“Mom.” I shove the cop’s hands off her and pull her to my chest. “Mom! What happened?”
The officer looks between the two of us, his expression sad, then makes eye contact with me. “I’m sorry, kid. You have no idea how sorry I am.”
“Mom.” I brush the hair off her face. “What’s wrong? Talk to me. I can call Dad. Just tell me,” I beg. I have no idea what’s going on, and I hope Dad walks through the door any minute because he’ll know what to do. He and Mom have been married for over fifteen years. They were each other’s high school sweethearts, and if anyone knows what to do, it’ll be him.
“He’s gone, Kash. He’s not coming back.”
“Who’s gone, Mom?” I ask, even though I’m afraid to hear her answer.
“Dad.” She sobs. “Dad is gone, Kash. He’s not coming back.” She cries harder.
“No. You’re lying.” I glare at the cop who’s still standing in our kitchen. “You’re a liar!” I shout at him and clench my fists. I don’t care if he tries to take me to jail. “You’re lying! He’s on hisway home.”
Mom is crying into my chest, and my shirt is soaked with her tears, but I refuse to believe what she’s saying is true. I refuse to believe that my dad is gone. That he’s not coming back. Yeah, he’s late for dinner, but it’s not the end of the world. He promised me that we were going to go hiking this weekend.
“I’m sorry. I wish I were lying, son.”
“I’M NOT YOUR SON,” I scream at him. Holding Mom closer to me, I rub my hands on her back and pretend the wetness coating her hair isn’t my tears falling. It isn’t acceptance that my dad is gone, and he’s not coming back.
“I’m sorry, kid. Is there anyone I can call?”
Mom’s sobs turn to hiccups, and she has a faraway look in her eyes. “There’s no one. There was only him.”
Chapter One
Kash
Present day
Jolting up in bed, my chest heaves as if I’m back in that kitchen, holding Mom as she sobs because Dad is dead. Sobbing because her world fell apart, and the love of her life was gone.If only that were true.I snort aloud, shaking my head.
After my dad’s death, Mom became a shell of herself. Her normal, happy demeanor was gone, and in its place was a hollow woman. It felt like I was living with a ghost for the first few months. She took some time off work, but as we stood side by side at his grave, I accepted that life as I knew it was over.
My dad was killed at thirty-five in a freak accident on a job site. I heard a few of my “uncles,” Dad’s work friends, talking about how they still couldn’t understand how it happened. Someone was moving a load with a crane, and somehow it came loose, or broke apart, and went crashing to the ground, right where my father stood. Another man was injured, but my dad was killed instantly. Well, that’s what the doctors told my mom. They assured her that he didn’t “suffer,” as if they knew anything.
Glancing at the clock, I sigh when I see it’s close to five AM. There’s no way I’m getting back to sleep now. Fuck knows what triggered it, but I haven’t had that dream or thought about that day in forever. Grabbing my phone and a hair tie from the nightstand, I toss my hair up and head out to the kitchen. Pulling a bottle of water from the fridge, I shuffle to the living room and turn the TV on. There must be something on this late at night, or, well, early in the morning.
My phone pings with yet another notification from Bri. God, I wish she’d stop. Scrolling through my messages, I see that there’s at least ten from yesterday alone. She was our receptionist up until acouple of months ago. She didn’t appreciate that I wasn’t into relationships. I never lied to her, contrary to what she says and believes. I simply don’tdorelationships. They aren’t worth the trouble or heartache. They never last anyway, so what’s the point?
I pinch the bridge of my nose and block whatever number she’s messaging me from, then toss my phone aside. I’m beginning to think I should change my number or maybe find a new place. Looking around my apartment, I realize it’s pretty bare. Sure, I have some artwork up, but it doesn’t feel like home. I’ve only lived here for a year, and my lease is up soon, but I don’t think I want to stay here.
Settling in, I pull a blanket from the back of my couch. I may be a bachelor, but God knows Emma would skin me if I didn’t have basic home décor items. She doesn’t visit as often as she used to, but it doesn’t matter; the guys and I all end up at her house, anyway. It’s the closest true thing to home I think any of us have.
Rhett, Seth, and Atlas are the foster brothers I grew up with. Somehow, we all managed to show up within a few months of each other and, fortunately, were fairly close in age. Rhett, Atlas, and Seth bounced around a lot, not having the best of luck, but my situation was different. Ihadparents who loved me. Ihada family. Yeah, I was an only child, but up until my dad died, there was no question about us being a tight family. Then he had to go and die, and everything got fucked up.
For someone who claimed to love someone else deeply, my mom wasted no time moving on. After she finally pulled herself out of the shell she hid in, she started dating. I remember watching her and my dad go on dates occasionally, but she never dressed up for him the way she did forthem. We used to fight about it a lot. When my dad died, I think a part of her died too, getting buried alongside him. The first time my mom ever hit me was during an argument we had about a week before she left.
Kash ~ Eleven years old
“What do you mean,you have a date again?” I stare at my mom in disbelief from across the kitchen table, my science homework forgotten.
“I don’t have to explain myself to you, Kash Malone. You can’t expect me to be alone forever.”
Glaring at her, I shake my head. Is she serious? I don’t even think the ground has reset on the top of Dad’s grave, and she’s worried about being alone? “Strange, because Dad’s all alone and you don’t seem to give a shit about that.”
“Hey! Do not speak to me that way. I’m still your mother.” She slams her hand on the table.
“Whatever you say, Angel,” I toss out at her and take a small bit of satisfaction when her face falls. My dad used to call her that. She was his ‘angel,’ and he was convinced that she was the most perfect person in the world.
