Chapter 11

Which is when, of course, my cell phone rang. For a panicked moment, I thought it was Joshua calling to cancel. A glance at the caller ID had me groaning. It was my mother. I almost didn’t answer. But Mom was a bit of a worrywart when it came to me—I was her only child after all—and if I didn’t answer, she’d spend the rest of the evening imagining me bleeding to death in a ditch.

I swiped a finger across the screen and lifted it to my ear, eschewing the regular greeting to rush out, “Can’t talk, Mom.”

She laughed, a rich sound that usually made me smile. But she was cock-blocking me, and I just found it irritating. I scowled only because she wasn’t there to see.

“What’s so important that you can’t spend a few minutes talking to the woman who spent eighteen hours in hard labor to bring you into the world?”

Mom never let an opportunity pass to lay on the guilt. I rolled my eyes and ground out, “Third. Date.”