She didn’t want to leave it like this, but she was as mad at him as she’d ever been. “Tell Scotty I’ll call him tonight.”

“Okay.”

Apparently, he was mad too, or he would’ve told her to be careful. He would’ve said he loved her. But he didn’t say anything and neither did she. Checking the time on her phone, she saw that she had thirty minutes to kill before the pickup for the meeting with her White House staff—a meeting she wished she could cancel in light of her argument with the vice president.

After unlocking her bedside drawer to retrieve her weapon, badge and cuffs, she went downstairs, put on her coat and left the house with a heavy heart. She and Nick didn’t fight like that. Ever. Her eyes burned, and she blinked back tears that she attributed to the cold.

She took the ramp to her dad’s house and went in without knocking. “Hello?”

“In here, honey,” Celia called from the kitchen.

Sam entered the kitchen where Celia hurriedly gathered up paperwork that had been spread out on the table. Since this was the second time she’d come upon them obviously trying to hide something, she said, “What gives?”

“Nothing,” Skip said gruffly.

“Are you guys having financial issues? Tell me the truth.”

The look that Celia gave her father confirmed it for Sam.

“What’s going on?” Since she had time and didn’t want to be at home, she took a seat at the table.

“We’re handling it,” Skip said.

“Skip—”

“We’re handling it, Celia. That’s the end of it.”

“That’s not the end of it.” To Sam, Celia said, “Insurance only covered a portion of your father’s surgery. We owe the rest.”

“How much?”

“Two hundred thousand.”

“What?” Sam asked, shocked. “Have you talked to the union?”

“We’re not talking to the union.” Skip’s mulish expression told Sam he’d had this same argument with Celia. “My injury has already cost them enough. Everyone’s premiums have gone up because of me.”

“Who told you that?”

“No one had to tell me. I know how much all this costs.”

“You were injured on the job. No matter what it costs, they owe it to you to find a way to pay for what you need. That surgery wasn’t elective. It was lifesaving.”

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Skip said.

“We have to talk about it,” Celia said.

“We’ll get a second mortgage on the house,” Skip said.

“Dad, let me talk to the union, will you please?”

“No. I don’t want charity.”