Chapter 8

Before he heard the news, Ezra had thought he would fall apart and cry until he couldn't breathe. Instead, he felt strangely calm, as if the ending he'd seen coming had finally arrived.

He calmly watched the grief on the doctor's face, calmly signed the death certificate, and calmly watched as they wheeled his mother out. It wasn't until he pulled back the white sheet himself and saw her familiar face, now gray and lifeless, that it finally hit him that he no longer had a mother.

In this whole wide world, he had no home left to go back to.

Tears blurred his vision, and Ezra finally broke down and sobbed like a child.

He went through all the paperwork in a daze, then carried his mother's urn back to his hometown for the funeral.

That was when Odette showed up. She stood in the ‌funeral hall, travel-worn, her face full of guilt as she looked at Ezra. "I'm sorry, I—"

"Get out," Ezra rasped, cutting her off.

"Watch your mouth, Ezra!" Rafe charged forward.

"We rushed all the way back to pay our respects to your mom, and this is the thanks we get?"

Ezra caught the faint glint of satisfaction in Rafe's eyes and raised his hand to slap him, but Odette grabbed his wrist.

She shielded Rafe behind her and explained with forced patience. "Ezra, this is on me, but it has nothing to do with Rafe. His mother suddenly got seriously ill, his ankle still hadn't healed, and his father has done so much for me.

"I just couldn't stop worrying. But I worked out the timing. As long as I made it back before the surgery—"

"And did you make it back?" Ezra yanked his hand free and swept everything off the table at her.

"You killed my mom, Odette!"

Odette stood still and took the full force of his anger. Rafe stepped forward to stop Ezra, his face full of concern, but a glass smashed against his temple.

Odette's expression changed instantly. She shoved Ezra hard and snapped, "If you're angry, take it out on me. Don't hurt Rafe!

"I didn't tell you before because I was worried about how you'd take it, but your mother's condition wasn't good. Even if the surgery had worked, she would've suffered through round after round of chemo. Maybe this way isn't such a bad—"

"Get out!" Ezra was shaking so hard with rage that he couldn't even finish a sentence.

Odette looked at him and hesitated, but in the end, she only said, "Take some time to calm down. I'll come see you later."

With that, she gently touched the scrape on Rafe's temple and hurried him into the car. As the car sped off, Ezra's phone suddenly chimed with messages from Rafe.

"My condolences, Ezra. I told Odette my mom just had a little cold, but she insisted on ditching you and your mom to come visit her with me.

"But hey, who told you to keep pestering her to remarry you? You've only got yourself to blame.

"Ever think maybe you're the jinx that killed your mom? If you'd just kept your head down and stopped wanting what was never yours, your sickly mom might've lived a few more years."

A drop of liquid suddenly smeared across the screen. Ezra reached up to wipe it away without thinking, only for his hand to come back covered in blood. It took him a moment to realize he'd hit his head on the corner of the table when Odette shoved him.

Ezra looked at the blood on his hand and the wreckage around the room, then suddenly started to laugh, and the longer he laughed, the more the tears came.

He had nothing left to lose now, but he was going to make Odette and Rafe pay for what they'd done.

Ezra roughly wiped away his tears, picked up his phone, and dialed a number. "Hello, I'd like to report a crime. I want to press attempted murder charges against Rafe Ellington."

After he hung up, Ezra laid his mother to rest and went back to Port Seward. Then he took all the evidence he'd gathered and stormed into the hospital.

Odette was showing some senior officials around the hospital, and when she saw Ezra charging in, she went rigid.