They Thought I Was Asleep, So I Let Them Keep Lying novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Cal's Promise

Cal's POV

I sat on the edge of my cot in the garage apartment with my phone in both hands and didn't press play.

Devin had gone for a run.

He said he needed to move, and he said it without looking at me, which was the other reason he'd gone.

I knew what Dale's last line had done.

I had watched Kate's back go straight in the middle of that diner, and I'd watched her not turn around to ask.

She was waiting.

She would ask when she was ready, and I had maybe an hour.

I pressed play.

"Cal, it's Joan."

My throat closed at the first word.

I had heard it forty times.

"I'm in the car outside the doctor's. I know you're on a roof, so don't pick up. I just want it on a machine, so you can't tell me no."

A long, ragged breath on the recording.

"It's four months. Maybe five if I behave. He said it nicely, and I thanked him, which is a ridiculous thing to do."

She laughed, and it wobbled.

"I don't want Kate told. I mean it. She'll quit that job and drive down here and sit by my bed, and I'll watch her give up her whole life for a woman who's going to die anyway."

I put my hand over my mouth.

"She's been alone a long time, Cal. She's good at it. I raised her to be, and I was wrong, and I don't have time to fix it."

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