SACRED (The Kingwood Series Book 3)

by S. L. Scott

  Her sad sigh follows and she looks to me where I’ve taken cover behind the other side of the couch, standing behind it. “A man has come by twice to tell us your father is in debt to him.”

  “But he’s dead,” I say.

  “He said the debt is still owed. He either wants his money back or what he paid for to be delivered.”

  I’m almost hesitant to ask in fear of what the answer might be, but we have to resolve this matter. “What did he pay for?”

  “He didn’t say, but he paid three hundred thousand dollars for whatever it is.”

  Gasping, my eyes bulge. “That’s insane!”

  Vaughn kicks the footstool down abruptly and stands. Tracking him to the window, he stops, and I can see it then. The weight of the world is pressing down on him. He’s too young to bear such a burden.

  My mom replies, “Yes. His insurance policy was only worth two hundred fifty thousand dollars, which, as you know, we sunk into the houses. So even if we sold them, we won’t have enough.”

  I didn’t realize my body had gone slack and the arm of the couch was holding me up. Not until I realized I needed to sit down. Fumbling my way around, I drop my head into my hand.

  Vaughn says, “We don’t have much time left to figure this out.”

  My mom adds, “I don’t know what to do.”

  In that moment the change in Vaughn becomes apparent. He’s stepping into the “man of the house” role of our family, and horrifyingly, he’s misunderstood that role to include violence. How do we undo that? “How much time is left?”

  Vaughn looks straight into my eyes. It’s sad to see, but his innocence is gone. A cold, hard replacement is firmly intact. “Not more than a week or so. He didn’t give a date, but he said by mid-month.”

  “What does that mean?” Panic rises inside. “What will happen?”

  When my mom is about to respond, Vaughn holds his hand up and cuts in before she can speak, “I don’t know, but I’ll do the best I can.”

  My mom and I speak in unison, “What?”

  He nods, taking in the backyard with some foolish pride that this family is his to protect all on his own. Giving us a look that’s too familiar from eyes that match his, he says, “I’ll take care of it.”

  I stand in protest. “You will not. I’m not willing to let you ‘take care’ of anything. You’re a kid—”

  “And you’re a fucking woman,” he roars, hitting the blinds, which then come toppling down.

  Then we hear the cries from the back bedroom. Toby. But we all stare in a standoff, my mom and me against Vaughn. Although my heart is racing, I keep my voice low and ask, “Are you on drugs?”

  His glare is daggers straight to my heart. I’ve seen that stare too many times in my twenty years. “Don’t question me, Clarissa.” He releases a harsh breath, and then adds, “The baby is crying.”

  My mom stands from the couch and hurries past me and down the hall.

  Protective.

  Love.

  Care.

  Friendship.

  Even motherly.

  I’ve felt all those things for my brother, but now I have to add hate to the list. Right now. Right here. I hate him.

  Hurrying to the coatrack, I snag my purse and sweater, and open the door. To my back, he says, “Watch yourself, Clarissa.”

  I whip around. “Don’t threaten me, Vaughn.”

  “It’s not a threat. Keep yourself in check.”

  “I don’t even know what that means.”

  He turns his back to me, the aggression leaving his body as if he was possessed and now he’s free. How do we undo this? “Just go, Clara.”

  I do. I go because horror has returned in the form of cutting words and physical violence. I go because tears are filling my eyes and I don’t want to cry in front of him. He’ll take that weakness and feed off it to build his strength. But most of all, I can’t see Toby. I’m in no place to put on a fake smile to keep him from being scared. He reads me too well.

  Today another place of safe haven has been tainted. I feel sick with fear.

  Again.

  20

  Cruise

  My knee is bouncing and my fingers seem to be on a mission of their own by how they’re tapping against my leg. I can’t hide my nervous energy. When I look at Alex standing at the window, he shakes his head just enough for me to get what he means. I stop my hand and my leg and look across the table.

