“I’m walking out.” Her eyes flicker. I see the worry. The fear. It doesn’t stop her from telling me she’s leaving.

I harden my jaw, glaring at her. “Fine, you’re fired, effectively immediately. I’ll have your final check for you later this evening.”

“Keep it. I don’t want your money,” she flings at me as she turns on her heel to leave. “It’s full of conditions anyway.”

All I’ve ever done is take care of her. Watch over her. “If making sure you’re protected and safe are so-called conditions, then you’ve never protested before,” I call after her as she leaves.

She doesn’t turn around. Doesn’t say another word. I don’t understand her. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t understand me, either.

No one does.

Dad enters my office minutes later, slowly shaking his head, his expression somber. No doubt he notices the devastated look on my face, because I’m barely keeping my shit together.

“She tell you?” he asks.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” I start looking through drawers, looking for . . . what? I don’t know. If I look at my dad too long, I might break down and cry like a baby.

He sighs. “She’s nothing but a whore, son. You really want a girl like that in your life?”

I leap out of my chair and lunge at him, ramming his big body against the wall so fast, the back of his head thumps the wall hard. My face in his, I glare into his eyes, see the fear and confusion swirling in them. “You call her a whore again and I will tear you apart. Do you understand me?”

He releases a harsh, stuttering breath. “You really care about her that much? Even after everything I told you?”

“I don’t turn my feelings on and off like a goddamn light switch,” I tell him. “I’m not like you.”

Dad’s eyes darken with anger. “You don’t know me.”

“You’re damn right I don’t know you. You never stuck around much. Hell, it’s been two years since the last time I saw you,” I yell, furious at my dad, at Jen, at myself.

What the f**k is wrong with me? With everyone in my life? Everything’s hard. Nothing’s easy. I’m tired of it. I want my life to be simple. I want to be happy.

I want to be with Jen. But again, it’s not that easy.

“You never seemed to want me around. Your mother deterred me from being a part of your life every chance she got,” he throws back at me.

Stunned by his words, I release my hold on him and step away. “What did you say?”

“You think I didn’t want to be a part of your life? You think I stayed away from you because I wanted to?” He brushes his hands down his front, straightening his shirt that I wrinkled, then runs them through his hair, smoothing out the unruly strands. “Your mother did her best to keep me away from you.”

“Why?” I don’t believe him. I know she hates him, but she wouldn’t force him to stay away from me . . . would she?

I hid away and cried a lot when I was a kid, wishing my dad cared enough to want to spend time with me. She knew this after finding me more than once. I’d been jealous of what Danny had with his dad. A solid, loving father/son relationship. They would go out in the yard and toss a baseball or football back and forth to each other. They’d go fishing together. They included me all the time, always making me feel welcome, but deep down inside, I felt like an intruder. A jealous, unloved interloper.

“She was afraid I’d take you away from her, I think. I don’t know. Our getting together was nothing but a chance encounter gone completely out of control. When she told me she was pregnant with you, I tried to do the right thing and marry her. I looked forward to being a father.” He pauses and takes a deep breath, his shoulders slumping against the wall he’s still leaning against. “Within days of moving in with her, I knew we’d made a bad decision. We didn’t get along. We fought all the time. She hated me, resented that I’d impregnated her and took away her freedom.”

There’s that damn word again. Freedom. Jen constantly struggles for it and I constantly try to hold her down. Maybe I’m more like my father than I know.

“I always thought it was you who wanted to stay away,” I say, my voice surprisingly calm. Though my head is spinning with everything I’ve discovered. “Mom said you hated Shingletown and that you were desperate to get away.”

He laughs, but there’s not much humor in the sound. “Your mom is right. I hated that stupid little mountain town. There was nothing to do, no good jobs. I was struggling. My father had cut me off, was dying and I had no idea. Twenty-eight years old and I should’ve had my head on straight, you know? I should’ve had it all figured out by then. But I was nothing but a big kid who wanted to party. I had no real responsibilities. Until you came along.”

I had no freaking idea he felt this way. That he suffered with all of this. Of course, he’s never really explained himself to me, while my mother would bad-mouth him every chance she got. Still does. I could call her at this very minute and she would call Conrad Wilder the scum of the earth and whatever other horrible name she could come up with.

“So why didn’t you two divorce?” That’s the one thing that’s tripped me up my entire life. If they hated each other so much and couldn’t live together, why not get a divorce and be done with it?

“It sounds stupid, but I don’t want her out of my life. Crazy, right? Maybe we’re just lazy. I don’t know.” He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself. “We’ve always stayed in contact, your mom and I.”