Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 149209 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 746(@200wpm)___ 597(@250wpm)___ 497(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 149209 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 746(@200wpm)___ 597(@250wpm)___ 497(@300wpm)
In the span of a few hours, for better or worse, everything between us has changed.
CHAPTER FIVE
When we reach the inn a few hours later, we’re alone. Maxon, Keeley, and baby Kailani, whose name was chosen because it’s Hawaiian for sea and sky, will be home sometime tomorrow.
Bethany has been quiet since we left the birthing center. Not sad, just contemplative. Judging by the fact she’s barely let go of me since Kailani made her way into the world, Beth is as impacted by the infant’s birth as I feel. I wish I knew what was going on in her head.
“It’s midafternoon, and you never got breakfast. I’m sure you’re starving,” she says as we enter the bright kitchen at Maxon and Keeley’s place. “At least let me cook for you before you go. I owe you that much.”
“You don’t owe me anything. I was happy to drive you there.”
“But you stayed. That was above and beyond. I’m already cooking for myself. So unless you have someplace to be…”
“I don’t.” My mission is her.
She grabs a few things from the pantry, then opens the fridge. “Allergic to anything?”
“No.”
“Hate anything?”
“My palate is pretty open-minded.”
She turns and smiles at me. “Perfect.”
I try not to let the warmth on her face affect me. No such luck.
In a few short minutes, she’s diced an onion, sliced off some soft white cheese I can’t identify, chopped sweet cherry tomatoes, then grabbed a couple of skillets from the drawer beneath the stove. She’s proficient, methodical, and strangely fascinating to watch.
“You’re good in the kitchen. I can, um…boil water.”
“Seriously? Then what do you eat?”
“A lot of stuff that’s frozen or out of a can. Where I live in North Dakota, there aren’t many restaurants nearby, so I learned to fend for myself…but it wasn’t pretty.”
“Your mom never taught you to cook?”
“She liked taking care of ‘her boys,’ as she called me, my dad, and my brothers. I never imagined a time she wouldn’t be here to do it.” Thoughts of my parents and years we should still have together always drag me into a pensive mood. I can’t go there right now. This is my alone time with Bethany. I have to take advantage of it. “In fairness, she did teach me some basics before I moved out of the house, so I can scramble an egg, make tacos, even toss together a no-frills lasagna. That’s about it. Who taught you? Your mom?”
Bethany shakes her head. “Since Mom wasn’t around much, an older neighbor taught me. Patti lived alone since her jerk of a husband left her for a friend of their daughter’s and the other kids had moved away. She and I spent a lot of time together when I was in junior high since she loved to cook, and I enjoyed learning. She was kind. It was nice.”
Though their mutual loneliness tossed them together, I can tell Bethany was genuinely fond of the woman. “Where is Patti now? Still in your old neighborhood?”
For a long moment, she doesn’t answer. “My freshman year of high school, I went to her house to tell her that I’d been invited to a slumber party by this really popular girl and to ask if she’d help me bake awesome brownies to take. When I knocked, she didn’t answer, even though her car was out front. I waited a few minutes in case she was in the shower or something, then I let myself in with my key so I could check on her.”
Dread tightens my stomach. “Was she dead?”
“Yeah.” Sadness mutes her expression.
“Heart attack?”
Losing my dad decimated me, and I’m a grown-ass man. I can only imagine how traumatic losing a maternal figure as a kid must have impacted Bethany.
“No. She’d hung herself.”
Oh, shit. Being left behind sucks. So does the hurting, grieving, and clinging to happier times. But to lose a loved one to a death so preventable?
“How old were you?”
“Eleven.”
“You must have been devastated.”
Bethany nods as she sautés the onions. I can’t see her face since she’s focused on the stove, but my money is that, on top of an already emotional day, she’s fighting tears.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart.”
“The worst part was, she didn’t leave a note. She didn’t say goodbye. She just…”
The squeak in her voice tugs at my heart. As much as my head tells me I shouldn’t empathize with her until I figure out how guilty she is, I can’t be unmoved. At the moment, I can’t even bring myself to care whether she scammed clients’ money or not.
Maybe the big picture I’ve been missing is that Bethany Banks endured a childhood full of disappointments, thanks to the adults around her. How was she supposed to learn to care about others when she had almost zero examples to follow? How was she supposed to truly understand the trauma she’d leave in her swindling wake if no one ever showed her empathy or compassion?