•50•Explain Yourself!

Ten seconds later, Eva was still staring at Adam, stupefied, wondering whether she had misheard him.

“Adam, what are you talking about?” She would have chuckled at the absurdity of his declaration if not for the gravity of this whole situation. “How can my mother be your mother?”

She scanned Adam's face, waiting for any twitch, any sign to indicate that this was just his example of an extremely bad joke.

The hard lines of incense remained. Eva looked back at her mother to find the woman sobbing and looking at the floor like she found it very interesting.

Reality slammed into her with an intensity that sent her hurtling right into absolute shock.

“Get her the fuck out of here, Eva!” Adam whisper-yelled churlishly, but his next words were ground out loudly. “Somebody get her the fuck out of here before I lose my shit and do something I'm going to regret.”

His hands were balled into fists, his whole body crackling with rage, like an elastic string stretched beyond the yield point and j