I’d had a fair share of stories made up about my life. The online articles that said my mother was really Carlyn Clark who played Della in The Boy & His Ribbon and not a woman I looked very similar too called Jacinta Murphy who’d died by her own hand.
Every week, some blogger stated Dad had married some Scottish waitress or abandoned me in some equally ridiculous tale.
Rumours came with the territory of movies and TV.
But Jacob lived in a small-knit town that should have his back. Not suspect his origins, discuss his bank account, or talk nastily about the deceased.
“I always thought Ren Wild landed on his feet. Came from nothing, yet the Wilsons gave him part of their farm.” Lorraine sniffed. “If I knew a bit of hardship in my life would mean I could be a millionaire and a landowner in my thirties, then sign me up.”
“I know. Easy way to get rich, that’s for sure.”
Easy?
Right.
I’d had enough.
I couldn’t listen to another second of this.
Slapping my magazine onto the chair next to me, the loud thwack reverberated around the waiting room, making people in different states of injury flinch.
Spinning around, I found two women—one older with grey speckled hair and another younger with reddish blonde—sitting with their heads together and a conspiratorial look on their faces.
The younger woman, Lorraine, held a tea-towel around her hand where a small stain of blood hinted at a kitchen accident.
For a second, my anger spluttered. She was hurt. She was in the hospital. I should—
I should stand up for Jacob.
God knew how often he’d been talked about behind his back.
Pointing a finger at both women, I said coldly, “You should be ashamed of yourselves.”
“Excuse me?” Gladys startled, her watery eyes growing wide. “Who are you?”
“I’m the girl who brought Jacob Wild to the hospital. I’m also the girl who can’t sit and listen to any more of your nonsense.” More pairs of eyes landed on me as I stood. This new drama was far more entertaining than two-year-old magazines.
“You were eavesdropping on our conversation?” Lorraine’s nose reached the ceiling. “You know what they say about listening to things that don’t concern you.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong. It does concern me. It concerns me a great deal because you’re utterly heartless to laugh at a boy’s inability to move on after his father—his father—died. You’re cruel to gossip about one of your own. A son of this town who is a hard worker and a loyal friend.”
My voice shook as more fury layered it. “And you’re a freaking moron if you think Ren Wild had it easy. Did you not see the movie? Did you not hear what that Mclary farmer did to him? What they tried to do to their own daughter? You think Ren would’ve chosen that life, knowing he’d find some happiness all before he died anyway?”
Furious tears glittered, blurring the two women I wanted to slander and shame. “Do you think he wanted to die by coughing? Do you think he wouldn’t trade being wealthy if it meant he got to live a lifetime with his wife and son?”
The waiting room no longer existed. Patients and blood and a building full of pain no longer mattered as I leaned toward the two women and saw nothing more than stupidity. “Do you not think he’d give up all of it for one more day with the boy you’re laughing so callously about?”
Something hard and bruising latched around my upper arm.
And then I was moving, dragged toward the exit by the very same boy I’d been defending. He showed no signs of being in pain. No halted gait or tweaked spine. The strength in his fingers commanded me not to say a single word. Not a peep. Otherwise, I wouldn’t like the consequences.
“Jac—”
“Don’t.” His face shimmered with outrage—a visible emotion with strains of hatred, resentment, and violence etching lines around his eyes and tension around his jaw.
I bit my lip as he hauled me from the hospital and practically threw me through the doors.
Stumbling from his force, I tripped down the steps and spun to face him as he winced and slowed, unable to descend the stairs as effortlessly as he’d evicted me from the waiting room.
“Keys.” He held out his hand.
I fumbled in my pocket even as I whispered, “You can’t drive.”
His dark eyes, once again a malicious gleaming black, dared me, just dared me to stop him. He didn’t have to say a word. His stare was reprimand enough.
I dropped the car keys into his outstretched palm, flinching as he clutched them with brutal fingers. He strode off with rage fluttering in his wake.
Trailing him, I glanced back at the hospital, expecting to see a line-up of gossip-loving townsfolk, taking photos, jotting down what I’d said and how this ended. Ready to sell my mistake to the highest bidder.