Hate You Not

“Yes, you have a degree of wealth,” he says, looking at me over the rim of his bifocals. “But I have so much more.” He lifts his gray brows—partly teasing, I think—and I laugh.

It’s true, and for a moment, I feel torn. It would be such a damn relief to pass the impossibly complex tangle that is Aes’ development on to someone with deeper pockets and more resources than I have. And he’s not wrong; there is some chance I could run through my money.

But…I don’t know. I shake my head and finish my gin.

“I don’t think I can.” I grit my teeth and pull a slow breath in through my nose. It’s too hard to explain to him.

He tilts his head to one side, giving me his thin-lipped smile. His brown eyes seem to see into me.

“Okay,” he says simply. He taps the side of his head. “I know.”

Whatever that means. The man is one of the wealthiest tech barons living right now. Who knows what he does know.

For the rest of the flight, we talk about baseball—one of his favorite topics.

Before the plane lands, I give him my apologies and let him know I’d love to have his bank account on board, even though I feel the need to steer the ship myself. He’s a good sport about it, but by the time I climb into the cab of Shawn’s truck at the airport, I’m fucking exhausted.

“Hey there, man!”

Shawn’s as friendly as I remember, carrying the conversation for most of our drive to Heat Springs. After the first hour, I get out of my head and pull more of my weight. He asks about my brother—in a way that doesn’t bother me—and I tell him how it’s weird it feels to constantly re-remember Asher is gone and not just waiting around at his house for when I get a chance to stop by.

“That’s exactly how I feel about Sutt, man. She was always way out there in California. I’ll be thinking she’s still there, doing her thing while I do mine. And then I remember…” He shakes his head. “She always was a shitty driver.” He shakes his head, and I can’t help laughing.

“I know, I’m so bad. She would expect it, though, believe me,” he says. “She and I were the two oldest. It was us who shared the bunk beds and all that good shit. Mary Helen was sort of in the middle and then June a little younger than her and a whole lot younger than Sutton and me.”

“What was that like?”

He starts talking, and I swear he keeps the conversation going solely on his own for at least twenty minutes.

“Am I boring you to sleep?” he asks with a guilty grin.

“No, I like to hear about it. Sounds like you guys grew up…in a really good place.”

He nods. “Yeah, our mom was awesome. Like the kind of mom that did all this crazy craft shit. She had us making bread that rises on its own, like painting pottery and making clay beads. One time she had this kiln, you know, the real hot things that bake the clay and seal it up and make it shiny?” He shakes his head with a small smile. “She just really liked being a mom. Hell, I just remembered last time you said your mom passed away. We can just move on from moms if you want to, to my dad,” he says, barely taking a breath. “That dude’s crazy. Runs away from everything. He ain’t like he used to be. Losing our mom made him skittish. You hang out with him one weekend, and then he’s shutting himself off again.”

I nod. “Yeah. I get that.” I don’t, of course. The last time I saw my father in person—intentionally, anyway—was the day Asher moved into his college dorm.

“Were you guys little kids and shit?” Shawn says. “Do you care if I ask?”

“We were younger, a lot like Oliver and Margot.” For the first time, I realize how true that is. We were so damn young. I let a breath out. “We were on our own, too. Pretty much,” I hear myself say. “He was better off if he was working.”

“That sucks, man.” His gaze flickers toward me. “You’re the oldest, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Always feel responsible for the younger ones, or I do anyway. June or Mary Helen needs help, I’m always trying to be there. Like June when she wanted to take the farm over…”

I find out more about June in the last half hour of the drive to Heat Springs than I did in all of Molly’s reports.

“It wasn’t so much that she couldn’t let it go,” he says, of the farm. “I think it was more like she just didn’t want to give up. June is a stubborn ass. When she wants something to go her way, she’s gonna make it go her way. Ever since she was a little thing with pigtails. Mama used to braid their pigtails every day…”