Page 43 of Daring You

The way Mike can go from so endearing to vicious, how did I not notice it before? Is it because what he’s saying is true? I’m so desperate for a guy to love me, I blunt the sharp edges?

Mike is right about the inheritance. Locke and I’s trusts, set up by our late mother, kick in when we’re thirty, and it’s a lot of money. Somehow, she managed to keep a lot of it away from our father, who tends to squander money as soon as he sees triple digits in his bank account.

When she was first diagnosed with ovarian cancer, we thought she’d be okay. Stage 2, the doctors said. It was curable. Then, it spread. To her uterus, her lymph nodes. Twelve months later, we’re told she’s at a metastasized stage 4. My mom was dying, and I couldn’t argue her out of it. I was unable to make any deals, force any settlements. I couldn’t call the devil and ask him to please spare her. I was simply reduced to a spectator, watching the love of my life, my role model and best friend, die.

I rub at my eyes, considering now is the time to go home and do the rest of my thinking on my laptop, safe in my apartment. I could pour a glass of wine, play music, and pretend that I don’t only seek out men who are intent on hunting and destroying, a habit my mom would be so disappointed to see. Apex predators, willing to conquer and discard without so much as an oops.

I push away from my desk, reminding myself that I’m an apex predator, too. I’ve made grown men cry in courtrooms and depositions. I’ve won cases considered losers that Yang and his other partners tossed to me like garbage they needed dumped.

And if I can give such a dominant title to Mike Ascott, then I sure as hell can own it, too. That’s more my mom’s style.

I’m useful, I’m smart, I am not Acne Hayes.

Inheritance.

The word whispers through my mind, an indistinct voice so distinctly my mother.

I blink. Peer harder at my monitor.

As soon as Locke and I were born, my parents put a will in place so we would always be comfortable, in case the worst happened. And the worst happened.

They did it as soon as we were born.

My fingers fly over the keyboard as I type in what I need.

Ryan Delaney’s parents must have had a will, and somehow, some way, that little boy would’ve received his inheritance.

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