Текст книги "Within Temptation"

Автор книги: Tanya Holmes

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

We approached Beverly’s street. “I’d have to see what model they’re in before I can give you a price, but these homes start in the mid four hundreds.”

He whistled. “What’s the high end?”

“Five-fifteen,” I said, squinting at house numbers.

We pulled into the cul-de-sac where the O’Dell’s stunning Dutch Colonial stood out in relief.  As I crept into the driveway, Trace stared up at the house, slack-jawed. “Holy shit,” he said. “No friggen way.” He flicked a glance at me. “How much?”

Oh, God. The Tuscany.

One of the priciest models.

“Five hundred and ten thousand,” I sputtered, then repaired, “but with a forty-year mortgage or an interest only payment option, anything’s possible. You know, creative financing?”

“Puhleeze. They don’t make enough to afford a crib like this. Icky can’t be pulling more than twenty K, and that’s being generous. You got him the job. Am I close?”

I gave a reluctant nod. “Twenty-one-five.”

“Bev would be at about thirty-five K—forty tops. That puts them at a little over sixty thou. It’s drug money.”

I killed the engine and propped an arm over the steering wheel, staring past the snowflakes pelting the window. A dim glow of Christmas lights lit the dark yard. “I don’t believe it. I can’t. Not with Beverly being so…so religious. Just last month I saw her and two other ladies handing out church flyers outside of Walgreens.”

His eyes turned to stone as he fussed with his seatbelt. “Oh, yeah, she does her share of Bible-thumpin’, but she has the same issues my mama had. Pleasing her man trumps everything.” He shook his head. “You’d never know it, but my sister’s got a 130 IQ. Yeah, she’s real smart. But she’s dumb as hell when it comes to Icky.”

Trace threw his door open. He cut around the hood and helped me out. He was a collection of contrasts. Though he’d been gentle when he led me with care up the walkway, his face was iron-hard. His hand felt rough, yet protective. He seemed aware of my presence, but consumed by his own thoughts. The fine lines in his forehead had deepened. He was somewhere else, someone else, which made me very worried about him.

When the porch lights flooded the lawn, I gave little thought to who might see us. I was too focused on Trace, and what he might encounter in that house.

The front door swung open and his sister appeared in a short jungle-print robe with matching low-heeled mules. Raccoon eyes, red-rimmed and puffy stared out from a bloodless face. Pink rollers lopped against her head as her gaze batted from Trace to me.

Beverly hugged herself tight. She sent me a curt nod, then glared at her brother. The cigarette jutting from her lips seesawed when she spoke. “Thought you was comin’ alone.”

Trace’s eagle eyes were narrowed on the brightly lit hallway beyond Beverly. “You wanna tell me what’s up?”

Beverly snatched the cigarette from her mouth. She flung a restless glance over her shoulder and gripped the door. “I shouldn’t have called you, okay? Go on home. It’s fine now.” When we cleared the stairs, she gestured wide with her cigarette hand. Smoke and ashes ghosted her movements. “Go on,” she ordered. “Patrick’s just havin’ a bad—”

CRASH!

Trace forged past us and followed the sound.

“Oh, hell’s bells,” Beverly sputtered, tearing after him.

I wasn’t far behind, but froze once I entered the kitchen. Broken glass littered the floor. Patrick was sitting at the center island, drink in hand: a half-empty bottle of Wild Turkey to his left, a full ashtray to his right. Orange bristles covered his jaw, and bags, like mini flour sacks, underscored his tired eyes. When I’d first met him, he’d been polite and groomed. This Patrick was a scruffy mess of stringy red hair, angry eyes, and rumpled clothes.

I’d never met this man.

TRACE

____________________________

“Look what the wind blew in,” Icky taunted.

I ignored him and glanced around. The huge kitchen was loaded with fancy stainless steel appliances. Hunter green counter tops. Granite. Maple cabinetry. A center island with a swan-neck sink. Pots and pans hung from a copper ceiling rack. The living room was decorated just as nice. This whole setup smacked of tall money, but the broken china scattered across the green ceramic tile marred the pretty picture.

I looked at Icky. “What happened in here?”

“None of your business.” Icky guzzled his drink and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. To Bev he barked, “You call him?”

“I was afraid. I didn’t want the police to show up.”

“So you thought your little brother could put me in line?” Icky poured another drink. “Yeah, right. His pussy-ass won’t even go down in Gary’s basement.” He glanced at me and laughed. “Fucking coward.”

