Page 71 of A Ticking Time Boss

The world goes still. “He called you out of the blue?”

“Yes.”

Anger rises through me like a tidal wave. How dare he, after everything. To open old wounds and force himself—

“He apologized,” Mom says. “Profusely, actually.”

“You can’t believe him.”

She shrugs. “I’m not ready to believe him. But I’m not ready to not believe him, either. He has nothing to gain from asking for our forgiveness.”

“He always has something to gain,” I say. “He hasn’t done a selfless thing in his life.”

“He gave this apartment to me with no strings attached.”

“Yes, when he knew he was going to prison, and they were seizing all his assets,” I say through gritted teeth. The past couple of years I’ve spent considerable amounts in lawyer fees to make sure Mom was completely and thoroughly protected from any of his illegal dealings.

And oddly enough, because their marriage was never actually legal, she’s off the hook. Another one of his lies that worked out in the end.

“I’m not making excuses for him,” she says and sinks down on the chair opposite me. Her eyes are imploring. “I’m thinking of you.”

“Of me? Mom, he—”

“I know what he did,” she says. “He hurt both of us. I know you like to focus on me. But he lied to you too.”

I look at the mustard-yellow cupboards and the seashell knobs. Another feature she’d installed, right after we got back from our trip to Florida. It was the one proper vacation we ever went on with him. “I’m aware,” I say.

“He’s out of prison and mentioned that he wants to see you, but doesn’t know if you’d want to.”

“I absolutely don’t want to,” I say. “He has no space in my life.”

Her hand lands on mine. “That’s your right, sweetheart. You never have to see him again for as long as he lives. But, and don’t get angry, I wonder if maybe you have things you want to say too. Things you want to ask. Everything happened so fast there at the end, when all his… lies unravelled. If you met him, it would be on your terms. You could tell him anything you wanted.”

“You mean I could yell at him for a solid hour and then leave.”

She chuckles. “Yes. You’re very forceful when you yell, you know. You were always the most intimidating soccer player.”

“In little league,” I say, but her idea sinks in. “I get what you’re saying, but nothing good can come of it. I’m not going to meet him.”

Mom lifts her hand from mine. “Okay. That’s your right, sweetie. I just wanted to relay the offer to you.”

“I don’t want him calling you all the time either.”

She folds a kitchen towel, hiding her face from view, but I can hear the smile in her voice. It’s infuriating that she’s so calm about this. “Calling once in ten years isn’t exactly harassment. I have no love lost for your father, except for the fact that he gave me you.”

I rub a hand over my neck. Mom is too good at this, too kind. I can’t see it the way she does. She has an easier time forgiving the sleights he committed against her than I do. Having a real wife, other children, a white-picket fence and house in suburbia… living a double life.

I’d driven past his other house once.

I’ve never told her about it, and I never will.

But I’d been twenty-three, and furious, and sitting in a rented car outside a house that looked like it belonged in a commercial for house insurance. A dog had barked from somewhere inside the house and a teenage girl had appeared in the window. Younger than me. A half-sister?

I’d floored the gas so fast I left tire marks on the street.

“There’s no way I could trust him or anything he says,” I finally say. “Especially not now, when I’m…”

“So wildly successful?” Mom says teasingly.

---