Chapter 39

• The question made me pause, and I stuttered for just a second. The rest of the family seemed to circle around me and for a moment I knew what a dying animal felt like with a pack of vultures overhead. "Uh, well..."
• "Aren't you the guy who paid for mom's surgery?" the girl fixed me with a look better suited for the Spanish Inquisition. "Why else would you do that?"
• Nicole gathered herself and came to the rescue. "No, he's not my boyfriend." And then she noticed her entire family similarly appraising me. "Well, we'd sort of been dating," she addressed to the gathered crowd.