Bev pleaded, “Patrick, put the bottle down.”

“Patrick, put the bottle down,” Icky mimicked in falsetto.

“He’s on antidepressants,” Bev said with a sob. “Now he’s mixing ‘em with liquor. He lost—”

“Shut the hell up,” Icky roared.

Bev tried again. “His boss caught ‘im—”

Icky smacked the counter top, his eyes wild and raging. “I said shut the hell up!”

“—caught ‘im in the men’s room,” Bev yelled back, “snorting coke! He got fired two weeks ago, Tracemore, and I’m just findin’ out. He’s been leaving the house, dressed in a suit and tie and goin’ God knows where!”

I remembered the day at Rascal’s. Icky had looked like he’d just come from the office. “You back with Spyder?”

Icky considered me for a moment, then settled his mocking eyes on Shannon, as if noticing her for the first time. “I thought you had better taste, Ms. Bradford.”

I lurched forward, but Shannon tugged me back. “Don’t,” she said.

Icky winked at me. “Better listen to her.”

Bev shook her head, her expression grim.

“Answer the question,” I said, my voice just above a whisper. “Are you working for Spyder again?”

Amusement lit Icky’s eyes. “Why would you think that?”

“This house.” I nodded at Icky’s wrist. “That Rolex. And the piece of shit car you picked me up in—just to throw me off.”

“Jealous?” Icky said with a malevolent smirk.

“Of you? Uh-uh.” I folded my arms and leaned against the wall. Shannon stood next to me. “I just wanna know how a data entry clerk and a…a—”

“Cosmetologist,” Bev told me.

I rolled my eyes. “Right. A fingernail painter. Where’d the money come from, Beverly?”

Bev sent me a searing look. “Y’all need to go.”

“I knew your let bygones be bygones was a load of horseshit,” Icky hissed. “You got nerve coming here all sanctimonious. I inherited some money from my uncle. Not that it’s any business of yours.”

“What uncle?” I asked. “You grew up in an orphanage.”

Icky’s sullen eyes narrowed. “Jeez. You are such a clueless dick! What do you think is paying for Cole’s stay in that nuthouse?” He beat his chest. “My money! That’s what. But do I get a thank-you? No. All you ever do is—”

“Trust me, when I’m able, I’ll take care of my brother,” I spat. “The last thing he needs is to be tangled up in your—”

“But that’s just it. You can’t take care of him now, can you, Mr. Parolee?” Icky tossed a hand and scowled. “Why am I even trying to justify myself to a murdering lowlife like you anyway?”

I glared at him for a long while, then said, “You talk too much.”

“The truth hurts,” Icky goaded. “Killing is easy for you Dawsons.” To his wife, he said, “Isn’t it, sweetie pie?” Soon as my brows arched, Icky said, “Did you know your sister—”

“Patrick!” Bev’s eyes bulged out of her face. “Don’t!”

Icky laughed and upended the bottle. “Why not? What’s there to be ashamed of? All you did was murder my child.”

Shannon gasped.

I swung a curious look at my sister.

“Tell them!” Icky yelled. “Or I will!”

Beverly’s eyes spilled over with tears. She shrank away, dragged a chair from the kitchen table and sank into it. Leaning both elbows on the surface, she pressed her forehead to her palm.

A full minute passed before she uttered a word. “It was a while back,” Bev finally said. “Patrick was still in Gainstown and we were always fightin’. I wasn’t sure we had a future and I didn’t think I could raise a child alone. So I aborted it. That’s why he slapped me, Tracemore. That’s why!”

Shannon stood beside Beverly and gave her shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “Why didn’t you ask your family for help?”

Bev wiped her nose with a ball of tissue she’d pulled from her bra. “Mama didn’t approve of Patrick.”

Icky knocked back a swig. “The witch hated me.”

“Damn it, shut up,” Bev snapped over her shoulder. One of her curlers drooped above her eye and she flung it back with an impatient flick of her hand. “I’d already given a baby up for adoption when I was 13. I didn’t want to, but Daddy made me.” She sniffed. “What I did this time…I know it was selfish, but I couldn’t bear not knowing what—I just couldn’t bear it again!”

“Eddie Gray’s bastard,” Icky put in. “Yeah, that’s right, Ms. Bradford. That greasy ball of fat knocked her up when they were teens, then tried to say it wasn’t his. Even called her a whore. Trace beat the crap out of him a few years later, and they’ve been at odds ever since.” He guzzled the whiskey. “Know what yanks my chain about this whole thing? That she gave his baby away—let it live—but she killed mine.”

