31 Kimmy
There was a persistent, synthetic whine coming from the other end of the Zoom call.
"Kimberly, I'll need a final headcount for the wellness mixer by Wednesday—otherwise, I can't guarantee table setup or relevant food options, and we both know what happened last time.
" The venue coordinator's face glitched, then froze, her mouth locked in a juddering, almost-vowel shape.
It only lasted a second or two, and then she was back on.
"I'll send the final numbers by the end of the day," I replied. "Don't hold the main ballroom for us if there's any risk of double-booking. I'd rather switch to the garden level than get blamed for shortage."
My hands moved automatically, flicking through the open tabs and spreadsheets, but my brain was at least three rooms away, straining to hear for something that hadn't even happened yet.
"Great! And—oh, I almost forgot. Could you—"
Her audio lagged again, which bought me a few seconds to look down at the object on my desk. The backup burner phone. Or at least that's what I called it.
On the screen, the coordinator's mouth began moving again. "I'm sorry about this," she said. "We had a storm warning and the internet has been going out all afternoon."
Nice problem to have when you're in Hawaii, I thought to myself. My face remained neutral. "Just call me if we forgot or missed anything," I said.
"I have to say you're extremely organized, lady. Why aren't you working for me?"
The venue coordinator was new. To the city and to the place of work. Her predecessor probably had forgotten to mention when she was leaving the company that Kimberly Holt was on the do-not-hire list. And sooner or later it would come up anyway.
"Well, I really like working from home," I lied. I hadn't always. Just the past three years.
"If you change your mind, let me know." She grinned.
"Will do," I said, jotting a note regarding the tasks into the planner. The call ended. I shut my laptop and leaned back in my office chair.
I glanced at the phone again, then spun and stared at the brand-new couch across the room that had been delivered two days ago.
After Seven had left my apartment that morning, he'd apologized again for the mess. A few hours later, I'd received a text from him stating that replacements for everything that had been dirtied in my place would arrive soon.
I'd thought it was a joke. But the following day I'd received a call from the delivery company. They'd brought in the couch, some pillows, throw blankets, and a carpet. They'd taken away the old furniture. Even a new welcome mat was included.
I was shocked and amused at the same time.
This man was as strange and as endearing as they came.
I'd sent him a thank you text.
And he'd texted me back stating that he'd pick up his jacket soon.
But the days dragged on and he wasn't contacting me, which worried me a little. But then again, he was up against the Valmont empire.
I kept telling myself that I wouldn't be a distraction and would only reach out to him if I was on the verge of dying. However, distinguishing between what truly constituted a life-or-death scenario was becoming increasingly difficult. But each day, my anxiety had been mounting.
No juicy scandals about Caius Valmont emerged in the media or on the Internet. Instead, he flaunted his wife publicly and received accolades that the wealthy invented for themselves.
The memory of the night Seven had spent on my couch was a permanent gouge in my brain. The smell of blood and vodka, the sight of him stapling his wound with almost zero emotion. Even in agony, he'd spoken with the same flat certainty he always did.
The way he'd said my name from behind the door as he promised to serve justice.
I felt goosebumps riddling my arms at the thought of him doing my bidding.
I shook it off. I spent too much time thinking about a man whose real face I'd never seen and probably never would.
My regular phone buzzed, the notification strip shoving its way to the top of the lock screen.
Margaret.
I accepted the call.
"Hi, Mom. I'm working. Can I—"
Her voice was not her own. It came out thin and jagged, vibrating with a fear I'd never heard in her before. "Kimmy, I've been in an accident, dear," she said.
Everything in my body stopped. The world shrank to the pitch and wobble of her voice, and it took me a second to realize this wasn't a memory of me when I was thirteen.
"Mom? Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, I think—I mean, I hit the airbag, and my glasses are somewhere, but the police are saying strange thi—"
I heard a male voice interrupting her. I couldn't make out what was said because I was already in panic mode. Not the quiet, background noise I'd lived with since I'd lost my parents, but something massive, tectonic.
"Mom!" I called. "I'm coming right now. Where are you?"
She rattled off an intersection, which I looked up on my phone. It wasn't too far from here.
"I'll be there in ten," I promised, and hung up.
I fumbled with the car keys and the shoes. I ran to the elevator, slamming the button until the doors banged open.
I barely braked before the crosswalk, the engine of my Honda making a last, high scream as I twisted the wheel into the curb. My hands left wet prints on the steering wheel.
Two police cruisers blocked most of the intersection. Their lights pulse-throbbed against the low clouds. A tow truck idled by the side of the road, hazards on, already threading its winch under the nose of my mother's crumpled sedan.
The impact had folded the front of the car into an origami of metal. The windshield was a spiderweb, the airbag hung limp from the wheel. The entire street reeked of scorched plastic and copper when I pushed the door open.
