She moved into a rooming house a few miles off her college campus the next day. She didn’t waste time explaining her decision to her mother. She’d learned the hard way, her mother’s maternal instinct ended after gestation.
She met Ozzy right after the move. He promised to help her, love her. Six months of hot and cold, back and forth, love and hate, seemed she was more like her mother than she’d thought. They’d broken up a week ago, this time for good.
Her middle name should’ve been Murphy’s Law because whatever could go wrong in her life, had. The only thing that had gone right was this job, and that was because of Scarla.
She had thirty-eight dollars in her bank account and that wouldn’t pay the rent on her room. So, she’d better suck it up, quickly.
This was her train of thought as she struggled under the weight of a rack of clean glasses, bringing them from the kitchen to the bar when the loud boom, boom, boom of knuckles meeting wood echoed in the crowded bar.
She refused to turn around because damn it, she couldn’t see out of her blurry eyes. Blaming it on sweat wouldn’t work when snot leaked out of her nose and she couldn’t string together a sentence without sobbing.
“Hey. I’m talking to you!”
“You and everyone else in the bar, buddy.” She dragged an arm across her cheeks. The three bartenders, all women who seemed to swim while she drowned, stopped to gape at her.
What? She wanted to say. There was only so much a person could take. Scarla warned her the bar would get busy, but this—this was—
“All right, get your shit. You’re fired.”
The rack slipped from her fingers and onto her feet. Glass shattered around her. Sophie ignored the pain racing up her calves and the shards littering the floor to whip around and plead for her job. The apology withered on her tongue as she stared into pewter eyes she’d never forgotten.
UnHallowed, she thought and swallowed the sudden lump in her throat. She’d seen him once in their sophomore year of high school at the homecoming dance. As Scarla’s best—only—friend, she’d been warned about the “uncles.” Warned they were unique. Warned they were special. Sophie humored her bestie…until she met the uncles and saw the wings sprouting from their backs. Turned out, they weren’t the only ones special. Some humans could see them. She found out very young children could see the celestial world but lost the ability by the age of three. Some didn’t. She was among the few who kept the ability.
Too timid to look Chayyliél, Daghony, and Kushiél in the eye, she stared at her feet during the introductions behind the gym and took to heart the warnings to never divulge what she knew of them to anyone.
Now, she couldn’t look away from the ruggedly handsome UnHallowed glaring at her. His face was all angles from his square jaw to his sharp nose, and the ridge of his eyebrows. His hair was long, brown, and tousled as if he’d rolled out of bed seconds ago from a long passionate night. Her mouth dried at the lurid image now stuck in her brain.
Scarla hadn’t warned her that the UnHallowed would be here, at the bar. Be her boss since he’d just fired her.
She knew one of the fallen angels owned the bar under an alias, except Scarla ran it, even though she wasn’t present. Did Chay approve of the hire? More importantly, did he remember her?
In one fluid motion, Chay climbed over the bar—real hygienic—and landed next to her. She stumbled back, her shoulder knocking into the bottom shelf of premium liquor lining the rear wall. Bottles crashed around her, adding to the carnage.
“I’m sorry, sorry.” She spun, tried to stop any more from falling, and knocked more off. “Oh, God.” She panicked, hyperventilating. Suddenly, an arm banded around her waist and she was jerked backward into a hard chest. She yelped and covered her head until her feet touched solid ground three feet from where she’d stood.
Even then, she kept her hands up, sheltering her head and face.
The abrupt silence in the bar competed with her heart banging against her ribs. Sophie peeked through her fingers, first at the crowd staring at her, then her ex-boss. Her hands dropped to her sides at the fury twisting his handsome face.
“Who hit you?”
Startled by the question, Sophie shook her head, hard enough for her ponytail to smack her cheeks. “No one.” She adjusted the shirt collar, hoping she hadn’t sweated through the concealer.
“Come with me.” He didn’t wait for an answer, just assumed she would follow as he pushed through the swinging doors and marched into the kitchen.
Sophie obeyed. She needed the job. In her defense, Chay wasn’t the person that hired her. By the way the staff got out of his way as he stomped through the kitchen, he was the head man in charge, and not only did she damage property and cost him money, she’d made a complete fool of herself.
