Destroyed

by Jackie Ashenden

  ‘No. Got that when I patched in and the tattoo guy did it for me. Now you’re being distracting.’ His finger caught me under my chin and tipped my head back so I met his gaze. ‘Come on, baby girl. Talk to me.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said quietly. ‘Maybe it was growing up in a house that feels like it’s going to collapse at any second if you make a wrong move.’

  ‘Why did it feel like that?’

  ‘Oh, Dad. His moods. You never knew where you stood with him and you never knew what could set him off. He used to shout at me for no reason, and I hated it so I tried to keep out of his way as much as possible.’ I swallowed, a familiar tense, anxious feeling gripping me. ‘And my brother used to do the same thing.’

  Tiger’s dark brows drew down in a sudden, ferocious frown. Maybe that should have scared me, too, the way it always had whenever Dad had looked at me that way, but it didn’t. Because this was Tiger, and sitting here in his arms I’d never felt safer in my entire life. ‘Your brother. My buddy’s old lady used to go out with him and he used to hurt her. He ever do that to you?’

  I hadn’t had much to do with Cat when she’d been with Justin so I didn’t really know her. ‘No, he didn’t. I kept out of his way, the same way I kept out of Dad’s.’

  But Tiger’s frown didn’t lift. ‘He fucking better not have laid a finger on you, get me? Because I’ll kill him if he did.’

  At first I thought Tiger was joking, but he wasn’t smiling. Shit, he really would, wouldn’t he?

  I wrapped my fingers around his wrist. ‘Don’t kill my brother, Tiger. Please.’

  He grunted, but the feral look in his eyes didn’t waver. ‘Just a warning.’

  ‘Look, Dad and Justin didn’t hurt me, so I’m not sure why I was even so scared.’ Now I’d said it out loud, it all seemed so stupid. A lifetime of fear just because I didn’t like my daddy shouting at me? How pathetic. ‘They never did anything to me.’

  ‘Fear doesn’t come from nowhere, baby,’ Tiger said fiercely. ‘And being an abusive fuck doesn’t necessarily mean punching the shit out of someone. Making you feel bad about yourself, making you feel scared, that’s all abusive shit right there, and you know what? At least if someone hits you that’s honest. At least you know where you stand. But with that kind of emotional bullshit, it’s hard. You have no comeback and no way to protect yourself.’

  I stared at him, suddenly thinking about all the things that Dad had said to me over the years, the jabs and criticisms, the subtle way he used my fear against me. ‘He told me Mom left because of me,’ I said hoarsely, not even realising I was going to mention it until the words came out. ‘He said that I’d made him angry and that Mom didn’t like it when he was angry and so she’d gone.’ There was a lump in my throat and it felt tight and sore. I tried to turn my head away, feeling vulnerable and wishing I’d never spoken, but Tiger’s grip on my chin tightened, holding me so I couldn’t.

  ‘Go on,’ he growled.

  I didn’t want to, but there was something about his hot amber gaze on mine that felt reassuring. Even though it burned with anger, I knew the anger wasn’t directed at me. It was for me. And I liked that. No one had ever been angry on my behalf before.

  ‘He said that if I wanted her to come back,’ I went on, even though it was painful to say it out loud, ‘if I ever wanted to see her again, I’d better be a good girl and not make him mad.’ I swallowed. ‘I shouldn’t have believed him. I don’t know why I did. At the time I felt bewildered because I didn’t know what I’d done to make him angry. All I knew was that I had to make up for it somehow, so I tried to be as good as I could be. And eventually I thought that if I made myself invisible, he wouldn’t see me and if he couldn’t see me, I wouldn’t make him angry. And then maybe Mom would come home. It’s stupid now I think about it, because how could Mom know if he was angry or not when she wasn’t there? Anyway, I don’t know why he said those things to me. Maybe he was simply angry about Mom leaving and didn’t know what to do—’

  Tiger’s grip tightened, cutting me off. ‘Don’t excuse him,’ he said, his voice hard. ‘That was a terrible thing to say to you. No father worth the name blames his little girl for his own fuck-ups, no matter how goddamn angry he is.’

