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Atteht about Michael’s confession and hoouldn’t talk to Kiersten about his family What did that mean? Had he completely lost touch with the apart after Gary found out ere together, but there had been no mention of him at all since my return “Do you still talk to your parents? To Gary?”

If he was surprised by ainst the couch “I see Mom sometimes I try to avoid Dad as much as possible To say it fucked him off that I made detective and he retired as a plain old beat walker is an understates between us went from bad to worse when I first made lieutenant You know my dad No matter what I do, I can’t win Last time I saw my mom was after Kiersten and I filed for divorce My dad is usually out on a Sunday at a bar, but the bastard had deliberately stayed around so he could go on and on about how I e, but a man isn’t a man if he can’t keep his woman happy”

Anger boiled in my blood “Motherfucker”

Michael gave rin “Yeah”

“And Gary?”

He shook his head “Gary left not long after you Took a decent paying job in construction with a cousin in North Carolina He never came back, and we lost touch over the years”

Goddamn it

I left

Gary left

“I’m sorry”

“I had Dered “They’re like family”

The swelling feeling of love and heartbreak building in my chest was almost too much to bear I knee’d needed to have this discussion, to put it all out there, but it also becao of that little spark of hope I’d held onto all those years concerning Michael

No matter what he’d discovered today, he would always feel abandoned by me After his parents’ abandonment came mine Then Gary’s It didn’t o, I wouldn’t

I would live with all kinds of re every time I looked at his handsome face

The thought exhausted me