I don't.
Instead, I type out a quick reply:
Hey Mom. Sorry, been busy. Everything's fine. I'll call soon. Love you too.
Everything's fine. The biggest lie I tell.
I set the phone down and go back to chopping vegetables.
The knife moves in steady, rhythmic strokes.
Carrots. Celery. Onion.
The familiar sting of tears—from the onion this time, I tell myself.
Just the onion.
I'm halfway through a bell pepper when I hear the motorcycle.
The sound of Cain's engine is distinctive—a low, aggressive rumble that I've learned to recognize from blocks away.
My body reacts before my mind catches up: shoulders tensing, stomach clenching, heart rate spiking.
I set down the knife. Wipe my hands on a towel. Check my reflection in the microwave door—scarf in place, face neutral, nothing to criticize.
The front door slams open.
Cain stands in the doorway, and I know immediately that something is very, very wrong.
His face is white.
Not angry-red like I expected, but white.
Pale. Bloodless.
His jaw is clenched so tight the muscles stand out like cords, and his hands—his hands are shaking. I've never seen Cain shake before.
"Cain?" My voice comes out small. Tentative. "What happened?"
He doesn't answer.
He walks past me to the kitchen, grabs a bottle of whiskey from the cabinet—the good stuff, the expensive stuff he saves for special occasions—and pours three fingers.
Downs it in one swallow and pours another.
I stay very still.
Whatever this is, it's bad.
The kind of bad that could explode at any moment.
"That fucking bastard," Cain says finally. His voice is low. Controlled. But underneath the control, I hear something I've never heard from him before.
Fear.
"Who?" I ask, even though I already know.
"Leviathan." He spits the name like a curse. "That cold-blooded piece of shit. He had no right. No fuckin’ right."