The second car was a Lexus and had its rear smashed but not as bad as Margaret's car. I spotted a man in a suit, surrounded by two officers, probably taking a statement. I didn't care about his damages. It didn't seem that serious.
I ran.
At first, the only thing I saw was the color of her cardigan. Blue. As I got closer, I saw that she was arguing with a police officer.
"I told you," she was saying, her hands up like she was in a musical. "I take blood pressure pills. The new ones have side effects. I told you that already. But my doctor has cleared me for driving."
"Ma'am, I hear you," the officer replied, tone neutral and a little loud, "but we have to follow protocol. Your behavior at the scene suggested impairment, and the sobriety test was not within normal range."
"My behavior?" Margaret's voice ticked up an octave. "I'm bleeding, my car's in the gutter, and you think I'm behaving erratically, young man?"
I called out. "Mom!"
Her head snapped toward me, and her whole posture dropped, like the tension holding her together had just let go.
There was a tiny trickle of blood on her face, from the forehead, across her cheek and down to her neck.
"My daughter is here," she told the officer, then turned to me.
"Kimmy, I don't understand what's going on. They said I failed a sobriety test."
"What sobriety test?" I looked the officer right in the eyes. "She needs a hospital. Can't you see?"
"We're simply following protocol."
"What protocol? She's a senior and she needs to be seen by a doctor, and you had the audacity to subject her to some test?" I was fuming, ready to punch the inconsiderate asshole.
"We're taking her in for evaluation. She failed the roadside, and she's making inconsistent statements."
"She doesn't drink," I said, as flat as I could. "And she doesn't take any medication that would cause a DUI."
He barely flicked his eyes at me like he was afraid that he'd give away his incompetence if I looked at him long enough. "It's standard procedure."
Margaret was shaking now, her fingers twitching against my sleeve. "Kimmy, I think I have to go with them or they'll arrest me and add some bogus charges. Can you tell them I didn't do anything wrong? It's just a misunderstanding."
I tried to hold onto her, but she let go, arms slack at her sides. The officer led her to the rear of the cruiser, where a second officer stood by with the door open. As Margaret folded herself inside, she looked at me one last time. Her eyes were wide, terrified.
The doors closed with a brutal clunk. I watched the cruiser pull away from the curb, my feet stapled to the concrete.
I didn't understand what was going on either. Margaret hadn't gotten a single ticket in the forty years she'd been driving.
Three days later, I stalked the rug in Margaret's living room with a phone pressed to my ear, trying to keep my voice level and reasonable.
"I'm telling you, we've had auto-renewal for the past eight years," I insisted. "The account number on file is correct, the address is the same, and I know the premium came out because I check her statements every month."
"Miss Holt," the insurance rep said, "we have no record of a payment processed this past December. The policy lapsed at midnight on the twentieth. We mailed three notifications to this address. I'm sorry, but that's what I see in our system."
"That's impossible," I snapped. "She checks her mail every day, and we haven't received those letters."
The rep's silence was almost smug. I could picture him, a thousand miles away, clicking on something irrelevant as he waited for me to either escalate or give up.
"I'd like to speak to a supervisor, please," I demanded, but my voice was paper-thin.
After what my mother had to go through on the day of the accident, and now this!
"Certainly. Please hold."
The line dropped into some poppy hold music. I wandered to the window, which looked out on a yard. A pair of squirrels bickered on the tree branch, then vanished into the canopy of leaves.
Margaret was seated on the couch behind me, her hands clasped tightly in her lap, her knuckles pale. Beside her lay a letter from a legal firm. The other party, whose Lexus had been scratched, was threatening to sue if the repair costs weren't paid.
This was fast, I thought to myself. Way too fast. As if the Lexus owner knew that we had insurance issues. Or maybe even prepared in advance.
The music cut out. "This is Greg. How can I help you today?"
I ran through the story again, more clipped this time. "I saw the transaction. It cleared on her bank app, and now you're telling me the coverage lapsed before the crash?"
"Unfortunately, yes," Greg said, a shade softer than the first guy. Perhaps, he was a better actor. "If you'd like, I can email you a copy of the notification schedule and the policy documents."
"Will it help to cover the damages?" I asked.
He paused. "I'm afraid not."
I wanted to scream. Instead, I said, "Thank you," and hung up.
I set the phone on the windowsill, stared at it for a second, then turned, crossed the living room, and dropped to a squat in front of the couch.
"Any luck?" Margaret asked, her voice almost normal.
I shook my head. "They're lying. I'll get it sorted."
She covered my hand with hers. Her palm was warm, dry, marred by tiny scars from years of gardening and home repairs. "I'm old," she said. "What can they do to me? I don't have much."
"Don't give up and don't say that you're old." I paused for a second and ran the details through my head again. Something was off. I felt it. "I'll look into this some more, Mom," I said. "There has been some sort of mistake."
I hoped she believed me. I hoped she'd hold on for a little while longer while I dug into this deeper.