them.”
Makay took his hand. “Nate, ever since you were born, you were my baby. I went back to Fern’s so I could be with you, and when that didn’t work out, I still went there every day to see you. I took you with me to school when you were only six months old.” Barely eighteen and taking a baby to college. No wonder she’d flunked out that time. “Even if I had my own baby, I couldn’t love it any more than I love you. So, you’re right, I am your mom. Just as much as my mom was my mom.”
“’Cuz you were adopted?”
“That’s right. It’s exactly the same thing.” She wondered now if she should have officially adopted him. It hadn’t seemed necessary when he was younger, but she hadn’t counted on the influence of other children or his own urge to feel connected.
“Okay,” he said and snapped on his safety belt.
She pulled from the curb. “Now, just so you know, I’ll be driving to the club tonight so if you need me, I can come home. Just ask Lily to use her phone if you need me. Okay?”
“Sure, but I’ll probably be having too much fun.”
At least one of them would be. Makay was now into her third round of second thoughts. She should be following Lenny and getting more evidence against him. Or maybe using the details from the manila folder he gave her to research the target herself and find out where she lived. That way maybe she could catch Lenny in the act of putting a blackmail note on a car or watching someone’s house. Lenny had taught her a few researching skills over the years. For all her hatred of Lenny now, he had given her that much.
Tomorrow, I’ll take care of Lenny, she thought. She still had that video of him, and as soon as she had a moment, she’d put it on her computer and see exactly what happened with that Beetle.
Chapter Five
H arrison ran his fingers through his hair as he stared at the fogged mirror in his bathroom, a towel around his waist. There was nothing in his face that signaled his frustration, but it raged inside his chest. Not for the first time, he wondered if he should call off his planned outing with his sisters and their husbands.
He’d taken time off work this morning and spent two hours at the gym waiting, hoping to catch sight of whoever came to pick up the return note he’d left on his mother’s car, but though he’d spent most of that time in the outdoor pool area that overlooked the parking lot where he’d left the Beetle, he’d been unable to see anything out of the ordinary. No one lurking around. No one stopping near the car and speeding away. Yet when he’d returned to the parking lot, the note he’d left under the windshield wiper was gone.
The only thing interesting he’d witnessed was the vibrant blue Sebring that he was sure belonged to the woman he’d helped at Albertsons yesterday. But he’d only noticed the car as it pulled from its parking space, which was far away from his car, almost out of his view. Phoenix was a large city, but this was one of the best fitness centers, so he shouldn’t be surprised to see her there. Still, she hadn’t dressed like a person who liked to visit a gym. In fact, now that he was thinking about her, she had seemed an exact opposite of the kind of person who would stay indoors. Maybe she liked to hike and bike and that sort of thing.
Why was he thinking about her again? It made no sense. She had a child, and where there was a child, there was usually a daddy close by.
Well, whoever had picked up his note today now knew to deal with him and to leave his mother out of it. What he’d like to do was go to the police, but he would respect her wishes. Truthfully, he didn’t know how Eli would react to the secret, and he wasn’t anxious to find out. For now it was a waiting game to see what this person wanted from his mother and how far he or she was willing to go.
Was that his doorbell ringing? Pulling on dark gray dress pants and a fitted gray and black button-down shirt, he hurried
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