Page 14 of Skating Towards Danger

Right?

Chapter 4

Paige – Two Days Later

“Paige, the back table needs clearing,” Andrew, my manager and kind of boyfriend, snaps and I roll my eyes but grab the tray, cloth, and spray, not needing a ‘lover’s spat’ while at the workplace—not that you could call it that considering I haven’t screwed him.

It’s more like he wants to get laid, and I refuse, heck, I haven’t even kissed him yet.

It’s his table, but the ass is trying to punish me, and honestly, all it’s making me want to do is dump him because the ass is showing how immature he really is, but then he’ll probably try to ruin my job, and this is the only thing keeping me afloat with the one bedroom I’m renting from the swingers a few blocks away.

Huffing, I quickly load up the tray with the dirty dishes, grab the spray bottle, and scrub the metal table with the cleaning solution.

“I really shouldn’t have shat where I eat,” I mumble before I pick up the full tray, cloth and spray bottle and walk it to the pass.

Matt, the chef, gives me a nod in thanks and takes the tray before I go back to the counter, putting the cloth and bottle down and grab new menus, a cup full of colorings, and a picture before taking it to the back table I just cleaned and place them on there then head back to the counter again, ignoring the ass playing on his phone.

I sit on the stool, grab the napkins and the napkin suspensers, and continue to fill them, something I was doing before Andrew rudely interrupted me.

“Paige!” Andrew snaps, and I look at him with a raised brow because seriously, once okay but twice within a few minutes, I don’t think so, buddy.

He clears his throat at my look before turning his phone around, and I sigh, seeing the headline.

Rose Carmen’s daughter, Paige Carmen, will take part in a tribute during the semi-finals.

Great. There’s a large photo of me and another of my mother and me from when I was five.

Shaking my head, I reload the napkins, hoping he’ll just let it go, knowing my past is off-limits. But does he? Of course not.

“Seriously, you’re not going to explain yourself?!” he snaps, and I look at him sharply and I can’t control my anger.

I demand, “Explain what exactly, Andrew?” he narrows his beady eyes at me, but I don’t back down, and I ask, “Should I explain how my parents were killed in a car crash fifteen years ago, a crash I was in?” his light green eyes widen, “Should I explain that I use to skate like my life depended on it but stoppedafter losing my parents? Or should I explain how I got a call a few days ago about a tribute for my mother and that it would be perfect for me to put my skates on professionally again for the first time since I was sixteen when I finally told my aunt and uncle I couldn’t skate anymore?”

Andres swallows and stutters, “I-I uh, Paige, I…”

Well, he has a brain after all seems as he realizes he just messed up.

I scoff and stand up when I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket and I snap, “My past is off limits, you knew this going into this, so what I have to do in five months’ time in honor of my mother, let it go!”

I storm away into the hallway, leaving him shell-shocked. As soon as I’m away from him, I pull my phone out when it vibrates again and take a deep breath to calm my anger, seeing it’s Uncle Rocco.

I really don’t need him coming to find me and kicking the crap out of my sort of boyfriend, though, if I can figure it out, soon-to-be ex.

“Hey, Uncle Rocco, is this important? I’m at work,” I answer quietly.

“Peanut, I’m sorry to interrupt your day. I uh, look, I know you don’t want anything to do with people who knew your parents, and I know that you don’t want to see Lorenzo, which you haven’t done since you woke up in the hospital.” I flinch hearing that man’s name. “Your aunt wants you home tonight for dinner, and Lorenzo is going to be here with his family.”

I open my mouth to decline because that just seems like a night full of bad memories that I never want to remember, but Uncle Rocco quickly states, “You’ve barely been home, Paige. I miss you, your aunt misses you, and I know agreeing to this tribute is going to be hard on you. Please, please cometo dinner… Lorenzo's son will be here, and he has two small children that will adore you.”

I swallow hard and look down at my sneakers.

After losing Royal, being around infants was hard, really hard, but one night, I was fifteen, I think, I was walking back to my uncle’s after partying and found a little girl, no older than six, shivering and hunched down, trying to hide.

She was lost, and everything inside me wanted to help her, so despite being high, I helped her to the closest police station where, unfortunately for me, my uncle was called because, well, I was high.

The police praised me for helping the little girl who turned out to live in a foster home and got lost on a school trip, but no parents claimed she was missing because she didn’t have any, then put me down for doing drugs.

I volunteered at the local shelter for three years after that.

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