Page 65 of Every Broken Piece
She looks nothing like Tess.
This woman is brittle, fragile, but not delicate. Every wrong decision, every difficult path is marked on her skinny body and in the premature lines of her hard face. I don’t know how old she is. I haven’t had a chance to read the report Jack sent me a few hours ago, but I can guess that she’s far younger than she looks. If I didn’t know her life story, I’d estimate that she’s in her mid-sixties. Since I do know her life story, she’s probably closer to late forties, early fifties.
She stops a good distance from me, far enough that I can’t grab her. She knows. She understands how vulnerable she can be around a big guy like me.
Her eyes dart to Roger, who’s watching her but hasn’t moved and won’t unless I need him to.
It’s March in Ohio. I don’t know much about Ohio weather, but it’s mid-thirties right now. She’s dressed in a stained, baggy Cincinnati Cyclones sweatshirt that hangs almost to her knees,and sagging leggings. If she weighs more than ninety pounds I’d be surprised. Her cheeks are hollowed out. Her over-processed, brassy blonde hair hangs limp and frizzy. She has open sores on lips that she nervously licks.
Tess has her eyes, those caramel-colored eyes. But where Tess’s televise every emotion that rolls through them, her mother’s are blank.
Sandra Jansen tips her chin toward the building behind me as she buries her hands in the front pocket of her sweatshirt. I keep my eyes on that pocket in case she has a gun. I’m unarmed but Roger isn’t.
“You don’t live here,” she says with a voice that tells me she’s a three-pack a day smoker.
“I’m sorry, who are you?”
A lick of dry, chapped, and peeling lips. Her foot jiggles and her eyes dart from Robert to the building, to my groceries, to me, then up the street.
“I seen you,” she says, her gaze landing on me but not for long. She pulls her hand out of her pocket—thankfully it’s not holding a weapon—and taps the side of her leg with her fingers, before shoving her hand back in the pocket. “At the hospital. You’re Theresa’s fiancé.”
Tess’s name coming out of this woman’s mouth has bile crawling up my throat. I lift my brows. “Who are you?” I ask again.
She slides to the right, pulls her hand from the hoodie and touches my car. Her nails are bitten to the quick, her cuticles red and raw. “Nice ride.”
“Look, lady, I have to get these upstairs.” I lift the bags of groceries. “Say what you came to say.”
Her eyes jump to mine. Another lick of the lips. She’s missing a few back teeth. Meth will do that to you. “I came to see my daughter.”
“She doesn’t want to see you.”
Fury, swift and ferocious, darkens her expression, hardens her eyes. “Who the fuck are you to tell me that?”
“Her fucking fiancé.”
She takes a step closer. She’s within striking distance—me to her, and her to me—but doesn’t seem to notice or care. “Yeah? You really engaged to my Theresa?” She assesses my car once again.
“She’s notyourTheresa. She’smyTheresa.”
I need to cool my shit. I let her get to me, thinking she has a right to a daughter she treated like crap her whole life. I don’t know what Sandra Jansen has to do with Tess’s attack, but I’d bet my corporation she had something to do with it. No way in hell I’m letting her near Tess.
Her expression is calculating, those hard eyes sweeping over my shoes, my watch, my car, to Roger who’s watching all of this go down.
“She landed herself a rich one.”
“Fuck off, lady.” I move toward the steps leading to the apartment building door, my anger at a dangerously explosive point, when bony fingers dig into my bicep. Immediately I shake her off, dropping the bags of groceries. Roger pulls his weapon but keeps it near his outer thigh.
I step into her personal space. She takes a hurried, stumbling step back, eyes widening. “Don’tevertouch me again.” For every step I advance, she retreats two. “And don’t ever contact Tess again.”
She pulls her shoulders back. “She’s my kid. I have rights and you can’t keep me from her. Besides, she owes me.”
Oh, hell no. This woman isnotgoing to guilt Tess into helping her out of whatever jam she got herself into.
“You gave up your rights the minute you became a shit mother. She wants nothing to do with you. And just to be clear, in caseyou’re confused. She’s mine.” I crowd her until she’s backing into the street, looking both ways, for help or escape I don’t know. I’m too far inside my own anger to give a shit what she’s thinking. “I protect what’s mine, Sandra. I’ll do what it takes to keep her safe. And if I ever find out that you’re behind that attack on Tess, I will tear this fucking city apart to find you. Are we clear?”
Her eyes are wide. She shrinks into herself, curling her shoulders and wrapping scrawny arms around her middle. She came here thinking she’d shake money out of me. She’ll walk away with my threats in her ears and hopefully take them back to whoever assaulted Tess. But if Sandra Jansen thinks she’s seen the last of me she’s wrong.
“We clear, Sandra?”
