Page 131 of More For Me

Mom closes her eyes. “No, Nisha. I’m not protecting your father.” She looks at me, her expression bleeding worry. And…sympathy? For me? She’s the one who was just abandoned, so why is she looking at me like that?

“Things have not been right between us for a very long time. We weren’t a good match. We were too different from the very start. After your brother died, things only became worse. We weren’t able to grieve together, so we grew apart instead. Both of us separate in our pain until there was nothing left of the marriage we once had.”

“Ammi,” Nisha, says, her eyes filling with tears again. “You never said anything.”

Mom waves her hand. “It’s not for a mother to complain to her children.” Then her face crumples. “You both already spend too much time taking care of me.”

“That’s not true,” Nisha insists. I can’t speak at all. “We’re your family.”

“You are,” Mom says softly. “My greatest gifts.” Then she sighs. “But I also need to have a life, beta. I need to find my strength again. And I cannot do that tied to a man who makes me feel weak.”

This is wrong. This is…there has to be something I can do. She can’t mean that.

“You had an argument,” I say, hearing the panic in my voice. “You can talk about it. You can work it out.”

“No, Bodhi.” She reaches for my hand but I pull it back. I don’t know what will happen if she touches me but I envision myself falling to pieces, breaking a part until I’m nothing but dust.

“We should have done this many years ago. Maybe things would have been easier for you both—”

“You think this will make it easier?” I yelp. “You think it will be easier for me if my parents split up?”

“I think it will be easier for you if your parents are happy,” she says.

But how can they be happy if they’re apart? How can they be happy if we’re not a family anymore?

I stand so quickly I knock over my chair. I feel like I’m going to be sick, and I still can’t get enough air in my lungs. Guilt crashes through me in red hot flames, burning away any ability I have to think rationally. To get ahold of myself.

“I have to go,” I somehow manage to grit out.

“Bodhi, no.” Mom reaches for my arm but I jerk it back, nearly knocking over the chair next to me, too. “Sit down, beta. We need to talk.”

I shake my head, my mouth far too dry to speak. Why the hell can’t I get enough air in my lungs?

“Bodhi,” Nisha says, sounding worried. Dev starts to stand but I hold out my hands, warding him off.

“I have to go,” I say again, then turn and practically sprint to the door. Mom and Nisha both call after me but I ignore them. I have to get out of this house. I have to get out of this house or…I don’t even know. I just know I need to leave. Now.

* * *

“Sir?Can I take your keys, sir?”

The voice calling from outside my window breaks the daze I’ve fallen into, and I look over to see the valet standing next to my car, clearly impatient.

Shit. I hadn’t even realized I’d made it to the front of the line. I hop out of the Jeep and hand off my keys. The guy looks me up and down, taking in my dark jeans and untucked navy button down. “You know this is a private event here tonight, right?” he asks.

“Yup,” I grunt, not giving a shit about the skeptical expression on his face.

I hadn’t consciously planned to come to the engagement party after leaving my parents’ house. I drove around aimlessly until the weird panic in my chest faded to numbness. Then I drove around some more and somehow ended up here. I guess my subconscious was trying to get me to Everly.

I don’t even blame the guy for questioning my presence. I’m definitely not dressed for an event like this. Maybe I shouldn’t even go in. But I have this idea that if I can see Everly, even if just for a few minutes, the crushing numbness will ease. I need to feel her arms around me, to remind myself that she exists, that she cares about me. That things are going to be okay.

The bouncer at the door seems to share the valet’s opinion, because he gives me the same apprising, judgmental once over. “My name’s on the list,” I grit out. “As a guest of Everly Ransome.”

He looks almost disappointed when he finds my name and has to let me through. At least in the lobby no one seems to give me a second look, all attendees too busy being rich and fancy to take note of a commoner in their midst. I scan the sea of unfamiliar faces, looking for a shock of black hair or the midnight blue of her dress.

God, she’d looked so gorgeous when I left the house tonight. I feel a sudden swell of nausea. I never should have left her. I should have come here with Everly and Fox instead of going to my mom’s. Maybe then I wouldn’t feel like my lungs are being slowly compressed under an unbearable weight.

“Bodhi?”