Surgeon – Chapter Thirty-Two

***A/N: This is the final chapter before the epilogue! I’ll give the rest of this week to vote for book two (which you can do here), and then I’ll hopefully write the epilogue this weekend!

NOT EDITED

Chapter Thirty-Two

12:30 PM; LOS ANGELES, RENEE AUSTEN’S HOUSE

Clearing his throat, Bo lifted a fist and lightly rapped his knuckles against the door. When the door opened, he found himself looking at an older black woman. She was about the same height as him, her natural, kinky curls forming a short afro on her head. Her brown eyes, soft and warm, lit up at the sight of Bo.

Bo offered a smile. “Hey, Mom.”

Renee Austen smiled widely, the corners of her eyes crinkling. “Bo! Oh, come here, baby,” she said, holding out her arms. Bo walked into her embrace, quickly wrapping his own arms around the woman who adopted him after his birth parents gave him up for being abnormal. “I thought you left L.A.?” she asked as she pulled away, hands on his shoulders.

“I did. I was in Minnesota. But I thought visiting you was long overdue,” Bo said. “Very long overdue.”

“Well, I’m so glad you decided to drop by. I’m so happy to see you, sweetheart,” Renee said. “Would you like to come in?”

“Well, I was thinking we could go out to lunch, my treat.”

“I would love that! We have so much to catch up on,” Renee said. “Would you like me to call your father up? He’d love to see you,” she said. Bo smiled faintly. Bo was convinced that Renee and Denzel Austen had had the most amicable divorce in history. She had kept his last name, and they still had lunch together at least twice a week. The only thing that had truly changed was their shift to separate houses.

“Yeah, Mom, I’d love to see him too.”

“Great. I’ll get changed and then I’ll give him a call.” Renee looked her son up and down, a smile on her face. “It’s so good to see you, sweetheart.”

“It’s good to see you too, Mom.”

She stepped away from the door. “Well, come on in and sit down while I get changed,” she said. Bo walked into the foyer, shutting the door behind him. “I won’t be long, promise. Oh, your father is going to love seeing you.” Bo smiled as Renee hurried out of the foyer and headed back to her room. No matter how terrible he believed California was, no matter how many bad memories he had because of the state, his mother always had a way of making even the dreariest of states seem bright.

1:00 PM; LOS ANGELES, SLICE OF LIFE DINER

The Slice of Life Diner in Los Angeles was important to Bo for precisely one reason. It was a small restaurant chain, and there was one back in Maryland, where Renee and Denzel had lived before moving out to L.A. when Bo went to college. The one in Maryland was the first place Renee and Denzel had taken him after they adopted him. They hadn’t even made him order lunch. They had ordered pie instead. Every year after that—at least until he moved away—they had gone back to the diner in celebration of the day they brought Bo into their lives, and they’d order the same pie.

Today was no different.

“So, Squirt, what have you been up to?” Denzel asked.

“I was in Minnesota since, uh, the first of this month,” Bo said.

“Oh, that, umm… Surgeon case, right?” Denzel asked. Bo nodded. “I saw that on the news. That, uh, Detective Mason spoke very highly of you in the press conference.”

“He did?” Bo asked.

“Yes. He said that, due to your hard work, you were able to stop another five women from being killed. He seemed very impressed with your work, Squirt.”

Bo chuckled, passing his fingers through his hair. “He was… on my side the whole time I was there. A few of the other employees were treating me like I was a…”

“Freak?” Renee asked. Bo nodded. “Oh, honey, come on. You know you’re not a freak,” she said. “You’re my favorite intellectual. You’re my favorite son too.”

“I am your only son,” Bo said, one eyebrow raised.

Renee smiled. “Shut your mouth,” she said, punctuating each word with a tiny shake of her head. “That doesn’t make it any less true.”

Bo smiled faintly. “I know, Mom. Thank you.”

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