Heartless, page 40
“I came to see your father,” I say.
I don’t apologize for his passing. I’m not sorry.
Mathias folds his hands across his desk, staring down at them and running his thumb along top of its opposite knuckle like a worry stone.
“Father passed last year, as I’m sure you’ve been informed.”
I’m going to cut to the chase because I didn’t come here to reminisce.
“I came for answers.” I shoot daggers his way and sit up straight.
Mathias snorts, his crystal eyes hardening. “Answers to what? Kind of a broad statement there, Calypso.”
He says my name again, softly. Sweetly. The familiarity of my name on his lips is meant to break me down, weaken my resolve. Remind me we were once lovers.
I won’t let him get to me.
My body shakes. I try to fight it, but I feel it. It starts in my toes and trembles upwards. As long as it doesn’t hit my voice, I’ll get through this.
“I was recently informed.” I pause. Inhale. I need a moment. My fingers drum across my thighs. I want to pop my knuckles until they hurt. I need a distraction. I lie them flat across my legs and meet Mathias’ stare again. “It was recently brought to my attention that those mis . . . miscarriages I had several years ago were inflicted on me.”
Mathias wrinkles his nose and then laughs. In the span of two seconds, he’s already made me feel two inches tall. My mind floods with doubt. Am I crazy? Was this just another one of Elijah’s ploys?
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says. “And I really hope you’re not coming here to imply something sinister took place.”
“Your father and Holly’s father made an arrangement,” I say. “When we were all babies. You were always supposed to end up with Holly. But you fell in love with me.”
Mathias leans back, his hand positioned beneath his chin and his eyes narrowed.
“We were in love,” I say. “And we were young. And no one could talk us out of it.”
His silence causes a second wave of self-doubt. Maybe our love was only ever one-sided. Maybe it was all in my head. Maybe all these years, I made it into something bigger than it ever was.
But I press on.
“You wanted to please your father. You wanted to carry on his legacy. You wanted a family . . . with me,” I say. “And when you thought I couldn’t give it to you . . . after we lost three of our . . .”
I can’t say it.
“Your father had me poisoned so I’d lose them,” I say. “Your mother helped. My father helped.”
Mathias clears his throat. “Wow. Calypso. I . . .”
My eyes burn. Being back here, with him, with my first love, it brings a rush of nostalgia more powerful than I imagined. The good, the bad, everything in between, it’s all hitting me at once.
“I think you should go,” he says.
I blink. My mind goes blank. “What?”
It’s not the reaction I expected.
“Coming back here,” he says. “Mucking up all these feelings. You and your theories. It’s not a good idea. You shouldn’t be here, Calypso.”
I rise slowly, feeling grossly dissatisfied with our entire exchange. I didn’t travel this far to be shooed from his presence like some pesky fly.
“My theories?” I spit. “Our parents murdered our babies, Mathias.”
“You have no proof.”
“What if I get proof?” I say. “I’m going to talk to my father after this. Get some answers. If he confesses, will you believe me then?”
“And what will that change?” His voice booms. Mathias is angry. “What’s done is done. The future we would’ve had together is long gone. Holly is my chosen one. We have a family.”
“I’m not asking you to leave Holly.” I wouldn’t dream of it. Sitting across from Mathias Shiloh, I know one thing to be true now: I could never be with him again. I wouldn’t want to.
“Then why did you come here?” he asks.
My lips part, but I don’t answer.
I came here to confront Father Nathaniel. I wanted him to pay for his sins. I wanted a confession. I wanted his entire reputation to be ruined. I wanted his empire to crumble, his minions to scatter like leaves in the wind.
I wanted him to see me thriving.
Still standing.
Mathias slinks back in his chair, gazing out the window to a wooden playground where giggling children chase one another without a care in the world.
It’s peaceful here. Corruption aside.
I had a happy childhood.