  My mother is drinking tea and she takes it exactly the same way my mom does. She’s not dressed in an expensive blue suit and every strand of her hair is not perfectly in place, but she’s real and she’s mine.

  The shape of her mouth I recognize from seeing my own.

  Her hair is a bit lighter, but I think that might be from coloring than from genetics.

  The same shade of brown stares back into mine.

  Christine Amelia Braddock.

  The woman who gave me life.

  I can’t stop myself from thinking of Dove. Different meaning, but same phrase.

  The woman before me is so much the same, but here we are lives, maybe even worlds apart. She says, “I watched the news every time they showed you on TV.”

  I’ve been juggling between hurt from being abandoned and joy from finding her since I arrived. It’s all a clusterfuck of emotions that I’m trying to hide. “You knew where I was?”

  Her gaze goes to the mug on the table as sadness comes over her expression. “I did. I saw an interview with your . . . with the kind people who adopted you. Since your family was in the public, I could keep up with you when I was strong enough. Sometimes, I wasn’t.”

  Alex says, “I’m going for a ride. I’ll be back shortly.”

  I’m grateful to have a friend who can read me without a word. Once he’s out of the house, I look at my birth mother and ask, “Why did you give me away?”

  “It’s a regret I have every minute of every day.” Straightening her shoulders, she adds, “I would have regretted keeping you more, though. I could have never given you the life you have.”

  “I have a life, but I didn’t have the love a kid needs.” The response comes without permission and I’m even surprised by the anger in my voice as if she’s to blame for the assholes I’ve lived with all my life.

  “If I would have known—”

  “What?” I look at her, but then shift and look around the house. “What would you have done?”

  “Cruise.” My eyes return to hers. “I don’t know. I gave up my rights to have a say in your life, but I didn’t give up my love for you.”

  “Do you ever wonder how it could it have been? What I was like, not on your TV, but in person?”

  “All the time, but where does that leave me? Heartbroken and sad. But you became the son of a senator and his wife seems truly lovely.”

  I don’t want to feel bad and I’m not here to make her feel worse. I don’t know what I want or expected, or even need from her, but this makes me uncomfortable. I’ve felt off for a long time, but all that “off” seems to want to place blame on her. I take a deep breath and blow out. “I’m happy to meet you.”

  Her smile returns. “I’m happy to meet you, too, again. Would you like to hear about your father?”

  “Yes. And more about you.”

  “I have photo albums in the living room.” She gets up and I follow.

  When I sit, she goes to her bookcase and pulls a wide, cream-colored photo album from the shelf. I didn’t know people still used those, much less print pictures to put in them. She sits on the couch next to me with the album on her lap. Before I have a chance to see the first photo, she says, “He was a marine.”

  “Was?”

  “He was killed while serving overseas.”

  Like a punch to my gut, I feel so disappointed. I can’t change things, but I so wish I could now.

  She opens the album and a large photo of him is set under clear plastic. The photo, like the album, is worn and dated. I may have so many features in com
mon with my mom, but the others are from my dad. Her finger runs over the edge of the photo as if it were him in the flesh.

  “What was his name?”

  “Tucker Braddock.” There’s lightness to her voice when she says his name. She turns a page and there are six photos of him in his uniform, most smiling, some more serious. “He wasn’t from New Haven. I don’t know where he was stationed. He couldn’t tell me. Covert operations or something like that.”

  “So what you’re saying is my father was a badass?”

  She laughs, and I love her smile. I prefer the smile to her sadness. “Yes, he was, but he was also so much more. He was . . .” Seeming to remember him in the fairest light, the smile may soften, but her eyes are bright with memories. “He loved me. He used to tell me two more years and then he would be out of the military. We bought this house for him to fix up when he got out. The money I received from a policy after his death, helped pay it off. I just couldn’t bear to sell it. Even after his death, I couldn’t bare to sell. He loved it here.”

  “How often did you see him?”