Icky’s angry eyes cut to me. “You’re all one twisted family of killers, but I don’t just blame Bev, I blame you too. You’re the one who put doubts in her mind. You and your mother poisoned her against me. You both got what you deserved.”

“Trace?” Shannon came back to me. “We should leave.”

I glowered at Icky. “We got what we deserved, huh?”

“You’ll never guess it in a million years,” Icky taunted.

“Patrick, if you care for me, you’ll stop this,” Bev cried.

Icky laughed at her. “Shut up.”

I grabbed Shannon’s hand. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“Hey, Butcher Boy!” Icky called after me. Pride rang in his voice. “Still wondering who wrote that parole letter?”

I was halfway across the kitchen when I jerked to a stop. Bile seared my throat like an eruption from hell. I rounded, my anxious gaze skipping to Bev for confirmation, but she just shook her head and dissolved into tears.

Shannon wheeled around. Her face was ghost pale.

“That’s right,” Icky said with a hard laugh. “I did it, and I’d do it again in a mother fucking heartbeat.”

“You wrote that filth?” Shannon asked, eyes round.

Felt like Icky had plunged an ice pick into my chest. “After everything I’ve done for you, this is how you repay me?”

“Oh, you mean Nyle Weathers?”

Blood raced to my head and my vision blurred.

Shannon gazed up at me. “What is he talking about?”

“Big, bad Butcher Boy,” Icky taunted. “I don’t owe you a damn thing. My baby’s dead because you clouded Bev’s mind with lies. Making her doubt me!”

Mad as hell, I stood ramrod stiff, arms at my sides, clenching and unclenching my fists while Icky kept the rant going.

“And here’s the best part,” Icky continued. “They scraped Bev’s womb so clean she’s barren now! She thinks it’s God’s judgment, but I blame you.” He took a swallow of booze then pointed the empty glass at Shannon. “I got the letter idea after I saw her ad. When I told her about my felony, she volunteered to help me with my resume. Once I got to her office, stealing the stamper was easy. It was just sitting on a desk begging me to take it. Grabbed the stationery the second time I—”

“Trace, no!”

I barely heard Shannon’s cry and Bev’s screams. The roaring in my ears all but drowned them out. I snatched Icky off the stool and punched him so hard he went crashing into the wall. A fancy digital wall clock smashed to the floor. Its guts raced across the floor like roaches.

“Mama killed herself ‘cause of you!” I stalked to where Icky sat slumped in a corner, gasping and bleeding. Shannon yanked at my arm, but I kept going.

Before I could finish Icky off, Bev threw herself between us. “Get out!” She fell to her knees and clutched Icky to her breast. “Get outta my house ‘for I call the law! Get out!”

Shannon tugged me from behind. “Come on. Please!”

I blinked as her voice slowly registered. The red haze faded like mist, but the pain lingered. I narrowed my eyes on my sister and when I finally spoke moments later, my throat was raw. “All this time. You knew, and you didn’t say a damn thing. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Bev cleaved to Icky, her gaze fused to the floor.

Shannon stepped around me. Her face was red. “Why Patrick? What did I do to warrant this? I only tried to help.”

“It wasn’t about you,” Icky yelled at her. Blood poured from his mouth. He spat out a tooth and looked at me fiercely. “It was about him. It was always about him!”

Beverly’s head shot up. “I’m sorry for what he done, Tracemore. Real sorry. But tellin’ you would’ve made stuff worse. Now we see I was right.”

“Bullshit, Beverly!” I stabbed a finger over Shannon’s head. “You were protecting him. Can’t you see how he destroyed us? How can you forgive him? And don’t go hiding behind no Bible verses. It’s too damn late for that!”

Icky hocked another bloody tooth on the floor. It took effort, but he rose to his feet on shaky legs. Prideful insolence painted his bludgeoned face.

Shannon curled a steady arm around mine. She looked mad and disgusted as I gave my sister a fiery once-over.

“You were in pain.” Bev lifted her teary eyes. “I-I didn’t want to add to it. I did it for our family. I did it for you.”

I looked from Bev to Icky, and back again. “For me.” I sniffed hard. Tried to stuff my emotions inside where I could control them. When that didn’t work, I gave my throat an exaggerated clearing. Aw, hell. I had to get out of here.

“Tracemore!” Bev cupped a hand over her mouth. Tears and drool leaked from between her fingers. “Please forgive me!”

