Page 48 of Bad Medicine
Why? Why was he back? I was so confident that I’d never see him again, that he’d gone to Russia to become a mobster and wound up dead in a gutter somewhere, never bothering me—us—again.
Now, he was right here in Las Vegas. I could run into him anywhere, the hospital, the street, a goddamn coffee shop, for Christ’s sake.
And if he got a look at Jasper? If he spent even a single second looking at my baby boy, there’d be no denying his blond hair and blue eyes. What then?
Fear crawled up my throat, pure terror so raw and crippling that, for a second, I wasn’t sure my legs would hold me. Clutching the edge of the vanity, I stared into my own eyes, hoping for an answer, a plan, to protect my son from the monster who had fathered him.
“Hey,” Linny called through the door, snapping me out of my spiral of chaos. “You fall in? What’s taking so long?”
“Sorry,” I replied, snatching my leggings and t-shirt off the back of the door and pulling them on quickly, not even bothering with a bra. “I’ll be right out.” Turning on the cold water, I ran my wrists under the spray, taking a few deep breaths to try and calm my racing pulse. Then, with fresh determination, I headed out to face her.
“You ready to tell me what had you so rattled?” she asked, assessing me with a critical eye. “You were supposed to be gone all night. Instead, you barreled back in here in less than an hour, and you won’t tell me a darn thing.”
“I know,” I reached for her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “And I’m sorry.” Walking to where Jasper sat on Linny’s couch watching cartoons with a cup full of pretzel sticks, I pressed a kiss to the top of his head, smiling when he tipped his body to the side so that he could see around me.
“Love you, Mama,” he muttered distractedly, and I smiled, feeling tears pricking at the back of my eyes.
Nothing would ever hurt him; I’d make damned sure of that.
Leaving him to his cartoons, Linny and I headed to her kitchen, where she had already set out the teapot and a slice of pumpkin pie for each of us. Sitting across from me at the table, she poured the tea, adding a splash of milk for herself and leaving mine plain. Once she had taken a bite of her pie and a sip of her tea, she set down her cup, looked me square in the eye, and said, “Alright, child. Spill.”
So I did. I had told Linny bits and pieces of my story before, but never the whole thing. I hadn’t wanted to involve her in any of the truly awful things that I had witnessed, and so I had given her a glossed over version that, while still bad, wasn’t truly horrific.
But this time, I left nothing out, telling her all the details of that night with Greg, the cold, callous way he had taken that man’s life without so much as hesitating. The way I had hidden my pregnancy from him, never even attempting to track him down and hoping that I’d never, ever have to face him again.
When Linny got up and switched our tea for Bourbon, I launched into the story of how I had met Francesca, how I had gone against my better judgment and gotten involved with another group of criminals—albeit ones who seemed to dwell much more in the gray than the black, but still. I explained about the danger Francesca had been in, what I knew of it, anyway, and how after the last time I had fixed her up, things seemed to have calmed down.
It was on my second glass of bourbon that I told her about Rocco, and all the ways he was messing with my mind...and my body. I watched Linny’s face, waiting to see the criticism, as I explained how I knew better than to even consider getting further involved with him, but couldn’t seem to stop myself. I was drawn to him like I had never been drawn to another man before.
But through it all, Linny never faltered. She sat, listening patiently while I basically vomited six years’ worth of stress, angst, and heartache onto her kitchen table, and she never even so much as frowned.
“And then tonight,” I said, draining my glass and blowing out a breath. “Tonight, my worst nightmare came true.” Raising my eyes to hers, I whispered my terror to the only person in the world who I knew I could count on. “He’s back, Linny. Greg. The man who—” Lowering my voice, I cut a glance to the living room, making sure that Jasper was nowhere near us before I continued. “The man who could take my son from me.” I closed my eyes, pressing the heels of my hands into them as the thought ravaged my heart. “How can I protect him from a man like that? A man the world sees as an upstanding citizen, when in reality, he’s a demon in a nice suit?”
“Well, you certainly don’t do it alone, that’s for damn sure,” Linny said firmly, and I opened my eyes to frown at her.
“Linny, I love you, but I would never expect you to put your life in danger for us.” She went to speak, but I cut her off. “He’s dangerous, Linny. Really, truly dangerous. And I would never forgive myself if something happened to you because of my poor choices.”
“First of all,” Linny said, her face tight. “It’s my life, and I’ll do what I want with it. I didn’t burn all my bras in the 70s just to be told to sit down and shut up now.”
I snorted out a laugh, fully believing the mental image I now had of a younger Linny, standing in a crowd of women, lighting fire to their undergarments and screaming about gender equality.
It made me love her even more.
“Secondly, I know you. I have seen you through all the ups and downs you have faced these last five years, and I know without a shadow of a doubt that you would do anything—absolutelyanything—to protect that little boy in there,” she said, her head tilting to Jasper where he sat, now hanging upside down off the couch with his feet in the air.
“You’re right,” I whispered on a tortured breath. “I know you’re right, Lin.”
Reaching for my hand, Linny squeezed it, hard, and I could see the determination in her eyes.
“And the last thing to know is the most important of all: you are not alone.”
Her words, her fierce determination, sent a bolt of warmth into my frozen heart.
“You have me, Mia. You will always have me. But I’m pretty sure you just might have some other people in your corner, too.”
I had spent so much of the last few years fighting and struggling alone that it was a hard concept to wrap my head around. I had seen Francesca, watched how she interacted with her people, those who were really close to her heart. She fought for them fiercely, protected them with every thing she had, and still gave them room to spread their wings.
Was it possible that she now counted me among her list of people she would do anything to protect?
