I stil talked into the handset.
“Mom, you have to take the money.”
“My life’s been a livin’ hel since you left, girl.” I heard Mom over the speakerphone and her voice was sharp and ugly. “You left me to him. Didn’t think for a second about me, what I might go through with you gone. You were always so damned selfish. Then I got the cancer. We don’t hear word one from you for years. Now you think you can swoop in, big time rock star, in the papers, datin’ a famous athlete, make it all better.” She dragged out the “al ” with acid sarcasm.
I felt my heart lurch and my stomach clench as my mother delivered her gut kick.
She sounded like Dad.
And she’d seen the papers.
Which meant she knew I was the target of a kil er.
And she didn’t care.
“Mom.”
“He’s on a tear about this money. You ain’t helpin’ things.
I don’t need this. I need to rest.”
“Mom, let me help.”
“You can help by keepin’ your nose outta our business.
You wanted to be gone, Stel a, you’re gone. Let me die in peace.”
“Mom.”
“Don’t cal back and I ain’t tel in’ him that money was from your hotshot boyfriend neither. I got enough to deal with.”
“Please, Mom, listen to me.”
But the phone was dead.
I stared at it, silent.
Mace was not silent, he muttered, voice low, “You have got to be f**kin’ shittin’ me.”
I didn’t look at him. I kept staring at the phone. I was a mixture of mortified and… I didn’t know what.
Final y, I put the handset back in the receiver.
“You… have gotta be… fuckin’ shittin’ me,” Mace repeated and, final y, I looked at him.
Uh-oh.
He was pissed.
“Mace –”
His hands went to the phone, he twisted his torso violently, ripping it out of its socket, the cord flying. He got to violently, ripping it out of its socket, the cord flying. He got to his feet and, using the entirety of his upper body for momentum, he threw it across the room.
It exploded against the wal .
Erm.
Wow.