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I thought when I could barely breathe through crying, I'd at least get one simple word of comfort from my mother.

Instead, what came through wasn't gentle consolation but a cold, harsh laugh, followed by a near-hysterical rage.

"Ruby Caldwell! Have you lost your fucking mind?"

Mary's voice shot up, so shrill it nearly pierced my eardrum. "So much older? With a daughter? A businessman? Is your brain full of mush?"

I froze, tears hanging on my lashes.

"How did I raise such a stupid daughter?" Mary was hysterical on the other end, breathing like a bull. "Why would some rich old man want you? Tell me! Besides a body full of fat and a clueless poor face, what do you have that's worth anything to that kind of man? They have money, status, women around them who are young and beautiful and thin—he's just using you for variety, cheap fresh meat to amuse himself with!"

"Mom! It's not like that, he's not like that—" I was freezing all over, trying to defend him.

"Shut up! Your dead-beat father said the same shit to me!" Mary wouldn't listen. She dumped out every old grudge, words poisonous as a laced whip. "He drove a nice car, did business, promised me everything—and what happened? While he was screwing that young nurse, he turned around and complained about my stretch marks, said I was crude, said I wasn't classy! Women like us from poor families are just rags to be used and thrown away by rich men! And you dare fantasize about dating some old bastard who could be your father? You're pathetic!!"

"Pathetic" hit like a sledgehammer to my skull.

Blood froze instantly. My heart felt squeezed by an invisible fist, pain choking me.

All my vulnerability, all my confession—rewarded with the most vicious words, dragging me to hell.

"Stop projecting your tragedy from twenty years ago onto me!" I shook violently, screaming through tears into the phone. "Why do you always think I only deserve to be used? Why is it that the moment I get close to a little warmth, you call me pathetic?"

"Because I'm trying to save you! You idiot!" Mary shrieked. "Break it off with him right now! Quit tomorrow! If you see him one more time, I'll disown you—"

"ENOUGH!!"

I screamed and hit end, hurling the phone at the old sofa across from me.

It bounced off the cushion and slid into the dark crevice.

The room sank back into deathly silence.

I collapsed on the rough carpet, gasping for air, face soaked with tears. The pain in my chest crashed over me in waves, cold enough to make my teeth chatter. Mom's words spun in my head like a curse—"body full of fat," "cheap fresh meat," "pathetic."

So in the eyes of my closest person, I didn't deserve to be loved seriously. My so-called courage was just a clown's delusion.

The doorbell pierced through without warning.

I flinched, body coiling tight.

It was 12:40 AM. The building's security had been a joke for years. Except for drunks, nobody rang doorbells at midnight.

"Ding-dong."

Again.

I held my breath, grabbed a box cutter from the entryway shoe rack, tiptoed barefoot across the cold floor to the door, and pressed my eye to the peephole.

The dim motion-sensor light in the hallway was on.

Outside stood a figure so tall it nearly blocked the entire frame.

Marcelo.

He'd shed his coat. Just that black cashmere sweater. Silver-gray hair at his temples slightly mussed, forehead faintly damp with outdoor rain. He held a large black box tied with a ribbon in one hand. The other hung naturally at his side—no weapon, but his whole presence radiated the weight of someone who'd just torn through a storm.

My heart skipped violently. The hand gripping the box cutter shook.