by Kari Gregg
Sammy had stayed with them. Even though he'd fought tooth and nail to persuade them to abort it, he'd stayed. Sam had filled out all the annoying paperwork. He'd traded whispers with passing doctors and nurses, handling all the details so Mitch could focus on comforting Liv, keeping her calm.
"Thank you." Mitch bit back tears.
Sam's hand squeezed his shoulder. "Once she's out of surgery, I'll move the rest of my things out of your house."
Pain swallowed him, consuming him whole. "Don't go," he said. "I know you have every reason to hate us, but please, don't go."
When he looked up at Sam, the younger man's jaw had tensed, his eyes glittering with equal parts relief and self-loathing. "I . . . can't." Sam shuddered. "I'm sorry."
Chapter Twenty-Eight
When the phone rang later that afternoon, Mitch lashed a hand out for the receiver before the noise disturbed Liv. She'd been so quiet, so still since they'd left the hospital. She had to be tired. Had to be. God knows he was exhausted, but neither one of them could sleep. For him, the pain was too fresh, too piercing. Too consuming. For Liv . . . .
He didn't know.
She wouldn't let him in.
She hadn't looked at him since he'd broken down at the hospital. She stared over his left shoulder when she spoke to him, answering in flat monotones when he asked her a question, her dark eyes vacant and dead.
He'd done that to her.
Losing the baby had been so monstrous, so huge . . . .
He made her lie down. The physical trauma alone—she needed rest. Her doctor had stressed that. But no matter what he'd done to make her comfortable, she lay in their bed, ignoring him to stare with unblinking eyes at the ceiling. Finally, she'd closed them a few minutes ago.
Not to sleep.
To shut him out.
Pretending she was asleep helped him get through the minutes that stretched one on top of the other, though, so he grabbed the damned phone. "Hello."
"It's time."
Lost in his world of misery, Mitch frowned at the telephone. He didn't recognize his stepmother's voice at first. Probably because it hadn't slurred. His eyes closed.
His heart clutched in his chest.
God, he didn't need this.
"What?"
"Heard about the baby. Sorry," Rita said, sounding anything but. She inhaled, held it, and exhaled so that he could almost smell the smoke from her cheap cigarettes.
"I wouldn'ta called, 'cept for the prissy-ass nurse you hired. It's Gary. She says he's finally dying. Won't last the night."
He rubbed a weary hand over his face, swallowed.
His eyes burned.
"Mitch?"
His head shot up, his gaze flashing to Liv. Her clothes had been soaked with blood so the hospital had given them a set of scrubs for her to wear home. The violent blue of the material emphasized the dark shadows under her eyes and made her face seem even more pale and drawn. As tall as Liv was, Mitch had never thought he'd see the day when he'd ever describe her as delicate, but today she was. Fragile. Like even the act of breathing might shatter her.
You're nothing. Worse than nothing. A Goddamned boil on the ass of humanity. You're the angel of fucking death. Know that, Mitchie? You destroy everything you touch. He swallowed convulsively, slapped a palm over the telephone receiver. "Need anything, baby?"
She stared at him, eyes haunted.
She shook her head.
He tried to smile, though he knew he'd done a piss-poor job of it by her instinctive flinch. He nodded to the phone. "It's Rita." He uncovered the receiver. "I'll be right there," he said, then hung up before his stepmother could get a shot in. Liv didn't speak.
Just stared.
His heart, already shredded, bled.
"I'm sorry," he said. God, would he ever say anything else to her except I'm sorry? He pushed out of his chair and pretended that he hadn't seen her cringe in retreat when he walked to her. He tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear instead. "I wouldn't leave you unless it was important. I need to go." Her head dipped to a small nod.
She shifted, slid away from his touch.
Mitch slowly lowered his hand and reached for his jacket draped over the chair, his stomach a tight, painful knot. "You should rest while I'm gone. Doctor's orders."
"Okay."
"Go back to sleep, honey." He leaned forward, kissed the crown of her head. "I won't be gone long."
