Chapter 363: Think hard and go tell Mum yourself
"Leave me alone, Josh. Go away."
"I would," he said, stepping inside anyway, closing the door behind him, "if I weren’t sitting on something that’s about to ruin a boy’s entire future. I’m not his biggest fan, Justina, believe me. But is that actually what you want? Before you answer, I already know you’ve been seeing him for weeks. Don’t bother lying about it. Lucy told me everything." He held up his phone, the photos still open on the screen.
"Think hard, and go tell Mum yourself. Or I will."
Justina opened her mouth, some protest half-formed, and then nothing came out at all.
She’d known, somewhere underneath the crying and the fear, that this moment was always going to arrive eventually, had known it the second the lie left her mouth in that upstairs bedroom, had felt it sitting there ever since like a stone she couldn’t put down.
She knew the truth would break her parents’ hearts in a completely different way than the lie had. That was exactly why she’d told it in the first place.
And she’d let it go so far now, so much further than she’d ever meant it to go, that she genuinely didn’t know how to unmake any of it. She was terrified not of Josh, not even really of the truth itself, but of what came after it. Of her father’s face. Of her mother’s.
"Josh, please." Her voice cracked, tears starting again, faster than she wanted them to. "You can’t tell Mum. I have never asked you for anything. I’m asking you now. Please. I’m begging you."
"There’s someone sitting in a jail cell right now, Justina." Josh’s voice stayed level, but there was no give in it either. "Someone’s whole life is at stake. And Mum deserves to know the truth."
Neither of them heard the door open a crack down the hall.
Julian had already left the house by then, phone glued to his ear, deep into whatever his lawyers were now arranging on Nolan’s behalf, entirely unaware of the conversation happening two doors down.
Amara had been on her way to check on Justina herself, hand already lifted to knock, when Josh’s voice carried through the gap in the door someone’s whole life is at stake, and something in the shape of it made her pause before she pushed the door open any further.
She caught only pieces after that. Enough to make her stomach turn slowly over. Enough that the version of the story she’d been holding onto since last night, the version where her daughter had simply survived something terrifying, no longer sat quite as steadily as it had that morning.
She didn’t go in. Whatever this was, it was clearly not meant for her ears yet, and some instinct told her that walking in now, catching them both mid-argument, would only shut the whole thing down before she understood any of it.
She stepped back from the door as quietly as she’d approached it, and walked slowly back to her own room, sitting down on the edge of the bed with her hands folded in her lap, turning over every word she’d just heard and liking none of the shapes it was starting to take.
Amara waited the rest of that day, telling herself patience was the right choice that if something was truly wrong, her daughter would come to her on her own, in her own time, the way children eventually always did when they were ready.
She busied herself with small things around the house, checked in twice with Julian’s lawyers to see how the case was progressing, and kept one ear turned toward Justina’s door the entire time, waiting for it to open.
It never did.
By evening, the waiting had curdled into something closer to unease, and Amara found herself picking up Justina’s phone from the kitchen counter, meaning only to call Lucy, meaning only to ask, gently, whether Justina had said anything to her, whether there was some piece of this her daughter might have shared with a friend that she hadn’t shared at home.
A male voice answered instead.
"Hello? Hello?"
And Amara’s whole body went cold at once, because she knew that voice knew it instantly, in a way that had nothing to do with the weeks it had spent living in her daughter’s contact list under someone else’s name.
Her vision blurred at the edges. She ended the call before she’d found any words at all, hands trembling slightly as she set the phone back down.
She opened the messages next, though some part of her already knew, with a sick, sinking certainty, exactly whose name she’d find hiding under Lucy.
There were dozens of them, weeks’ worth, and by the third message Amara understood completely the number saved as her daughter’s best friend belonged to Nolan, and the man who’d just answered that call was Sebastian.
And still, even with the proof sitting open in her hands, some part of her refused it. There must be some misunderstanding, she told herself, the way mothers tell themselves things they desperately need to be true.
I trust my daughter. She took a slow breath, set the phone down, and started toward Justina’s room, determined to hear it from her own mouth before she let herself believe anything else.
She’d only made it halfway down the hall when JJ appeared, tugging gently at her sleeve.
"Mummy, can I talk to you? I want to go to the bookstore. Maybe Justina would like some fresh air too."
Amara had to work to keep her face steady, had to hold the last few minutes together behind something calm enough for her youngest daughter not to see the cracks in it.
"I’m sorry, baby, I can’t take you right now." She crouched slightly, softening her voice. "Let’s do this, tell Josh I said he should take you."
"Mummy, you know how he is," JJ complained, already deflating.
"He’s your big brother. Of course he’ll love to." Amara forced a smile she didn’t entirely feel, though it seemed to be enough, because JJ’s disappointment eased slightly at the certainty in her mother’s voice.
"Come on, I’ll ask him," JJ said, brightening again, already tugging Amara’s hand toward Josh’s door instead of waiting for her to volunteer.