“If problems in the relationship exist, removing one problem sometimes creates another.”
“You’re not telling me what I want to hear.”
“Is that what you want? For me to tell you what you want to hear?”
My phone begins to beep again. “She’ll keep calling until I take this.”
“I’ll call you in an hour,” he says, removing the question of when we will speak again, and just like that, he disconnects.
I don’t even have time to process the impact of my conversation with Adam before I’ve accepted my mother’s call. “Mom,” I greet.
“Honey,” she murmurs. Always the “honey” endearment when she wants something, as if years of salt can be removed by sugar.
“How was the trip?” I ask.
“It was fine,” she replies dismissively, “but your father is acting strange. He’s quite withdrawn. How was he with you?”
Good,I think, but then I’m not the one betraying him, but what I say is, “We had a great pizza night. He seems to be enjoying his work again.”
“Oh, did he tell you his news then?”
I stiffen, confused by the direction this conversation is now traveling. Did my father change his mind and enlighten my mother on the pending patent sale? Did she find out on her own?
“What news is that?” I ask, my voice sounding appropriate, or inappropriate, depending on how you look at it, strained.
“I guess not then.” She sighs. “Okay, I’m going to be honest with you. I intentionally volunteered for the convention to get out of town and give him some time with you. I thought he’d tell you what’s going on, and then you’d do what you do and work your magic on him.”
I blink in consternation. “What does any of that mean, Mom?”
“He was invited back toLion’s Den. It’s a second-chance season, with the biggest flops now being offered the chance to become the biggest winners. All investments promised during the show will be automatically doubled by a pool of money established by the studio.”
Confusion ripples through me. What the heck is going on? Why didn’t he tell me this? And what does it have to do with what hedidtell me? “He’ll never go back on that show, Mom.”
“You could convince him.”
“He didn’t tell me because he doesn’t want to be convinced.”
“I just want him to get the credit he deserves,” she argues. “He’s worked so hard.”
There is tenderness in her voice, and my head is officially spinning, the ground with it. Is she or isn’t she cheating on my father? And if she isn’t, why is he hiding the patent from her?
“I think it will all work out, Mom. As Dad always says, there are more ways to fry an egg.”
“It would be nice if it got fried while he’s still young enough to enjoy it.” She doesn’t give me time to reply. “Anyway. I need to go. And by the way, your father is not supposed to be eating pizza. His cholesterol is off the charts. I meant to warn you. And before you assume as much, I’m not chiding you. I just want you to help me convince him to care about his health and his work.”
It’s my father with the cholesterol issue? What is going on? “He cares about his work.”
“As long as he’s safely locked away in the garage. Everything in life is not safe, nor does every risk end in disaster.”
When my mother and I finally hang up, I set the phone down, an eruption of hail on the roof sending me seeking refuge in my windowless kitchen for cover. The way secrets seek refuge from the lies they may soon become. It seems everyone in my life, except Jess, has a secret. Then again, maybe she does. Maybe we all do. Even me.
Adam is my secret.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Present ...
I gasp awake, hunching forward with my hand pressed to the stickiness on my belly, the biting pain stealing my breath. Air rasps through my teeth, my chest heaving, my gaze lifting to the stairwell around me. Now I know where I am. Images, horrible images, scratch at my mind.