“After the third baby,” he says. “My father told me how beside yourself you were. He told me if I were to get you pregnant again, your body wouldn’t be able to handle it. He told me you might die, if not for physical reasons then from a broken heart. I didn’t want to hurt you again, Calypso. I didn’t want to put you through that all over again. I loved you too much.”
I came here expecting a fight. A battle. A war.
I didn’t expect to have my heart broken all over again.
Our gazes meet, holding for what feels like forever.
I want to be mad at him. I want to believe he’s lying, covering for the evil deeds of his father. It’s easier that way.
“I believed my father.” His voice breaks. “And I let you go because it was the only way to stop your pain.”
My gaze lands on a drawing hanging on a bulletin board behind him. The name Cassidy is scribbled in the corner, only the ‘d’ is backward, making it look like Cassiby. He and I always planned to use that name. It was his favorite for a girl.
Must be a picture his four-year-old drew.
“Bullshit.” I rise, my chest on fire. I slam my fist against his chest. “Holly was already pregnant when you and I broke up. You’re a goddamned liar, Mathias Shiloh. You’re no better than your father, may he rot in Hell.”
Mathias trips over his words.
I’m halfway to the door when I hear him calling after me.
“I’m going to see my parents. Don’t you dare try and stop me,” I declare, my back toward him. “And then you’ll never see me again.”
I burst through his doors and storm down the hall, where Crew and Nicolette are idly chit-chatting. I don’t have time to wonder what the hell the two of them could possibly have to talk about.
“Let’s go.” I brush past them and head out the front doors, running down the stairs and marching toward the dirt sidewalk path that will lead us to my father’s apothecary.
Crew is yards behind me, Emme in his arms.
Ahead in the distance, I see a woman with sandy hair that matches mine, streaks of gray that show her age, and a long gray dress that drags on the floor as she sweeps the front steps of the shop with a Shaker broom.
“Verity.” I call my mother by her first name, the way I’ve always done.
Once upon a time, before she and my father came to Shiloh Springs, her name was Margot.
Plain old Margot. Margot Crabtree, I believe she was.
She stops sweeping and glances around, her hand shielding her eyes from the early afternoon blaze of the sun. I watch her squint, then squint harder.
“I need to speak to Stone.” I stop short, fold my arms, and peer inside the shop to see if my father is inside. There’s movement behind lace curtains.
“Calypso?” Verity drops the broom and ambles toward me, arms open wide. She wraps me in an embrace before kissing my forehead. Then my cheeks. Twice. Then the tip of my nose. I stare into her eyes and know immediately she’s not all there.
It’s nothing new.
Some things never change.
“Is Stone inside?” I ask.
“We missed you, my little willow wind.” She calls me by my childhood nickname. “Never thought I’d see you again. Come inside. Stone will be tickled.”
She looks past my shoulder, her stare falling on Crew and Emme. Verity’s hand lifts to her lips.
“Is this . . . is this your family?” she asks.
Kind of.
“Friends,” I say.
Her brows scrunch and she studies them some more, Emme in particular.
“No, no,” she says. “That makes sense.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about. I toss Crew a look, silently instructing him to ignore her. I should have warned him on the way up here instead of stewing in silence.
“The vision I had.” She presses a fingertip against pursed lips. “It was a boy. You had a little boy. Sandy hair. Dimpled chin. That’s a girl, isn’t it?”
My face reddens slightly. It’s got to be the heat. It’s really warming up.
“Shall we head in?” I suggest.
The whitewashed wood floor of my father’s apothecary looks the same as it did years ago. Wide planks, dirt-smudges. Character, he called it.
“Stone,” Verity calls, traipsing to a back room. Her fingers toy with the beaded necklaces that hang from her neck. “Stone, guess who’s here?”
“Your parents have the coolest fucking names,” Crew whispers in my ear. “Your dad better look like a goddamned superhero.”
I fight a smile and ignore him.
