After Hours (InterMix)(35)

“You better not be threatening me,” Amber shot back, ignoring my telepathic commands that she keep her mouth shut, keep him moving toward the exit.

I matched Marco pace for pace, corralling him to the front of the house. “It was obviously a misunderstanding. Confront the guy about it, not the mother of your kid. Okay?”

“I will,” he said, nodding. “Don’t think I won’t.”

“Great. Fine.”

He reached the door and shoved it open. I followed, Amber and Jack a few paces behind me. “I have to head back, the second he’s gone,” I told her over my shoulder.

“Really?”

“Sorry. But yeah. It’s my first week and I can’t lose this job.”

She shot me a bratty, beseeching look but I saw resignation in her eyes. She stayed on the front stoop. Jack was thrashing, wanting to follow his dad or me. Amber set him down, holding his hand tight. I walked down to the driveway a few steps behind Marco, ever the bouncer.

He opened his door, leaning his meaty arm on the top of the window as he called, “Fucking pathetic, calling your sister to back you up.”

My eyes narrowed. “Pathetic that she should need to.”

“Fuck you, Erin. You love this, don’t you? Playing mommy. Feeling all important. Bet you’d take the kid if you could. But he’s my son. Don’t you f*cking forget that.”

My temper was fraying. Amber-words were begging to be said. Mom-words, impulsive and baiting. Don’t you f*cking jump to any conclusions about who his father is, you worthless sack. “Just be a good guy. Chill out and send her the money.”

“I’m a good dad.”

Oh yeah, father of the frigging year. I locked my arms over my chest on the other side of his door. “Don’t let her wind you up,” I said quietly, changing my strategy.

It earned me a relaxing of his bunched shoulders, a softening of his features. If I didn’t hate his guts so much, I could’ve admitted he was actually pretty handsome.

“She knows just what buttons to push,” he said.

“I know that.” I knew them, too, I just chose not to do the pushing. “You’re a dad now. You have to control your own buttons.”

For just a second, I thought I’d calmed him down. Then his expression went dark as a flash thunderstorm. “I’m a grown man. I don’t need no advice from you. You never gave me a chance, not since the first time I met you.”

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. The smallest, meanest sound, plucked right from Amber’s mouth. “The first time I met you, you got wasted and called my little sister a bitch when she asked you to clean up a beer you spilled.”

“I was drunk.”

“Exactly, Marco. Exactly.” I shook my head. “Get back to work. Congratulations on landing a job.” I’d meant the last remark sincerely, but given the conversational context, I couldn’t fault him for misconstruing.

“Fuck you, Erin.”

I tossed my hands up and turned away, done with him. I dug my keys from my scrubs’ pocket.

“Yeah, that’s right. Play your little part. Little Miss Better Than Everyone. Like you didn’t grow up with the same slut mom your little slut sister did.”

I whirled around, the world gone crimson as a stab wound. “Get the f*ck out of here,” I said, so quiet and slow and deadly I gave myself chills.

“Truth hurts,” Marco said, and his smug-ass grin was the final straw. When he got inside his cab and slammed the door, I spat on his windshield and gave him the finger. In the half second it took, my brain screamed Mistake! ten thousand times over.

His door flew open.

“You f*cking touch my truck—”

Logic told me to run but my body was marching to meet his, some idiot bit of my programming thirsty for blood and shrieking Mama bear! Activate! I fisted my car key and slammed it against his gleaming hood, drew it with a squeal down the perfect, glossy red paint, and wished with every cell in my body I was rending his chest open.

Then his hands were around my arms, thumbs digging into my flesh. Thoughtless, I drove my fists up between us the way I’d practiced a thousand times in restraints. I broke his hold and thumped his chin. He grunted, and when he opened and closed his mouth his teeth were pink. He must have bitten his tongue.

“You f*cking psycho cunt.”

“Excuse me?” Twice in one week I get cunt hurled at me? I couldn’t hit Lonnie but I could sure as f*ck hit Marco. I came at him flailing, but he grabbed my arms again and shook me hard.