“Mom, let it go, please.”
“Stone Ryan. Tell me you didn’t sabotage your relationship on purpose!” she exclaimed and threw her hands in the air.
Dad grunted. Damn. I knew where this was heading.
“Said, I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Stone, I’m warning you!” Mom threatened.
“Mom…”
“Tell me right now!” Mom shrieked.
“Fine, I sabotaged the relationship on purpose! I didn’t break up with April because I cheated on her, like everyone thought. The truth is, April wasn’t planning to return to college to finish her course. She spoke about getting a job because she hated being away from me. April was going to throw everything away. And Clara warned me.”
“Clara?” Mom gasped. “Clara split you up?”
“No. Clara told me what April planned and how she knew April would regret it. I waited a few months before taking action, Mom. Plus, there was the fact that I was facing prison time.”
Dad shook his head as Mom’s mouth dropped open. “You were what?” The shriek made me and Dad wince.
“I’d been arrested. You don’t—”
“Don’t tell me I don’t need to know! What the hell did you do?” Mom yelled.
Damn, I felt as though I were a kid again. I took a deep breath. “I raced some cars to get money to buy April a ring to propose. There was an incident, and someone died. I was in the race, and the police arrested me. I was accused of clipping his wing. My lawyer ran the paint chips from the accident, and they came back red like mine, but they weren’t from my car. There was a similar car with the same colour red.”
“You bought April an engagement ring? By racing cars? A lad died?” Mom yanked out a stool and sat down heavily.
“Yes, to all three.”
“Stan, you knew?”
“Yeah, Edie. Stone came to me. The boy was scared, and the cops were coming down hard on him. Luckily, the lawyer was diligent and not one of the usual public defenders. He managed to prove Stone was innocent of the crash, but the police still charged Stone with crimes associated with illegal street racing.”
“I don’t believe this. Do you have a criminal record?” Mom demanded.
“No. Because the accusations against me were dismissed after I named a kid whose father was rather high in politics and was also racing that night, I had video as well,” I admitted.
Mom’s eyes bugged wider. “You blackmailed a judge?”
“No. I mentioned a name, and the next thing was that all charges were dropped. The cops had been questioning me about other racers. Giving him up protected a lot of kids back then,Mom. We weren’t bad, just teens out for a speed thrill or to earn easy money.”
“But a boy died.”
“Not by my hand. There was a story behind it which concerned a girl, but it didn’t involve me,” I explained.
Mom stared at me in disbelief, and then at Dad. “Clearly, I don’t know either of you!” she exclaimed, threw a tea towel at us, and stormed out.
“Ah, shit, it’s gonna cost a lot more than flowers to make this right,” Dad complained.
He wasn’t wrong.
Chapter Seven.
April
Iwas beyond furious as I stormed from the conference room. Dr Simmons had seemed seemed upset when he'd informed me to attend a meeting with HR regarding a complaint. Someone had told HR that I’d been slipping out on tasks and leaving them for others to complete. And apparently, I’d also been clocking out early and taking full pay.
