Page 107 of Revenge Puck

“You’ve always been there for me and Finley, Preston. I can never repay you for that. So, if you thought we were better off without him, then I trusted you. I trust you more than I would ever trust him.”

She trusts me. She trusted me when I said she should go out on a date with my best friend and look where that got her. But this time, keeping Christian away, it may be a bigger screw up than letting him get her pregnant as a teenager.

“There’s, ah, something else I need to tell you.”

“What now?”

“I got an offer from the Grizzlies, the team in San Diego. Well, that is, if they don’t withdraw it after my ejection...”

“Okay. So, if the offer is still on the table, you’re going to up and move all the way to California?”

“I told you it’s the best offer I got. The other…I can’t afford a pay cut to stay closer…”

“I could get a job to help out. You don’t have to keep supporting me and Finley.”

“Yes, I do. Who else will do it? Christian?”

“I never asked you to take us in. Yes, it was my only option when I was a depressed, pregnant, teenager. But now that he’s getting ready to start school full-time in the fall, I could get a job. I can take care of myself now, you know?”

“Earning a living to support you and him isn’t as easy as you think it is.”

“Well, I’m not asking you to move to California for us. I never asked you to take out vengeance on Christian, either. That…what happened should’ve been between me and him. You shouldn’t have had to give up your life for us.”

“And you think he would have?”

“I doubt it, but I’ll never know now, will I?” For the first time in as long as I can remember, there’s anger in my sister’s voice.

“If you want to tell the son of a bitch, then tell him! You could have done that at any point, but you didn’t, did you? If you think he won’t abandon you both, then you’re still the naïve nineteen-year-old you were when he knocked you up.”

“Love makes you want to think the best about someone. It has nothing to do with how young I was at the time.”

“Love is nothing but a pain in the ass.”

“Forget about me and Finley, and what happened in the past. What about Elle? You’re just going to up and leave her?”

“I don’t know what you want me to do, Maya. I have to go.”

“You don’t have to do anything, Preston. There’s another team who wants you, isn’t there?”

“Yes. But like I said…”

“It’s less money. You would have to take a cut in pay. So what? Some things are more important than money. And one of them is in Greensboro. You would be crazy to choose anything over Elle. Trust me, if you give up on her without trying to fix things with her, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

38

Elle

I’m folding towels in the laundry room when I hear the door chime, quickly followed by Audrey exclamation of, “What the hell are you doing here?”

Based on her angry tone, my first thought is that it must be Christian popping in again, maybe even asking for a haircut before he leaves for game six in D.C. tomorrow.

The urge to shave his eyebrows off has lessened, thankfully. I’m too sad about Preston to even be malicious toward the jackass.

Despite how much Preston hurt me, unlike Christian, I don’t want to do him harm or try to get payback. Mostly because I don’t blame him for pushing me away before he hurt his career even more.

“Ah, Elle?” Audrey asks from the doorway of our tiny laundry room.

“Yeah? Christian here for a cut? I don’t mind fitting him in.”

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