The Perfect Shot (Book 3) ✓

33 - Ultimatum

Hannah

My head was still ringing from the hit and the sound of bending metal around me. Then the screams from the strangers asking if I was okay didn't help with the headache that was forming in my head. I was really lucky. I didn't even see the truck coming towards me. I don't know how it happened, but I was happy that everyone was alive after this accident.

I was lying on a bed in the hospital, waiting for my scan results when I heard loud voices near my door. I was wondering who it could be when I recognized my father's voice. And there was only one reason for him to get so loud. I tried my best to stand up from the bed, I was still a little bit dizzy, so I was as careful as possible and slowly walked to the door. Once I opened it, the voices became even louder, my head started pulsing even stronger, and all I wanted was to get back in bed. But I knew I had to stop this nonsense that was happening in the hall. I was wondering how to make myself known when Max looked at me.

"You shouldn't be up." Everyone looked in my direction, but I only saw Cleo and the worry written on his face. His eyes were moving up and down my body, checking the extent of my injuries. I was surprised that he was here, but at the same time I was really happy that he managed to come so soon.

"I'm fine."

"Sweetie, you were in an accident. You should be resting." My mother took a few steps in my direction in order to send me back in the room, but I was on a mission and didn't let her move me from my spot.

"I'm fine. But I need to talk with my father." Then I turned around back to my bed, waiting for my father to follow me in the room. He was not alone; my mother was right beside him, and I was wondering if it was for the good or for the bad. Guess time will tell.

"You need to stop."

"Hannah...I don't..."

"You need to stop acting like an ass when Cleo is around."

"Language, young lady! You being in an accident don't make it acceptable to talk like that to your parents!" I could see he wasn't very happy with my choice of words, but I was beyond caring at the moment, I just wanted it to end.

"I need you to stop harassing him."

"I'm not doing..."

"Stop lying, dad. Just stop. Everyone knows you are the reason he has his shitty schedule. He was always working and had no time for himself. You even sent him out of nowhere to a different town, just to make him be away from me. It's not working."

"Hannah, he is not worthy..." I was getting angry by the second.

"I don't care what you are thinking of him, of his past, of his actions, of the way he was living his life. I don't care. Neither is he. But with all of your petty actions, you are hurting not only him, you are hurting the SWAT team, you are hurting your police force... you are hurting me. I like him, dad. I more that like him, but the right words are for him to hear first, not you...and I can see my life with him in it...I really do, and it will be good if you stop sabotaging us and let us be...let me be happy with the person who makes me feel this way. Just...let us be."

"Hannah. Jones doesn't deserve you. He just doesn't, and I can't let him..."

"It's not up to you! You have no say in our relationship!" I was already screaming at him, I was sure the people at the other side of the closed door could clearly hear my words, but I didn't care. I wanted this bullshit to end. And it was going to happen, one way or another. "Don't you see what you are doing? Can't you understand it? Your fucking ego and principles are making you blind. The image you have in your head about Cleo is so warped up, it's not even close to the real person. And you don't want to see him, you don't want to get to know him, the man I know, the man I fell for, the one I want to spent my life with. The one who makes me happy every single day, and takes care of me all the time. The one who wants the best for me, and is always supporting me, and making me feel alive... and...and..." my eyes were full with tears at this point, because I could see that no matter what I was saying my father wasn't changing his opinion...his stubbornness was legendary and my words were going to do nothing. The screams, the tears, they didn't affect him. He wasn't going to bulge at all. I took a deep breath, trying to summon some calmness and strength. "You are never going to change your mind of him..." it wasn't a question, it was a statement, but he answered me none the less.

"He doesn't deserve you."

"Well, I guess then that was it." I was hoping that he'll change his mind, but I knew him well enough. I looked at my mother, waiting to see if she'll try to say something, to show me that she was on my side, or at least she understood me. She wasn't meeting my eyes, looks like the floor was way more interesting than her own daughter. "I want you and mother to leave the hospital, I don't want you here anymore. You are not needed." That made her eyes snapped up to mine, shock morphing her face.

"Sweetie..."

"No. Just no." Neither one of them looked like they believed my words. "I want you to leave. I don't want you here. If you don't support the man I choose for myself, the one who give me so much love and support...then I don't need you around me. It's that simple. We are together. This is not changing. If you are not changing the view of him, or the way you act around him...then I don't want either of you around me."

"You are choosing a manwhore over your parents?" My father sounded surprised, like I wasn't doing this time and time again for the past months.

"Cleo is not that. At least, not anymore. And the past is the past, I don't care for it, neither should you."

"You can't tell me he changed his ways just for you. Men like him don't do that."

"You don't believe I'm worth it? That someone can care so much for me that he changes his life? Decides I'm enough for him? That he doesn't need anyone else?"

"Oh, sweetie, we know you are worth it. Everyone knows that." My mother finally decided to speak.

"Looks like both of you don't. And looks like you don't trust me at all."

"We do...of course we trust you..."

"Then why are you not trusting me that I know what I'm doing? That I really know who Cleo is, what kind of a man he is?"

"It's just..."

"It's just what, mom?" She looked between me and dad, trying to find the right words, but failing.

"We want the best for you."

"Cleo is the best for me." My father was ready to argue, but somehow my mother stopped him.

"We know you believe that...And he really is an amazing cop. There's no one better than him when it's up to shot someone from a far..."

"I don't even care how you want to finish that sentence." And it was true. I knew that there was 'but' and I didn't need to hear it. Not anymore. "With your actions" I looked at my father "...or inactions..." I looked at my mother. "...what you are doing is basically making me choose between you and Cleo. And you know, he never made me do that choice. Not once he made a comment about the absurd things you were making him do, the misused power you had over him. Everyone knew that what you did with his schedule, the interfering with his job, it was not right, but Cleo deal with it. He accepted it, like this was the price he had to pay to be with me...and there should never be a price to pay to be with someone... not when that someone wants it as much as you do. And that...the way he accepted everything you threw at him showed me that he was the bigger man, even though he's so young compared to you. And that right there made me want to be with him even more...that... his way of dealing with you and your absurdity is the reason that I choose him instead of you. I choose a man I know for less than a year than my own parents...because he accepts me, and he believes in me, and he believes in my judgment. He trusts me. And he's not trying to change me or my views. That's something I can't say about you. And I want you to leave my room...and the hospital. The only people I need around me right now are waiting outside that door." I was done with them. I was done trying to change their mind, to make them see what I could see. They just didn't what to do it. And I was done dealing with all that negativity.

"Sweetie..."

"Leave...both of you...if you can't accept my relationship with Cleo, leave..." There was a long silent pause, both of them were looking at me, trying to see if I was really meaning it.

"Let's go." My father was the first to break the silence. With one final look at me, he turned around. He held his hand out for my mother who took a few seconds longer to make her decision to follow him. Like always. Once upon a time I was so happy seeing them so close together, supporting each other all the time...now,not so much. Because I could see my mother wasn't 100% sure this was the right choice, but it was my father's and she was going to follow him. 

***Do you think Hannah's choice was the right one?