Page 18 of Offside Angel

Just the fact that he’s here makes it easier.

“My dad came home right after I’d rinsed the dye out, and I thought he’d be happy. Maybe he’d like me more if I didn’t look so much like my mom, you know?” I blow out a shuddering breath. “The second he came inside, he could smell the bleach. He came looking for me in the bathroom and his face went redder than I’d ever seen it. I didn’t know it at the time, but he’d just lost his job a few days earlier. Instead of going to work, he was drinking the day away at a bar. He was drunk and angry before he’d even walked through the door. He asked who I was trying to impress. He thought I must have a boyfriend. When I told him I didn’t, he called me a liar and said I was a whore…”

Just like your fucking mother.

“I tried to get to my room, but he grabbed me by the hair and threw me against my brother’s door. Dante usually tried to stay out of it, but that day he opened the door and looked down at me on the floor. I thought he was going to help me. I thought that, now that he was sixteen, he’d stand up for me, y’know? He was almost the same size as our dad by that point.” I squeeze my eyes closed, and I can still see the way my brother’s lip curled in disgust. The way he looked down at me like I was a pile of rotting garbage at his feet. “Dante spit at me and said they should shave my head to ‘put me in my place.’”

A dangerous growl works out of Zane’s chest, and I open my eyes. He’s clenching his teeth hard enough that his jaw flexes. “Why wouldn’t he protect you?”

“I’ve asked myself that question so many times.” I stroke my thumb over his knuckles, comforting him while he’s comforting me. “My dad never went after my brother. Maybe Dante wanted to keep it that way, so he joined his side. Or maybe whatever cruel streak there was in my dad was passed to Dante, too. Genetics, or something.”

“You’re not cruel.” Zane lifts our intertwined hands to his mouth and kisses my fingers. “There’s nothing cruel in your DNA, Mira.”

The sound of my name—the name I chose myself—on his lips is like a balm over all the old wounds I’m reopening.

I blink away tears. “I like when you call me that.”

He frowns. “What else would I call you? You told me that’s your name. That’s who you are to me.”

My heart swells, and I don’t know that I’ve ever been so broken and so hopeful at the same time in my life. My body doesn’t know how to hold both things at once.

Which is why I cling onto Zane’s hands even tighter.

So we can hold it together.

“Whether my brother was always cruel or our father made him that way, that day was the beginning of the worst years of my life.”

“How could things have gotten any worse?” Zane growls. “The P.I. said you had a long history of broken bones and burns and bruises… ligature marks… Your father choked you, Mira.”

I nod. “If I didn’t stay out of sight when my dad was home, things would get ugly. Especially if he’d been drinking. He threw me against walls, knocked me out of chairs, pinned me to the floor by my neck. It was bad, but there was some relief: when he wasn’t home, I was free… until Dante joined in.” I chew on my lower lip, biting back a sob. “Big brothers are supposed to protect little sisters. I thought he was my friend. Then, out of nowhere, Dante turned on me. One of them was always at home with me. If it wasn’t my dad, it was Dante. If it wasn’t Dante, it was my dad. It didn’t matter what I wore or how quiet I was or whether I looked at them or kept my eyes on the floor—I was always doing something wrong.”

You look nice, Dante would sneer if I ever dared put on a dress or fix my hair. If you think you can convince the world you aren’t trash, you’re stupider than I thought.

“Somehow, the mental exhaustion of it all was worse than broken bones. I preferred getting kicked around because at least my dad would get bored once I was on the ground. At least it would end. But they never, ever got tired of berating me.

“They broke me down until I didn’t think I was worth anything. Even when I turned eighteen and could have left, I didn’t think it was possible. How would I ever be able to escape them? They’d made me believe that I was worthless and hopeless. I didn’t think I could do anything right. I thought I needed them.” I shake my head. “Sometimes, I don’t know who I hate more: the two of them, or myself for letting them get in my head. I hate who I used to be.”

Zane quickly grabs my chin, forcing my eyes to his face. “The girl you used to be—Katerina—she survived. Don’t forget that, Mira. Katerina did what she had to do to survive so that you could be here. She’s a hero as far as I’m concerned.”

I slide his hand to my cheek, nuzzling against his warm skin like it might be the last time. Because it might be.

“That’s because you don’t know the whole story,” I sigh.

Zane nods gently, encouraging me to keep going.

It’s the only reason I can swallow the lump in my throat and power on. Because more than anyone, Zane deserves to know this. He deserves to know everything about me. It’s the only way I’ll be able to trust whatever decision he makes next.

“The night everything happened—the night I killed him… It was my birthday. I doubt either of them even realized it,” I say through a bitter chuckle. “They’d never celebrated my birthday before. But this was a big one. I was turning twenty-one, and more than I did at eighteen, I felt like an adult. I felt ready to head off on my own and start over. So, that was my plan.”

I still remember exactly how it felt for the entire week before. The way I carefully and secretly packed a bag and hid it under my bed so they wouldn’t find it. I practiced the speech in my bathroom mirror, whispering what I wanted to say to each of them more times than I could count.

I’m grateful to you, Daddy, for taking care of me and raising me, but it’s time for me to take care of myself.

The lies were like slow-acting poison. The more I said them, the angrier I got. By the time my birthday rolled around, I was shaking with rage.

“Dante and my dad were in the living room watching football. Dante didn’t live with us anymore, but he was there almost every night, anyway. They’d been drinking all day, and I might have been able to just slip out the back door without them noticing. But… I wanted them to know I was leaving. I wanted to see their faces.” I shake my head. “I was so stupid.”

Some nights, I dream that I’m walking through that living room. I can feel the threadbare carpet under my feet, barely covering the subfloor in some places. I can hear the low murmur of the television, my father’s laugh at something my brother must have said. I can see their heads—one of them balding more than the other—peeking over the back of the twin recliners in front of the television. I walk and walk and walk, but I never make it to them.

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