Rushing the Goal (Assassins #8)(112)

“Yeah,” she agreed, but she knew she could never fully get rid of him.

“Well, let’s just drop it. It’ll get fixed. Angie is fine. Plus, we have a cake tasting for the wedding. Y’all should come. Free cake!”

Oh, God, no.

“We would love to,” Benji said, his arm coming around her shoulders as she looked up at him, wide-eyed. “I love cake. Don’t you love cake?”

She tried to tell him with her face that she’d rather eat a bullet than go taste testing with the almost newlyweds, but apparently Benji didn’t know how to read her face. “Yes. I love cake.”

“Great! It’s at noon, over at Audrey Jane’s. Jayden raves about her, and she is just cute as a button,” Autumn gushed, taking Lucy’s hands. “This will be good. Get your mind off of that trash and try to salvage your weekend.”

“Nothing will salvage this weekend until I know Angie is okay,” she said morosely, and Autumn begged her with her eyes.

“My heart can’t take it, Lucy Lane. I need you to believe with me that our baby is okay.”

“She’s fine,” Benji said then, lacing his fingers with Lucy’s. “But maybe we can get your dad to call Rick’s lawyer and demand a phone call.”

“Oh, good idea,” Lucy said quickly, pulling her dad’s number up. “Mom, River, love you. See you at the bakery.”

Hitting send, she heard Benji saying good-bye as the phone rang. When her dad answered, her stomach dropped. “Hey, honey, how ya doing?”

“I need you to tell me you can call my f*cktard ex-husband’s lawyer and demand I talk to my daughter,” she barked into the phone.

“What’s going on?”

She explained the whole thing, what had been said yesterday, and what was said just minutes before she called him. Her father listened. She could hear him taking notes, and he only asked a few things. But other than that, he let her do the talking. She was standing beside Benji’s car when he walked up, leaning beside it and watching her. He was just as nervous as she was; she could see it all over his face. While that pleased her to no end, it also worried her. Was this the beginning?

The beginning of the f*cking end.

Shutting her eyes, she pinched the bridge of her nose. “I don’t know what to do, but I’m pretty sure shit’s about to get nasty.”

“Yeah,” her dad muttered into the phone. “I’m looking over the parenting plan now, Lucy, and I really don’t think he has to let her call you.”

“What?” she roared. “Dad, I’ve got to talk to my daughter. I have to make sure she is okay.”

“I must have missed this part when we were going over all the details four years ago, or maybe I just assumed he wouldn’t be an * and not let her talk to you.”

A tear leaked out of her closed eyes as Benji’s fingers locked with hers. “Dad, please tell me what to do here.”

“I’ll call his lawyer, scare him a bit, see what I can get done. But I don’t think he’ll go along with it, especially since I told him to take a flying leap at the beginning of the week.” He paused, the sounds of paper being moved around coming through the phone. “Lucy, what are you thinking? What are you wanting to do?”

“I don’t know yet. I want to talk to Angie.”

“Okay. Well, let me call the lawyer, see what I can do. I’ll call you back.”

“Okay, um, er, thanks,” she muttered and then she hung up quickly, feeling dirty for even speaking to him. “I hate that I f*cking need him right now,” she cried, shaking her head. “I hate that I have to depend on him, but I know he’ll get it done because he loves Angie.”

Looking up, she found Benji watching her, nodding his head. “I know, baby. Come here,” he said, bringing her into his arms and kissing the top of her head. “I’m sorry this sucks right now.”

“I just want to talk to her.”

“Can you try calling Heidi? Surely, being a mother, she’d understand.”

That was another great idea. Her lips quivered as she nodded, pulling out of his arms to call Heidi. She answered right away. “Hey, what’s up?”

“Hey! Are you by Angie? Can I talk to her?”

“Oh, no. She’s at home with Rick. She got in trouble this morning for mouthing off or something, I don’t know. So she didn’t get to come with us.”

Lucy began to shake. That liar. “What did she mouth off about?” she asked as calmly as she could.

“I really don’t know. I was in the shower.”

Covering her mouth, she closed her eyes, shaking her head. “She had a hockey game this morning.”

“Oh? Rick said it was canceled.”

I hate him. I hate him so f*cking much. Clearing her throat so she didn’t sob into the phone, she said, “Can you have her call me when you get home?”

“Sure, but just call Rick. He’s home with her.”

“I’ve been calling all morning. He won’t answer my calls,” she bit out, seeing red as everything inside her burned. She wouldn’t bring Heidi into this. As much as she wanted to cuss the woman out and tell her to fix her stupid husband, she knew she wouldn’t. Heidi was a doormat. She was worthless and did whatever Rick said. She wouldn’t side with Lucy. Lucy was pretty sure Heidi wished Lucy and Angie would just disappear. But she saved face, tried to be nice, even though Lucy knew she didn’t give two shits about her. Hell, she heard the shit that woman had talked about her and Angie, saying they were a problem since the very beginning.