Your Fault (Culpable Book 2)

The silence was agonizing on the way home.

When Will parked, I got out of the car and shot upstairs. I didn’t want to talk to my mother. In all honesty, I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Since I’d gotten back, everything had gone wrong: I didn’t see Nick at the airport, I found him all beaten up, we argued, I fought with my mother, and I had to listen firsthand to what she thought of him… I needed to get away from all of them. I needed space.

When I walked into my room, the first thing I saw was a fat envelope on the bed. It was from school. I opened it and felt a knot in my stomach as I looked through the dorm documents. When I was looking into housing months before, I had checked the option for a roommate. That had been my plan, sharing a dorm room on campus, but now everything had changed. I’d decided to live with Nicholas, and I would have to call the school and let them know.

I was scared of the moment when I’d tell my mother. She was going to kill me. And a part of me, the part of me that was still just a little girl, was scared to admit to her that I was going to live with a guy my first year of college.

I couldn’t believe it was two weeks until I’d have to do it… I would have liked to pack my bags right then and go, but I’d have to deal with the situation. My mother needed to learn to live without me. Anyway, I was sure William wanted to live alone with her. Since we’d gotten there, all we’d done was cause him problems, me especially.

I grabbed the papers and shoved them into my desk drawer. I put on my pajamas, even though I wasn’t tired after sleeping all day, and I got in bed, ready to think about nothing.

It took forever to get to sleep, and when I did, the nightmares came back. I knew I was looking for Nick in my sheets, I knew when I felt him near me, my fears would vanish, but he wasn’t there, and he wouldn’t be able to protect me…

The sunlight was dazzling…for a moment, I didn’t know where I was, but then I managed to situate myself in my dream.

My father was with me.

“Noah, there are times in your life when people will do things you don’t like… Think about when Mom doesn’t do the things Papa tells her to, then Papa has to punish her, right?” my father said while we were both sitting by the seaside watching the waves crash against the cliff.

I nodded, listening to him, saying yes to whatever he said. That was easy because his questions were almost always rhetorical; you didn’t need to think about the answer because the question already implied it.

“The thing is, your mom doesn’t know what’s good for her. She doesn’t understand that I’m the only one who knows that.”

My father grabbed me around the waist and set me on his lap.

“You’re my girl, Noah. You’re my little treasure, and you’ll always do what I say, right?”

I nodded, looking into my father’s eyes, those eyes that were exactly like mine, the color of honey. Only his were bloodshot from alcohol.

“So, next time I tell you to scram, to leave your mother where she is, what are you going to do?”

“Go to my room,” I whispered almost inaudibly.

My father nodded with satisfaction. “Don’t ever disobey me, honey… I don’t want to do anything I’ll have to regret later…not to you. After all, you and I, we’re the same, aren’t we?”

I nodded and smiled while my father grabbed a string off the ground and started knotting it nimbly.

“This will be our tie, so strong that no one will ever break it.”

I looked at the knot, a figure eight. My father had made me tie one many times…

And I never stopped until it was perfect.

The next day, I got up with bags under my eyes. I’d had a horrible night, and it didn’t help that breakfast was so uncomfortable. William didn’t utter a word, and my mother scowled at me in silence, pretending to read the newspaper. A wicked part of my brain wondered what it would be like to drop the bomb on them that I was going to live with Nicholas right then, but just thinking about it gave me the urge to throw up.

I was happy when my phone started ringing. I’d been waiting for Nicholas to call me. I left the kitchen, ignoring my mother’s reproachful expression, and answered.

“Hello?”

“Is this Noah Morgan?” a woman asked on the other line.

“Yeah, who is this?” I replied, taking the stairs two at a time. She was silent until I reached my bedroom door.

“This is Anabel Grason, Nicholas’s mother.”

I was dumbstruck. Anabel. Half my problems were her fault—my problems and those of the person I loved most. She’d abandoned him, and now he wanted nothing to do with her.

“What do you want?” I asked as I shut the door behind me.

