So I keep her talking.

“Your dad was a piece of shit, by the way.” Tessa hits the accelerator again through a red light. “He said if I ever talked to you or Quinn again, he’d make me pay, and when I showed up at your house again to tell you about the baby, he offered me more hush money and asked if it was yours. The funny thing is, I never told Quinn… it could have been yours, or it could have been his, kind of like fucking Russian roulette. In the end, both of your parents paid me more than I deserved, but my own fucking father took it since he was so deep in, then killed himself this morning after making a few bad investments.”

“I’m sorry, Tessa.” I don’t know what else to say… she isn’t in her right mind.

She slams her hands against the steering wheel. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this, Ambrose! I was supposed to teach! I was supposed to come back and fall in love! You were supposed to love me first! Not second!”

“You drugged me, forced yourself on me, and you think I loved you?” I ask. “Maybe at one point I could have, but you took advantage of me.”

“You knew exactly what you were doing!”

“You slipped something in our drinks!” I yell. “No, I had no clue what I was doing! I was a fucking virgin, Tessa!”

She starts to laugh, and it’s not the normal laugh that comes bursting from her lips but something evil, like a monster. “Oh please, you wanted it, I could tell. Every day you flirted with me, every party you drank with me, you wanted it so bad, I just forced your hand a bit.”

“A bit?” I repeat. “A bit? You literally sent both of us to therapy after that. We could have put you in prison!”

“Shut up! Shut up!” The Jeep makes a jump and barrels down the next hill. I’m starting to freak out.

I don’t know what to do. The truth is important but more important than my life?

We fly down the road, passing cars on the left and the right, nearly running into a semi.

“I see how she looks at you,” she whispers. “She loves you, but she doesn’t deserve you, either of you.” Tears stream down Tessa’s face. “I do. I deserve something good after everything I’ve been through.”

“You do.” I lie. “You deserve all the good things.”

“Liar!” she shouts, clenching the steering wheel. “I want to die.”

“NO!” I shout. “Tessa, you have so much to live for. Think about this.”

“I have.” She grits her teeth. “Since the cops left at five this morning. I’ve thought about it a lot, and the only way this should end, our tragic love story, you, me, Quinn… it ends this way.”

“Tessa!” I scream, then make sure my seatbelt’s on.

Quinn starts yelling through the phone, then MB.

I say a quick prayer, then try to grab the steering wheel as the Jeep careens toward the dock by the lake.