The Monster (Boston Belles #3) - L.J. Shen Page 0,25

wasn’t used to me giving strangers the time of day.

“Air bike and ropes next. You’ve got sixty seconds to recover, Monster,” he mouthed, offering me a fist pump I refused to reciprocate on the grounds I wasn’t fucking five, before scurrying behind a black curtain to allow me some privacy.

“Hello? You still there?” the Southern woman on the other line demanded, her nasal voice grating.

I picked up the phone from the floor.

“Listen, Mrs. Masterson, I appreciate your motherly concern, but to say Cat and I weren’t close would be the understatement of the fucking century. There’s nothing I need from her place. I’m a busy man. I don’t have time to go down to Georgia.”

But I had every fucking intention of going down on Aisling tonight, and that was a problem. A pleasant shiver prickled my skin. Who would have thought little Nix had it in her? To con, deceive, and weasel her way into my club—into my pants—and give me the fuck of a lifetime?

Not me, that was for sure, but I was happy to give her a replay and finally get her out of my system. See all the tricks she picked up in med school and mar that pale, milky skin of hers with my nails and teeth. She was swan-like. Elegant and aristocratic. And it made fucking her so much more pleasing than my usual flavor of pointy long nails, botoxed lips, and ass implants.

There was something simply not as exciting about being buried in a woman that had already seen more dicks than a urologist. Experienced or not, I could tell by the ice princess’ touch she didn’t give it out so easily.

She couldn’t have.

She was hopelessly fucking obsessed with me.

And fuck, for the first time in a decade, that little fact made me proud rather than annoyed.

“Drugs. She had an overdose. That’s how she passed away,” Mrs. Masterson continued, unconcerned with my lack of interest in the conversation. “Poor thang. Girl Scouts found her. Came to try to sell her some cookies. Would you believe? They looked through the window. Saw her lying on the floor and called 9-1-1. Poor children. No one ought to see somethin’ like that, let alone kiddies. They say she’d been like that for days. Maybe a week. No one came to check on her. Her phone log said no one even called. She was a lonely woman, your mother.”

I was hardly surprised. Cat was about as lovable as an SS soldier and just about as endearing. When she was younger, she had her looks to save her. Once her beauty had faded, she became just another haggard junkie, and life tended to be harder on those people.

“Look, I know you two weren’t exactly thick as thieves…” the old woman on the other line sighed “…still, son, you should be here.”

“I’m not—”

“Boy, I don’t know how to be clearer than I am. There’s something of hers you should see,” she cut me off briskly. “Let’s leave it at that, shall we? She told me you were a rich man. That means you can afford to take the time off work and get your ass down here, mister. I know I’m old, but I ain’t stupid. I don’t mean you should come here to pick up some Walmart china or family albums. There are some things you need to see.”

I started to hate her less despite myself. “Like what?”

“I ain’t tellin’.”

“You’re an infuriating woman, Mrs. Masterson. Has anyone ever told you that?”

“All the damn time.” She cackled, and I could tell by her cough she was a heavy smoker like me. “So, is that a yes, little Greystone?”

“Brennan,” I corrected, clenching my jaw, staring at an invisible spot on the wall. The same wall I looked at day in and day out when I did my hundred chin-ups five times a week.

Should I or shouldn’t I entertain my fucked-up, morbid curiosity about Cat’s life or whatever was left of it?

The answer was simple. No. She was a complete stranger at this point. Twenty-six years had passed since I’d last seen her. And still, like a fly to a pile of shit, something compelled me to get a closer look at the mess she’d created for herself. That, paired with the idea of relishing Cat’s failure at the most basic human thing—survival—was something I wanted a front-row seat to.

“I’ll be there by tomorrow morning.”

“Smart move, boy.”

I hung up and called my travel agent, giving him the details. I heard him typing