“Don’t piss her off, and you wouldn’t have to worry about it,” I pointed out.
He waved me off and grabbed the remote from the coffee table. “Listen to what she said, though. I didn’t deserve a second chance, but she gave me one. It’s the best damn thing that ever happened to me.” He turned on the TV, and of course, put on the qualifying from last weekend.
I yelled to Violet asking if she needed to help with dinner, but she said she was good, so that left me with wandering down to my room to figure out what the hell I was going to do.
Brooks Cummings.
When I started working at Cummings Racing, I thought he was a pretty cool guy who had worked his way up to where he was and I was lucky to be working on his car. Then the shit hit the fan, and I thought he was a complete dick who didn’t care who I was because I was a chick. Then he did a complete one-eighty and apologized for the dickishness, and now I was more than completely confused.
Do I really give the guy a second chance?
Violet was right that he hadn’t really done anything horrendous. I mean, everyone had their moments where they act like a dick or bitch, right?
Hell, I had been a bitch and threw a wrench at his head. Even after I did that, he had hopped on a plane and asked me to come back to work for him. If Brooks could do that, I could give him a second chance.
It may be a second chance with a lot of conditions attached to it, but it was better than nothing. I was going to be weary of him until he showed me exactly what type of guy he was.
I pulled my duffel bag out of the closet and tossed it on the bed.
So, Brooks Cummings got a second chance, and I got my job back.
We both won, but for some reason, I didn’t feel like I was on the winning side.
*
Chapter Thirteen
Brooks
“What do you mean?”
“I’m leaving means only one thing, Brooks.” I watched my dad grab his coat off the back of the chair and shrug it on. “I can’t keep living my life this way.”
“This way?” I scoffed. “You live in a seven-thousand-foot mansion and have everything you could ask for.”
“Except the woman I want in my bed every night.”
“You’re fucking married, Dad. The only woman you should be wanting in your bed is upstairs.”
He pulled his keys out of his pocket and grabbed his duffel bag off the floor. “You mean the woman who doesn’t know my name today? The one who sleeps in the spare bedroom more than in our room because she’s afraid she’ll wake up not knowing who I am?”
“How can you leave her? She’s your wife,” I pointed out as if he had forgotten.
“She hasn’t been my wife since the stroke, Brooks. I hate to do this, but I can’t keep living my life taking care of her.”
He was a selfish fucking prick. “So what? You just leave to live your life and not care about the woman who was your wife for the past thirty-nine years?”
This hadn’t been what I expected when my dad called me over this morning. I tried to put him off because I had plans to pick up Frankie today, but he had insisted I needed to come. Apparently I needed to be here because he was taking back the life my mom had been withholding from him. I looked at my phone. “Fuck,” I grunted. I needed to be on the road to the airport in five minutes.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded.
I looked up and shook my head. “Nothing, I wouldn’t want my problems to keep you from living your life.” I pulled up Harlyn’s phone number and sent her a message that she needed to pick Frankie up at the airport for me. I knew it wasn’t her job to be a chauffeur, but I was desperate.
My idea to have Frankie’s car hauled here was a good idea because it stranded her at the airport, giving me the excuse to pick her up, but now my idea sucked.
Harlyn responded instantly. I can’t get away right now, but Remy and Jay are on the way to get her.
Thanks.
Well, that was one crisis averted. Now I needed to figure out what the hell I was going to do about my mom and dad. “What is Mom supposed to do, Dad? You’re really going to leave this house to her?”
“Hell no. I’m leaving long enough for her to figure out where she is going to go, and we’ll be back once she packs up.”
“We?” I was shocked at the next word that came out of his mouth, but I shouldn’t have been since he had just told me my mom who had a stroke was holding him back from living his life. He was a grade a prick.
“I’ve met someone,” he replied simply.
My blood boiled, and all I wanted to do was punch him square in the face. “Get out,” I demanded. He didn’t deserve to be in the same house as my mother anymore. He had put up a facade of loving her after her stroke, but obviously the jig was up, and he wasn’t here for the long haul. “Mom will be out by the end of the week.”
“Brooks, look.”
I cut him off and pointed to the front door. “Go be with your bitch, and don’t ever talk to me again. My lawyer will be in touch with you to buy your share of the team.”
“I’m not giving up that team,” he roared.
He was passionate about not losing Cummings Racing, but he could give six shits about my mother. “You will. I own more than you do. I hold all the strings, father.” As much as I wanted to take everything away from him, I knew I couldn't. I may be able to retain ownership of Cummings Racing since I was the one who founded it, but I was going to have to pay him a pretty penny to get lost. “As I said, my lawyers will be in touch to discuss the liquidation of you being part of Cummings Racing.”
He bared his teeth and took a step toward me. “Me leaving your mother has absolutely nothing to do with you.”
“Wrong. You’re so fucking wrong, I don’t even know where to start.”
“I’m not going to give up the team.”
When I started Cummings Racing, I had planned on running it forever with my dad. Now, it looked like things were going to change. “You will. But, you shouldn’t be too worried because though I know what a selfish prick you are, the rest of the world is mostly oblivious to the fact. You’ll rebound from this, figure out another way to make money, and Mom and I will be a distant memory.”
“You’re going to regret this if you decide to go through with these ludicrous threats, Brooks.” He stormed out of the house and slammed the door behind him.
Holy fuck.
How in the hell did that just happen?
I hated my father, and deep down, I always knew he was only in it for number one, and everyone else was there just as stepping stones or to support him. My mother had lost her ability to support him, and she wasn’t of any use to him.
She was out of the picture, and now, he was onto what he thought would be the next best thing.
He was wrong.
He would see that choosing himself would not only make him lose my mom, but me also.
Now, all I needed to do was figure out how I was going to take care of my mother and do it by Friday. I needed to have her out of the house before I left for Virginia this weekend.
I heard her muffled footsteps moving down the stairs.
“Brooks? Was that you I heard talking?”