  ‘It’s okay,’ I croaked, not wanting to make a fuss about it. ‘Look, the whole being scared thing was my fault anyway. I’m kind of pathetic and emotional and—’

  But Tiger cut me off again, sharp and hard. ‘Is that what he told you?’

  ‘No, of course not. But I know that I am and I—’

  ‘It’s not your fucking fault your mom left. Why do you still believe him? Why are you taking the blame?’

  I stared at him, stunned. ‘I’m not!’

  ‘Yes, you are.’ There was a fierce, angry light in his eyes. ‘You’re excusing him. You’re saying you’re pathetic and you’re not. You’re just fucking not. You’re steel, baby. Coming down to the clubhouse, shoving Crash when he put the moves on you. Getting all up in my grille. Fuck, you wanna know how many people challenge me the way you did? Not one. No one would fucking dare.’

  The way he said the words and the conviction in his voice did things to me. I hadn’t thought I still blamed myself for the way Mom left. I knew it had simply been Dad’s anger talking, but...

  Realisation began to settle down inside me, and with it came pain. Because all my life my father had made me feel small and weak, and I’d let him.

  Even when I told myself I hadn’t believed the things he’d said all those years ago, there was still a small part of me that did.

  A tear slid down my cheek and I didn’t bother to wipe it away. ‘Mom kissed me goodbye when she left. She said she’d see me again. Dad was always so angry afterwards, no matter how good I was. I wondered if I wasn’t being good enough and somehow...she knew and...stayed away.’

  The fierce light in Tiger’s eyes didn’t fade, yet somehow it became warmer. He’d kept that big, rough hand on my cheek, and now he brushed the tear away with his thumb, a gentle movement that pierced my heart straight through. ‘You didn’t drive her away, Summer,’ he said, and that warmth was in his rough voice, too, wrapping me up like a velvet blanket. ‘And you didn’t keep her away either. Your father’s an asshole for telling you that. I bet she left because she couldn’t stand his shit, but honestly? She should never have left you behind in the first place. She should have come back. She should have fought like a fucking demon to get you.’

  I felt every one of those words hit me like sparks thrown from a fire. And they touched something cold in my heart that I hadn’t known existed, igniting a warmth that hadn’t been there before, thawing everything icy inside me.

  Another tear slipped out, though I tried not to let it. ‘We were supposed to be talking about you. Not me.’

  ‘I prefer talking about you.’ His thumb moved, brushing away a tear again. ‘Don’t let your dad affect how you feel about yourself, baby girl. The only power he has over you is the power you give him, so don’t give it to him. And you can do that. You’re stronger than you think. Jesus, if you can face down an MC enforcer like me, you can face down anyone.’

  He was right. I knew it deep in my bones. Maybe the knowledge had always been there and I hadn’t wanted to face it, because the thought of confronting my dad was scary. And not because of what he might do to me, but because of the way he could hurt me inside.

  But Tiger seemed to see deeper into me than I saw myself. And if he thought I was strong, then maybe I actually was. He wasn’t a guy who would lie or blow smoke. He didn’t manipulate people. He told the truth.

  I gave him a watery smile, leaning into the comfort of his palm against my skin. ‘You’re not that scary.’

  ‘I’m pretty fucking tough.’

  ‘Not as tough as you make out.’ I put my hand over his where it rested on my cheek. ‘Your mother didn’t come back for you eit
her, did she?’

  His gaze flickered as I hit a nerve he didn’t want touched. But I didn’t look away and I kept my hand over his. I wanted him to know he could talk to me about that, that he could trust me. ‘It’s not the same,’ he muttered eventually.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Your mom said goodbye to you.’

  ‘So? Clearly that didn’t stop me from blaming myself.’

  ‘I don’t blame myself.’

  But he did, that was obvious. ‘Tiger...’

  He looked away. ‘Come on, I’ll make you breakfast. But don’t forget I owe you one.’

  ‘You owe me one what?’

  ‘One orgasm.’ His hold shifted and I found myself sliding off his lap and onto my feet.

