Reckless Temptations (Tempted #4)(35)

I called back and left a message, and did the number one move every girl does when she’s been shunted—I lied through my teeth.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to call you.”

He would know it was a lie.

How many Tigers can one person have stored in their phone? I changed his name in my phone to dickhead after that.

Two more weeks went by and still not a word. One would think that I would’ve gotten the hint by now, but nope, I still stared at my phone hoping he’d have a change of heart. Things got progressively worse on my end and Mia and I needed to vacate our apartment.

The jig was up.

No job.

No place to live.

Mia was moving back home with her parents, and why not? She wasn’t pretending to be someone she wasn’t. Me? I had to come clean, once and for all. I had no other choice.

Anthony and Adrianna had asked my mother and I to come home for the weekend. This brought on my anxiety about bumping into Riggs. What would I do? What would I say? Then I drove myself crazy thinking about what he would do. Would he ignore me? Would he smile at me? Would he be with someone else?

I didn’t have a broken heart, but I had a broken ego—I think that hurt just as much. The more I thought about it, the more my sadness turned to anger. I shouldn’t care about seeing him, and I shouldn’t give a shit if he was with another girl. I had bigger fish to fry. I should be concerned about telling my family about nursing school and the fact my ass was broke with no place to live. Instead, I was mulling over some douche bag who probably didn’t even give me a second thought. A douche bag who stuck his dick inside any girl who would let him.

Stupid girl! You let him!

Yeah, I did, even after I saw him with some other girl five minutes before. I dropped my head into my hands and fought back the tears that threatened to spill.

Don’t cry.

Don’t give that bastard that kind of power.

He doesn’t deserve your tears.

But it was no use, they poured from my eyes, three, almost four weeks of unshed tears.

Being the fool sucked.

I cried and cried, letting it all out as I sat alone in my empty apartment waiting for my mother. I cried because I lost my way. I cried because I thought Riggs would help me find it. I cried because I felt like an idiot. I cried because I lost my Tiger and I was no longer Kitten. Again, I was back to being plain old Lauren.

I used to like being plain old me.

What happened to that?

You wanted more, that’s what happened, my conscience reminded me.

The doorbell rang, and I tried to pull myself together. It didn’t do me any good because when you shut your feelings off for so long you become helpless to the emotions.

My emotions owned me.

I wiped at my tears, giving up on hiding my pain from whoever was on the other end of that door and opened it.

My mother’s eyes widened as she took me in. Like so many times before, I saw my pain reflected in her eyes. I wonder if every mother and daughter had that kind of relationship. If they had a mom like mine, the type of mother that owned her daughter’s pain as her own.

She dropped her bag onto the floor, opened her arms wide and I sobbed as I stepped into her embrace.

“Oh, my girl, it’s okay,” she whispered, hugging me tightly as she walked me back into the apartment.

My mother was always my hero and not because my father wasn’t around and she had to be both our mother and our father, but because she knew all the right things to say. She knew how to heal and how to make me feel better. I was blessed with the best mom out there, one who loved fiercely and gave wholeheartedly. I don’t think I will ever be too old, or there will ever come a time when I don’t need her in my life. When the day comes that I have children of my own, I can only hope I’m half the mother to my children she is to me and my brother. One of the best gifts I’ll ever be able to give my children is the gift of her as their grandmother.

She sat us on the couch and went to work on drying my eyes. She didn’t ask questions or try to figure out why I was upset. She didn’t tell me to stop crying but handed me tissues and told me to let it all out. We sat like that for a few minutes, me crying until there were no tears left, and her holding my hand as I sobbed.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, blowing my nose into the tissue before turning toward her.

“Are you ready?” She asked, with love and concern etched in her eyes, the eyes of a worried mom. The eyes of a mother that would always love her children unconditionally. I felt the familiar pang of guilt surface as I realized I should have never doubted my mother in the first place. She would always love me even if she didn’t agree with me. She’d always be my biggest fan, my number one supporter.

“I’m ready,” I whispered.

“Let’s hear it,” she said, squeezing my hand reassuringly.

“I don’t want to be a nurse and I quit the program months ago,” I blurted, blowing out a deep breath. I lifted my eyes back to hers and saw the confusion and shock settle in.

“I don’t understand. What do you mean you don’t want to be a nurse anymore? What happened?” She questioned.

“I can’t do it, mom. It was one thing to memorize a text book and know the ins and outs of the human body, but it was another staring at a body trying to remember every single thing I’ve learned so I could help that person. It was too much responsibility, and it was too heartbreaking to lose my first patient on my very first day,” I explained sadly. “Please don’t try to change my mind,” I started.