Now Or Never (Irresistible 5)

New lingerie aside, I was indeed freshly waxed and it was finally fucking Wednesday. I couldn’t wait to see Iain, and it didn’t help that I was about to put the finishing touches of planning for his birthday this weekend. I’d confirmed with him yesterday that he could really take off both Saturday and Sunday, and since he’d said yes, I’d been narrowing down my choices of bed and breakfasts.

Now if you’ll just respond to my latest texts, that’d be perfect, I thought, smiling wryly as I imagined Iain’s reaction to the pictures I’d sent today.

And just as I did, my phone buzzed on my table.

There he is.

I grabbed it excitedly, but my heart stopped when I looked at the name on the screen.

Mom.

I stared.

Holy shit.

I froze in my chair. Another second ticked by and then my pulse kicked into gear, starting to pound now and getting faster by the second because my phone was still buzzing in my hand.

Because it wasn’t a text. She was calling.

From back home. She was on the other line right this second. Holding her phone to her ear, probably sitting at the edge of her bed as she waited for me to pick up.

It would be our first time hearing each other’s voices in two months.

Nine weeks, to be exact.

That was how long it had been since my mom and I last spoke. How long it had been since she was in the driveway, shoving my dad, screaming at him to stop me with her eyes swollen beyond recognition from crying the entire night. I’d had hot tears in my eyes but no words left on my lips, calmly putting my suitcases in the trunk of the cab that I’d splurged on, because I knew she’d never let me get to the bus stop on foot let alone drive me.

“How could you do this to me? How could you be such an ungrateful little bitch to me?”

First time she called me a bitch. Last words she yelled at me as the car pulled out of the driveway.

And that was how we left off.

Well. Maybe she’s taken these past couple months to think and reflect on why I left home the way I did, I reasoned, swallowing the knot in my throat. But it came right back.

Or maybe she’s finally lost it because withholding contact for two months didn’t break me.

Wishful thinking had me torn, telling myself it could be either. Regardless, I didn’t pick up. I was at work, now wasn’t the time, and I—

Oh God.

A voicemail.

I stared at the little red notification, a chill going up my spine.

But another few seconds of staring and my mind was made. I wasn’t going to listen.

At some point, but not now.

As much as I wanted to believe that she’d called to be reasonable with me, to say she was hurt but she understood why I left, there was a slim chance that those words were actually waiting for me in that voicemail, and I wasn’t about to let her ruin my good day

.

But just as I affirmed that decision with myself, my phone buzzed with a text.

From Iain.

Just the sight of his name on my screen eased my hammering pulse, and with an eager swipe of my thumb, I opened the text.