As I staggered from the house like a blind bull, I heard Shannon yell, “God help you both!” before tearing off after me.

CHAPTER NINETEEN
Breakthrough

SHANNON

____________________________

Moonlight bathed Jefferson Boulevard in a pale wash of silver while I drove. The car was quiet, except for an Ed Sheeran song filling the silence. Trace had said nothing during the ride back, leaving me unsure of what to do.

Every now and then I’d reach for his hand to give it a sympathetic squeeze, and he’d return the gesture, though absently. Less than three feet separated us, yet he seemed miles away.

The scene at the O’Dell’s still haunted me, but one cryptic exchange screamed the loudest:

‘After everything I’ve done for you,’ Trace had said. Patrick’s reply? ‘…Oh, you mean Nyle Weathers?’ More damning words followed. ‘…My contacts are sure Dawson was involved in his death,’ Darien had said. ‘They just didn’t have the evidence to prove it.’

I drew a shaky breath, not liking the path my thoughts had taken. Did Trace kill that prisoner? If so, what could have driven him to it? Every part of me, from my flesh to my soul, desperately hoped my suspicions were wrong.

I found an empty space half a block away from his house and rolled in beneath the hulking shadow of an overgrown pine. After I cut the engine, I faced him, squeezed his limp hand again. This time he didn’t squeeze back.

Winter’s chill seeped into the car, and when Trace finally looked at me, I could see his breath. He rested his head against the seat. His doleful eyes were dark and haunted, telegraphing a thousand hells.

I’d seen him furious. I’d seen him indifferent, and I’d seen more than a dozen of his emotions in between.

But this?

Never.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

“Naw.” He shook his head. “You?”

“I’m still numb, I guess.”

He shifted. Moonlight poured over half his face. “Icky, I get,” he said, his voice hoarse from yelling, “but Beverly….”

“Can you forgive her?”

He shrugged. “I dunno, but if you don’t press charges against him, I will.”

“That’s not a good idea.”

His eyes narrowed. “We’re talking theft, forgery and a bunch of other—”

“What about Nyle Weathers?”

A wall crashed between us and he looked straight ahead.

“Patrick knows what happened in Gainstown,” I said. “He’ll likely hold his tongue as long as you do.” I watched the subtle changes on his face while understanding registered. “Please. I need to know the truth. Did you kill him?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes or no, Trace?” He didn’t answer, so I grabbed his chin, forcing him to look at me. “How can I believe anything that comes out of your mouth?”

He jerked his chin away. Fury sharpened his expression, as if I’d punched a button inside of him—the wrong one. “You got no idea what I’ve been through. So spare me your self-righteous bullshit.”

His words cut into me like a switchblade.

“Hell,” Trace said, “why should I tell you anything?” He pushed the hair off his face. “You yank down the blinds when folks see us together. You show up at my house wearing a damn hood—and you expect me to trust you? I won’t spill my guts to a woman who’s ashamed of me, much less get involved with her.”

“For the last time, I’m not ashamed,” I said, forcing a calm I didn’t feel.

Trace flicked a glance at my hood. “That says otherwise.”

Okay, he was mad and hurting. What better way than to take his rage out on me? Small wonder he’d try to turn things around, but I wasn’t about to let him get away with it.

“My hood has nothing to do with this situation. We’re talking about your inability to—”

“It has everything to do with what just happened.” He laughed, but it sounded cruel. “You want honesty? So do I. Can you really see us together? Here or anywhere else?”

My face fell and I sank against the driver’s side door. I told myself his words were meaningless. That he was wrong, but he’d hit his mark. “Why are you pushing me away?”

He sighed. “Because I’m beer nuts and you’re…you’re truffles,” he said bitterly. “You know words I’ve never heard before. You’ve built a successful business on your own. You’ve got book smarts, money and I-I don’t have a pot to—”

“No.”

He did a double take. “No, what?”

“No, I can’t see us together,” I told him. “And it’s not because of your education level or social standing. Given everything you accuse me of, don’t you think it strange how I always find my way back to you? Even after all these years. But none of that matters because I can’t possibly be with a man who doesn’t trust me.”

“So go marry that rich prick and be done with it!”

“This has nothing to do with him,” I yelled. “You lied. Now you say you want to help me, but you insist on keeping secrets. I can get that at home. I don’t need it from you.”

