Bella reached for her sister’s water and downed it. “If you don’t mind that is.”
Dakota butted in. “It doesn’t matter whether she minds or not. It’s the code.” She reached for a clean glass. “Can I have a sparkling water please with lots of ice? I think I’m going to need it.”
Mari gave them all a glass, poured one for herself and took a satisfying drink, trying to buy herself time to sort the words out in her head. She might as well get this over and done with. They weren’t going to go away until she told them the whole story.
“I moved in with them before she died. She ran off and left me to fend on my own and that’s when Jeff and Pearl took me in. Ethan was my best friend at school. Ever since we were little actually. We were like two peas in a pod. Together all the time despite my mother doing her best to ruin everything for me. Pearl, Ethan’s mom, was everything mine wasn’t. Kind and warm, caring and ready to listen to me. Willing to see me as a person, not a ball and chain around her leg.” She smiled to herself remembering how Pearl had reacted yesterday when she’d come to visit. “She was the mother I never had. Nothing like the stereotypical cold foster mother you read about. She was the mother who baked apple pies and made pumpkin spice at Halloween. She even made Ethan and me matching costumes when we were little so I never felt left out, because my mother would be on a bender or disinterested in what I did at school.”
Mari looked at her sisters, hoping they understood just how important Pearl was to her. “My mother hated that we got on so well. I can’t prove anything, but I believe that there was something to connect his father and my mother that made her bitter. She had it in for Pearl but I never could figure out what and nobody tells kids anything. It was more than Pearl being mother of the year kind of thing too. But it was the way his father reacted that scared me the most.”
“You mean like an affair or something?”
“No, April. I’m not sure that’s it. I get the feeling that there was bad blood between them but it may only be my imagination working overtime. It was like he resented me or something, even though he was the one who suggested they take me in. It was like a love-hate relationship that I’ve never understood. At first I thought he was sad for me but as I got older, it felt as though I was in a vacuum. It only got worse.”
“Sounds like a honey of a guy.” Bella shuddered. “Are you sure you weren’t imagining it? You know, teenage hormones and over imagination playing up? Maybe he wasn’t the kind of person that wore his heart on his sleeve, kind of guy.”
“I don’t know but I wasn’t the only one who thought so. Ethan used to try and figure it out but eventually he gave up. Kept butting up against a brick wall.” She ran her finger over the rim of the glass, thinking aloud. “None of it made sense because they took me in when Mom lost it so I don’t get why he was so against me. Maybe it was because she kept coming back and tried to wheedle her way in for money or something – I don’t know. It never made sense.”
“But that doesn’t explain why you left. Why you ran away.” Dakota waved her hand toward the ballroom where the builders were working. “I mean, if I had that guy waiting at home for me, I wouldn’t run away and leave him behind.”
“I didn’t want to. Believe me. I wanted to stay so badly it hurt. But Mr. Benson accused me of something I didn’t do and it made it too hard to stay. He never would’ve let Ethan and me get any closer. He told me so to my face that night.”
“What else did he say?” Bella rested her chin on her hands, waiting for answers.
Her heart squeezed, giving Mari pain as the memories rolled through her mind. “There was a break-in at their house while I was with friends at a boxing match watching Rake. Things were messed up, thrown all over the place.” She passed her hand across her forehead. “He said it was me, that I wasn’t at the match like I said I was. He claimed I did it to get back at Ethan for dumping me.”
“What? Was he serious?” Dakota’s voice rose. “He doesn’t know you like we do, obviously. My goodness, I knew soon as I met you what kind of person you were. How could he, living with you like that, not see the real you?”
April butted in. “What did he blame you for taking?”
“Nothing was taken that I know of. More that I trashed the place for revenge.” She sucked in a deep breath. “It was impossible for me to stay after that because Ethan sided with him.”
“What? Are you freaking kidding me?” Bella stood, staring, with her mouth open. “And you didn’t punch him in the nose for that? You never did tell us what he said to you.”
“No, I didn’t hit him even though I thought he deserved it for not sticking up for me. We fought something terrible though. I don’t know what started him off but it was the beginning of the end for us. He informed me that he didn’t see his future aligning with mine and marriage and kids weren’t an option. He wanted to be ‘free’ to play the field instead of being saddled with me.”
“The bastard!” April was horrified.
“I didn’t see I had any choice but to go. Too
