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“Is there something wrong with the food?” Crash asked.

“Not at all,” Kitty sniffed, perfecting the role of the victim.

“Aw, come on, Mama. You’ve got to keep your strength up,” I smiled sweetly. “You’ll be no good to anyone if you starve yourself. We all know how much you like playing boss lady.”

“Well, you’d know all about being starved for food, wouldn’t you? How long was it you were Alex’s little slave for again?” She asked, her voice equally sweet as my own.

I gave her a fake little laugh.

“Alright, does someone want to tell me what’s going on here?” Crash demanded, looking back and forth at us.

“Nothing at all,” I said. “Mama is just having a hard time playing nice, aren’t you, Mama?”

“Why should I play nice with a murderer?”

“Damn. I guess Dante and Crash should leave the room then, huh?”

“There’s murder, and then there’smurder. What you did was for your own benefit, not the clubs.”

“Fuck me, never become a historian, will you? Because your ability to retain facts is shocking.”

“Let’s just put an end to this before it escalates,” Dante said, throwing me a look.

“Fine,” I said with a shrug, picking my plate back up. “This chicken is amazing… Was it breast?”

“Um… yes?” Crash asked, giving me a strange glance.

“And did you use the knife with the leather handle to cut it up?” I kept my face neutral, my tone innocent.

“Why do you ask?”

“I just figured it sliced through Macbeth easily enough, so I bet it made easy work of this chicken.”

“You—” Mama was on her feet in an instant, lunging over the table at me. Dante dropped his plate to the floor and grabbed her around her waist, pulling her away from me.

“There’s a special place in hell for fucking psychos like you!” she screamed at me, straining against her son to get free.

“It’s called a fucking throne,” I laughed back, getting to my feet. Crash stood up at the same time, shooting me a warning look.

“Is there any fucking need?” Dante snapped at me, throwing his mother in the direction of Crash, who dragged her out of the room.

“Oh, don’t you fucking start!” I snapped at him. “She started it. Are you honestly expecting me to stay silent and let her get away with her pathetic attempts to hurt me?”

“You know what she’s like and—”

“No. Nu-uh. Don’t you dare finish that sentence. Idoknow what she’s like, because you all let her be that way! I’m sorry, but I’m not going to be spoken to like that by anyone. I don’t let my own mother speak to me that way, so I’m certainly not going to let yours.”

“For the sake of peace, can’t you just learn to let it wash off you?”

“Who disturbed the peace here? You’re directing your anger at the wrong person, Dante. You need to be having a talk with your mother because I willneverallow myself to be disrespected. Not by you, and certainly not by fucking her. Yet another reason I don’t want to be here.”

“Oh, here we go again,” he sighed, tipping his head back in frustration. “It always comes back to being a member of this fucking club!”

“Because my reasons are fucking valid, and you’re not willing to listen to them! It’s always the same shit – calm down, we’re okay, nothing is going to happen. And yet every five fucking minutes, something is happening! I shouldn’t be fending off attacks from your mother every five fucking minutes. Attacks you should be defending me from, by the way!”

“I have done, Rachel. Many fucking times. Just because you don’t see it or hear it doesn’t mean I’m not doing it. You know damn well that if you’re giving as good as you get, and I jump in defending you, you’ll turn your anger on me and tell me you don’t need me defending you! I’m damned if I do, and damned if I goddamn don’t!”

“I shouldn’t have to keep giving as good as I’m getting! If you weren’t such a fucking mummy’s boy, you’d tell her to shut up in a way that actually gets through to her thick skull that she needs to shut the fuck up! I can’t spend the rest of my life with her hanging over my shoulder waiting for me to fuck up!”

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