A second later, my mother comes out and closes the front door to the shop, a sign to the locals that they’re not accepting business at the moment, though there’s nothing to keep anyone from walking in if they wanted anyway.
“We’re going to head back to the house.” Verity points to a door in the back of the shop, one that leads to the house I spent most of my childhood in. Two other families lived above us, but we all came and went as we pleased. Nothing was off limits to anyone. As Father Shiloh always said, “We’re nothing but one big, happy family.”
The four of us pass through the door, and I’m hit with the scent of sage. My mother must’ve been cleansing again.
I spot the back of my father’s head. He’s seated in his favorite wingback chair. Tufts of stuffing and foam stick out from sewn rips along the back and bottom. His wiry, salt and pepper hair is still long and going in five different directions. In another life, I swear he would’ve been a mad scientist.
If he was ever missing in action, we always knew where to find him—in his back room, mixing different medicines and concoctions. Coming up with cures for random ailments plaguing the community. He once cured the entire village of a serious lice infestation with a secret ratio of tea tree oil and apple cider vinegar.
“Stone,” Verity says. “Calypso is here.”
We head for the sofa, the four of us, and we each take a square. It sinks in and smells of sandalwood and patchouli incense. Thank God for the open window next to Emme.
“Calypso,” Stone says. His beard has more gray than black now. It hides everything but his nose and eyes. His barrel chest rises and falls with slow breaths as he studies me. “What brings you home?”
Home.
I huff.
“I want answers. I want the truth.” I stare into a set of eyes that match mine fleck for fleck.
His mouth pulls into a Cheshire grin. “Don’t we all? Isn’t that why we’re all here?”
Crew exhales loudly.
“The miscarriages,” I say. “The tea Penelope gave me. You prepared it.”
He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t breathe. Doesn’t blink.
My mother stops messing with her necklace.
I shove my hands under my thighs to keep from fidgeting.
“You were never supposed to be a Shiloh.” He rises, dragging his thumb and middle finger along the corners of his jutted mouth.
Air is sucked from my lungs.
“Having those babies, those Shiloh babies, would’ve ruined you.” He clears his throat. “It would’ve been dangerous.”
Verity frowns. “Stone, stop talking all this nonsense.”
“Nathaniel Shiloh didn’t give me a chance.” He reaches for an amber mug, like the one the local artisans made for the bazaars, and takes a sip. It sends a twinge of pain to my groin. “He wanted you out of the picture. He wanted his son to marry the Linwood girl, and nothing was going to stop him.”
“What are you saying, Stone?” Verity’s eyes are as clear as I’ve ever seen them. She’s oddly coherent. Perhaps she was in my corner all along, not taking part in any of the orchestrated evil.
“Nathaniel asked me, and I obliged,” Stone says, his face straight. “I did it to protect Calypso. I did it because if I didn’t, it would’ve gotten worse.”
He clears his throat and takes another sip.
“And he said if I didn’t, we’d be excommunicated,” he adds. “We had nowhere to go. Not a real penny to our names. We’d have been homeless.”
Verity rises from the tattered sofa. “Stone, how could you?”
“I was protecting us.” He gazes out the window, probably so he doesn’t have to meet three angry glares.
“You fucking coward,” Crew growls, his teeth clenched. “You were protecting no one but yourself.”
Crew hands Emme to me, like he’s about to go after my father. He stands, pushing his sleeves up.
“Crew,” I say.
He storms across the room, his tightened fist in my father’s face.
“You don’t get to play God,” he says. “You’re a goddamned coward, Stone. I’m pretty sure that’s not even your real name.”
I nod, agreeing.
It’s Michael Miller.
“You came to this fucking cult because you’re too chicken-shit to deal with the real world. You wanted to live this fantasy, Little House on the Prairie life with your Monopoly money, mixing potions in your little apothecary like you’re straight out of Harry fucking Potter, and the second your precious way of life was threatened, you did the unspeakable.”
