“Sounds like it is.” He smooched her cheek. “If you need to talk to your monkeys, I’ll take Snoot out for a walk.”
She hesitated, a scowl on her kiss-stung lips. “I hate to interrupt our evening, but it’s high time I put this to rest.” She hovered her finger over the screen, then raised an eyebrow. “You want a sample of what I’ll be dealing with while we’re apart?”
Her offer floored him. “You want me to listen in?”
“Why not? You’re a wise person. Maybe you can give me perspective.”
He pressed a kiss to her temple. “Then I’d be honored.”
The phone stopped buzzing, then started again.
“Oh, crap. It’s a video call.” She angled the screen away from his face, rolled her shoulders like a boxer warming up, and pressed Accept.
At first, Kieran found the caller’s tirade amusing, like a panel guest’s rant on one of those trashy talk shows his ma had loved. But as the woman grew shriller, he found himself struggling not to snatch Addy’s phone and give the venomous cow what for.
“Your mother’s nerves are shot, Miss Addy,” the woman insisted in her nails-on-a-chalkboard voice. “She needs your help, and it’s about damn time you stepped up.”
Addy’s jaw muscles ticked. “What exactly is her diagnosis, Aunt T?”
“Diagnosis?” The woman’s snort rang out loud and clear. “Excuse me, Doctor High Horse, for not knowing the medical terms. My sister is sick and old, and she can’t handle living alone anymore, so someone’s gotta take care of her.”
A voice from Kieran’s past wheedled into his memory.
You’re abandoning us too? This is the thanks we get after devoting our lives to our children—a blatant lie, because his parents had done the bare minimum to stay out of trouble with the authorities.
And so it was with parents of their ilk, his and Addy’s. In their view, it was kids’ job to sacrifice for parents, not the other way around.
“You know what your problem is, Addison?” the auntie shrieked. “You’re selfish. Always have been.”
Growling low in his throat, Snoot stalked over to stand at Addy’s feet. His hackles bristled.
Damn right, pup.
Anger sizzled along Kieran’s nerves. How dare this shrew abuse the woman they loved? Before he could stop the impulse, his hand shot out and grabbed Addy’s phone.
“Now it’s your turn to listen, Tish.” He spat the words out like shards of glass. “Addy is the least selfish person I know, and her work is damned important. She’s saved more lives than there are people in your puny town. There’s a nationwide shortage of doctors, and you expect her to sacrifice her career to take over her mother’s care? Explain to me how that makes sense.”
Snoot chimed in with a resounding woof.
“Who the hell are you?” the red-faced woman demanded.
“Someone who cares about Addy a helluva lot more than you do.”
Addy pried the phone from his fingers and shot him a look that would have silenced a rabid wolf.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, flushed with shame for his loss of control, but still furious.
Unfazed, Aunt Tish continued her barrage. “All Betsy’s other kids have their own families to worry about. Addy’s the only one who’s single.”
Kieran put his arm around Addy and snugged her to his side. “No, she’s not.”
The woman glared. “A boyfriend is not the same as family, Addy. Blood matters more than some foreign—”
Before she could finish her insult, Kieran barked, “You really want to talk to a surgeon about blood? As if you had the tiniest notion in your pea brain about what Addy’s been through, what she’s sacrificed to help others.”
“Kieran.” Addy hit Mute and shot him a warning glance. The fire in her eyes appeased him—as long as it was directed at her asinine aunt and not at him.
But it was him, and not her phone, she was glaring at.