“Tell you what.” He gave me a scathing once-over. “When you lose that hood, when you can admit to your family—to Montgomery…hell, this whole town—how you feel about me, then maybe this ‘friendship’ won’t be such a damn joke. Right now they all prob’ly think I’m a pet project of yours. Just like Icky was.” He laughed bitterly. “Who knows? Maybe I am.”

An eternity passed before I trusted myself to speak. “I’m sorry Beverly lied,” I said in a painfully controlled voice. “And I’m sorry Patrick wrote that hateful letter.” When fire flashed in his eyes, I narrowed mine. “Yes, you had a terrible night. We both did. But you still have no excuse for lying. And you want to know what hurts most? That you feel no guilt for your dishonesty.”

“Why should I? I told you I didn’t kill your mama, but you still didn’t believe me. So yeah, I lied. At the time, I didn’t think you deserved to know the truth, but since Icky spilled the beans, I’ll tell you exactly how Nyle Weathers died.”

“I don’t want to hear it!”

“Tough shit.” He jerked all the way around to face me. “Icky was in stir two years before he got transferred to my cell. So he asks for my help one day. Seems he was having problems with three inmates. They were ass raping him. Butt fucking. Fudge packing. You know what that is, don’t you?”

My mouth fell open. He was being deliberately base and crude. He wanted to shock and upset me. “Stop it!”

“Naw, you asked for it, now sit there and listen!” he barked. “They raped a bunch of other cons too, but Icky had it ten times worse. They lent him out to people. Made him suck cock. Take it up the ass. Pissed on him. Some of the shit they did, I can’t even name.” A muscle in his jaw pumped hard and fast. “I had to do somethin’, so I went to talk to Nyle and his boys, but we had…words.” He looked away. “A week later, Nyle pulled a shank on me—in the shower, of course. Said he wanted me to dance for him before he made my ass bleed.”

My stomach hit the seat as the frost in his eyes chilled me to the bone. “So I decided to make him bleed instead.” When he spoke next, his words were ice cold. “I wrestled the shiv away from him. Then I cut his dick off and shoved it in his mouth. He bled out in the shower.”

I struggled to breathe, but he kept talking.

“I did it as a warning for the ass-raping animals who hung with him. Had I not gone through with it, had I not been as vicious as I was, they’d’ve thought me weak. They’d’ve come for me again, and the next time, they’d’ve killed me. That’s just the way it is. You gotta hit back hard to send a message. Let ‘em know you’re willing to take things to the next level.” He stared forward. “We were on lockdown for days after that. Everybody’s cell was searched, but my…friend got rid of the shank for me, and any DNA evidence went down the shower drain.”

I listened in rapt silence, my heart hanging on his every word. When he looked at me again his eyes were filled with unshed tears and a flood of emotions. Pain, defiance, remorse, grief, anger. They were all there.

“From that day on, Icky was under my protection,” he said matter-of-factly. “And they never bothered either of us again. So yeah, I killed Nyle. Not by choice. I did it to survive.” He sniffed and looked away. “Wasn’t nobody goin’ backdoor on me.”

I moved to touch him, but he dodged my hand. His rejection hurt even more than his words had. “Why is Patrick so bitter toward you?”

“He resents me, but he’ll never admit it.”

“Why?”

“The baby Bev aborted, it reaffirmed his sexuality. I was there. I’m the only one who knows what really happened to him. Nyle and his boys turned Icky out—took his manhood. Then Bev gave it back with that baby, but now she’s barren.”

I tried to make sense of the bombshell he’d just dumped on me. “But aren’t you afraid the others will tell?”

“What others? One was killed in an attempted robbery two days after he got paroled. The other guy’s in a coma. Cancer. They don’t expect him to ever come out of it. Icky and my friend are the only ones who know the truth.” He paused to stab a look at me. “And you of course.”

Trace had killed a man with the same hands he’d used to caress me tonight. I should’ve been terrified of him, but instead I was ashamed—of myself.

He’d lied because he didn’t trust me. Surprisingly, I couldn’t blame him.

He cracked the door, bathing us in light. “Meet me at Rascal’s at two on Wednesday.”

I blinked away the daze. “Rascal’s? Isn’t that a bar?”

“Hole-in-the-wall would be more accurate. It’s at the seediest side of town. I know you don’t want me showing up at your office.”

“Trace—”

“Naw, this way’s better. The garage and the club aren’t options either. Neither is my house. And Briar is out of the question. So Rascal’s is the safest place. We won’t be alone and the regulars are discreet.”

