Chapter 103

Aria’s POV

Alone in the mansion the next day, while Liam was at work and the kids at school, I felt much like a ghost wandering the halls. Every square inch of this place was filled with old memories, both the good kind and the bad.

I had known being here would be difficult, but now that I was here, it was even harder than I had imagined it would be.

The memories came without warning. I could be walking down the hallway and suddenly the feel of the carpet on my feet would remind me of when I had nervously paced back and forth up and down the length of this hallway, waiting for Liam to call me when he had checked on Sophia, after he promised he would.

He never did. Then he showed up the next morning and acted like nothing was wrong. He couldn’t understand why I had been upset.

Shaking my head, clearing away the memory, I walked into the living room instead. There, I remembered the arguments we used to have – arguments that usually ended with passionate make out sessions on this very couch.

For the rest of the afternoon, I wandered around the mansion, experiencing memories like they had only just happened. Eventually, I went out to the pool area, pulled a chair close to the fence and looked at the landscape beyond the backyard, not wanting to fight the memories anymore.

Around 3pm, Joe and William came bustling through the door. Their high energy was enough of a distraction that the whispers of times past went quiet and I could focus on the now again.

“Are you ready to visit your mom?” I asked William. He’d changed into his nicest button up top and black slacks. His dress shoes didn’t fit anymore, so he had to wear sneakers. Even with them, he still looked very handsome for a 6 year old.

“Yes,” he said.

“I want to go,” Joe said, not for the first time, but like all those times before, I replied the same way.

“No, Joe. I’m sorry. You have to stay home this time.”

He pouted a little, lowering his head. “Okay…”

When the babysitter came, I led William out of the house, and we got into the car. The jail was forty-five minutes out of town. When we arrived, we were one of two cars in the guest parking lot.

I’d already called ahead. Since they knew to expect us, we had no trouble making it through security and into the meeting room.

We followed a tall security guard into what appeared to be a dining hall, with tables and chairs. Two of the tables were occupied. One with an inmate and her family, while a security guard watched nearby. At the other, Sophia sat alone.

“You,” she spat, seeing me. She started to stand.

“Sit down,” the security guard guiding us said. Sophia sat down.

I walked behind William, my hands on his shoulders. At Sophia’s outburst, I had stopped, keeping William from moving forward too.

Even before Liam asked me twice if I was sure about this, I had known this was a bad idea. Sophia hated me and she had a short temper. I’d hoped, being here, getting help, and being sober, might help cool her attitude towards me – at least in front of her son.

That had been too much to hope for, it seemed. Now, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to expose William to Sophia while she was like this. Even if her rage was on me, not him, he would still see a side of his mother that he shouldn’t have to.

Although, thinking on it, maybe he already knew how she was.

Even when Sophia had snarled at me, William didn’t even flinch. How much of his mother’s terrible side had he faced already while they’d been alone in that house?

William started moving forward again, tugging against my hold. I moved with him, reminding myself that a boy should know his mother. That reasoning was getting harder and harder to justify, when she was acting like she was.

Even after William and I sat down, Sophia kept all of her attention focused on me, glaring. She had not yet acknowledged her own son sitting beside her.

“Mom?” William said.

Sophia didn’t answer, focus on me.

“Mom? I came to see you.”

Still she ignored him.

“William is here,” I said.

“No one asked you,” Sophia snapped. “You have a lot of nerve coming here.”

“Liam had to work,” I said. “So I brought William, who wants to see you.” I emphasized the final words, hoping she would take the hint.

The last time I sat across from this woman, she’d been waving a gun around, threatening my life. There was no gun now, but she seemed just as pissed off.

“Mom,” William said and reached out.

“No touching,” the security guard said.

William pulled his hand back.

Sophia, finally, turned to look at her son. To my surprise and alarm, her hate-filled expression did not soften.

“William, you are ever the disappointment,” she said. “You were supposed to help keep Liam at my side. You promised you would. And now, look how it all turned out. Useless.”

William hung his head in shame.

A fire of anger alit in my chest. Who the hell did she think he was, to talk to William like that? A mother should never belittle her son like this, especially not when the son was only six years old.

“You never should have put that impossible burden on William,” I scolded, the words coming out of my mouth before I could even think to stop them. “Liam is an adult man who can make his own decisions. You shouldn’t have to manipulate someone to love you.”

In a flash, Sophia turned her attention back to me. “You are trying to lecture me? You? Do you even know why Liam married you? You don’t, do you?”

“We loved each other,” I said with confidence. Not that this was any of her business.

Sophia laughed once, loudly and bitterly. “Liam needed a wife, and there you were, an unremarkable girl who fit the bill. Didn’t you ever wonder why he, the superstar driver, took such a sudden interest in you, a nobody? Or did you really believe you were that special?”

My thoughts skidded to a halt as I tried to process what she was saying to me. Sophia was a hateful person who had always been jealous of my relationship with Liam. She would say anything she needed to, to upset me and drive a wedge between Liam and me. She’d always been that way.

By now, I should know better than to listen to her, but this time, there was just something about the way she said those words. She believed them, even if they were inherently untrue.

I’d always wondered why Liam took sudden interest in me. Sophia had called me unremarkable in an attempt to hurt me, but it wasn’t all that far from the truth.

Compared to the supermodels and actresses that Liam could have dated, he had chosen me. It made as little sense now as it had back then.

“You really didn’t know,” Sophia laughed again, for real this time. “You dumb bitch.”

“Don’t call her that, Mom,” William said.

Sophia glared at him. “What a disappointment you turned out to be.”

“That’s enough,” I snapped, just as the security guard stepped forward.

“Visiting hours are over for today,” the guard said.

William stood first, with me quickly following.

“Good,” Sophia grumbled. “I don’t need these two dragging down my day any more than they already have.”

Outside, on the way to the car, William reached a shaking hand up and grabbed mmine. I held onto his as tightly as I could, and he did the same.