* * * * *
Gary died an hour later.
Never said a word.
Just stopped breathing and died.
Not that Mitch had expected a melodramatic scene at his deathbed, with Gary gasping through the pain to apologize for every shitty thing he'd ever done and begging his son's forgiveness.
Mitch didn't know what he had expected.
Not this.
Rita sniveled into a frayed dishtowel at the kitchen door. She'd yanked on a pair of jeans that fought mightily against its seams and a sweater so tight, the fabric dipped where her belly button should be. Her hair, newly bleached, had been styled, curled, and set. Neat fingernails painted slick red dug into her forearms when she hugged herself. Artfully applied makeup gave her cheeks an obscene, girlish glow. The coroner had rolled Gary into the body bag. He'd asked Mitch and Rita both to leave while they saw to him. Unbelievably, Cheryl, Liv's sister, had appeared at his elbow to guide him away.
But Mitch couldn't leave.
He had to see it through to the end.
Cheryl apparently got tired of being ignored so she'd clung to Rita's elbow, patting his stepmother's shoulder, while the coroner had adjusted the controls of the hospital bed to raise it.
Rita wailed when they slid Gary onto the collapsible gurney.
Mitch had hung his head, pasting his stare to the threadbare carpet between his knees, as dead and empty as the corpse the coroner had threaded through the trailer's front door.
People had come to talk to him in hushed voices.
The body would go to Langston's Funeral Home. No autopsy. And no memorial. Gary Lane McAllister would be cremated as soon as the law would allow. Someone asked him about the death notice. For the newspaper.
"Whatever. Ask Rita."
Mitch just stared at the carpet and willed his heart to start beating again. Eventually, everyone left.
The coroner.
The nurse he'd hired to tend to Gary.
The hospice chaplain.
Even Cheryl.
He vaguely heard his stepmother shoo her away, their voices carrying from the front steps outside. Cheryl's uncharacteristically concerned. Rita's adamant. She'd take care of Mitch, his stepmother promised.
The absurdity of that almost made Mitch smile.
"I'll call the medical supply company to clear out the bed and other equipment tomorrow." He raised his head, unsurprised when she glared at him, arms crossed over her chest. Her scarlet-tipped fingers tapped an annoyed staccato on her forearms. "His doctors have been instructed to send the final bills to me. I'll take care of this month's utilities and pay for the cremation—"
His stepmother sneered. "Cheap fuck."
"I don't give a shit what you do with his ashes." He pushed to his feet, his body as numb as his heart. "Goodbye, Rita."
"Where in the hell do you think you're going?"
He fished his keys out of his pocket, but his hands didn't seem to want to work right. Clumsy. "This is it. Gary's dead."
"That don't mean I am." When she slid next to him, the cloud of cheap perfume made his eyes water and choked his throat. "I'm still your mother."
"Stepmother." He grasped his keys so hard his knuckles shone white.
"He wanted to kick your ass out when you showed up. I'm the one who let you back in here. You owe me!"
"I paid the bills you decided to let slide the two years it took Gary to die." He stared at her. "I owe you nothing."
"You can't just leave."
He trudged to the door. "Watch me."
When she put a hand
on his shoulder, he jerked away. "Don't touch me."
"Aw, don't be that way."
She cooed?
He froze.
Bile burned his gullet.
"How can you be so mean?" She slid her fingers up his biceps as she crowded in on him. The sickly sweet scent of her perfume seared his nostrils. "After all that we've been to each other."
Just that quickly, he was ten years old again.
Ten and scared.
And sick.
Ashamed.
"Cut it out," he said, hating the pleading note in his voice, the tremble in it. She smiled, cat-like. "You don't want me to stop." Her free hand curved around his hip to cup his ass through the denim of his blue jeans. "You never did."
"No!" But as soon as he pried her hand away, she twined both arms around his neck and pasted herself flush against him.
She laughed, a hard, brittle sound that sent shivers up his spine. Like fingernails on a chalkboard. "You enjoyed it. I made sure you did." He glared at her. "I hated what you did to me."