Hesitant, finally sighing, she said, “I need to ask you for a favor. I know Nicholas doesn’t want to see me, but I don’t care. I need to talk to him, and I need your help. You’re his girlfriend, right?”

Her tone was so gentle that I wasn’t sure what to do. Unsettled, I sat on the edge of the bed.

“I won’t do anything Nick doesn’t want. The two of you need to work it out. I’m sorry, Mrs. Grason, but you must understand I’m not exactly a fan of yours, and honestly, I think Nicholas is better off without you.”

There it was. I’d said it, and I wasn’t going to take it back now… She had abandoned Nick, my Nick, when he was just twelve years old—leaving him with a father who was too busy building his empire—without any explanation, and now she wanted that relationship back? She must have been sick in the head.

“I’m his mother, and there’s no way he’s better off without me. Things have changed, and I want to see him again.”

I wasn’t about to give in. I had tried to talk to Nick about that very subject, and he had made it very clear to me that I should stay out of it. Anabel was a big no for him, and I knew him enough to realize he wasn’t going to change his mind.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Grason, but Nicholas has repeatedly said there is no discussing this.”

“Then meet me on your own, just the two of us. Nicholas doesn’t need to know. Just pick a place.”

What? I couldn’t do that. Nicholas would kill me. He would feel betrayed if I talked about him to the woman he hated most in the world, the woman who had hurt him more than anyone had… No way.

“You don’t understand. He doesn’t want to see you, and there’s no way I’m going to lie to Nicholas.”

I was being firm. I guess all that stress from recent days was rising to the surface. Plus, I needed to defend my boyfriend, keep anyone from harming him, including me.

I heard Anabel take a deep breath. Then she went on.

“Here’s the deal,” she said, changing her tone to a more strident one. “My six-year-old daughter has a father who spends half his time traveling all over the world. I can’t be with her all day, and I know Nicholas wants her to spend some time at his apartment. It’s fine with me, but my husband refuses to talk about it. If you do what I ask, if you meet with me and help me find a way to recover my relationship with my son, I’ll let Nicholas visit with Madison when my husband is away. But if you don’t, I’ll do whatever I can to make sure Nicholas doesn’t see his sister again.”

Damn. Maddie was everything to Nicholas. I couldn’t believe that woman would threaten such a thing. Was that the kind of relationship she wanted with her son? One based on deceit and blackmail? I felt my blood boiling with rage. I wanted to hang up on her and let her know very clearly what I thought of her proposal, but it was Maddie we were talking about. If Nicholas had his way, she’d be living with him. He’d talked to lawyers, his father had tried to find a way to let him have her for a few weeks, but it was impossible: if her mother didn’t agree, there was nothing to be done… I knew I was treading dangerous ground, but I couldn’t let that woman come between Nick and his sister.

“Where do you want to meet?” I asked, hating myself for letting her manipulate me.

I could almost hear her smile on the other line.

“I’ll let Nicholas know he can have Maddie next week. We will meet when I bring her. Don’t worry, it’ll be our secret. No one will have to know.”

“I don’t want to lie to him, and eventually I’ll tell him. I promise you he won’t like it. What you’re doing, extorting me, is going to have the opposite result of the one you want. Nicholas doesn’t forgive easily, and you are the person who’s hurt him more than anyone else in his life.”

“You haven’t heard every side of the story, Noah. Things aren’t always the way you believe or the way you’ve been told.”

I didn’t want to hear another word from her. “Send me the address of the place you want to meet.”

I hung up without waiting for a response and lay down on the bed, looking at the roof and feeling guiltier than I ever had.

Eventually, my mother came to tell me she and Will were going to a charity ball on the other end of town and that they wouldn’t be staying at home that night. She said I should invite Jenna over, and I agreed without really thinking about it. Nick was the one I wanted to have sleep over, but a part of me was scared to call him and for him to realize I was hiding something. I spent the rest of the day torn, but when I saw he hadn’t called me either, I went back to bed, determined to spend the night alone with my nightmares.