I put it there.
God.
I tore my eyes free of hers and walked to the cab.
Then I got in and gave him my address.
The driver had pulled out on Broadway when my phone rang and I saw it was Tack.
Over it, way, way over it, when I put the phone to my ear, I asked as greeting, “Do you not understand the concept of me needing some time?”
To this, my heart stopped beating when he replied on a growl, “You call Mitzi and share, you answer to me. And if you answer to me, when you do, I won’t go gentle.”
Then I heard the disconnect.
Unseeing, unfeeling, not hearing a thing, not thinking a thing, I flipped my phone shut.
I didn’t cry until I closed my front door and I was home.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Dish Out Retribution
My cell phone sitting on the nightstand ringing surprised me and it surprised me because it woke me up. After what had happened at the Compound I never thought I’d get to sleep. Apparently, I was wrong.
My eyes slid to my alarm clock to see it was just after one in the morning.
I knew the caller had to be Tack either calling to argue with me, patch things up with me or tell me he was in an Emergency Room because Operation Rivers of Blood didn’t go too good.
I was not ready for any of those options and even though I was still hurt, still pissed and had no intention of answering, this didn’t mean I wasn’t a woman. And women were like cats.
Curious.
Recklessly so.
So I picked up the phone in order to stay my course as a woman, in other words, torture myself and I saw the display said “Tabby Calling”.
I felt my brows draw together and I sat up in bed, flipped open my phone and put it to my ear.
“It’s late, honey. Everything okay?”
I heard a loud, agonized, hitched breath and nothing more and I shot up straight in the bed.
“Tabby?” I called. “Honey, talk to me. What’s going on?”
“My…” another hitched breath that hurt to hear, “my… Ty…” another sob, “Tyra, my boyfriend hit me.”
Her boyfriend?
Tabby had a boyfriend?
Since when?
And he hit her?
I threw the covers back and swung my legs out of the bed.
“Is… is Dad there?” she asked.