She smirked. "You came. Every time."
Humiliation churned his stomach. "Why do you keep doing this?" He grabbed her wrist, but her hand shoved down his zipper and dove into his pants. Rita grinned, sly and evil. "I think the real question is why do you keep letting me?"
His heart pounded against his ribs, just like it had when he was a kid. In his mind, he pushed her away, but pain, oceans of it, had buried the man he'd become. In Mitch's place, the boy she'd molested stood there instead. And the boy cowered. The boy didn't—couldn't—stop her when her hand wrapped around his flaccid cock. His eyes snapped shut.
His testicles shriveled to the size of mustard seeds.
The cold sweat of fear trickled between his shoulders.
"Because you like it, Mitch. That's why you let me touch you. You can move across town. Act as high and mighty as you want, get a pretty new wife who thinks the sun rises and sets by your puckered asshole, but you can't escape what you are." Her painted mouth twisted to an ugly sneer. "The only reason you got that pretty new wife is because you knocked her up. She'd have never married you if you hadn't got her pregnant first so get off your high horse, sonny. You're trash no better than me."
"No." But pain squeezed his heart, because she was right. Liv wouldn't have married him. Even pregnant, she'd objected. The only reason she'd given in, taken his name, was realizing how much it would hurt him for his son or daughter to be born a bastard. Like him.
Liv had married him out of pity.
Because she was trapped.
Not for love. Never for that.
"She'll leave you when she figures out what a twisted fuck you are. They always do. I know the truth about you, sweetie. Gary did and deep down, you know it, too." She gave his cock a painful squeeze. "I keep doing this," she said, "because you keep letting me." Her mouth curved to a malevolent grin. "And you keep letting me because you like it."
"Mitch."
Oh fuck.
Liv, face pale, eyes rounded, stood at the front door of the trailer. "Cheryl called." Livvy.
Here.
With Rita plastered to him and her hand down his pants, desperately working to stroke him hard.
Shit.
He reared back, away from Rita, and flinched when she didn't let go of his dick. Cursing, he grabbed and squeezed her wrist until her fingers sprang wide, then yanked her hand out of his pants. Too late, he pushed her away.
He pivoted to the door, raised his hands to reach for her. "I can explain." But he couldn't.
He knew he couldn't.
How could he explain it to her when he didn't even understand it himself?
Ghostly white, she turned her back on him and walked down the steps. Mitch raced after her to the backdrop of Rita's taunting laughter. He caught up with Liv when she opened the door to her rattletrap Mazda. "That wasn't what it looked like."
"It looked like she was pumping your dick for you, Mitch." She glared at him through eyes that glistened. "Tell me which part I got wrong."
"It wasn't for me. She had her hand down my pants, but it's never been for me." He slammed the car door shut before she could climb in. "Damn it, Liv, will you just listen to me?"
"Are you listening to yourself?" She stared at him, features drawn and tight. "Are you?"
"I was ten the first time she raped me."
She sucked in a sharp breath, but the stare she swung on him reflected equal parts pity and accusation.
"The whole time we were growing up, I told you everything, Mitch. Everything. No matter how mean and ugly it was." Her voice cracked. "No matter how ashamed and dirty it made me feel. I didn't keep any secrets from you."
"You were just a kid. You didn't even know what sex was. You were the only clean thing in my worthless, miserable life, Goddamn it!" When he reached out to cup her cheek, she knocked his hand away. "You used to look at me like I was Spiderman, Batman, and Superman all rolled into one. Nobody thought I was worth anything. I didn't even think I was worth anything. Until you. I couldn't destroy that. I wasn't more than a kid myself, honey. Please."
"That was then. You're right." She swiped at the wet tears pooling in her dark eyes. "But what about now, Mitch? We aren't kids any more. Why didn't you say something now? When I slept with you. When I moved in with you. When I got preg—" She shoved a clenched fist to her mouth. Fat tears leaked from her eyes. Mitch's heart tore open. "Liv—"
"I married you," she shouted, shoving him away. "I was too scared to breathe because of my parents, my family, but I let you wear me down. I married you, anyway. Because I trusted you. And you didn't tell me? "
Tears burned his eyes. "I was ashamed, all right? Guys aren't supposed to get raped, not even when they're scrawny ten year-olds."
