Loving Her (Mitchell Family #9)(55)
Author: Jennifer Foor

I was trying to focus on the road, but talking about my feelings had gotten me all messed up in the head. My eyes watered so badly that I had to pull over to the side of the road.

Normally, I’d be able to walk away from something without shedding a tear, but I felt like I was dropping off a part of myself and just walking away. It was like telling a kid to walk outside and shoot their favorite pet. This beautiful young girl had a piece of my heart and imagining her giving it back to me was devastating.

I began to sob, putting my hands up to my face to hide my embarrassment. Here I was, driving her to try and teach her a lesson and not even two hours into the drive I was pulled over and crying like a little pu**y.

I couldn’t look at her and see her unaffected reaction. I had to try and calm down on my own.

I heard her jacket shuffling and felt her arms wrapping around me. In the smallest whisper I heard her speak. “I’ll miss you the most.”

I turned, not even wiping the tears away, and looked at her. “What did you say?” I thought I was hearing things out of desperation.

She started to cry.

There we were, on some deserted country road crying together. I wiped a tear from her cheek and she looked up at me. “Please don’t cry anymore. It makes me sad.”

“I’m sorry.”

Izzy shrugged. “I know you’re my only dad. I get that you’re the only man that raised me.”

I looked right at her, amazed that after she’d dissed me in so many ways, she was admitting the only thing I wanted to hear. “Can you say that again?”

Izzy rolled her eyes. She put her hand on my shoulder. “You heard me.”

I reached down and grabbed her hand, squeezing it between both of mine. “That means a lot to me.”

She turned away, like the last five minutes hadn’t happened.

Deciding not to push my luck, I started driving again. Izzy put her ear-buds back in and looked out the window. I had to be happy that she’d at least acknowledged me. It was better than nothing at all.

Thankfully, she fell asleep shortly after that and slept for the whole rest of the ride. Had it not been for that, I don’t know what we would have talked about. I didn’t know what Colt was thinking when he said he wanted me to have the whole ride to talk to her, when for all these weeks she’d done everything she could to avoid conversation with me.

Izzy woke up when we hit the gravel driveway and approached Colt and Van’s house. She started gathering her things and prepared to jump out, even before the vehicle came to a stop. When it did, she went flying out and up the steps to see her cousins. I took my time getting out, while telling myself the whole time that this was going to be temporary. I kept reminding myself that she’d come around and we’d all be happy again in no time.

Then I walked in the house and saw her smiling. My heart dropped as I watched her interacting with Noah and Van, like she used to at our house. I felt so defeated.

Colt put his hand on my shoulder and walked with me into the kitchen. I watched as Van took Izzy by the hand and led her into the office. “Is she giving her the house rules or something?”

Colt chuckled and took a sip of a bottle of water. “Why don’t you go find out.”

I rolled my eyes and walked out of the kitchen, wondering why he was being so damn cryptic. Obviously she would need to follow the rules and be respectful of her cousins and their things.

When I got to the office door, I heard Van talking and I stood there, shocked at what she was talking about.

“Bella, you know we love having you here, right?”

“Yeah. I promise to behave.”

“There’s something I think you need to know before you decide to stay here with us; something that might make you change your mind. Sit down and I’ll explain.”

“Am I in trouble?” I could understand why she’d think that. I couldn’t imagine what Van had to talk to her about.

“No. This is about me. It’s about something that happened with me and your biological father.”

It took me two seconds to get my hand on the office door-handle and burst into the room. “Van, don’t do this.” Izzy was sitting down. Van had her hands on her hips and a mad look on her face.

“This is my decision, not Colt’s and surely not yours. We sat Noah down and told him everything last night. Bella deserves the truth, Ty.”

“Please don’t do this. Miranda doesn’t want her to know. I don’t either. It’s too horrible and it could make things way worse. How do you think she’s going to take the end result of your story?”

“It is the truth. If she wants to make decisions that impact her family the way she is, then she can hear the truth, besides, I talked to Miranda about this today and she said I could.”

I ran my hands through my hair and folded my arms across my chest. “Fine. I guess I can’t stop you.”

Van sat down opposite from Iz and reached her hands across the table. She gripped onto Izzy’s and looked her right in the eyes. “What I’m about to tell you isn’t going to be pretty. It might even make you upset. I wouldn’t be telling you this if I didn’t feel like it wasn’t important. You and Noah went digging into something that you never should have learned about. Now it’s destroying one of the people that love you the most in this world.”

“What is it?” Izzy asked.

“Tucker Chase was a horrible person, Bella. You’re not going to learn the truth from any newspaper or obituary. If you want the truth, I’m going to give it to you. I’ll tell you everything I know and experienced firsthand, so you can finally put this curiosity to rest.”

Izzy was quiet for a couple moments and then finally answered in a soft tone, as if she were intimidated. “Okay.”

“When I met your mother, she was giving birth to you. We’ve been close ever since. I got to see what she was put through when she was still seeing Tucker. Not only did he ask her to terminate her pregnancy, but he made it clear that he didn’t want to be a father. Your mother was heartbroken, because she loved you more than anything in the world. She wanted the best life for you and soon realized that it was best if they ended things. We went out one night and he tried to kidnap her. Ty and Conner had to fight him off of your mother because he was beating her up.”

“You’re lyin’ so I don’t like him.” Izzy was in disbelief. She couldn’t allow herself to think that Tucker Chase was better off dead.