  Yeah, he really did not want to talk about his mother and I couldn’t help the sharp spike of disappointment that slid under my skin. I’d laid myself open for him yet he wouldn’t give me any of himself? It didn’t seem fair.

  He got to his feet and then, unexpectedly, reached for my hand and threaded his fingers through mine. His amber gaze was suddenly direct. ‘I’ll talk while I cook, okay?’

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Tiger

  TALKING TO SUMMER about my shitty past was something I definitely didn’t want to do. But she’d looked so hurt that I couldn’t seem to stop myself. If she wanted to hear it, then where would be the harm in telling her?

  It was all in the past now anyway. It didn’t have any fucking power over me.

  I got Summer to sit on the stool at the counter that divided the rest of my space from the kitchen, while I opened the fridge and got out some eggs and bacon.

  If she wanted to hear this shit, then I’d tell her while I cooked, give me something else to focus on. Of course I’d rather have given her the orgasm I owed her, but she clearly wasn’t going to drop this until I’d given it to her.

  You want to tell her, come on.

  Well, okay, maybe I did. She’d been upfront with me about her asshole of a father and how he’d basically undermined her confidence, making her think she was to blame for her mother leaving. Making her scared of him.

  It made me want to punch that fucker in the face so hard it was a good thing Summer was here to distract me with my own issues. Because I was definitely itching to get on my bike, take a trip down to the station and confront that asshole. Not a good idea, what with him being the police chief and all.

  Trying to ignore the urge towards violence, I put some coffee in the coffee maker, then got a pan prepared for the eggs and bacon. I could feel her staring at my back, waiting for me to speak, and since this wasn’t going to get any easier, plus the fact that I wasn’t a fucking pussy, I just came out with it. ‘No, Mom never came back for me. I never knew why she left. One day she was there, the next she was gone.’

  ‘Did you...try to find her?’

  ‘Yeah, but I was only sixteen. I wanted to go to the cops, see if they could find her, but I’d got a name for myself by that stage and I didn’t want to draw attention. Plus...’ I grimaced as I cracked the eggs into the pan. ‘Mom was a whore. The cops don’t want to involve themselves with that if they don’t have to.’

  ‘No, I understand,’ she said quietly. ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘I’d already started prospecting for the Knights so they took me in, helped me out. Looked out for me. They became my family.’

  ‘Do they know about the reading thing?’

  I slapped some bacon down beside the eggs. ‘No. Smoke’s maybe guessed, but we’ve never talked about it. I can write my own name and sign shit, so that’s not a problem. I can dictate texts on my phone and it reads them out to me, plus I can do the same with emails on the laptop. I’ve got a system worked out so it’s fine.’

  ‘But you never wanted to learn? Not once?’

  I stared at the cooking food, pushing it around with a fork. I’d always told myself it didn’t matter that I couldn’t read. Sure, it was fucking annoying sometimes, but I’d managed to get through life without so far. Why bother learning when I was fine?

  You know why you haven’t learned.

  ‘About a year after Mom left, I got a letter.’ The words were out before I could stop them, and now they were out, there was nothing for it but to go on. ‘It was addressed to me and I recognised the handwriting. It was from Mom. She’d tried when I was younger to teach me a few basics of the alphabet so I could recognise a few things, like my name and stuff. But I couldn’t read a whole letter and she knew that.’

  Behind me there was silence.

  I pushed around the bacon again, watching it sizzle. Fuck. This was harder than I’d expected. ‘I wanted to throw the fucking thing away, tear it up, but I didn’t. I carried it around with me for months. I thought about getting someone to read it to me, but that would mean admitting I couldn’t read it. Also I just...’

  ‘You were angry at her.’ Summer’s voice was soft.

  She’s not wrong.

  I gritted my teeth. Yeah, okay. Maybe I was. ‘The next year I got another one and then another. I kept getting them. So now I’ve got this pile of letters upstairs and I still haven’t read a fucking word.’

  There was another long silence.

  I flipped over the eggs and made sure the bacon didn’t burn, trying not to think about those goddamn letters and how much I didn’t want to know what was in them.