“I have no interest in drinking with you at a bar.”

“We won’t be drinking.”

Curiosity burned hot. “What then?”

“We’re meeting to ride to Wyatt together. Mrs. Campbell’s house is an hour’s drive. I don’t trust my bike for a trip like that.”

TRACE

____________________________

I let myself in the house just as the answering machine cut on. It was Amber.

“Hey, shug. Yeah, I’m drunk dialing.” She laughed. “Okay, but seriously, I didn’t mean to hang up on you like that. I’m just a little down about us. Maybe I was rash. I dunno. I’m going to be busy for the next week or so. We’re training some new hires. Soon as I get them squared away, I’ll try and come by for my stuff. We can talk then.”

I fell back on the sofa. Now she wanted to talk? Unfriggenbelievable. Naw, I wouldn’t waste another brain cell on Amber or any of the other insane women in my life.

Not tonight. I’d had my fill of crazy.

From the kitchen, a sleepy ballad on the radio drifted through the shadows like a ghost, filling the darkness. Diana Ross crooned slow and lazy. She sang a sad hello to a faithful, but gloomy companion—some specter named ‘Heartache.’

Speaking of heartaches, my mind gravitated to the basement door and down the stairs to the place I’d avoided since I got out, to the demon roused by Bev and Icky’s lies.

Hey, ya little shit. Do ya miss me?

Icky had shamed me tonight. Called me a coward. Right now, I couldn’t argue the point to save my life, but I was tired of being afraid.

I needed my freedom.

I shoved off the sofa, stalked down the hallway, and stood by the door. Leaned my forehead against it. I told myself it was just a piece of wood, and this basement was just the place where my parents had breathed their last, nothing more. Fear almost did me in once I unhooked the chain. The rusty metal scraped pendulously against the wood as it fell. I threw the deadbolt back and gave the knob a turn. The thunderous groan of ancient hinges reverberated when I tugged the door open, and musty dampness smacked my face and crept into my throat. I could taste the smell. My stomach heaved, then settled.

Don’t be a pussy, echoed Gary’s rusty voice, a voice scarred by a lifetime of whiskey, cigarettes, and meanness. Come on, you little shit. I’m waitin’ on you.

I started to back away, but Doc’s soothing voice stopped me: We destroy fear by facing it, son. Instead of letting it remain a chamber of horrors, take control of the basement. Create positive memories in that room and embrace the negative ones. Stare the monster down and it’ll lose its power.

Taking a strengthening breath, I flipped the wall switch and descended into hell. Light stung my eyes. I squinted and kept a tight grip on the wooden handrail. The dusty old steps screeched beneath my weight. I could almost hear Daddy’s cruel laughter. The same laughter that had trailed me when I, bloody, bruised, and blinded by tears, had stumbled up these same stairs as fast as my young feet could carry me after one of Gary’s vicious beatings.

Once I reached the bottom, I looked around. The harsh fluorescent bulb, naked and bright, exaggerated every crack and dust ball. As basements went, it wasn’t anything spectacular. Just twelve years older than the last time I’d seen it, smelling of earth and dampness, secrets and misery. I turned in a slow circle and found nothing but empty space. Eight large boxes labeled‘Cole’s books’ were stacked in a corner. A crate filled with Bev’s Barbie collection topped them. My old, urine-stained mattress was propped against the back wall. And Cole’s first Yamaha keyboard lay strewn under the stairs—right below the buckshot holes.

Throat working, I gravitated there, my attention glued to the spot where my father had died. A dark splatter covered the wall, remnants of blood and brains, long gone, but not forgotten. Remnants of a man who claimed he loved me with every stroke of the belt, or extension cord, or whatever weapon happened to be within grabbing distance. It all went down in this basement.

I snatched Cole’s keyboard and pitched it across the room. It crashed against the opposite wall, falling in a broken heap of plastic. Exhaustion turned my legs to jelly, and my knees hit the floor. Hot tears slid down my face. Annoyed, I swiped them away, but they just kept coming.

I wept for my mama, and the goodbye we never said. I cried for my sister, because of the pain Icky would leave her with. I ached for my baby brother, sweet Cole, who never had a chance in this fucked up world. I even mourned for the father I never understood.

When I finally climbed the basement stairs hours later, weary and drained, I’d made peace with myself and my parents’ ghosts…for the most part anyway. I also did something I should’ve done my first night home—changed the damn fuse for the ceiling lamp in the living room.

And then there was light, in more ways than one.