Page 87 of For Emery

“Wasn’t too hard to figure out where you both went when you left the hospital together.”

“What do you want?”

“What I’m owed.”

My stomach lurched as I bolted toward the door, knowing if I didn’t act quickly, he’d catch me. But he was at the door as fast as me, caging me in.

A cold gut-wrenching fear grasped hold of me.

My mother said she knew her time had come. Now I understood what she meant. Hiding for four years always made it a possibility. But this was the reality.

“Help!” I screamed, hoping someone would hear me.

Wayne covered my mouth, stealing away my breath. “Your mother fought me well.” The smell of alcohol on his breath terrified me. He was rational when he was sober. He was a monster when he was drunk.

My eyes shifted to my phone on the desk. If I could just get to it. If I could just call for help.

“Scream again and I will hurt you,” he warned.

The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach told me I wasn’t getting out of this unscathed.

He slowly removed his hand from my mouth, gauging my next move.

“She loved you, Wayne,” I said, unable to hide the quaking in my voice. “You just never loved her back.”

His hand came out of nowhere, slapping me across the face.

The sting elicited a pool of tears in my eyes.

“I loved her,” he snarled. “I loved both of you.”

Tears trailed down my throbbing cheek. “You don’t hurt the people you love. And you hurt her repeatedly.”

“She left me with nothing. I’ve got nothing left.”

“What do you want? Money? Is that why you hurt her?”

He said nothing.

“If you could stay sober, you’d be able to hold down a job. You could make your own money.”

Still he said nothing.

So, I kept talking. Talking so he wouldn’t hurt me. Talking so he would sober up. Talking so help could show up. “But what I really think you need is help, Wayne. Get help.”

My words sparked a rage in his eyes. A rage I’d never seen directed at me before. “I need help?” His hands dropped to my shoulders and he slammed me against the door, my head bouncing off it.

I gasped as the wind was sucked out of me and I slipped down to the floor with a thud.

Wayne stared down at me.

Had something I said resonated with him?

Was he having a change of heart?

Did he feel regret?

The glazed look in his eyes told me he was too far gone for any of that. I was transported to my youth. But now I was in my mother’s place.

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