Page 3 of What We Had

The curl remaining on my lips vanished. “I just came back from one. Crashed and burned.” I laughed, despite the sentiment. “The casting director suggested that next time Iapologizebefore starting my lines.”

Deacon blew out air and shook his head. “These people. They are disconnected from reality, yeah? You must come out, my friend. It will fix all your problems.”

I had a small but trustworthy inner circle of friends who knew my status. I never even had to tell Deacon—the man simply intuited it and assumed.

I dismissed his suggestion with a wave. “It’s too late now, my friend.” I said his term of endearment for me and mirrored his accent, flicking my R ever so gently.

“Never too late.” He took a single step back into his property. “Stop by when you get back. We must talk through some things.”

Ominous. But with Deacon, everything came with a shadow. “Sure thing.”

I stepped through my front door, sneakers tapping against white marble. The moment the door swung shut and latched behind me, my phone vibrated continuously in my pocket.

Shit. Yet another distraction. I was really going to be late getting to the center.

I was halfway down the hallway to my bedroom when I looked at the caller ID. I came to a sudden halt.

RACHEL BROOKS titled my screen with an alluring red circle and an uninviting green one underneath her name.

Why the hell is my mother’s assistant calling me?

Aside from my mother, Rachel was the closest thing to family. My father died just after I was born. His brother was the reigning duke of dickheads, and I never spoke to him or any on that side. I had no siblings, no close cousins.

I cleared my throat. “Hello? Rachel?”

“Connor, hi. Yeah. Hey. So. Okay, listen. Are you free right now?”

I rubbed my face. “Rachel, what’s up? Is something wrong?” I asked more sternly than my usual affable tone. I shifted my voice and spoke purely with my Mass accent. “Did ma fire you again?”

“Connor, you need to come home.”

I felt the blood drain from my face.

“It’s your mother. She… look, she made me promise not to tell you, but I just... I… I can’t do this anymore. You’re her son.”

“Rachel, what is going on? What happened?”

“You need to come home. Tonight. It’s getting worse and I don’t know how much time she has left.”

I stopped breathing.

I heard her heavy breaths just fine, though. The hitch in her voice, the rawness of her words. She had been crying. “She has cancer, Connor. She never wanted you to find out. It’s bad, too. You need to come home.”

ChapterTwo

NEONBLUELIGHTSblared in the darkened back road. I dropped an F-bomb louder than I care to admit. Said it twice. How fast had I been going, sixty? I was driving along a residential road, so the speed limit was probably thirty-five. The clock on my rental car’s display told me it was three past two in the morning. What sort of cop patrolled the unused residential roads in Concord, Massachusetts?

Watching for idiots like you, I told myself.

I pulled over. My headlights illuminated a freshly paved road with too-bright double yellows running down the middle. Rows of conifers book-ended the road with the occasional break for a driveway that vanished behind the arboreal walls. Flickering blue lights painted every surface. The cruiser pulled up behind me and its high beams bounced off my mirrors, practically blinding me.

I couldn’t even remember the last time I was pulled over. I knew I looked like shit, having grabbed the first flight I could find out of LAX. The travel gods smiled on me and gifted me with a direct into Logan, and then threw me a bonus with this beautiful rental, a shiny black Land Rover Discovery. I only had one drink and downed plenty of water during the six-hour flight. I had bags under my eyes and my body tingled from the warring caffeine and over-tiredness in my system.

I unlatched the glove box and fished around inside. Wasn’t the registration supposed to be easily accessible in rentals? I couldn’t find it from a cursory glance, so I yanked two fake leather binders and dropped them in my lap. I rolled down my window and did a weird half-stand, half-sit position to fish my wallet out of my pocket. No need to turn on the cab light since the asshole cop had apparently turned on every light available west of Boston to shine directly into the back of my car. License, check. Registration…?

Boots echoed along the silent road, slow and methodical. Police officers did that on purpose, to really let the tension build. A flashlight clicked on, as if the patrolman needed more light. The cop stepped up to my lowered window and dazzles filled my vision as the flashlight hit my eyes.

“Any idea how fast you were…Connor?”

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