Page 22 of Knockout Queen

Fuck that.

“Listen, all you have to do is get me the tape. I’ll send it out to the colleges in the area. It would help if you tell me what colleges you’d actually like to go to though. What’s the poster you have in the room? There’s a big S...”

“State,” Oscar says automatically. His cheeks burn afterward, and he looks away.

I smile. “State. Good. I’ll send it there. Do I have to talk to the coach at the school? Do you have footage in your room? Where can I find the highlights of your career?”

He grinds his teeth together but answers me anyway. “My mom has some from Spring Hill. I can find that. I guess. Even though it’s dumb. It’s pointless.”

I make a mental note to get in contact with the Rawley High football coach, too. Oscar not playing football would be a travesty.

“It’s a waste of time,” he says again, trying to drive the point home.

“Don’t care,” I tell him with a quick smile. “I have time.”

He raises his brows. “Oh, you have time? In between finding your one boyfriend who was kidnapped, staying out of the way of the police, and K and—”

I press my finger to his lips to stop him from talking. “I always have time for you, and this is important.”

He takes a deep breath, his solid shoulders moving under his shirt. It always amazes me how lithe and muscular he looks even under regular clothes. I’m glad I went to my old suite and put on some actual clothes rather than the joggers I’ve been living in. Sure, I’m wearing a belly shirt under a pair of overalls with a jacket over all of it, definitely not clothes I’m used to or comfortable wearing, but it doesn’t matter. Oscar uses his free hand to thread through my hair at the nape of my neck. He tugs a little, just enough to let me know he has a fistful. “I love that you care, but I have a hard time believing anything good is going to come out of all of this.” He swallows then glances away like he’s ashamed. “Can we go in there and ask this prick about my mom now?”

I push up on my tiptoes and give Oscar a solid kiss on the mouth. His grip tightens once more until I step back. “Yes, we can go find your mom now.”

He starts to walk toward a rusted door on the side of the building but stops again. Without turning around, he says, “I’m worried about what you might see if we find my mom. If she’s like before...”

I can read the apprehension in his tight shoulders. “Your mom needs help. That’s all.”

“She wasn’t always like this.”

“I know,” I tell him, swallowing the serious lump in my throat that’s now forming. “It doesn’t matter what we find. I’m here.”

Oscar hesitates for only another fraction of a second before leading me toward the door again. The hinges creak when he opens the solid metal. The sound echoes through the vast room. Shadows shift, and it takes a second for my eyes to adjust before I realize there are people inside. They’re squinting into the light the open door provides. The inhabitants are disheveled. Dirty. Lost.

I hold onto Oscar’s hand tighter.

He scans the room. “I’m looking for Cynthia Drego. Anyone seen her? I’m her son.”

A bunch of grumbles accompany his question, but it doesn’t deter him. We move further into the old building that looks like it used to be a factory. Metal beams are still shoved horizontally into one corner that people are using as a flat surface to play cards on.

“Cynthia Drego?” Oscar calls out again. “I’m her son.”

People glance up disinterestedly then return right back to what they were doing. Some are just staring aimlessly, only shifting their gaze to watch us briefly before returning to stare off into the distance.

He calls out a few more times before we get to the back of the big room. Plastic flaps fall over a cement door-shaped hole in the wall. Oscar brushes them aside and moves in. A guy in his mid-twenties with loose, curly hair to his ears glances up and stops what he’s doing. “Dealing? Or personal?”

“Neither,” Oscar says.

The guy’s brows sharpen as he inspects us even closer. He lingers on the bruising on my face. “What is it then?”

“Looking for my mom.” Oscar lets go of my hand and crosses his arms. “Cynthia Drego. She’s about five foot four. Brown hair. Kind of frail looking. Probably high. My coloring.”

The guy shrugs. “Don’t know. She buy direct?”

“Listen,” Oscar says. “I’m just her son. I want to make sure she’s eating and shit. I’m not looking for anything else.”

“Still don’t know,” the guy says, shrugging like he couldn’t care less. It’s obvious he wants to blow us off. “Did you check her usual places?”

Oscar nods stiffly beside me.

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