  Because you don’t want to know why she left in case it was your fault.

  It wasn’t my fault. I hadn’t done a goddamn thing. She was the one who’d left me. Without a fucking word. Not even bothering to tell me where she was going and taking Tommy with her, too.

  I used to tell myself I didn’t care, that it didn’t touch me. But of course it had. I’d never forgiven her, not after everything I’d tried to do for her. Protecting her from the pricks that would have hurt her, getting some part-time work under the table and giving her the cash for when things were tight, looking after Tommy so she could work...

  Then she’d left. Thanks for nothing, Tiger.

  The food was ready so I slid the eggs and bacon onto some plates and carried one over to her, getting out a knife and fork for her, too.

  She gave me a quick glance as I put the silverware down before glancing down at her plate. ‘This looks delicious. I could read them for you, if you like.’

  She said the last sentence in exactly the same tone as the first and I almost missed it. Then I heard. And I had to turn away, going for the coffee maker, because I didn’t know what the fuck to say.

  Okay, that was a lie. I knew.

  ‘No.’ I pulled out a couple of mugs from the shelf. ‘I don’t want to know.’

  Another silence.

  Then she said, ‘I didn’t think you were a coward, Tiger.’

  I snapped my head around, a surge of anger going through me, and met her blue eyes. They were clear and direct, and didn’t flinch away even though I must have been snarling. ‘No one calls me a fucking coward,’ I growled. ‘No one.’

  Her chin lifted a little. ‘Then why haven’t you got someone to read them to you?’

  ‘Because I don’t need to know what the fuck is in them.’

  ‘Bullshit,’ she said sternly. ‘I think you do. I think you’re desperate to know. But you’re afraid of what you might find.’

  ‘I’m not—’

  ‘You’re afraid you’re to blame, aren’t you?’

  I don’t know how she saw through me, right the way through to my goddamn shrivelled-up excuse for a soul, but she did. And this time I was the one who had to turn away, using making the coffee as an excuse not to have to deal with the look in her eyes.

  ‘I know what it’s like, Tiger,’ she went on, clearly not picking up on my ‘shut the hell up’ vibes. ‘I know what it’s like to blame yourself. I mean, wasn’t that what you told
me about my own mother just now?’

  I stalked over to the fridge for some cream. ‘It’s not the same.’

  ‘You said that already. But it is. We both had people leave us and we both don’t know why. God, at least your mother reached out to you. I would have given anything for a letter from mine.’

  The wistfulness in her voice hit me like a hammer to the back of the head, making me stop dead.

  You tool. Sulking over some fucking letters. She’s right. You’re being a pussy about this, not to mention selfish. At least you can find out what happened to your mom. She can’t.

  Slowly I resumed walking to the fridge, pulling it open and getting the cream out. Then I carried it over to the counter where I’d left the mugs of coffee and splashed some in. I stood there for a second looking down at the coffee mugs, my chest feeling tight. Wanting to put my fist through a wall or get on my bike or pull apart an engine or just carry Summer up to the bed and fuck her into the middle of next week.

  Basically, do anything but think about those letters.

  But they wouldn’t let me alone and neither would her accusation. Yeah, fuck. She was right. I was being a pussy about this.

  ‘Tiger, is that the reason you never learned to read? So you didn’t have to find out what was in those letters?’

  I blinked down at the mugs, the question bouncing around inside me like a pinball in a machine, hitting things, lighting things up.

  Fuck, was she right?

  ‘No,’ I growled, denying the thought and trying to make it sound less like the lie it was. ‘What the hell kind of pussy would that make me?’

  ‘It wouldn’t make you a pussy at all.’ She sounded very patient. ‘That stuff is...hard. And you’re trying to protect yourself.’

  ‘I’m not a fucking kid,’ I ground out, her tone irritating me. ‘I’m not trying to protect myself. And I don’t care why she left.’

  ‘I think you do care,’ she disagreed, unfazed by my shitty temper. ‘Why else have you still got them? If you didn’t care, you would have thrown that first letter away. But you didn’t. You kept it. And then you kept all the rest, too.’