“That must be it.”
“Of course that’s it. Anyone who crosses him crosses you, too.”
“Ain’t that the truth?”
Sam’s phone lit up with a text from Collins Worthy that had her groaning. When you have a moment, could you please give me a call?
“What now?” Freddie asked.
“My mother-in-law’s boyfriend wants me to call him.” On the top-ten list of people she didn’t want to deal with today, they were tied at number one.
“What’s up with that?”
“Hell if I know, and I don’t want to know. I’ve had a blissful couple of weeks with no word from the lovebirds, and I like it that way. Any time either of them resurfaces, they send my anxiety soaring.”
“Why is he the one contacting you instead of her?”
“He’s trying to rehabilitate her and knows neither of us wants to talk to her. He’s hoping for a reconciliation that simply isn’t going to happen. But hey, he can knock himself out trying to make her a better person. There’s plenty of room for improvement there.”
“It’s weird that he’s hitting you up right when news breaks that Nick had to fire his VP.”
“Their timing is always impeccable.”
“Will you call him?”
“Eventually, but only so they don’t bother Nick with whatever it is they want now. An encounter with his mother is the last thing in the universe he needs right now—or ever, for that matter.”
Dealing with them exhausted her, but she’d take one for the team to keep them far away from Nick. Any time his mother slithered out from under her rock, she sent him into a tailspin that he could ill afford at any time, especially now that he was consumed with cleaning up Henderson’s mess.
“You should just call him and get it over with, so you don’t have to dread it,” Freddie said.
“You’re right.”
“Could you say that again so I can record it for posterity?”
Snickers of laughter came from the front seat.
“You’re supposed to be on my side,” Sam reminded them.
“Always, ma’am,” Vernon said.
He called her that only when he was being cheeky. Lucky for him, his cheekiness was one of the things she loved best about him, along with his wit and sarcasm.
Sam flipped her phone open, found Collins’s contact and made the call, bracing herself for whatever fresh hell he’d launch her way.
“Hi, Sam, thanks so much for calling.”
The man was elegant, polite, successful and, as far as Sam could tell, far too good for her grifter of a mother-in-law, but hey, that was his problem, not hers. “What’s up?”
“I wanted to let you and Nick know that Nicoletta is in the hospital with pneumonia. It’s been rather touch and go the last few days. I thought you might like to know.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“She’s asking for Nick.”
Why did Sam know he was going to say that?
“Sam? Are you there?”
