Page 26 of Breaking Through the Doubt (Espen Jetties #4)

26

COREY

“Ready for tonight’s game?” I asked, juggling the phone on my shoulder while I began setting up my station for my day of clients.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Leslie said in a nonchalant voice, which seemed strange.

“Leslie, is everything all right?”

“Yeah, it’s fine. Just collecting my things to head over to the arena.” His answers came too quickly.

I thought about asking if it had anything to do with what happened yesterday, but Leslie had told me how special I was to him and I pushed the thought aside. It was all in my head, based on the interaction with my mom. There was a reason I kept thoughts of her buried deep in a box in the back of my mind. The times I managed to let her out, it always distorted my reality.

“You’re going to have a great game tonight. I’ll watch as much as I can between clients.”

“Thanks, Corey. Listen, I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Bye.” The word was barely out of my mouth before the call disconnected.

I told myself he was nervous and wanted to play his best game. It had nothing to do with me.

By the time the first client stepped through the door, I’d managed to push those thoughts out of my head and focus on the job at hand.

During one of the few breaks I had in my schedule for the day, I found Emilio sitting in the back room shoveling a sandwich into his mouth. I didn’t think he bothered breathing before taking the next bite.

“Did you forget to eat during your days off?”

He forced himself to swallow. “Nah, just didn’t have time to eat breakfast.”

“I’m not sure you’re even tasting it at this point.”

He chuckled and picked the sandwich back up again. “Probably not.” He took another bite, this one smaller than the last.

I walked past him to the side closet where the security equipment was kept. The closet didn’t have a door, but the small alcove gave me the right amount of space without having to use our supply shelves to house it. I’d gotten the security system at the encouragement of my father. Never in a million years would I have thought I’d be using it to protect my shop from my mother.

“Did you talk to Leslie?” Emilio asked. When I turned around, at least half of his sandwich was gone. He sat there, watching me closely. He didn’t have to mention about what for me to remember our conversation the other night.

I sat in one of the chairs and glanced around to make sure Karli and Lila weren’t around.

“I did, but not until yesterday.”

“Yesterday? I thought you were going to talk to him as soon as he came home.”

“I planned on it. Then, every time I tried, everything that came to mind made me sound like an asshole.”

He picked up the other half of his sandwich. “Okay, then what changed yesterday?”

I ran a hand through my hair. “She showed up at the shop.”

Emilio stopped with the sandwich halfway to his lips and set it back on the table. “What do you mean she showed up here?”

“Leslie wanted another tattoo, so we came here, and I saw her outside.”

“Shit,” Emilio said, glancing back at the security equipment. “Explains why you’re messing with that stuff.”

“Yeah. I want to make sure the shop is safe from anything she does. I went outside and told her to fuck off, but my gut is telling me she won’t go away that easily.”

He shook his head. “Probably not. Did she ask you for money?”

“Thankfully, no. I wouldn’t have given her a goddamn dollar, even if she had asked.”

Emilio played with the corner of the wrap his sandwich had come in. “You may have to tell Lila and Karli about her.” I opened my mouth to protest, and he continued quickly, “I’m not saying you need to tell them who she is. You can tell them there’s been a woman hanging around out front. If they know what she looks like, they can keep their eye out for her.”

I knew Emilio was right. If I was back here checking on the security equipment, the least I could do was give my employees the information they needed to keep themselves safe. I honestly didn’t think she would do anything to them. I felt confident what she wanted was money to buy drugs.

“You’re right. I’ll pull up the camera footage and let them see.” I could use the video right before I went outside. There was no audio on the cameras, but I wasn’t taking a risk that people could read lips.

* * *

I walked into my apartment and dropped my bag on the floor. The emotional drain of the last few days had taken its toll. My eyes felt heavy and all I wanted to do was grab a beer and watch the highlights of Leslie’s game.

Before I did that, I needed to call Dad and tell him what happened the day before. I refused to waste any more time on her yesterday, when my time with Leslie had been so limited with his road schedule.

I sat on the very edge of the couch. If I sat back, there was no way I’d get up later for bed. It was early enough that Dad would still be awake. God, I really didn’t want to have this conversation. It was bad enough I’d seen her yesterday, let alone talk about her two days in a row.