Oh well, there was no dignity in starving.
Her boss didn’t stop until he reached a back office. Then he stepped aside for her to enter, the perfect gentleman. She flinched as the door slammed closed behind her.
“There is only one reason a woman cowers and covers her face and head the way you did. Tell me his name and you can have your job back.”
Was it the voice or the subtle threat laced in his words? Either way, warmth spread to all her limbs, followed by a rash of goosebumps, and a dry mouth. She had to clear her throat to say, “He’s in jail.” She lied.
The tension in his shoulders ebbed and a fraction of warmth returned to his stark features as a barely there smile teased her. “Name and which jail.”
“I’ll get my stuff and get out of here.” She edged toward the door.
“Let me guess. He’s the love of your life and he promised to never hit you again because he’s found religion.”
The sandpaper tone of his voice rubbed every nerve in her body. How could he judge her when he knew nothing about her? “You don’t know me, so don’t—just don’t—” She couldn’t finish the sentence with that demonic gaze drilling into her. She spun, intending to yank open the door and flip him the finger once she crossed the threshold. The plan would’ve worked if the door had cooperated. No matter how much she turned to knob, it wouldn’t budge.
“You’re right. I don’t know you.” The sandpaper was gone from his voice, leaving a deep smooth voice that now caressed her frazzled nerves.
That wasn’t an apology, though his short speech stopped her struggle to escape and had her wheeling around to face him. She refused to accept pity. That’s why she hadn’t told Scarla. She wanted a J-O-B and nothing else.
His gaze, those silvery eyes of his, took a stroll down her body, and she’d swear he touched her.
And that’s when her nipples pebbled, and heat gathered down below. Her mind recoiled. Male attention was the last thing she wanted.
“You need to get back to work…” He paused, and an eyebrow arched with a silent question.
She touched her chest. “Sophie, Sophie Charles.”
His brow knit together. “Sophie? Scarla’s friend? Sophie from high school?”
She nodded once and found herself smoothing the hair away from her face and straightening her shirt.
He gave her another appraising glance. This time clinical without the heat that had her nipples drilling through her bra.
“Get back to work, Miss Charles.”
“Of course, sir, and thanks for not firing me.” Her hand kept slipping on the knob. She couldn’t get a grip to get the hell out of the room before he changed his mind. She dragged her palm over her thigh and finally managed to open the door. One step over the threshold and his voice stopped her again.
“Break one more thing and it’s coming out of your paycheck.”
She glanced over her shoulder at him, but it turned into a stare. Those eyes of his soaked into her, saw things she didn’t want anyone to see, especially a boss that put the s in sexy. “Okay.”
If only she’d stayed when Ozzy came sweet talking, instead of giving him another chance.
The water cut off in t
he shower and she heard the sliding glass door open in time to save her from more pointless memories. Thank God. Her head was about to fall off. She’d dropped her head into her hand and closed her eyes. The bathroom door opened, and her mother yelped.
“Sorry, I need some Tylenol or Advil, anything you—” Her words died as she caught sight of Ellen standing naked in the bathroom doorway. Her nudity wasn’t what had startled Sophie. It was the pink scar running horizontally across her chest where her left breast used to be.
“Y-you h-had a mastectomy?” Recently? “And didn’t tell me?”
Ellen spun and snatched a towel off a nearby rack inside the bathroom. That’s when Sophie saw the wispy strands of hair circling a bald patch encompassing the back of Ellen’s head.
“There wasn’t much to tell.” Ellen shielded her body. “I…ah… I found a lump. Ignored it for a while,” she whispered.
“What?” Sophie’s voice rose. “You ignored it? For how long?”
Ellen ducked her head. “A year.”
Thank God Sophie was sitting because the pounding in her head drained to her heart and all her muscles.
“I finally went in May. The mastectomy happened two months ago.”
Two months ago. That was in July. What was she doing in July that she couldn’t be here for her mother? “Why didn’t you tell me, Ellen?”
