that had put me—at least a little—at ease. Maybe it was his eyes, the color of the sea after a storm—a tumultuous green with flecks of gray—or the sincerity in his baritone voice when he’d asked if I was okay. Like he truly cared.

I wish I’d taken him up on his offer to have coffee. Life’s relentless chaos was getting exhausting, and a moment of happiness would have been a welcome change. If I didn’t start grabbing on to glimpses of joy where I could, I might drown in despair.

“What were you thinking, Ivy? Dad wouldn’t want you to get killed.”

The mention of him serrated my heart open and left it bleeding.

“Or ruin your finances to pay Grams’s balance.”

“But no one else can, so what am I supposed to do? She needs medical care for the rest of her life.”

Mom sighed. “Ivy, I understand you feel obligated to help, but you can’t sacrifice your own well-being in the process.”

“I’m not,” I claimed in a defeated sigh. “But if you have any ideas, I’m all ears.”

Mom straightened her spine and shifted gears.

“You need to call that assisted living facility and explain to them you do not have the resources to fund her stay. Because you don’t. That is the cold, hard truth.”

“And then what?” I challenged.

“Then, Grams will have to find somewhere else to stay.”

“Where?” I clasped my hands together, knuckles whitening with worry. “Where, exactly, can Grams go stay for a price I can afford, that provides round-the-clock medical care?”

Mom’s lips thinned. “Harborview Haven has an opening.”

I narrowed my eyes. “You were on the same tour I was, Mom. Would you feel safe there? Would you trust that staff to not screw up your medications?”

If they couldn’t even bother to clean up urine off the floor when they knew a tour was coming, what kind of care did they provide behind closed doors? That place was riddled with high turnover, budget cuts, and other problems. They’d get it together, I’m sure, but not for a while.

“If I missed a viable solution,” I continued, “I’m all ears, but meanwhile, I need to figure out how to pay her bill.”

“It’s not your responsibility to figure it out.”

“If not me, who? Her only son is dead. Who else, exactly, can take care of her?”

Mom was silent for several seconds. “I don’t know, but it shouldn’t be you. It’s not fair to you.”

Fair. That wasn’t something I expected these days.

“Have you tried to explain the situation to them?” she pressed.

“Of course,” I said. “But they run a business, Mom. It’s very simple. If we want Grams to remain there, they will happily let her stay for a fee. We either pay the fee or she needs to leave.”

Mom looked at the coffee table again, at the physical proof of how hard I’d been trying to fix this.

“I’m sorry,” Mom eventually said. “I wish I could help financially.”

Mom touched the empty spot on her ring finger, but the divorce wasn’t the cause of her financial strain. Half of nothing was, evidently, negative nothing.

She took a seat next to me and placed a gentle hand on my knee. “Tell me how I can help.”

I placed my hand on hers, softening my tone. “Please, just stop telling me to do something I can’t. I can’t give up on her. If you want to do some research to see if there are any other funding alternatives that I have not considered, that’s great, but please stop battling with me on this.”

Mom’s eyebrows knitted together, and she squeezed my hand lightly, as if afraid I might break at any moment.

“I’m angry at him,” she admitted in a tone filled with shame. “I know I shouldn’t be, but…” She shook her head. “If this was too much for him to bear, how could he leave this for you? He had to know when he…” She trailed off before sighing. “That he would be leaving you in a terrible position.”

I turned away so she couldn’t see my tears.

“I know what I did was stupid.” I twisted my free hand on my lap, still clutching hers with my other. “But you don’t need to worry about me, Mom.”

I seriously could not deal with this anymore. Scrubbing my face with my hands, I said, “I really don’t want to talk about it anymore, okay? Can we please talk about something else?” Or better yet, leave, so I could have that bubble bath.

Mom studied me for several long seconds. I could see her worry for me, and I felt bad for having put her through this today. She’d lost Dad, too, even if he wasn’t her husband at the time. And now, I was all she had, except for her boyfriend.

“How’s Steve?” I asked.

If this didn’t speak to how desperate I was to change the subject, I don’t know what did; I never brought Steve up. He was the guy she started dating while still married to Dad, and now that they’d been together for a couple of years, it felt like any day, she’d show up with a ring on her finger.

I shuddered at the thought.

She looked down at the ground, letting several seconds pass before speaking so softly, my ears strained to hear her. “Steve and I are not together anymore.”

My head snapped back. “Since when?”

Her lips thinned to a grim line. “Since I found out he’s married.”

The words hit me like a sucker punch. Married? Steve, the man who’d swept into my mom’s life like a tornado, leaving devastation in his wake, was married?

Memories of that awful time crashed through me, as vivid and painful as the day they’d happened.

Mom’s face was etched with apprehension. “I want you to hear this directly from me,” she said, her voice unfamiliar and brittle. She took a deep breath, then blurted out the words that shattered our world. “I’m leaving your father.”

I stared at her, uncomprehending. The words were English, but they made no sense. My gaze darted between her and Dad, mouth open, waiting for the punch line that never came.

Dad’s attempt at a reassuring smile only twisted the knife deeper. The fact that Dad tried to give me a reassuring smile only broke my heart for him even more.

“Why?” I finally managed to croak.