  “Every free day he had and if he had more than four hours off, he was hanging out with me at the library or the diner where I worked, just to spend time with me. He was quite the charmer. I skipped classes sometimes just to spend an hour with him.”

  Tucker Braddock.

  Cruise Braddock.

  John Braddock.

  “Did I have a name before I was given . . .” I don’t finish. I imagine this topic is as touchy for her as it is sensitive for me.

  “Yes, I named you after your father, and my father who died when I was young. Tucker David Braddock.”

  Tucker David Braddock.

  “I don’t know what to say to that.”

  “That’s okay. It’s a lot of information, heavy information at that.”

  “I have a million questions, but my mind is a little blank right now.” I laugh. “So I’m not sure what to say.”

  “I feel the same. I was wondering if maybe we can meet again? With the initial meeting out of the way, maybe we’ll be better equipped a second time.”

  She’s probably right. “I’d like that.” I didn’t even expect to meet her, so I’m feeling like a failure on knowing what to ask. Looking back at the album, I point to him. My dad is holding up a photo. “What is that?”

  “That’s you. It’s an ultrasound picture I sent him. He was so proud when he found out we were having a baby. I could barely keep him on the phone. We only had three minutes, but he spent it telling every marine around him how he was going to be a father.”

  As much as I like hearing about him, I can’t help but feel another shoe is about to drop. “Did we ever meet?”

  “No.” She tears up and her shoulders fold forward. “I’m sorry.”

  “You don’t need to apologize.” I’m tempted to reach over and comfort her, but I’m not sure what to do. But when she sucks in a trembling breath, I cover her hand with mine. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “I’m sorry for yours. I wish you could have met him. He was a wonderful man. So strong and kind. His heart was bigger than his large build. You look so much like him. It almost hurts. He was just twenty-four when he died.”

  My age now. That fact is haunting. “How old were you when you had me?”

  She relaxes, not moving her hand. “I was twenty-one. The summer after my junior year at Yale.” She turns the page, and while looking at the photos, she adds, “I came here on scholarship. I think we met the day I arrived. I went to the store to get a few groceries. I walked down to the local store and he was coming out. He followed me right back in and talked to me while we walked every aisle. It sounds creepy. It wasn’t. I call it our first date. We were together only a year the first time he was sent over . . . I’m not sure where he was sent. He came back and asked me to marry him. One year to the day we met, we were standing in front of a justice at the courthouse.” She swipes under eyes, and an embarrassed laugh comes out. “Some photos look like the desert. Some are the base camps. I guess it really doesn’t matter. Knowing where he was or where he died that won’t bring him back.”

  Looking around the house, I start noticing the small details, the lack of family photos, the abundance of cookbooks, a basket of yarn and knitting needles, and women’s shoes next to the front door. “Did you remarry?”

  “No one gets a love like that twice in a lifetime. I dated once under pressure from friends, but nothing came of it. My love for Tucker is too great to forget.”

  “Did you forget me?”

  “Never.” The album is closed and set aside. “I’m just going to cut to the biggest question I know you have. Why did I give you up for adoption?”

  “Yes. I’d like to know.”

  “When I found out I was pregnant, I only had your father. My parents were across the country and divorced. I had no money to see them and they had less. Tucker was thousands of miles away. My family was worried I’d wasted the opportunity I’d been given. I wasn’t given Yale. I earned it. Without your father, I lost myself in grief. You were the sweetest little baby. Everyone who saw you commented on how cute and handsome you were. And how much you looked like your dad. I could see it. I can see it now too. As much as it made me happy to hear, it broke me every time I did. On top of that, I missed too much school and had to drop my classes and get a job. It sounds like excuses now, but I need you to understand how much I loved your father.”

  “All right.”

  “I lost him the week before I had you. I was on my own with no one to turn to. My part-time job fired me for missing work the day you were born.” When she looks at me, she says, “I couldn’t afford my bills between the pregnancy and school. Your father had been sending me money but he didn’t make much.” Pausing to get lost in her thoughts, she smiles but it’s not one of joy. “We thought love was enough, but when he died . . .”

