Page 61 of Dear Debbie

The sound sets off my nerves. There’s nobody who could be waiting at the front door that would have anything good to say. Is it Jo Dolan, wanting me to pay for her extermination bill? Brett Carlson, looking for me to pay for his broken fuse box? Garrett Meers, who hilariously still can’t seem to get the porn video down from the newspaper website?

“I’ll get it,” I say.

I abandon my eggs and hurry to the front door, where our visitor seems to be in the process of putting all their weight on our doorbell. And when I get there, my heart sinks. It’s somebody far worse than Jo or Brett or Garrett. It’s Zane.

And he looks pissed.

I guess that’s not a surprise. I dragged him out in the middle of the night, then he got stood up by his girlfriend who he thought was going to do God knows what with him in a public playground. I wonder what time he woke up on that bench. He’s lucky it’s a safe area, even in the middle of the night.

Honestly, he has some nerve coming over here after the way he threatened her, but I have to pretend like I don’t know about any of this. Lexi would kill me if she had the slightest idea what I did.

“Where’s Lexi?” Zane demands to know.

I fold my arms across my chest. “She’s eating breakfast at the moment. Can I help you?”

He looks like he’s not quite sure what to say. He can’t exactly tell me that my daughter stood him up in the middle of the night. So he says the one thing that he can say: “She blocked me on her phone!”

To be fair, I blocked him. Because he deserved to be blocked, and also, if I didn’t block him, he was going to blow up Lexi’s phone with messages asking where she was last night. In the interest of her never finding out what I did, I couldn’t let him send her any text messages.

“That’s her business,” I say tightly. “Do you have any messages you want me to pass on?”

“Yeah.” His lower jaw juts out. “Tell her she’s a bitch.”

I have to admit, that one surprises me. I didn’t think he had the gall to say that to my face. But it makes the next thing I have to say so much easier.

“I’ll be sure to let her know,” I say sarcastically. “Also, I have a little message for you as well, Zane.”

He rolls his eyes. “Yeah?”

“That’s right.” I smile brightly. “I just wanted to make sure that you are aware of what happens to a sex offender in prison.”

That wipes the smug look right off his face. “What?”

“A sex offender,” I repeat. “Like, for instance, somebody who passed around naked photos of a fifteen-year-old girl, which would legally be considered child pornography.”

For a moment, there is a flicker of fear in his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, I think you do.” I raise my eyebrows. “Anyway, if that person were eighteen or older and were to be caught—and these days, digital footprints make it so easy to get caught—prison would be a rough time for him. Prison is especially difficult for sex offenders. They often get attacked by other inmates to punish them and elevate their own social status.”

Zane takes a step back, nearly stumbling on his own feet. “What?”

“And then when you finally get out,” I continue, “you have to put yourself on the sex offender registry everywhere you live for the rest of your life. You have to let your employers know. Any woman you date can look you up and…well, cancel. And good luck finding a place to live when you have to tell landlords you’re a sex offender.”

“Okay…” Zane is shaking his head, all the anger vanished from his face. He looks decidedly freaked out. “Look, just tell Lexi that I can’t drive her to school anymore.”

“Will do!” I say cheerfully.

I close the door in his face and return to the kitchen, where my sandwich is still waiting for me. I slide back into my chair and pick up my egg muffin.

“Who was that, Mom?” Lexi wants to know.

“Nobody important.”

I take a bite out of the muffin. It’s delicious.

49

COOPER