Puck stilled.

“What?”

“I was getting out of the truck to go to the bathroom. Then I looked over there and saw my mom.”

Something crossed his face, a hint of shock tempered with . . . pity?

“Sweetheart, it’s not uncommon for someone to think they’ve seen someone who died.”

“No, it was her, Puck,” I said, my voice forceful. “I talked to her. She called me by name, said she was sorry. Then she got in her car and drove off. That’s her fucking gas cap right there.”

“What the hell?”

“It’s a con,” I said, feeling like the stupidest person on earth. “She’d been calling, begging for money. I kept telling her no so I guess she raised the stakes.”

“That fucking cunt,” he growled. He let me go, spinning toward his truck in helpless, frustrated anger. For a minute I thought he might punch it. Then—just like that—he pulled it together.

“Get in.”

“Puck—”

“Get. In. The. Truck.” Rage covered his face, along with that terrible darkness I’d seen from him a few times. Oh fuck. This was bad. Really bad.

Wait. Mom was alive. That was good. I didn’t want her dead, did I?

Mixed, confused emotions crashed through me as I climbed into my seat. I was vaguely aware of Puck outside, gassing us up. My thoughts flew too fast to catch as I tried to understand what had happened.

Mom was alive. She’d pretended to be dead. Told her daughter that she was dead.

For three thousand fucking dollars.

Pain sliced through me as it fell together. Pain. Relief. Shock.

Hurt.

How could she care so little for me, put me through that kind of hell for money? Because she’s a junkie and a crook. She doesn’t care about anyone but herself. Fucking bitch.

The rig swayed as Puck climbed in, looking straight forward. Rage radiated off every square inch of his body.

“This ends now.”

“What?” I asked.

“This shit with your mom,” he replied. “She’s cut off. Today. You’re never talking to her again. That woman is fucking toxic and she’s out of your life.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, turning on him. My head was a swirl of a thousand different emotions—Mom had been dead and suddenly she wasn’t. She’d tricked me and used me and treated me like I wasn’t even a real human being whose feelings mattered. Now Puck was going to tell me how to feel, too?

I didn’t need this shit from him and I didn’t care if he was right—it wasn’t his decision to make.

“It’s time to end this. I’ve watched that bitch jerk you around for five years and I’m sick of it. No more. I’ll get you set up at the hotel and then go straighten her ass out. We’ll leave for Idaho in the morning.”

The swirl of confused feelings in my head came together, turning into anger. I couldn’t turn it loose on Mom because she’d run off, but Puck? He’d just painted a big ass target on his forehead and I didn’t give a shit if attacking him was fair or not. I was an adult and I’d make my own damned choices.

“Who the fuck are you to tell me what to do?”

The muscle in his jaw flexed as Puck turned the key, the big truck roaring to life. “I’m your old man and it’s my job to protect you. I’m serious about this, Becs. We’re leaving tomorrow and you are never going to communicate with that bitch again.”

Oh no. No way. He did not get talk to me like that.

“Fuck you,” I growled. “You have no goddamn right to tell me what I can and can’t do. You don’t own me and you don’t get to control me.”

He turned to look at me, and the raw anger on his face stunned me. Holy shit. A small part of me wanted to cower back, to beg him not to hurt me. No. I wasn’t that little girl anymore and Puck Redhouse didn’t get to push me around.

“You’ll do what I say, Becca. She lied to you. Put you through hell. What kind of psycho bitch tells her kid that she’s dead just to make a quick buck? If you still want anything to do with her, you’re fucked in the head. We’ll leave first thing in the morning.”

Red rage filled my vision, no joke. As in, my vision literally turned red. That’s how angry I was. I wanted to kill him, destroy him. Here he was, I realized. Here was the biker asshole coming out, the one I’d known was in there all along.

“This is why I’ll never be your old lady,” I hissed. “In the end, you’re all the same.”

The words fell between us with a thud.

“I’m too pissed to have this conversation with you right now,” he said, slamming the truck into gear. He pulled out into traffic with a squeal of tires, just like my mom had. Crushing pain hit again, and I felt my anger deflate. Why would she do that? How could she do it? What the hell had I done to deserve that woman for my mother?

Fuck her.

And fuck Puck, too. Fuck him for being right about her, and for saying all the things I didn’t want to think about out loud.

Fuck all of them.

I started to cry.

SIXTEEN

PUCK

My fingers itched to kill Becca’s mom—her and her piece of shit husband. They’d been alive too long, polluting and destroying everything they touched. Fucking disease on the earth, both of them.

And now Becca was crying. Like I was the bad guy here?

Fuck. I knew I was being an asshole. Had known it the instant the words left my mouth. Not that what I’d said was wrong—this was absolutely the end for that bitch and her husband. I’d kill them both if they ever tried to contact her again.