Her face hardens instantly, warmth vanishing like it was never there. “What about him?”
“Is he okay with you being here?” I press. “With you having a job? Is he clean, too?”
Shefrowns,confusionflickering.“No,baby.”Her voice drops. “Your dad has been dead for five years.”
My stomach drops. “What?” My head spins. “What happened?”
“I couldn’t take it anymore,” she says simply.
“You killed him?” The words come out incredulous. Disbelieving. This tiny woman? That massive, violent alpha?
She huffs. “If you want to get technical, I defended myself with a cast-iron pan.” A beat. “It was full of bacon.”
“Hells yeah, Mama J,” Eric says instantly, holding out his hand for a high five.
I shoot him a glare sharp enough to cut glass. He lowers his hand slowly. “What?” he says, unapologetic. “You’ve told me the stories about your dad. He deserved at least a pan to the face.”
Despite everything, despite the shock, the grief, the tangled mess in my chest, I snort.
And just like that, the air in the lounge lightens.
He has a point. I have an odd feeling in my chest. Not sadness exactly. I can’t put my finger on it. I don’t miss him, but I miss what he could’ve been. What he should’ve been. How our family could’ve been had he not fallen into drugs and resentment.
When it becomes clear that I’m lost in my head again, she pats the top of my hand to get my attention. “Here’s my number,” she says, handing me a napkin that she had written on, “feel free to call me or text me any time of the day or night.”When I nod, she gets up and leaves, looking over her shoulder at me more than once before exiting the little lounge.
“I still can’t believe she’s actually here. I almost convinced myself that I had dreamed the whole thing up.” I shake my head, overwhelmed with all the information that’s been dumped in my lap in the last twenty-four hours.
“How are you feeling?” Eric asks, a pen poised over a paper napkin, a random pair of glasses on the bridge of his nose.
“What are you doing?”
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m being your therapist,” he says with a grin.
“Where did you get those glasses?”
“Found them on this chair when we sat down. You were too busy freaking the fuck out to notice, I guess.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“And you have some things to think about. She dropped a lot on you just now. Your dad, rehab, and Aksel. How are you feeling about him now?”
“Better, I think, but I don’t think I’m ready to talk to him just yet. Maybe tomorrow?” I say it like a question.
“Tomorrow,” Eric says, deepening his voice.
I deepen my voice and repeat it as well. And this continues until we are cackling and drawing attention with our hyena-like laughter.
“Tomorrow I’ll be able to handle it,” I say when I can breathe again.
Chapter Thirty-two
Aksel
“What are you most nervous about in the finale?”
Aksel exhales through a soft laugh, scrubbing a hand over his face before answering. “Oh man. I’d have to say the live audience. There’s more pressure when people can walk around and get a real-life look at your work. It’s not some carefully edited, prettied-up version they see on TV or socialmedia.”
Cammie arches a brow. “Are they filtered on TV? I never noticed.”