She failed at a casual shrug and ended up wringing her fingers. “What was there to tell? I didn’t know how to pick up the phone and say, ‘Hi, I have cancer. My breast has to be hacked off.’” The words seemed to choke her. “I-I couldn’t find the words, especially when we hadn’t been talking.”
True enough, and didn’t that make her feel like shit. “I’m… I’m so sor—”
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” Ellen sat beside her on the bench. “It’s not your fault I was a lousy mother. The men I picked left much to be desired…and I-I picked them over you and Caleb. ‘Weak is the flesh’, your grandmother used to say, and I’m living proof.”
Tears glittering in her eyes, Ellen took Sophie’s hand. “I’m glad you came today. I’m glad you’re here and I’m not saying this in a letter you find after I’m dead. I never got to apologize to Caleb, I will die with that on my conscience.” She wiped her wet cheeks. “But I won’t die without telling you how much I love you, and how proud of you I am.”
A sob ripped from Sophie’s throat and next she was in Ellen’s arms bawling, clinging to her as if she were still a child. In that moment, that’s exactly what she was, a little girl in need of her mother.
Sometime later, Ellen gently nudged Sophie off her shoulder. “Can I ask a favor of you?” Unable to get her vocal cords working, Sophie nodded. “I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow at noon. Bobby won’t be home by then. Can you go with me?”
Sophie choked on a well of emotion. She scrubbed her arm across her wet face and under her runny nose. Only then did she manage to croak, “Yes, Mom. I’ll go with you.”
Chapter Twelve
Was it a cliché to say everyone hated hospitals? Sophie had spent her fair share inside emergency rooms explaining how she tripped and got a black eye, fell down the stairs and fractured her ribs, and then there was the long hospital stay after Ozzy’s death.
Sophie pushed it all away as she and her mother cut through the emergency department. Now wasn’t the time for the past to come visiting.
“Parking is really bad today. Normally, I don’t have to park in the E.R. to get to the oncology suite.” Ellen’s low voice trembled, along with her body. “I hope you don’t get towed.”
Sophie placed a reassuring hand on her back, noticed how she could feel the sharp edges of her shoulders and the bony points of her spine. “It’ll be okay, Mom.” At her touch, a fraction of the tension eased out of Ellen and she seemed to relax.
Ellen led them to a corridor that took them to a different wing of the hospital. A bank of elevators took them to the third floor. A few more twists and turns brought them to the glass doors of the oncology suite. Soft, muted music filled the floral scented air. Combined with the neutral color scheme of greenish blue and tan, the room had a calming effect. The staff greeted her mother by her first name and one even came from behind the glass partitioned desk to hug her.
“Karen, this is my daughter, Sophie.”
The nurse smothered Sophie in a perfumed embrace. “She talks about you all the time.”
Now that surprised her, but after everything her mother had been through, perhaps not. Which added another layer of guilt.
“I’m glad you’re here. She comes to these appointments by herself all the time.” Karen patted Sophie’s arm.
What the hell? Where was Bobby, the loving husband, that he couldn’t make any appointment? Her gaze cut to her mother for the answer to the question she didn’t voice.
“Mrs. Garner, we’re ready for you to come back.” A different nurse called from an open doorway.
“Can my daughter come with me?”
The nurse smiled and nodded. “She sure can.”
They followed the nurse down a hallway, past a few patients that looked as bad as her mother. They had that gaunt, tiredness of a person that had seen enough and was at the end of their journey, literally living second to second. Sophie wouldn’t be surprised to see Daeden or one of his ilk on standby to collect souls. The thought left her knees shaking so hard, she collapsed onto the chair inside of the examination room.
She closed her eyes as Ellen changed into a paper gown. Not so much to respect her privacy. Sophie wasn’t prepared to see the scar again. Call her shallow, but her left breast ached in sympathy. The nurse returned and took her mother’s blood pressure, temperature, asked her a few questions about her medications and her overall health.
“I’ve been good. Not too bad. No real appetite, and…um…I think I felt something in my breast,” she mumbled.
Sophie heard every stilted word and the bottom fell out of her stomach.
