"Don't say a word to him. Not a single friggin' word. In the last month, Sonny's gotten the crap beat out of him. I got assaulted at my job, and I've been asked to become some douche bag's mistress. All because of you. You owe me, and trust me, you don't want me to start with the million and one things I've dealt with because of you before this year."
He opened his mouth to argue with me. His eyes going from my arm to Dex's face above mine.
"Don't," I insisted. "Just don't."
"He's a Widow, Rissy!" my dad yelled, completely oblivious to the fact we were standing outside of a cheap motel with dozens of other people.
That's where he was going with this?
"He's mine," I enunciated slowly. "And my business stopped being your business when you left."
I couldn't have slapped him any harder. And my inner jerk couldn't have been more pleased by the stripe of pain and humiliation that blazed across his face.
"Yeah," I taunted him. "Exactly."
Where had all of this ugliness bubbled up from?
"I didn't think..." he stammered. "They came after you?"
I didn't even bother with an answer, settling for a brisk nod.
My dad lifted both of his hands up, running them over the short trimmed hair on his head. "Jesus." He shook his head. "I never thought—"
Dex's body heat seared my back as he stepped forward, into me. He braced his hands on the doorframe, caging me. "You never cared. Don't mistake bein' a dick for bein' an idiot."
He bristled, his mouth poised to argue or talk shit back to the younger man.
Them arguing wasn't the point. It wasn't necessary. "It doesn't matter anymore. I need to know if you have the money."
The face he made wasn't a good sign. "Rissy."
"Yes or no?"
My father blew out a breath that made his lips flutter. "Not all of it."
I guess that could be worse, unless he considered twenty bucks to be a significant chunk. "How much?"
"Fuck." His lips fluttered again. "You wanna come in and talk about this?"
Dex and I answered at the same time. "No." Especially not when that woman was still in there. Gross.
"You got five minutes to meet us downstairs," Dex said. "Gimme your keys."
My father took a step back, frowning fiercely. "Excuse me?"
"Your keys. Give 'em to me."
"Why the fuck would I do that?"
Maybe he didn't know, but I did. I held my hand out. "We can't risk you leaving."
"I'm not leaving," he argued and for a split second I felt rude agreeing with Dex's request.
This wasn't anyone else's battle but mine. I held out my hand and waited. He didn't hand them over immediately. My father's face made a dozen expressions until he finally turned around and went into the room. Whispers stacked on top of each other before he returned, dropping a set of keys into my palm.
"Five minutes," Dex spoke from behind me as I eyed the woman in the room moving around.
The woman dressed in my father's clothes. The woman that looked like my mom if I closed my eyes, squinted, and made my vision blurry.
I sighed. All I could focus on right then, was how disappointed I was in this man I used to call my dad.
~ * ~ *
Awkward wouldn't even begin to describe the atmosphere in Luther's truck, or the tension across the table at the pizza parlor.
Tense also wouldn't be an appropriate adjective.
"Rissy—," he'd started to say about a dozen times before Dex shut him down.
"Don't," my dark-haired man snarled.
I didn't make an effort to assure Dex that it was fine, that I wanted to talk to my father, because honestly, I didn't.
"Rissy," he'd start again on deaf ears.
My mom. My poor, beautiful, sweet mom had been in love with this man. She'd thought the world of him even after he abandoned her with two small kids. She loved him even though he never called, never helped financially, never did a single damn thing.
Rage boiled beneath my veins.
If I'd known everything that I knew now...
That I was related to a self-centered man-whore...
I reached out to grab Dex's hand, threading my fingers over the top of his. The look he gave me was tight. He was seething beneath his skin and I had no idea what directly fueled him, but it wasn't like he didn't have a dozen possible sources.
Dex wasn't my father. Not in any way, shape or form. And I loved him.
“I owe ‘em twenty but I got eighteen on hand.”
Okay, that wasn’t so horrific. A two thousand dollar difference wasn’t as bad as I’d been expecting. Then again, I wasn’t expecting him to owe people twenty friggin’ thousand dollars either. Holy crap.