Page 43 of Fearless Sinner

Chapter Eleven

Chloe

Roxanne stares back at me in utter disbelief. Her skin is pale and her eyes wide.

I just got back from the bar and found her in the kitchen. I didn’t wait another minute before I launched into a full rundown of what happened to me tonight.

Poor Roxanne. She was expecting me to come back and bitch about the job interview. Instead, I came home and shocked her even more than I did that summer when I confessed to shoveling cow shit in our aunt’s car when we stayed with her.

The news that we’re now debt free is the kind that requires celebration, but she’s like me–wondering what owing the head of the Irish mafia eighteen and a half minutes will come to mean.

“Wow, I knew Cillian liked you, but damn.” Finally, she speaks.

I lower to sit on the high stool opposite her and rest my arms on the countertop. “You would have done the same thing, right?”

“Of-fucking-course.” She gives me a stare as if to question whether I’ve lost my mind and my choice was the only logical choice. “Girl, I know you know this, but we’re in a really bad situation. And you just more than halved the problem. If you weren’t around…” Her voice trails off. “If you weren’t here we’d be screwed. I’d have to figure out everything and I’d fail. Please tell me you see that.”

“Roxanne—”

“No. It’s true. Just accept it. Thank you for agreeing to whatever madness Cillian has up his sleeve for you.”

I nod slowly. “He kissed me…”

“You like him.” She speaks with reflection in her tone. I know her comment is more of an observation than a question.

“I don’t know if that matters. He’s dangerous.”

“Of course, but that’s not what I said. If you like him then whatever he has planned for the eighteen and a half minutes you owe him might not be so hard. And he can’t be all bad if he freed you from a debt of a quarter million dollars just for picking a coin.” She flicks her palms over and smirks.

“I thought about that.”

“Just be careful.”

“You know I will.”

“Okay, so now we just have to focus on your mom. I applied for that loan I told you about but I don't think I’ll get it. Our hopes still lie with you getting that loan.”

“I think I’ll hear from the bank on Monday.”

“Then we’ll know where we stand.”

“Yes.”

“I looked up how long a person with heart failure can go on when they need a new heart.” She sits and suddenly looks weak.

“What did you find?” I purposely avoid looking up anything because I don’t want to freak out.

“It’s not good. People always tell you not to look shit up on the Internet, but I couldn’t help myself. And everything I found was nothing but bad for people who have end-stage heart failure. It was silly of me to think I’d find hope. It’s called end stage for a reason.”

I get up and walk over to her when tears tip over her lids. “We have to be strong.”

“I know, and I’m so sorry to cry again. I’m just burned out. I feel like shit for not having the courage to tell your mom that Harlan was an asshole. If not for him we’d have all the money we need. We could have paid it already.” She shakes her head at herself. “I saw him cheating on her before the wedding.” She cries harder.

“Oh, Roxanne, what? You saw him?”

“I know. I’m such a fool. I saw him paying a prostitute for sex, then she got in his car and they drove off.”

“My God.” Everything I hear about this guy makes me sick, and I haven’t even met him.

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