The nurse wrote something down on a notepad and stuffed it back in her pocket. “All right, Mrs. Garner, Dr. Lacey will be in shortly.”
As the door closed behind the nurse, Sophie lunged to her feet. “You felt a lump?” She couldn’t stop the hitch in her voice.
Her mother refused to meet her gaze. “It’s probably nothing,” she mumbled, almost too low to hear.
A quiet panic settled in Sophie’s bones. She shoved her hands into the pocket of her jeans to hide the trembling from herself and her mother. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s nothing.” The left side wasn’t nothing. Jesus. I can’t do this! A vise clamped around her chest and breathing became impossible. She hitched her purse higher on her shoulder and eyed the closed door. Three quick steps and she would be in the hallway. All she had to do was tell Ellen she’d be in the waiting room.
Yet as her gaze skimmed her mother’s hunched shoulders, her white knuckles gripping the edge of the examination table, her pinched face, she knew Ellen didn’t believe her own words. What she’d said was for Sophie’s benefit, not hers. Oh, God.
A deep, rattling cough shook her mother’s thin frame as the door swung open and the doctor entered. He was an older version of Tom Hanks, only kinder eyes if that were even possible. His easy greeting and warm smile had Ellen relaxing her shoulders and Sophie breathing for the first time since she entered the building.
“Hello there, young lady.” He gave her mother a gentle hug and then studied Sophie. “Who’s with you today?”
“This is my daughter, Sophie.”
“So, this is the little girl you talk so much about. Well, she a beautiful woman, not the tween you made her out to be.” He winked at Sophie and shook her hand.
Sophie tried not to cling, her relief that great. The doctor had arrived. Now everything would be okay.
Ellen chuckled, which sent her into another round of coughing. “She’s visiting. She’ll be leaving me after this appointment.”
“Well, I hope you two had a nice visit.” He pull
ed a stethoscope out of his pocket. “How long have you had that cough?”
“Um. A week or so.”
Dr. Lacey listened to her lungs as she inhaled deeply, nodding between the agonizing pull of air. Sophie wasn’t a doctor yet even she knew how bad it sounded.
He put his stethoscope away and motioned her to lie down. “Hannah said you felt something?” Her mother nodded, her gaze fixed on the ceiling tiles. “Can you show me where?”
Ellen took her left hand and slipped it between the slight part in her gown. It only took a few seconds for her to stop and say, “Right here.”
Dr. Lacey slipped on a pair of gloves. He parted the gown, exposing her right breast. He touched the area her mother pointed to, then widened his examination until he’d probed the entire breast and underarm, his neutral expression slowly driving Sophie insane.
Quickly, he examined the mastectomy scar on the left side and closed her gown. “I agree with you feeling something there. You also have an area in your underarm I want a look at. Let me see if they have room to do an MRI today. I believe they’ve had some cancellations. I’ll be right back.” He patted her knee, tossed a careful smile at Sophie, and left.
Ellen sat up, the rustling of her paper gown the only sound in the room, and she held it closed with one hand. So many words crowded Sophie’s brain, things she wanted, needed to say. Too bad her tongue had withered to a slab of jerky in her dry mouth.
Four steps pivot, four steps pivot, was all she could manage in the tiny room.
“It’s gonna be okay, sweetie.” Her mother got up and blocked Sophie’s path, breaking her caged animal pacing. She squeezed Sophie’s shoulder and stroked her bare arm. Palm to palm, their hands clasped, fingers threaded together in a show of unity. “Thank you for being here.”
Sophie dashed away the tears spilling from her eyes. “Thanks for asking me.”
Dr. Lacey had them booked for a one o’clock MRI appointment. Enough time to have lunch and people watch. They took their food—a salad for Sophie, soup and a sandwich for Ellen—out onto the cafeteria balcony. A young couple sat on a bench, roasting in the sunlight. Though, they didn’t seem bothered by the heat. They sat close, whispering and giggling, sneaking quick pecks. That had never been Sophie. She never had anyone in her life she could do that with, not that she could count higher than one. Ozzy. Fucking, piece of shit bastard.
Only One I'll Have (UnHallowed Series Book 4) Page 9