“Who was on the phone, Mace?” I asked again.
He opened his mouth to speak and the phone rang He opened his mouth to speak and the phone rang again. My eyes moved to it. Mace’s upper body twisted and he looked over his shoulder to look at it too.
It rang a second time and Mace turned back to me just as I launched myself, moving quickly around him, toward the phone.
I was almost there when Mace hooked an arm around my waist, hauled me into his body and reached around me.
I was reaching too but his effing arms were longer and he tagged the phone.
He beeped it on and put it to his ear.
“Yeah?” he clipped just as I shouted, “Mace!” He listened for two seconds then said, “We have nothing to say,” then he beeped it off again.
“I cannot believe you just did that! It’s my phone!” I yel ed, struggling against his arm which was stil tight at my waist.
He shook me. “Stel a, calm down and listen to me.”
“Let go!”
He did but only so I could take a step forward. Once I did, he grabbed my hand, twirled me and brought me back to him, front-to-front.
He placed the phone on the counter, put both arms around my struggling body and tilted his head down to look at me.
“Listen,” he ordered.
I stopped pul ing away from him and looked at his face.
“This is unreal,” I stated the obvious.
“Reporters are f**kwads. We don’t talk to them. Ignore it. Don’t read it. Say nothing. Don’t pay any f**kin’ attention.
This’l be over and they’l move on to new meat.”
“I can’t ignore it!” I snapped.
“Why the f**k not?”
I didn’t know why not. My life was so out-of-control, it didn’t feel like I knew anything anymore.
“I know you have experience with this, Mace, but I don’t,” I told him.
“That’s why you need to listen to me,” Mace returned.
Then it came out. It came from someplace buried deep.
Someplace I thought was locked away for good, never to be opened again.
The panic overwhelmed me and my body started trembling. It was so huge, I quit fighting and melted into Mace. My head tilting back further, I put my hands to his chest and my shaking fingers curled into his white tee.
I heard the tremor in my voice when I asked, “What if my mother sees that?”
Mace’s face had been hard with determination but at my words his face and his green eyes went soft.
“Kitten,” he murmured.
“I’m not big news but maybe you stil are,” I told him.
“What if it makes the news where she is? I need to talk to the reporters, tel them I’m okay, tel them you and Lee and the boys know what you’re doing. Tel them the police are involved. The Feds too. Tel them that Sid’s a prick and he kil ed Linnie and we’re doing the right thing.”