I Left Him by Text, and He Kept Paying for My Father's Care novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: The Girl Was Cheap

Claire Ostrow lived on the twelfth floor of a building with a doorman and a plant that was actually alive.

She opened the door in a gray sweatshirt with her blonde knot coming loose.

It was the first time I had seen her without a dress that cost more than my rent.

"Come in," she said. "Sit anywhere. I've been up since five."

Willa was already on the couch with her knees pulled up.

Eli stood at the window with his hands in his pockets.

He had not touched me since the loft, and he had looked at me the whole way up in the elevator.

I sat at the opposite end of the couch from Willa and set my coat in my lap.

"Play it," Eli said.

Willa held up her phone.

Her thumb was shaking.

"He called me at eleven last night. I didn't answer. He left this."

She pressed the button.

Gordon's voice filled the room, warm and slow, the voice that had said please sit down in my kitchen.

"Willa, sweetheart, it's your father. I'm told you've been visiting that building again."

A pause, and the sound of ice in a glass.

"I want you to understand something, because you're old enough. Years ago I bought that girl off for the price of three months of rent. It was the cheapest thing I ever did for your brother. He went back to her anyway, and I'm not going to let him ruin himself twice."

My stomach turned over.

"If you want your tuition, you will stop going to Birchwood on Sundays. You'll tell your brother his father is tired and wants him home. And if the Doyle man needs a different bed, that is not your concern. A Garvey does not run errands for the help."

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