Page 7 of Highest Bidder

“What happened?” I closed the door behind her, my heart thudding. “Is it Mom?”

She shook her head. “No. I mean—not yet.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

Her wide eyes brimmed with tears when she looked over at me. “It’s Dad. The people he owed money to—they came to the house.”

I stared at her. “I don’t understand. Dad’s dead.”

“Yeah, well he ended up leaving us an inheritance after all. His loan shark debt.”

I sat down hard, the couch springs creaking beneath me. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

She wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her chin on her knees. “He owed a lot of money to the wrong people, Viv. They said if we don’t pay, they’ll come back.”

“How do they expect you to pay? The son of a bitch left you with nothing.”

“Do you think a guy named Lorenzo with a face full of scars and two goons in matching leather jackets give a shit?”

My stomach dropped. “Did they threaten you?”

“Not directly. But they weren’t exactly subtle. Lorenzo said it’d be a real shame if something happened to Mom’s car. Or the dog. Or her fingers.”

“Jesus Christ.”

Hope wiped her nose with her sleeve. “Mom didn’t want to tell you because it would just give you one more reason to hate Dad. But I didn’t know where else to go. Viv, they started talking about Roscoe and Mom’s fingers!”

My throbbing head made it hard to think. Or maybe it was my rage that had my thoughts jumbled all over the place.

That son of a bitch was still fucking over my mom, even from the grave. She was right about one thing: it was one more thing to add to the list of reasons why I despised my father, even in death.

“Did they say how much time they’d give you?”

“They said we needed to make a payment by Monday.”

“Did they say how much?”

“He said nothing less than a thousand. And that’s just covering the juice.”

“What’s the total amount?”

“Eighty-seven grand. Give or take.”

There was no way we’d ever come up with enough money to get out of that debt. We’d just be making thousand-dollar payments every few weeks in perpetuity.

My eyes dropped to the phoenix tattoo on my wrist, the one I’d gotten the day I’d saved enough money to stop couch surfing and sign the lease on my first apartment. A tiny studio that smelled like old coffee, stale cigarettes, and freedom. I’d sworn that day I’d be out from under my father’s thumb forever.

And yet, here he was, pressing down on my neck from the grave.

Funny, I’d gotten the tattoo to mark the day I’d started my new life. Now I just had a growing sense that maybe I’d never really risen from anything. The ashes were still there.

“We’ll figure something out. I can come up with the thousand by Monday. At least that’ll buy us a little time.”

She sniffled. “I’m sorry to dump this on you—”

I cut her off. “You’re not the one dumping this on me. It was dumped on you, same as it was on Mom, courtesy of dear old Dad. I wish I could say I was surprised.”

We sat in silence. She leaned her head on my shoulder, and for a second, it felt like we were kids again, hiding in the closet during one of Dad’s tirades, hoping he’d pass out before he found us.

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