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“You haven’t been answering my calls or texts.”

“Because I can’t help you.” Especially now that I’ve committed to paying tuition at a school that costs more a year than I paid for my twenty-year-old Honda.

“Dean, please. They’ve threatened to set my damn trailer on fire with me inside.”

Hell.

There’s a good chance he’s playing me. This is what he’s done my entire life. When he doesn’t need me, I’m ignored. When he needs help, he plays on my guilt. God forbid I try to set any boundaries, then he hammers at me until I give in. In the last year or so, it’d been so blissfully quiet. I guess I fell into dreaming that maybe he’d gotten his act together.

Today, I really don’t have time to deal with this. Mike will be back any minute with Ella, and I refuse to have him here when they show.

“Dad, I don’t have the money. Especially not how much you must owe to get a death threat. I’m not sure what makes you think I can help.” My anger rises, knowing I don’t sound as firm as I should.

He’ll keep picking at me until he finds an opening. It’s what he does.

“You’ve helped before.”

“Small amounts, sure. But I’ve got a kid to take care of.”

“What else am I supposed to do, Dean?”

“I don’t fu—I don’t freaking know, okay? But I just paid for—” Don’t give him any details. Any details, he’ll use them. To argue. As leverage. Something. “I just paid a huge bill. I don’t have anything now.”

Over his shoulder I can make out the blurry shapes of Mike and Ella turning the corner. They’re far off yet, and he hasn’t noticed them, but I see the way Mike freezes. I can only imagine what he’s thinking.

All I can see is the two of them coming closer. Closer. Not wanting my father to see where I’m looking, I force my eyes away.

“You know that friend of yours? He threatened me. Came to my motherfucking house and put his hands on me and told me to stay the hell away. That you won’t help me anymore. He was wrong, though. You wouldn’t say no to your old man when he needs help, would you?”

I do my best to hide the flash of surprise that goes through me. Mike went to my dad? Probably thought I wouldn’t be able to say no myself. It’s a valid worry.

Except I’ve already said no. Too bad my daddy can’t seem to hear me.

Desperate to get him gone, I pull out my wallet. I carry a hundred bucks for just-in-case reasons. I never want to be caught out when my kid needs something and the power is down or the place doesn’t take cards. A few local spots don’t.

“Here.” I shove the money into his hand. “It’s the money I carry for emergencies. It’s all I have. If you need it so badly, take it.”

Not sure who I want to hit more, him or myself. Me, for always caving to this man simply because we share DNA, or him for pushing when I’ve told him over and over I need to keep my money for my daughter.

“This won’t cover what I owe.”

Would it make things worse to remind him that when I was eighteen and got Billie pregnant, all he could do was whale on me because I’d decided to quit playing basketball? Probably.

“Well, then maybe what you need to use it for is a bus ticket out of town because that’s all I have to give.”

Mike and Ella have slowed to a stop, and he’s crouched down, facing her. Blocking her from view. Lord, please let him be telling her he suddenly decided they should go to the park or something.

“This seems like a nice building. Decent neighborhood.” My dad’s sizing up the mural on the side, done by some local artist.

Yeah, because I refused to keep Ella in the sketchy place Brennan found us any longer than I had to. “Well, if you think I’ve got anything much left over after the rent’s paid, you’re wrong.”

But I can almost see the drool. The beads of sweat on his forehead. The dollar signs in his eyes.

So I go for the riskiest option. The one most likely to piss him off, but also to get him gone.

I pull out my phone. “I’d hate to call the authorities on my own parent, but I will if I have to.”

My dad has the nerve to look confused. “What have I done wrong? We’re talkin’ is all.”