When she jerked the car door back open and climbed inside, Mitch didn't have enough pride left to try to stop her. "You aren't ten any more. And that didn't look like rape."
"C'mon, babe, that's not fair. She's been after me since she called me about dad's cancer and I haven't . . . ." He shook his head. "That's part of why I had to come back. To prove to myself that she doesn't have that power over me, not any more. And she hasn't. I told her no, shoved her off. I needed to do that, Liv. As a man, I needed that." He braced himself on the door. "But Gary just died; she knew I'd be fucked in the head." He leaned in. "I would've stopped her. You have to believe me."
"Before or after she jerked you off?" Livvy turned the key in the ignition. "I have to go."
"Don't run out on me, Liv. Don't. Please." He'd beg her to stay. Whatever it took. He didn't care. "I know I fucked everything up. I'm neurotic and a freak. But I love you. You have to know how much I love you. Don't leave me. Not now. Not like this." And because he did love her, he moved out of the way when she slammed her car door shut.
What was left of his heart shattered when the car sped away.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Mitch stared down a bottle of Jack Daniels.
He'd driven around for awhile, thinking, and had finally stopped at the liquor store on Elm on the way home. He wasn't surprised when her car wasn't parked out front, but when he unlocked the front door and found her things in the bathroom, her clothes still jumbled with his, cruel hope taunted him.
Mocked him.
Made a sorry mess of him.
She'd leave him.
Of course, she'd leave him.
She'd never wanted to marry him in the first place and within hours of losing the baby they'd made together, she'd found another woman groping him. Worse, his stepmother. Practically over his father's corpse.
Who'd stick around after that?
He couldn't blame her.
He was sick.
Twisted.
Fucked in the head.
Always had been.
That's why he'd married three women who'd run around on him, used him up and treated him like shit. He'd just been sticking to his old, familiar pattern, the habit Rita had taught him. Rita a
nd Gary both. He was nothing. Worse than nothing. He was just a piece of meat to be tormented and toyed with.
So he'd bought the whiskey and headed home.
But he didn't drink it.
When Mitch had finally worked up the nerve to tell his father what Rita had been doing to him, Gary had held him down. He'd fought like hell, but his father had been huge then, much bigger than a skinny ten year-old boy. It'd been ridiculously easy for Gary to hold him down and pour Jack Daniels down his throat. To celebrate his son losing his cherry.
He'd kept at it until Mitch had puked.
Then, dear old dad had called Rita in so he could watch her rape him all over again.
Mitch had never drank a drop of Jack since.
Even the smell made his hands shake.
He hadn't bought the whiskey to drink himself senseless.
That was his father's way.
Rita's way.
He'd bought the bottle to defeat it.
Mitch had spent two hellacious years back in that fucking trailer, waiting for that twisted son of a bitch to die. Maybe at first he'd wanted to know why. Why had Gary let Rita do that to him? Why?
Unlike the Winslows four trailers down, his father had never hit him. Mitch couldn't remember seeing his father's fist once. His dad hadn't smacked him around, beaten him, not like the trashy Winslows beat on their kids and each other. Gary McAllister had been proud of that.
No, his father's control was more insidious. Much more devastating. Gary McAllister hadn't ruled his family with an iron fist. He'd ruled them with his warped and malignant mind.
Mitch couldn't remember a time when his father hadn't told him he was a stupid shit, lazy, worthless, a faggot—any and everything that could beat a kid into the ground. He couldn't remember the first time Gary had forced him to stand in the corner until he pissed himself. He couldn't remember the first time his father had locked him in the closet, either. Starved him or worse, made him eat until he puked, then forced him to lick up his own vomit.
That was just life. He was nothing. Less than nothing.
