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“Yes, it is.”
Before he could yell at me further or call me woman one more time, I hung up the phone. For several long seconds, there was silence in the hallway that was heavy with what I’d just done.
It was the right thing. I was sure of it. He’d have run me into the ground with his drugs and the dangerous people that came along with that. The money couldn’t be worth it. But even knowing I’d done the right thing didn’t do much to settle my hammering heart or to untangle the twisted knots in my stomach.
Closing my eyes, I leaned back against the wall, pulling in deep, slow breaths in an effort to calm myself. Everything will be okay, I promised myself silently. Everything’s going to be fine. This’ll all blow over.
I stayed there for a while until I heard, “Momma? What are you doing?”
Startled out of my stupor, my eyes snapped open and I looked over to see my son standing at the opening of the hall, holding his workbook. It was one of those big books that taught kids to write the letters and keep them between the lines.
Smiling, I asked, “Cody, are you all done with your homework?”
He smiled widely at me and held up his book, opening it wide at the spine to where he’d been working. He’d written in crayon, even though he was supposed to be using pencil, but I didn’t have the heart to scold him for it. The teacher could get over it.
“That’s such a good job, honey!” I said with a smile, pushing away from the wall and heading over to him. I knelt and took the book from him, flipping through the three pages he had to do. His letters were sloppy, the crayon clearly going out of the lines and not quite connecting where they should be. But he was a fast learner and he’d be writing sentences before I knew it, so I meant it when I said he’d done a good job.
“Does this mean I get an extra-long story tonight?” He looked up at me with those huge eyes, his smile wide and hopeful. He loved his damn stories and if I was being honest with myself, they were one of my favorite parts of the day, too.
Rolling my eyes at him, I feigned annoyance with a large sigh. “Oh, all right. I suppose.” Then I grinned at him. When I reached out my hands, I caught him about the middle and proceeded to tickle him mercilessly. He let out a squeal and a laugh, batting at my hands. “But you’d better get your stuff packed up first and I want some pearly white teeth before you get into bed, understand?”
He saluted me with the wrong hand and said, “Aye, aye, Captain!” Then he whirled around and made a break for the living room, presumably to grab his things for school tomorrow. I watched him go, feeling a little shaken. I wanted to push Ethan Chambers completely from my mind, but it was impossible. He’d cast a raincloud over my day and I could only hope that tomorrow it would go away.
Chapter 4
The next few days were normal. So normal that the whole thing with Ethan seemed surreal. Maybe it hadn’t happened at all. Maybe it was all just a little blip of insanity in my brain and now I was all better.
Except the day after it happened, Jessie cornered me as soon as Cody was in school and asked, “Well? Did you call Ethan?”
Sighing, I nodded my head. “Yeah, I did.”
She let out a low whistle. “Damn. You’re braver than I am. I don’t think I would have been able to talk to him, not even over the phone. Especially over the phone. All that gorgeous body and you don’t even get to see it. Talk about getting all the bad and none of the good.”
I managed a bark of a laugh. “No kidding.” I didn’t tell her that I happened to find his voice devilishly attractive, too, but that wasn’t the point.
“So how did he take it?” she asked as we headed to The Cut to start our day. “I mean, he couldn’t have just been super happy fun guy about it.”
I shook my head. “Uh, that would be a resounding no. He was not happy.”
We went inside and Jessie automatically began to set up while I grabbed some of the stock from the back. I glanced at the extra space there, recalling Ethan’s offer and feeling a chill trip down my spine.
“But what did he say?” Jessie prodded as she counted the safe and brought out the drawer for the lone register.
I rehashed our conversation, leaving out the half dozen times he called me “woman” and the “fucks.” It wasn’t that I didn’t swear, but I tried to keep it to a minimum so I didn’t accidentally teach some inappropriate things to my six-year-old. That would definitely not be mommy of the year material.
