Heat flared in her eyes, and I licked my lips suggestively.
“You know, you don’t have to pretend to be jealous to fool Faith and Michael. They already know what we’re doing.”
I reached over and lightly traced my fingers up her arm, noticing the way she shivered at my touch. “I’m not that good of an actor.”
At that moment, the lights flickered off and on twice and the waitstaff came around to collect empty plates off the tables. There was an excited anticipation in the air, and I found my attention drawn to the stage along with everyone else as the lights went out again and stayed that way.
Normally, this kind of show wasn’t really my thing, but I was going to stay open-minded. Today had been great so far, the activitiesandthe company.
When the lights came up on the stage, music started playing from a three-piece band set up to the right. Every performer that had been working the crowd while we ate came out onto the stage and sang a medley of Broadway songs. They danced while they sang and the choreography was complex and entertaining.
I relaxed in my seat and enjoyed the show, tapping my foot along to the beat for familiar songs and clapping enthusiastically at the end of each number. Every time I looked over at Sage during the show, her eyes were glued to the stage and she had a natural smile on her face that made me smile, too.
I was completely engaged until I felt my cell phone vibrating in my pocket. I was tempted to ignore it, but I couldn’t do that. I was a father, and I needed to be able to be reached in the case of an emergency. That was why I pushed back my seat and stood when I saw my ex’s name on the screen.
“I’ll be right back,” I whispered to Sage before turning away to head outside, pushing the button to accept the call. I put the phone up to my ear as I stepped out of the building, closing the door behind me so that I couldn’t hear the sounds of the man singing a Poison song. “Hello?”
“Hey, it’s me.”
Alyssa’s voice was soft, almost hesitant, and I knew that meant that she wanted something from me.
“I know it’s you,” I told her, trying to stifle my impatience. If I didn’t have to share custody of my son with this woman, I would have cut her out of my life completely a long time ago. She was a user. She used people up to get what she wanted from them, and then tossed them aside. She’d done it to me more than once.
Of course, she was a different kind of user as well, but she had gone to rehab last year, and was in recovery. At least, that’s what she said, and the family court bought it. That was the reason I’d been unable to get sole custody last time I’d tried. They didn’t like to take kids from their moms unless they had a damn good reason and apparently, a long history of drug use was completely negated by a six month stint in rehab.
My biggest problem with that was that I’d been through this with her before. She’d done the rehab thing more than once in the past ten years, and the recovery never lasted. I didn’t want to be an asshole about it by expecting her to fail again, but my kid’s well-being was at stake here.
“Is Sam okay?” I asked of our son, since he was my first priority and I need to be assured nothing was wrong with him.
“Yes, of course. He’s fine,” she said, sounding a bit annoyed that I’d question her. “Actually . . .Ineed your help.”
What a shock.
“What is it this time?” I asked, pinching the bridge of my nose with my fingers and wishing that I was back inside with Sage. Alyssa probably wanted money from me.Again.
“I have these unpaid parking tickets…”
“I’m not paying them,” I interrupted, gritting my teeth together.
“I’m not asking you to,” she assured me quickly, so I just waited for the other shoe to drop. “I’ll pay them when I get my next paycheck on Friday. But until then...my car’s been booted.”
“That’s your problem.”
I knew what she wanted. She expected me to call in a favor or pull some strings to get the metal device off her car’s tire. Never mind that it could come back to bite me in the ass. And there was also the fact that my association with a known drug user was terrible for my career as a cop.
She didn’t care about any of that.
“Don’t you realize that I can’t take Sam anywhere without a car?” she said huffily, as if it were my fault she had unpaid parking citations. “He’ll miss his soccer practice and that sleepover he’s supposed to have this weekend. I can’t even go to the damn grocery store to feed him.”
Shit.She knew exactly how to get to me. She knew that she could use the fact that our son’s well-being was tied to hers to get me to do whatever she wanted.
I was already worried about Sam being thousands of miles away from me, where I couldn’t easily get to him if he needed me. The thought of him being stuck in Alyssa’s tiny apartment all week with a dwindling supply of food was enough to make me move heaven and earth to fix this problem.
“Fine,” I snapped, irritated that she got herself into this situation in the first place. She must have had a lot of parking violations that she ignored in order to get booted. “I’ll take care of it.”
Ending the call, I sighed. I always had a sinking feeling when I left Sam with Alyssa, and I hated that, but I was bound by the court’s order that we split custody. Usually, I was happy to find that I worried for nothing, but sometimes something like this happened.
Pulling up my contacts on my phone, I called a sergeant that I knew in the precinct where Alyssa lived. The man had been in my unit when I served in the Army, so we knew each other well. We’d kept in touch and done favors for each other over the years on the police force too.