Read Online Until I Die Again [On The Way To Heaven] (Soul Change Novel) by Tina Wainscott - Free Book Online Page B

when Theresa tried to drag his father away from that same desk stacked with company profiles. She called it an obsession with money; he called it taking care of his family.
    His mother had been happy with what they had in the early days—long days of work that made supper an occasion for togetherness. The money wasn’t worth his alienation from the family. Later his father made concessions, and they approached being the close-knit family they had been before. Then he died of a heart attack.
    Jamie hadn’t inherited that instinct for investing, although his brother Miguel had touches of it from time to time. His own lack of talent for the market didn’t bother Jamie. He had seen what it did to his family, and ultimately to his father after years of taking risks and worrying about the consequences. He had decided he didn’t want to put his own family through that. He needn’t have worried. Hallie’s professingsclaim to want children someday had turned into excuses and finally flat-out refusals to ever make herself fat and ugly.
    That didn’t matter now. He and Hallie were over, finito . Then he realized he had been walking upstairs. What brought him back to present was the sound of her crying. Actually, it was more like bawling. He walked to her door, not because of a need to comfort her, he assured himself. More out of curiosity. Never had he heard her cry as she was now. Not that pretentious crying she summoned to get her way or get out of trouble. This was out and out sobbing her guts out crying. He strained to hear the words she gasped out between sobs.
    “I—I w-want to g-go home! I w-want my mom. And d-dad. And Phoenix, T-tubby and Shelby.”
    Jamie frowned. She had never displayed a need for her parents. Especially her dad, who was virtually non-existent. And who the heck were Tubby and Shelby? And why did she want to go to Phoenix? It sounded as though someone else were in there and not Hallie.
    Then something triggered inside his mind. Her mother. Damn. She had called that morning while Hallie was still asleep. He glanced at his watch. And was coming to pick her up in an hour. He had meant to tell her when he saw her up on the balcony, but the conversation had taken a turn for the worse, and he’d forgotten. The same reason he’d forgotten again when she returned from her rendezvous with Mick. He certainly didn’t want her mother to find Hallie bawling, or even looking as if she had been. Velvet would rant and rave about his neglect, and he’d have to tell her where to shove her phony motherly concern.
    He was going to have to bust in on her crying session. When he knocked on the door, her crying stopped.
    “Go ‘way.” a muffled voice called out.
    He pushed the door open a few inches. She was sitting on the bed with her knees drawn up, her face buried in the pillow sandwiched between. Something about her posture reminded him of a little girl lost in despair. She didn’t look up at him. He leaned against the doorframe, trying to look more at ease than he felt.
    “Surely what I said didn’t upset you that much.”
    “Go away!” her muffled voice said again. “You would never understand.”
    He walked closer and wrapped his arm around one of the posts on the bed—the bed they used to share on their visits to Los Almeda.
    “Do you want to talk about it?”
    She lifted a red, tear-stained face. “No. Your duties as my husband are fulfilled. You’re dismissed.”
    “I see.” Now he was curious. Did Mick dump her? “I didn’t want to interrupt you, but I forgot to tell you that your mother called this morning. She’s going to pick you up in about an hour. You’ll be staying with her for dinner.”
    He wasn’t expecting the panicked look that emerged on Hallie’s face. She wiped away the tears and looked at him in an almost pleading way.
    “Just me?”
    It took him a minute to figure out what she was getting at. “Yes, just you. Did your mother ever include me in?”
    “I don’t know,”