Across the coffee table, the other man straightened his spine and gave a mock salute. “Aye aye, Captain.”
“I’m not a captain,” Evan muttered.
“Ah, whatever.”
21
Evan had insisted on taking Ruth’s number a while back, but he’d never used it.
Not until today.
Ruth stared at the two texts he’d sent in quick succession, trying to figure out if she should be nervous. The first said that he was leaving work and coming straight over. Which was weird. He didn’t text her when he left work, and he didn’t come straight over after work.
She should definitely be nervous.
Even though the second text said: It’s nothing bad, so don’t stress.
Hah. As if telling her not to stress could ever stop her from stressing.
Ruth knew very well that she was, as always, overthinking. Expecting the worst. Still, that knowledge didn’t stop her from rushing to answer the door when he knocked.
In fact, she was so quick to let Evan in that she didn’t even notice the knock wasn’t his. So she experienced the shock of her life when she opened to door to find Trevor Burne on her doorstep.
Daniel’s father had been a familiar, shitty fixture in her life for years. Before, he’d come to ‘visit’ a few times a year at least—depending on Daniel’s behaviour.
But this was after, not before, and she was supposed to be free. He shouldn’t be here.
The burly, greying businessman speared her with a familiar glare and said, “Leave my boy alone.”
Ah. Just like old times.
“Mr. Burne,” she clipped out. “I won’t pretend I’m happy to see you.”
With a disgusted huff, he barged into the house. That was his usual tactic, when it came to these clandestine, vaguely threatening visits. Jesus, had she fallen back into 2008?
Following him into her own damned flat, Ruth snapped, “What the hell do you want?”
“You know what I want.” He eyed her comic books. “I see you haven’t changed a bit.”
“Neither have you. Still a bullying prick.”
She thought he seemed startled at those bold words, at the vehemence behind them—but he recovered quickly. “Oh, yes,” he said, finding his way to the living room. “Ruth Kabbah. Eternal victim. I always do forget.” He sank onto the loveseat.
Ruth would rather eat her own vomit than sit next to him, so she perched on the coffee table—after pointedly dragging it far, far from Mr. Burne.
“Go on then,” she said, crossing her legs. “Get on with the speech.”
He glowered at her. Those grass-green eyes shouldn’t affect her anymore, but Ruth felt shame creeping over her skin. It was like a Pavlovian response.
And it was pissing her off.
“I don’t know why you do this,” Burne said in long-suffering tones. Which she found ironic in the extreme. “How many times have we had this conversation, Ruth? You know what I want. You know why I’m here.”
“I don’t,” she said. “I haven’t done anything to Daniel.” The words came like an abandoned habit: with depressing ease.
“Bullshit,” Mr. Burne said succinctly. “Do you know what he did the other day, at dinner? In front of the whole family? He called his wife—his pregnant wife—Ruth.”
Jesus. The idea made her want to wince, but she couldn’t. Her tactic, when it came to topics like this, was icy blankness. Impenetrability. Silence.
But all of a sudden, all she could think was, Why?
Everyone else got to say their part. Even if their part was complete and utter bullshit, even if the issue was none of their business, even if they were horrible people.
She wasn’t a horrible person. She was just weak.
Or she had been.
“Nothing to say for yourself?” Mr. Burne snapped. “Nothing. Ha! The pair of you disgust me. I can’t imagine why he persists in chasing you, to the detriment of all else—”
Ruth’s temper snapped.
“You know,” she said, her voice hard. “If you weren’t so stuck on the fact that your son is obsessed with the fat, black daughter of an unmarried immigrant mother, you’d have figured this whole thing out years ago.”
Burne’s mouth hung open. He made a series of incoherent, outraged wheezing sounds before he managed to say, “I don’t know what you’re trying to insinuate—”
“Then let me be clear.” Ruth got up off the coffee table, standing tall. “I think that you’re a stuck-up, racist snob, and since you’ve been harassing me for the last decade, I’m well-placed to judge.”
Mr. Burne shot to his feet, towering over her. Just like Daniel used to.
Just like Evan did. And Evan wouldn’t hurt her just because he could. She pushed down her automatic panic and remembered