Page 128 of Clean Slade
Despite being added to the list, Mrs. Ferraro had only picked up Mac a handful of times over the past few weeks. With Tony around, it was tricky for her to get away from him for too long, and we didn’t want to make the man even more delusional.
Besides, she always told us when she would pick her up. Or, at the very least, she told King, and he would inform me. Had he forgotten?
“Slade?” Wesley asked, his cheeks turning pink and his eyes made even wider by his eyeglasses.
“I…um…” What did I even say to Wesley? For all I knew, this was nothing. If I told him I didn’t know about the pickup, I’d freak him out, and then I’d have to find a way to explain why I was freaking out.
“Everything’s okay. I must have forgotten.” I reached for my phone and pressed King’s number on my screen, putting my car back in Drive. “Nice, erm…nice to see you, Wesley. See you tomorrow?”
I didn’t wait for an answer. I sped out of there but soon came to a halt as the school line jammed the road.
Shit.
Pick up, King. Pick up, baby!
The ringing continued until the line beeped and his voicemail started going. I tried again, same thing.
As I waited for the gridlock to resolve, I tapped the security app on my phone and waited for the feed to update.
Slowly, the images of Furfection filled my screen. Nat was there, trimming a dog, while Courtney was spritzing another with perfume. Hell, even Santiago was there, talking to a customer—why the hell was he talking to a customer—but King wasn’t.
I tapped out of Furfection and clicked the home feed.
For the second time in the last five minutes, an ice-cold fear washed over me, leaving me a little more numb and a lot more terrified.
King was home.
But so was his father and brother.
THIRTY
KING
“What do you want?”
Watching him standing in the middle of my living room as if he owned the place made me feel sick. It looked wrong.
His hands were in his pockets as usual, and the cigar was in his mouth like a prize.
“Watch your tone, young man,” he mumbled with that thing in his mouth before he removed it and blew the opulent smoke all over me.
“Watch your manners! You’re in my home. I never said you could smoke here.”
Challenging him like that was a mistake. It was always a mistake, but I couldn’t help myself. I couldn’t help it when he chose to ignore everything I did and said.
He raised an eyebrow, and I persisted until he stomped the cigar on the floor—myfloor—and rolled his eyes.
I glanced from him to the burn mark on my carpet to my brother.
“What’s going on? What are you doing here? You can’t be here. I told you. If you want to see Mac—”
“We’re not here for Mac.” My father raised his voice, and chills ran down my spine.
Chills or no chills, I couldn’t let them control my body or actions, so I turned back to him and glared.
“Then what do you want?”
I was tired. I was tired of everything. I knew things were starting to get too normal. Too good to be true.
