Page 75 of American Hellhound
~*~
“Maggie,” her father said, quietly, from the doorway. “Don’t do this, honey.”
That was Arthur Lowe for you – always lingering in doorways, always trying to make up for his silences with a kind, whispered word when it no longer mattered.
Maggie shoved a fistful of clothes into her suitcase. Decent blouses, t-shirts, sweaters, jeans. “No,” she snapped. “Youdon’t. It’s too late.”
“Maggie.” He took a tentative step across the threshold. “Please. Your mother will cool off. Don’t do anything rash.”
“Rash?” She tossed her hairbrush and deodorant on top of the clothes. “Rash was Mom refusing to let me tell her my side. Rash was believing I was the one trying to buy pot when it was those other bitches instead. Mom’s always thought the worst of me. She’s never even given me a chance.”
She ducked past him and went to fetch her toothbrush and makeup from the bathroom.
He followed. “That’s not true,” he said in his patented, gentle tone. The everything’s-fine, no-need-to-get-upset voice he’d used to placate her since birth. He’d always begged for her patience, her forgiveness, her grace; but he’d never begged those things of her mother.
“I won’t be falsely accused,” Maggie swore. “Iwon’t.”
When she turned, arms full of her toiletries, he was blocking her path, gaze impossibly sad.
“Please,” he said again. “You’ll lose driving privileges for a few days. But it’ll blow over. It always does.”
“No.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “It’ll be a stalemate. But it won’t ever lead to peace talks. And I won’t be punished for something I didn’t do.”
“She’s your mother.”
“She wishes she wasn’t,” Maggie said, and motioned him aside with a tilt of her head.
The worse part was that he didn’t resist. Didn’t touch her, pull her into the hug she needed so badly. He just moved. And she left.
~*~
When Ghost pulled up to his building, he spotted Rita. She’d dropped the tailgate of his truck and sat with her legs swinging, jeans riding up to show off pink-and-green striped socks and a hideous pair of clogs. She held a smoldering cigarette between her fingers and watched him dismount his bike with a critical eye.
Then he spotted the Monte Carlo.
“You’ve got a visitor,” Rita said. “She looks younger than me.”
Ghost sighed. “She is.”
“Be careful, Ghost,” she admonished, hopped down, and walked to her car.
“Thanks,” he muttered to himself as he closed the tailgate.
A dozen possibilities as to why Maggie was upstairs waiting formed in his mind, and none of them were good. He was already tensed for action when he entered the apartment – if someone had hurt her in any way, someone was getting hurt in return.
The scene that greeted him brought him to a halt. Maggie and Aidan sat cross-legged on the living room floor, Aidan’s homework spread out around them. Aidan was leaning in close, listening in earnest to what she was explaining, his shoulder pressed to her arm. In that moment, Aidan didn’t look depressed or disappointed, like a boy whose mother had abandoned him; he was rapt. Soaking the girl in. Maggie was smiling. “That’s right!” Laughing softly. Encouraging, being sweet to the kid.
Aidan had never received this from Olivia.
In that quick, stolen moment before their heads lifted and they saw him, Ghost felt the crumbling foundations of his life shift. He fell in love with her a little bit then. No one, not even him, had ever put that kind of smile on his son’s face. For that alone, he’d slay dragons for her.
Then they were looking at him.
“Hi, Daddy,” Aidan greeted, still smiling. “Maggie came!”
“I see that.”
“Hi,” Maggie said, some of her brightness dimming. “I’m sorry. I can explain.” She fiddled with the flashcards in her hands and looked so miserable it took every ounce of self-control not to go to her. He’d never been able to resist a woman who needed him.
