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Without moving a muscle or blinking an eye, she glares at me. “No. Seventy-five thousand.”
Leaning back in my chair, I rake a hand through my hair. “Are you kidding me?”
She shoots me another wry smile. “You heard me. Would you like me to write it out?”
“For crying out loud…”
“I was dealt a couple of bad hands.”
“A couple? How long were you at the tables?”
“Too long. But not long enough to recoup my losses.”
I swear under my breath. First twenty-five hundred. Then five grand. Now, this. I’m so furious with this woman my eyeballs throb, and my brain may implode.
For a few brief seconds, I study her, my eyes flitting from her pinched face to the one framed photo on my desk. A sepia portrait of my mother in her heyday. With her sharp features, dark beady eyes, graying hair, and thin lips, Rena is nothing like Maman with her sensuous features—alluring blue eyes, lush lips, and lustrous blonde hair, the soft waves cascading over her shoulders. I miss my mother so much. She’d tell my father to wrest me out of this mess. Once and for all.
Rena breaks into my thoughts. “They’re threatening to?—”
My blood pressure skyrocketing, I bark at her, “Who’s ‘they’?”
“Some loan sharks. They’re not very nice. Or patient. Or forgiving.”
“I see.” My voice is cool, but inside I’m simmering. “Maybe I can offer them my firstborn.”
My mother-in-law is not amused. “That’s not funny. They mean business…and apparently, they know about some ugly skeletons in the closet.”
“Yours or mine?”
“Both.”
A chill skitters down my spine. What do they have on me?
Her lips press tight as she folds her scrawny arms across her chest. “You can give me the money nicely or they can do it their way. They know where you live and work.”
“Jesus,” I mutter before huffing out a breath. Without another word, I yank my top desk drawer open and pull out my check ledger. I open it to a new check. Head bowed, I reach for my gold-trimmed Montblanc pen and hastily write out a check for cash. Seventy-five thousand dollars. The words barely legible. Then hand it to her.
She casts her eyes down at the signed yellow piece of paper and simpers. “Honestly, Ned, with your handwriting you should have been a doctor. They make good husbands.”
She folds the check in half and stuffs it into a pocket. Not even a thank-you. Just another smug smile. I hate her.
I slam my ledger shut and shoot her eye daggers. “This is the last time.” My voice rises. “The last time. Do you hear me, Rena?”
And I mean it. My trust fund is down to a dangerously low level, and all my credit cards are reaching their limits. My financial manager has told me I need to curb my spending. No more six-figure cars.
She snorts. “My dear son-in-law, I have ears.”
With that, she does an about-face and marches toward the door. Click-clack. Click-clack. Her ramrod posture as good as a soldier’s. The rapid sound of her heels reminding me of gunshots.
My desk drawer still open, I reach inside it one more time, my fingers curling around a cold metal object. My Glock. She’s right. There are ugly skeletons in my closet.
My heartbeat accelerates. Damn Rena. Damn my arrhythmia.
I reach for my meds, then slam the drawer shut.
That woman’s going to be the death of me.
TWENTY-THREE
