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I hated that for her.
“I used to rush to defend myself against false accusations, but now, I watch to see who believes it, so I know who to cut off first,” I said. “Maybe that’s something you should adopt.”
She would’ve answered, but the waitress came and slapped our plates down in front of us like she had some vendetta against us.
“Anything else?” she asked.
We hadn’t touched our drinks at all, so the answer was no. “Check, though, please.”
Because who knew when she would be back?
I reluctantly pulled my arm from around Hades’ shoulders and started in on my sandwich.
When I was done, I looked over to see Hades finishing off her last piece of meat that’d fallen free of her burger. Her completely gone burger.
“You’re rather impressive, ma’am,” I teased.
She smiled, licking mustard off the corner of her mouth as she did.
“Thanks,” she snickered. “It’s a skill.”
Hell yeah it was. I’d never seen a woman put that much food away.
It was a turn on.
So infrequently did you find a woman in this day and age that didn’t give one single fuck about anyone but themselves. I’d yet to meet a woman lately that wasn’t overly obsessive with what they were eating.
“Ready to go back there?” I asked.
“No need,” she said. “I found everything out.”
I blinked at her. “You did what?”
“I found the kid’s mom, and I found the person responsible for all the fear,” she said.
My mouth fell open.
“Really?” I asked.
She nodded. “When you have a plain face, and a plain body, and a plain blah personality, people tend to overlook you.”
I was already shaking my head, flabbergasted by what she was saying.
But then I remembered a few of the comments from the ladies from earlier as we’d watched Hades’ show.
One had said she ‘hadn’t realized someone like Hades had that in her.’
Another had said, “Wow, I looked at her and would’ve never thought that kind of talent could come from someone that has zero curb appeal.”
Now it made sense.
When you thought you were nothing, you were treated like nothing.
“Tell me everything,” I said instead of arguing with her.
I wasn’t going to change her outlook on life in a day.
I could, and would, help her, though.
By the time I was through with her, she’d see herself clearly. And hopefully get enough self-esteem that she would be able to live without me reminding her constantly that she was enough.
I held my hand up for the waitress to come back.
She did, taking my money and leaving without asking us if we needed anything else.
She came back moments later with zero change, and I had to roll my eyes as she placed the receipt down in front of me and left.
“I would’ve given her more,” I muttered. “But if she’s gonna be like that, I’ll just assume she doesn’t want it.”
Hades waited until we were outside to start talking.
“The mom is the blonde with the long curly hair and the permanent scowl,” she started as we made our way back across the street to the circus. “I heard her talking to the matriarch, Maxine. She was telling Maxine that she needed to tell Crew everything before he took her son away.”
“Okay,” I said. “And what happened then?”
She went to cross the street and I caught her hand just as a motorbike came flying up the street going nothing less than a hundred miles an hour.
Her eyes widened as she watched him pass, then looked four more times before crossing.
I had a smile on my face when we got to the other side.
“Then what?” I urged.
“Then I interjected, got the whole story,” she answered.
“And what’s the whole story?” I asked.
“The whole story is a little less anti-climactic than I thought it would be. Pretty much, in a nutshell, the mother was accused as being unfit by one of the lights guys that controls everything upstairs. When Crew came and the police were there, the lights guy was giving her this ‘I’m going to ruin you’ look and forced her to stay quiet. From what I gathered, the mom and the lights guy—I still don’t know his name—had a fling. He doesn’t want kids. She has a kid. So in order for him to have what he wants, he decided the kid needed to go. Hence the telling the police she was an unfit mother. Or him threatening to. The kid isn’t the son of the light guy, either. Nor Crew’s dad. It’s some random guy that Crew’s dad knew. When the dad found out about him just leaving his son behind, he kind of took over helping raise the kid. The mom planned on leaving tonight, actually. I think I have her controlling her shit, though. From what I understand, she was going to talk to Crew just as I was going on stage.”
“Well, shit,” I said. “That was anti-climactic.”
