Page 48 of Malachi
“Thank you, all, for listening,” Levi credited each of us as we all stood. “Even if it did cost me a bloodied nose.”
With the tension finally releasing from us all, I watched each of my brothers and their respective wives leave. With a heavy sigh, I turned off the lights, making my way out of the pole barn and around to the side where I could jog back up to the house.
Or would have, if I hadn’t run smack dab into Eden’s small body.
“Fuck! You scared me,” I ranted as I worked to catch my breath.
She stood there, all five-foot-nothing of her, with her arms folded over her chest and her eyes narrowed at me as she fumed.
“We need to talk.”
CHAPTER13
EDEN
I felt eighteen million emotions all at once, but the prevailing one was hurt. I was hurt that he had lied. Here I was, doing everything in my power to meet him with blatant and unbridled honesty, thinking naively that we were making headway when, in fact, I was still completely in the dark. I felt betrayed. He had treated me like a child. How could I have been so wrong about him? I might be young, but I truly thought myself a good judge of a person. I could not have been more wrong when it came to Malachi Temple.
“We need to talk, Malachi,” I reiterated when he simply stood there, mouth agape like a fish out of water. Good. I hope he felt just as flustered as he stood there, eyes ricocheting back and forth as he scrambled for words.
“Let’s go up to the house,” he began, but I didn’t want to hear it. I held my hand up, effectively cutting him off.
“We need to talk and we need to talknow.” I lowered my tone, my eyes shooting arrows of betrayal and hurt at him. He had the decency to look ashamed. I had to give him that.
“I think we should have this conversation in the house where it’s comfortable,” he urged. “And where there’s a bathroom?” He muttered the last bit under his breath. It made me feel better that he felt uncomfortable. I had half a mind to spew every slanderous, angry, insulting accusation I could think of his way for making me feel like this, but I held back.
“Fine. We can go back to the house, but when we get there, youwilltell me the truth. Thewholetruth.” There was no question in my voice as I turned on my heel and marched my way back towards the home that I thought we had started building together. No, it wasn’t a home. It was a house we happened to both live in. The feeling of home had crumbled as I listened to the truth of the Temple brothers come to light over the last hour and a half.
He stayed behind me as we walked, neither of us speaking a word until we were safely in the house, the door shut firmly behind us. Immediately, I turned on him, facing him with the same attitude that hadn’t left for a second.
“Speak,” I all but commanded him.
“Are you giving me order?” he questioned incredulously, a smirk playing at his lips. Clearly, he was unaccustomed to the thought of a woman ordering him about in such a way. Well, he was in for a rude awakening.
“I said, speak. You apparently have a lot to say in order to be honest and I have decided to be magnanimous in giving you the opportunity to tell that truth before I do my best to verbally slaughter you for being such a damned fool, Malachi,” I sneered. I let the hurt that ached inside me fuel every word I spewed.
“Ugh,” he groaned, walking past me as he ran a hand over his face.
“Don’t you walk away from me, Malachi Temple,” I scolded, grabbing at his arm in an attempt to pull him back. It was a futile effort. He was stronger than I was, ridiculously so. He simply shook me off as he continued to the living room. I had no choice to follow — with hands clenched at my sides, I stomped my way behind him.
Finally, he slumped down onto the sofa, leaning his head against the back of it as he closed his eyes in frustration, or perhaps exhaustion. I didn’t care.
“Listen here, Malachi,” I scolded. “I don’t care if you’re tired or frustrated or any other emotion you’d like to claim at this moment. I refuse to be lied to any longer, and from what I heard tonight, you’ve been doing a lot of just that.”
“You’re right,” he sighed quietly.
“Don’t argue — wait…” I trailed off as his words registered. “I’m right?”
“You are. You are absolutely right. I shouldn’t have lied,” he agreed. To say it shocked me would be an understatement. All the angry vitriol I had locked and loaded, ready to take aim and fire, dissipated, floating away on the wind as his honesty struck home.
“Well… good…” I huffed out awkwardly.
“Lying was never the plan, Eden, but hiding the truth always was,” he admitted with guilt burning at the edge of every word.
“So, just… let me get this straight. You didn’t mean to lie to me, but you never intended to tell me the truth. To the point that you had a plan — a full, thought-out plan—to withhold the truth from me. That’s what happened? You went into our marriage with details and a plan formulated with your brothers and I’m just supposed to be okay with this?” I scoffed, almost laughing at the absolute absurdity of it. Thoughts raced through my head so quickly I could barely latch on to one.
“No, I don’t expect you to be okay with this. I don’t expect you to be okay with any of it. That’s why I never intended to tell you,” he explained, though it didn’t feel like an explanation at all. “What do you want me to say, Eden?” he asked, with no small measure of exasperation.
“I don’t know. Maybe start with the truth. All of it,” I sighed, my hands flopping down and hitting my thighs with a thud of frustration.