Closing my eyes, I dropped my head. Thinking about the way she looked, how she’d tried to pretend like everything was right in the world, gave my stomach a good turn. I grabbed my phone and hit call on Dad’s number, determined to get this over with sooner rather than later.

It didn’t take him long to answer. A small part of me was hoping it would go to voicemail, and I could avoid this conversation for another day, even if I knew how unlikely that was.

“Corey, is everything okay?”

Dad knew I never called after work unless I told him I would beforehand.

“Not really.”

“What happened?” The concern in his voice made it harder for me to tell him the story. He wouldn’t see this as a bad thing, but as a chance to find and help her.

“She’s in Espen.” I let him put two and two together.

It didn’t take Dad but a second to figure out who I meant. “Did you see her? Where is she? Where is she staying? Did you get a chance to talk to her?”

His questions came rapid-fire with no time in between for me to answer them. Not that he would actually approve of my answers.

“Slow down, Dad.”

“Sorry. It’s just been so long since anyone has seen her that it seems surreal.”

“Well, it’s not. It was very, very real.” Disgust bled through my tone. I couldn’t stop it, nor did I want to. “She showed up at the shop yesterday.”

“Did you get a good image of her on the security cameras?”

“No, Dad. Leslie and I were at the shop. I was giving him new ink. I saw her myself.”

“You did?” His pitch jumped up a notch.

“Unfortunately.”

“Corey! How could you say that?”

The anger swept unbidden through me. “She’s no mother of mine. You’re the only one who thinks she can still be saved.” I thought about the woman who stood before me and got up from the couch, my feet moving of their own accord back and forth across the living room. “She wants to pretend that everything is fine, that we should ignore the past.” My voice rose. “And maybe if she’d attempted to get clean in the last few years, I might be willing to listen to you, but she hasn’t. She reeked of alcohol. I could see fresh track marks on her arm. Why in the hell would I let her into my life? So she can get money from me, then disappear again? I won’t fall into that trap.”

Once my anger was spent, my heart ached. These were things I’d never said to my father. I’d let him think for years I didn’t know why she’d come back. It was only when my dad told her no that she stayed away for good.

“She’s sick.”

“I might have agreed if she tried to stay sober. Hell, I don’t think she ever got sober.”

“What do you mean by that?” Dad’s tone was defensive. I hated hitting him with the truth, but I felt like it was the only way for him to understand my side. To really see why I didn’t want to find or save her.

“I think she only came home when she ran out of money. Pretended to play family to get cash. When she got what she wanted, she raced off into the night. You didn’t think I saw it, but I did.”

“You knew?”

“Of course, I also knew you cut her off from the money when I was fourteen.”

“Corey,” Dad sighed. “She was sick. I thought by giving her the money she’d want to stay. Eventually, I realized that wasn’t helping her and if I really wanted to help her, I had to cut her off.”

“And now you want to save her again.”

“If she’s back in Espen, it means she came for our help. She wants to get better to be a family.”

“Bullshit. She wants money, nothing else.”

“Don’t say that. We need to work together to find her. I can start calling around to motels and shelters. Maybe there’s something on your security cameras that will give us a hint.”

I tightened my grip on the phone, afraid if I squeezed anymore I might break it. “I have no intention of helping to find her. I told her to fuck off and get lost.”

“Corey,” Dad reprimanded. “I will not let you talk about your mother that way.”

I froze. “Then I don’t think there’s anything else for us to say to each other.” And for the first time in my life, I hung up on my dad without saying goodbye.

My heart ached. Like someone had taken a shot with a puck directly at my chest with no padding. With the heel of my hand, I rubbed the area, hoping to ease the pain, but nothing helped.

I wanted to call Leslie, talk it through with him, but I knew they had another game tomorrow. I didn’t want to mess with his concentration when he needed sleep. Emotionally, I didn’t think I had anything left in me.

If he was here, I wouldn’t need to talk. I could lay against him and let his strong arms hold me tight. Since it wasn’t an option, I trudged to the bedroom. Undoing my pants, I let them fall to the floor, followed by my shirt. I didn’t bother with showering.

The sheets were cool as I slipped beneath them. I lay my head on the pillow and closed my eyes, trying to sleep. The conversations with my dad, Leslie, and my mother ran through my head on repeat.

I did my best to shut the voices off and get some sleep.