“Like I said, a slut.”
Sheryl winced but shut up.
He snapped his fingers and opened his hand.
She handed him a small wad of cash. “What the hell is this?”
“It was slow. Sam sent all of us home, said it wasn’t a fit night to be on the road late.”
There wasn’t enough there to get the whiskey he needed. Even as he thought the words, he tilted back his Coke bottle that didn’t hold any soda. He flipped the dollar bills in his hand like a switch. “You sure there isn’t any more?”
She didn’t look at him once again . . . and moved into the kitchen.
“That’s all. Maybe if we could find you some work, we wouldn’t have to worry about money so much.”
His forearms tightened. “Don’t you think I’m tryin’? No one wants to hire an ex-con.”
“Didn’t your parole officer say he knew some people in Eugene?”
“You tryin’ to get rid of me?”
“No, baby . . .” she used her placating, talk him down from the edge voice. “We’re just running out of money.”
“You kept this place together without me for seventeen years, and you’re tryin’ to tell me you can’t do it now with me here?”
She turned on the water and rolled up her sleeves. “Zoe helped before.”
Just hearing her name shot his blood pressure high. “That snotty bitch daughter of yours. Too good to give it now, is she?”
“I can’t make her.”
Ziggy took another swig . . . his eyes landed on Sheryl’s purse. “Funny how there is always money for that baby back there.”
Sheryl tried to hide her eyes, but he caught her following his stare.
“You know something, baby?” His voice was nice and even. Nice and low as he stood. “I think you’re lying to me.”
He saw terror on her face when he lifted her purse.
“Ziggy . . .”
He tilted the bag, spilling everything on the dirty floor. Keys rattled alongside a wallet, and change took up the rest of the space. He shook harder as Sheryl reached for her bag.
He pushed her away and found what he was looking for. Two fives and a ten. “That’s all! Maybe I should get a fucking job!” he mimicked her words.
“Ziggy, please, I can explain.” She moved too close.
The back of his hand connected with her jaw and spun her into the coffee table.
Ziggy’s gaze landed on his spilled drink.
He saw red. “I’ll teach you to lie to me.”
Sheryl threw up her hands to block the blow, and the front door swung open.
The power at Miss Gina’s flickered all day and finally gave out after six o’clock. Mel, Miss Gina, and Hope entertained their guests with impromptu card games and Pictionary. By candlelight, Zoe managed to make a stove-top meal, so no one was hungry.
Eventually the guests made their way to their rooms, more than a little tipsy on the free-flowing wine.
Wyatt was out with Luke, helping with the accident on the road to Waterville, so the women decided to bunk down at Miss Gina’s.
Hope had decided she wanted to sleep in Miss Gina’s mini house, as she called it, and the two of them retired with homemade popcorn and hot cocoa.
By firelight, Mel sat in the parlor, reading, and Zoe used the quiet to write. With every recipe she decided needed to go in the cookbook, she wanted a short story telling how she came upon the idea and what she did to make it uniquely hers. A book filled with pictures and directions was not what she wanted to be known for.
She’d just unfolded from the chair to fill her mug with more chocolate when the phone to the inn rang.
Mel stirred.
“I’ll get it.”
They normally turned the phone for reservations on to voice mail in the evenings, but with most of their cell phones showing one bar, they left it on.
“Miss Gina’s Bed-and—”
“Zoe? Zoe, come get me. Please come get me.”
She turned stone-cold. “Zanya?”
“He’s tearing the place up. My baby.”
The sound of something crashing on Zanya’s end felt like lightning to Zoe’s system. “Oh, God.”
Mel ran from the parlor.
“I’m on my way.”
Zoe dropped the phone and ran past Mel to find her purse in the kitchen.
“What’s happening?”
“That was Zanya. I need to get her from my mom’s.”
“You shouldn’t go alone.”
“No choice. Call Jo!”
Without any other words, Zoe ran from the inn, jumped in her car, and tore out of the drive.
“You wanna piece of this, boy?”
Zane stood in the doorway, rain blowing in behind him.
“Get off her.”
Ziggy grabbed Sheryl’s scrawny neck instead.
Her hands caught his, and she started to kick.
“You motherfucker!”
Zane charged him, knocking him off.
Through the rain, Luke felt his cell phone in his back pocket buzz. The number to Miss Gina’s popped up, along with a picture of the flower child herself.
He smiled and answered, knowing it was Zoe checking on him. “Hey, baby.”
“Luke? Thank God.”
“Mel?” Not the person he expected to hear on the phone.
“Is Jo with you?”
Luke looked past the jumbled mess of cars, and the one he’d just loaded onto his truck, to find Jo talking with a deputy from Waterville. “Yeah, why?”
“It’s Zoe. She ran out—” the call started to crap out.
“Mel?”
More static.
“Mel?”
“Can you hear me?”
“Don’t move. What about Zoe?”
“Zanya called. Zoe ran out to get her.”
His grip on the phone threatened to crush it. “At Ziggy’s?”
“Yes. Hurry. It didn’t sound good.”
Luke turned and ran toward Jo, yelling her name.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The front door to the trailer was wide open. The motorcycle Zane rode was dumped in the yard, the lights blared along with a TV, and Blaze’s cries rose above the screaming from inside.
Zoe hit the door at a run.
Zane and Ziggy rolled on the floor, fists flying.
Zanya stood in the hall, Blaze in her arms, yelling, “Stop!”
Zoe’s eyes landed on her mom, who was picking herself up from the floor. Her face was bloody, one of her eyes already swelling shut.
Ziggy managed to get his feet under him, pulling Zane with him. “You wanna fight me?” His hand pulled back, sending a fist into Zane’s face with a horrifying crunch.
When Zane fell, he tripped over a chair and into Zoe.
They both crashed to the floor.
That’s when Ziggy noticed her. “Look who’s here to join the party.”
He wiped the back of his hand across his lips—it came up bloody.
Blaze screamed louder.
“Get him out of here, Zanya!” Zoe yelled as she attempted to get to her feet.
Ziggy lifted a hand. “You stay right there.”
Zanya cowered back, and Sheryl scrambled to her side.
Before Sheryl could get there, Ziggy shot a foot out, tripping her.
Zane shot up again and rushed.
Zoe rolled to her feet as Sheryl pulled Zanya back down the hall.
Ziggy’s blows to Zane looked like a rabid dog on the attack, each blow harder, faster than the last.
Zane fought, catching Ziggy a few times, but as Zoe knew, her father was a vicious man who lived without rules.
The grunts and fists started to slow, until only Ziggy was fighting.
“Stop it! You’re killing him.”