  “I understand why you did it.”

  “I didn’t want to give you away. I just thought it was the only way for you to have a good life, a life I couldn’t give you back then.”

  “You left me at the church.”

  “Every agency wanted a fee. Usually the adopting family pays it, but without a family in place . . . I was scared and didn’t understand, so I set you on the steps where I knew this sweet older lady worked.”

  Annie.

  Christine is nervous, her hands twisting together. She was younger than I am now and I’m not ready for a kid, much less raising it by myself. “I’m not judging you. You did what you felt was best. I know that.” Sitting forward, I ask, “Why did you stay in New Haven?”

  “Just in case you or Tucker ever returned to me.”

  “But he died.”

  “Not in my heart.”

  She’s left me speechless a few times, but that last response hurts the most. I hug her. I embrace this woman for loving me enough to know that sometimes love is not enough to keep dreams alive. I squeeze her to me for loving my father till this day with not just her heart but with her soul. I may have been born through grief, but I was conceived from love.

  I have no right to ask for more.

  The love she has for my father is the love I inherited. My heart has the capacity to love greatly, and I intend to. I used to be envious of Alex and Sara Jane’s relationship. They walked through hellfire for each other without thinking twice. Great love, like Christine and Tucker’s.

  I smile because I’ve found that. I’ve found my savior, my great love, my little dove. I thought I was empty, lonely, because I didn’t know where I came from. Sitting here with my arms full of all the love I was given from before I was born, I realize I’ve found what I was searching for—not just the answers to questions that have plagued me about my birth, but great love. And she’s sitting at home probably wondering where I am. “I should hit the road.”

  “Oh,” she says, leaning back. “But we can see each other again?”

  “Definitely. I’d like that. I’d like you t
o meet my girlfriend, too.”

  A wide smile cracks through her concern. “I’d like that very much.”

  The roar of Alex’s motorcycle is obvious as he approaches the house. “I guess it’s time.”

  We exchange numbers and I hug her again at the door when she walks me outside. She waves at Alex and he returns one. I’m almost to my bike when I stop, and turn back. “Soon, okay?”

  “Soon.”

  We don’t need a goodbye. The one twenty-four years ago was enough for both of our lifetimes. She loved me so much she gave me away. Now I know my worth.

  Bumping fists with Alex, he asks, “You okay?”

  “Better than I’ve been in forever.”

  “Good. Now let’s get going or Sara Jane’s going to kick my ass for being gone all day.”

  “She’s a real hard-ass,” I tease. She’s not at all.

  “Stop talking about my girl’s ass, and let’s ride.”

  I mount my bike and settle into the saddle. Revving my Harley, I nod twice to Alex and then, unlike our regular formation, he waits for me to take the lead. I take off and he follows behind.

  At the stop sign at the end of the street, he slows down beside me and comes to a stop. “You didn’t think I’d let you lead the whole way, did you?”

  Laughing, I lift my visor. “Race you home.”

  “Yours or mine?”

  “Clara’s.”

  He chuckles. “Fuck, you’re sunk.”

  With my hand over my heart, I reply, “In the best of ways.”

  Bastard takes off leaving me in his dust. My competitive side rages inside, but it’s my best friend, my brother, so I’ll let him win this time. My prize will still be waiting at the finish line.

  21

  Cruise

  Riding back from New Haven gave me a lot of time to think about my birth mom, my dad, the mom who raised me, the Senator, and my life in general. I was well aware of how hollow my existence had been: fast cars and faster women, and nothing to ever fulfill a deeper need.

  Being away from Clara for twenty-four hours, I can tell there’s a difference in me. She’s messed with my molecules, the atoms of my heart aligning with hers. She’s burrowed herself into my chest, penetrating my cold heart, letting the sun shine in. I welcome her warmth wholeheartedly.