Page 49 of Forget That Guy
“No.” Juliana clenched her jaw.
“That’s too bad. Because I’m going to share that information with you.” Holly crossed her arms over her chest and set her feet. “I’ve talked to her once. When I called her a few days ago to ask her why she was contesting my father’s will.”
I whipped my head around to stare at her.
That was news to me.
“That’s unfortunate…”
“I haven’t talked to her because it makes me feel like shit every time she reminds me that I wasn’t a good enough reason for her to stay,” she continued. “And honestly, I didn’t really even need her to stay. I just wanted her to love me like a mother should.”
Juliana continued the silence.
“One day, you’re going to push them too far, and they’re going to realize that it’s easier to cut you out of their life than keep getting their hopes up that their parent will want to be a parent. It’s freeing, really, to cut that last tie. Once you do, it doesn’t take long for you to stop thinking about them. One day, you’ll just be a person they used to know. You won’t know what it’s like to be a grandmother. You won’t know what it’s like to watch them graduate, because they won’t want you there. Youwon’t know what it’s like to help them pick out a wedding dress. Because they won’t even think about you. You have a choice to make, Juliana. And that’s going to decide how the rest of your life will go with those girls. Denver won’t have to badmouth you, because you’ve done a pretty bang-up job of fucking yourself.”
Juliana hissed. “I just wanted to be happy.”
“Sure,” Holly said as she headed toward the barn. “But so do they. Remember that.”
Juliana stormed off, yanked open her car door, then slammed it so hard that the car shook.
She backed away from the house and tore up the grass in her haste to leave.
Only when she was gone did Holly step up to my side.
“What happened?” she asked as she slowed to keep in step with me.
I gave her the rundown of Juliana’s entire visit, finishing with, “I have to head over to Nate Ryder’s place and talk to him about selling. Then I have to talk to the town council. This ski resort will happen over my dead body.”
She looked at me worriedly. “You think you can change the town council’s mind?”
I grinned. “I know I can.”
ELEVEN
Don’t worry about what people think. They don’t do it very often.
—Denver to Hux
DENVER
The first place I visited was Nate Ryder’s place.
He was an elderly man in his late eighties on his last leg. I’m talking stooped over, could barely lift his cane, shuffling all the way across the house at a speed that was alarmingly slow.
He’d been farming his land for so long that you could see the toll it’d taken on his body.
He held out his hand to me when I arrived at his front door.
“I was wondering if you’d ever come talk to me again.”
His words had my back straightening.
I frowned. “I was here last week. Fixed your tractor for you, remember?”
He nodded. “I do. But I wasn’t home. Had a doctor’s appointment. I’m sorry to hear from your wife that you don’t want to buy this land from me anymore. What happened? Your wife said financial hardship.”
I counted to ten before I explained everything that’d happened. Trying not to curse my ‘wife’ the entire time.
