Page 96 of Legal

“No,” I said. “Not in this case.” My father was the one who practically forced my mom to have plastic surgery because she wasn’t beautiful enough for him anymore. Because she was starting to age faster than he wanted her to. It was his fault she had complications. His fault she wore that scar on her face to this day. Then the bastard left her anyway.

“I don’t hold any grudges, and I wish you and your brother didn’t either.” I closed my eyes and jostled my head sharply. My mom was too damned nice. “Look how rich my life is now. I have Frank and my family around me. I came out of this a much stronger and secure person. Your father didn’t make me do anything, Jillian. If I’d held my ground, he wouldn’t have been able to talk me into something I didn’t want to do.”

The floor was crumbling away beneath me. This was another subject my mother never talked about. Ever. “But… Dad was so much younger than you. Even if you never had surgery, there would have still been all those extra problems to deal with.”

Not to mention the added stress Stephen and I went through. Although, he had it worse than I did. Not only did he have to go through Mom’s suffering, but he also had the pleasure of running into one of Dad’s much younger girlfriends.

“No more problems than anyone else in a troubled marriage. The fact that I was older than your father wasn’t relevant. The fact that we weren’t right for each other was.”

I… I didn’t know what to think anymore. “I don’t know what to do, Mom.”

“Just be happy, Jillian.”

Idrove home both lighter and heavier at the same time. When was the last time I’d had such a deeply personal conversation with my mother? Ever? It was a surreal feeling.

I didn’t know where to go from here. I hadn’t expected my afternoon to unfold quite the way it did. It threw me off track, and I was so far from the beaten path I didn’t know if I’d ever find my way back.

I pulled into the driveway to find Mike’s car there, as expected. He said he was going to spend the day doing some cleaning, which made me snicker at the time. His version of tidying up was putting on a new roll of toilet paper and throwing out the old one.

“Hello,” I called out when I stepped inside. The living room still looked the same; although, it hadn’t been too messy to begin with. “Hello, Mike? You there?”

I walked through the kitchen, noticing his dirty dishes in the sink, and went toward my office to drop off my work bag. I stopped in the doorway. The room looked different, more open. Cleared out. It took me half a second to realize why—the boxes of toys and bags of clothes were gone.

“Hey, Jillian. I thought I heard you come home.” I turned to see Mike coming up the basement stairs.

“Where’d you put all this stuff?” I asked.

“I dropped it off at the donation center this morning. You asked me to do that, remember?”

“Well, yes, a few months ago. I was still going through the house whenever I had time, adding to the pile, but… thank you.” I took the paperwork out of my bag and filed it in the drawer.

“You’re welcome. I thought about keeping some things, you know, for Daniel’s kids, but most of it was pretty worn out. Except for some of the board games—”

Games? I tuned out the rest of his words as my eyes darted to the side of my desk. I peeked underneath, then behind. My pounding in my ears grew louder and louder.

“Jillian, is something wrong?”

I tossed around a stack of folders. The room was pretty damn clean; there weren’t too many places for a square box to play hide and seek.No. Please, no.

“I had a game set aside. It was separate from the donation pile.” I spoke calmly and rationally. “Have you seen it?”

“Sure. It was right there?” He pointed to the place by my desk where I’d made a spot for it. Where I saw it every time I worked, which was a hell of a lot. “I stacked it with the others and brought it in.”

“Why would you do that? It was set aside for a reason, Mike.” My voice had lost some of its evenness. If it was anything like my emotions, it resembled a serrated ice pick. I had this sickening feeling I couldn’t tame, and it was grower stronger.

All I had to do was breathe. “Which center did you take it to?”

“The one on North Ave. What’s this about? Was that Daniel’s favorite game or something?”

“I gotta go,” I yelled as I ran for the door. If I remembered correctly, the place closed in twenty minutes, and that’s how long it took to get there.

I made it in eighteen. The chances were still pretty good, I assured myself. He’d only dropped it off that morning. It was unlikely someone had purchased it already. The center probably hadn’t even finished sorting through everything. It was a huge load.

I darted inside as the clerk was walking to the door, probably to lock it. “I’m looking for a game. It’s calledBunked. Purple and green box. It was dropped off earlier.”

I expected the woman to laugh at my frantic request. I was talking so quickly, and I sounded like I was jonesing. ‘Must need board game fix.’ When she handed it to me, I had to make sure I didn’t smack my lips and bounce up and down.

“I’m sorry, honey.” There was no laughter, only kind eyes. “We were cleared out of all our games and toys today. Every so often they get picked up for Children’s Hospital.”

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