To this, Mom and Dad exchanged a silent grimace. In her features, I saw fear of being labeled a villain, yet resolve that she’d thought long and hard about this and trusted she was doing the right thing.

Dad’s features, on the other hand, shot her an I can’t believe you’re doing this to us leer.

It was Mom who turned back to me, her smile gentle but her words razor-sharp, cutting through my soul—Dad’s soul—all the same. “I’ve met someone.”

I wish I could say I’d been a better daughter, that I hadn’t held a grudge. But that would be a lie. The months that followed were a minefield of arguments, and distance grew between us. One that, at the time, I had no interest in ever closing, no matter how much my father urged me to.

It really wasn’t until his death that she and I got back on solid ground, but if I were also being honest about that, the ground had never been the same again. I hated that I looked at her differently for her choices. After all, who was I to judge? I was of no moral high horse, I assure you. I was a flawed, broken human making mistakes every day of my life.

But I guess when someone hurts you that bad, when they hurt someone you love, forgiveness can be quite hard.

I’d moved forward with her, yes. But fully forgiven? That’s debatable. It was more like sweeping a boulder under a rug—always there, always felt.

One mantra had kept me from drowning in resentment.

“Steve’s my soulmate, Ivy,” Mom had insisted countless times. “I wasn’t looking for it. It just happened, and I can’t imagine my life without him.”

And now, it seemed this supposed soulmate had been married all along.

“How did you find out?” I wondered aloud.

“He confessed.” I could hear the lump in her throat. “It was more of a heated argument, I suppose. The truth just…exploded out when I pushed him about our future.”

I felt the air leave my lungs. For a moment, I couldn’t speak, couldn’t even think. When I finally found my voice, all I could manage was a weak, “Mom, I’m so sorry.”

The words felt hollow, inadequate. Because the truth was, a small, ugly part of me didn’t want to feel sorry for her. That part wanted to scream, You left Dad for him! You threw away everything, hurt us all, for a lie!

But as I looked at her—really looked at her—I saw the devastation in her features, the slight tremor in her hands. And suddenly, I was overwhelmed by a wave of compassion so strong, it nearly brought me to my knees.

I wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone, least of all my mother. To realize you’d left a man who truly loved you, who had built his life around you, for someone who had been deceiving you all along? To discover that the person you thought was your soulmate had been weaving an intricate web of lies, making you believe you were his entire world when you were just…God, I couldn’t even think the word mistress without feeling sick.

In that moment, I realized that despite everything that had happened between us, despite the hurt and the anger, I would do whatever it took to help her through this.

“You don’t have to say that.” Mom massaged her hands together, and when she spoke, her voice cracked. “I got what I deserved.”

“Mom…”

“It’s true.” She raised her chin stoically despite the tears in her eyes. “What I did to your father was wrong, and this is karma’s way of coming back to me.” She looked down again. “I deserved much worse, if you ask me.”

“No one deserves to have their heart broken, Mom. I know you loved Steve and wanted to spend the rest of your life with him.”

Mom took a deep breath and ran a hand through her hair, the way she always did when she was ready to end the subject.

“I’d better let you rest,” she declared, making it obvious this was too fresh, too painful to discuss further. “I’m glad you’re safe, Ivy.”

“Wait,” I said, standing up after her. “Let’s grab dinner?”

She offered a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Another time, okay?”

As she turned her back and started to walk out my front door, my mouth ran dry. I’d never seen Mom this hurt, and I’d never witnessed her beating herself up either. Maybe she regretted ending things with Dad; maybe she even blamed herself for his suicide.

“Mom, don’t go,” I pleaded.

At the sound of my near shriek, Mom paused, turned around, and sighed—recognizing the source of my panic.

“I’m sad,” she said. “But I’m not going to hurt myself, Ivy. Okay?”

Breathe in. Breathe out, Ivy.

Mom wrapped her arms around me, and I surrendered to her embrace, the soft strands of her hair sliding over my cheek.

“I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?” She pulled back and smiled. “Now, go. Get some rest.”

I watched Mom climb into her car, and as she drove off, I exhaled shakily, feeling foolish for my mini panic attack. Then again, I’d nearly died this morning. A little jumpiness was probably normal under the circumstances.

Desperate for some semblance of normalcy, I drew a bath, hoping the warm water might soothe my frayed nerves. As I sank into the bubbles, the shock of my near-death experience began to wear off, leaving raw emotion in its wake.

You’re alive. Be grateful for that.

I clung to these words, to the relief of survival. Mom and Grams still had me. This past year, I’d taken life for granted, hadn’t I? Caught up in my own struggles, I’d forgotten its preciousness.

But now, fate had granted me a second chance.

Yet, as shock and gratitude faded, an unbearable ache took their place as the full significance of what happened crashed over me. That man, “Bob,” coming for me, the evil glint in his face as he raised the gun—it all flooded back.

He’d appeared from nowhere. If I hadn’t fought back, I’d be on a morgue slab now.

The thought was too much.

I buried my face in my hands, body shaking with sobs. I surrendered to the pain, grieving until my eyes ran dry. As I sat in the cooling water, a chilling question surfaced.

Who is Bob, and why did he try to kill me today?