Page 59 of Lies He Told Me (Bratva Crime Syndicate 1)

My heart settles low in my belly. Damon’s there. Of course he still is. But as for telling her … not now. Not yet. Better to do it in person, especially if Damon’s around right now.

“Joy, honey? Why won’t you tell me where you are? I’ve been so worried about you. I’ve been asking and looking all around. I thought I saw you at the soup kitchen one time, but then some lady robbed me and by the time I got my purse back, I …”

She’s crying; I can hear it on the line. I am too. God, so she did look. She really did try.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” I murmur.

“I can’t blame you, though, for leaving.” She’s crying more, and coughing. Coughing badly. “With the way things are around here …” More coughing.

“Mom,” I say carefully.

Now that I’m listening, she’s been coughing way more than normal. Deep, nasty, hacking coughs, the kind that seem to start in your soul and work their way through your whole body on the way out. And this sudden tone of hers …

“Never mind,” she says, catching her breath. “You did the right thing in leaving, getting out. But I’d still like to see you if you’re near and have the time.” More coughing.

The desperation in her tone twists in my gut like a knife. My own mother. I let her down like everyone else in her life always has. I left her alone, like everyone else always did.

And now she’s coughing and coughing and coughing.

“You’re sick,” I say quietly.

“I’m always sick.” She tries to laugh it off, but just ends up coughing more. “You know that.”

“This is different.” I realize how true that is as I say it.

“No, it’s not.” Mom’s putting on her hyper-cheery tone, the one she uses when she’s lying the worst. “You know me, just seasonal allergies.”

Yeah, I do know her. She smoked a pack of Marlboros a day. Still, that doesn’t mean …

“Mom, tell me the truth.”

“Nothing to tell. If you want an update about how things are around here, well, Jeanine down the hall got arrested, but that’s no surprise.”

“Mom.”

“Please, baby, if you can’t tell me where you are, at least promise me that you haven’t gotten into any bad … situation.”

Oh, you mean like the seriously-considering-becoming-some-rich-politician’s-fake-wife kind of situation?

“I’m not on drugs and I’m not pregnant,” I rattle off.

An exhale. “Oh, thank God.” Those were my mom’s two worst fears. “But still, you didn’t say where …”

I cut her off before she can finish the sentence, “Mom, tell me what’s happening.”

More coughing, the painful-sounding kind. “Joy, please, honey, not now, I—”

“Mom! Tell me.” I feel bad. This is our first conversation and the last thing I want to do is ruin it by pushing her more than I should. But this coughing can’t be good. I have to know.

“You’re not going to give up, are you?” Mom asks wearily.

“Nope.”

“My stubborn baby girl.” She lets loose a sigh that crackles. “Well, the doctor isn’t too sure—and you know me, I never trust those quacks at the clinic anyways; they’re all so snotty—but he seems to think… well, he says it looks like there’s a chance that, I might, uh … I might have lung cancer.”

I sink to the floor of the phone booth. The sounds of the outside world have gone silent, like God hit mute on the universal remote.

“Lung cancer,” I echo dumbly.

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