I don’t think my father has heard of Harry Potter, but I’m sure he gets Crew’s point.
“I can’t believe this,” Verity whispers, her eyes glassy. If I know my mother, she’ll let this sink until she can stand the heaviness no more. And then she’ll roll a big, fat joint as soon as we leave and forget all about it. “Stone, how could you?”
“Forgive me, Calypso,” Stone has the audacity to ask. “I haven’t been able to forgive myself, but believe me when I tell you I’m sorry.”
“Seriously?” Crew spits. He reaches for my hand, pulling with a quick jerk until I’m next to him. “If she forgives you, it’s up to her. You don’t get to ask. You don’t get to make her feel guilty if she decides she can never fucking forgive you.”
Perhaps I should be falling apart at this revelation, but for whatever reasons, I’m detached from this moment.
It’s as if the balloon strings have been cut. I’m floating, rising above it all. Watching from above.
Maybe it’ll sink in later, on the drive home.
But it’s true what they say: Truth sets you free.
“We’re leaving.” Crew squeezes my hand.
Stone doesn’t protest.
Verity is speechless.
“Come on.” He leads me out a side door, where a very pregnant Holly Linwood-Shiloh stops dead in her tracks.
She looks like she’s just seen a ghost.
Her hair burns bright orange, reflecting off the sun. A hand cradles the underside of her bulging belly, the one carrying Mathias’ fourth child. All of her babies and my babies are siblings in the bigger scheme of things.
It’s weird to think of it that way, but it’s true.
I stop, releasing Crew’s hand.
When our eyes meet, we hold a silent conversation. Maybe she’s sorry. We were like sisters once.
Emme squirms in Crew’s arms and reaches for me. I oblige her and wrap her in my embrace. Holly’s eyes go from mine to Emme’s to Crew’s. Maybe she thinks they belong to me. I’ll let her believe what she wants.
“Motherhood looks good on you,” she says. “I always knew you’d be a good mom someday.”
A little tow-headed blonde, Cassidy, I’m assuming, tugs on Holly’s hand, trying to pull her toward the playground. She gives me an apologetic wave, her stare lingering a little too long, and then waddles behind her daughter.
“Who was that?” Crew asks when she’s gone over the hill.
My pained ego wants to declare her as the woman who derailed my future with her birthright. I can’t blame everything on Holly, and I don’t have the energy to loathe yet another pathetic soul from this stupid commune.
“An old friend,” I say.
“Ready to go?” he asks.
“More than you could possibly know.”
I slip my hand into his. I know we’re just friends, but Crew anchors me. He keeps me from floating away.
I’m glad he came.
We step off the dirt path and veer toward the main drag. When we pass the big brick building, I peek from the corner of my eye. Mathias stands in his window, half-shielded by a sheer curtain, and watches as Crew, Emme, and I depart the devil’s playground that is Shiloh Springs.
I’m free.
28
Crew
“We’re home.” I whisper gently, my hand on Calypso’s shoulder. Emme’s asleep in the backseat. A full moon lights the cabin of my truck.
Calypso inhales, sitting up straight. I pretend not to notice when she wipes the corner of her mouth. She wasn’t drooling, but she did sleep the whole way home.
We weren’t in Shiloh Springs very long, but I know the day took a toll on her.
I climb out and grab Emme from the back. She stirs but doesn’t wake.
Calypso seems drowsy, but she grabs Emme’s diaper bag from the backseat and follows me into my apartment.
She stands next to me as I change Emme’s diaper and slip her into pajamas, both of us holding our breaths that she doesn’t decide the last several hours of the trip were a mere nap.
“You doing okay?” I ask when we put the baby in her crib. We shut Emme’s door and linger in the hall.
Calypso yawns, nodding.
“You need me to tuck you in tonight too?” I tease.
She cracks a sleepy smile. “I might need you to carry me to bed. I don’t have the energy to even walk to my place.”
