Page 90 of Infinite

I sit her on the bed, kissing her head and wiping all the tears that fall. It takes her a long while to calm, long enough for the setting sun to crawl across the room and leave us with only a trickle of light.

Sam rests at my feet, quietly whining. Rosie alternates from hopping on the bed to jumping on the floor, until finally settling in front of Becca. It’s a bad sign that Becca has barely acknowledged her sweet pups. It’s also a bad sign that she can’t seem to let me go.

“I saw my father,” Becca finally says. “It was awful.”

I knew anything involving her family would be. But in my wildest dreams, I never would have guessed how bad, until she tells me.

Every word is like a physical blow. Every detail of the event is like something from the worst of dreams. What Becca describes isn’t an angry man. It’s a twisted man. A man so hateful and full of spite, he had to cast the last insult.

Wilton Shields couldn’t bring himself to leave this world peacefully with a kind thought or a chance at forgiveness. No, he used the moment to hurt his daughter and to make sure she’ll never forget it.

Damn him. Leaving Becca with this last memory of him was her daddy’s final ‘fuck you.’

In a way, he’s lucky he’s dying. If he wasn’t, I might kill him myself.

Mason had warned me not to go by myself. He wasn’t really afraid of what they would do. He was afraid of what I would do in response. Like me, Mason knew Becca’s daddy was incapable of gentleness, of thoughts meant to be kind, or a final act of forgiveness.

I don’t realize how tight I’m clutching Becca until I ease my hold. She doesn’t complain or struggle. She simply allows me to hold her in the way we both need.

“Did anyone help you?” I manage. “Anyone at all try to offer you comfort?”

Becca pushes her hair behind her shoulder. It’s the first time since she arrived that she’s let me go. “Matthew followed me out to my car. His wife, Lynda, too. They seemed sad.” She sniffs. “Horrified, even. But they didn’t say anything.”

I shake my head. Becca could have been a stranger on the street. But if I’d seen what happened, I would have done or said something. Here, her own kin can’t offer her so much as a sympathetic embrace.

“I-I told them that I wouldn’t be at the funeral. That I was done.” She reaches for a tissue and dabs her eyes. “They nodded, like they understood, even though they didn’t make a sound.”

“You should have called me.” I lift her hands and kiss them. “You should have let me know. I would have gone with you. You didn’t have to be alone.”

Gratitude spreads across her pretty face upon hearing my words. Becca was alone. She recognizes I understand that’s how she felt.

“You were a lamb,” I tell her. “Walking into an arena filled with lions who cared more about pleasing their king than you.”

“A lamb,” she says, closing her eyes briefly. “Here I always thought I was the black sheep.”

She’s trying to lighten the mood and make us feel better. I do, in a way, but not because of what she says, but because of how she handled everything flung her way.

“The black sheep, the odd balls, the fuckups, they don’t go out and accomplish everything you did. They don’t stand up to the lions and win. They cower and willingly obey to save themselves. Your family are those lions, Becks. They wanted and expected to you to fail without your daddy’s money and influence. Instead, you prospered and surpassed them all, proving you never needed them.”

She smiles softly as another tear leaks down her face.

“You’re a lamb, because of the gentleness you demonstrate to those blessed enough to call you a friend. That soft side you show to those who’ve captured your heart reflect in your beauty. You showed your family you’re not afraid, Becca. No matter how bad they treated you or how hard things were, you didn’t fear them. Never once did you crawl back, begging for help.”

“No, I didn’t,” she agrees, that sense of pride I know so well rebuilding.

“What happened today was total shit,” I say. “There’s no shame in what you did or in the tears that fell in their presence. But there is shame in everything that man said to you and they know it.”

“I don’t think my momma would agree,” she says. Anger and disappointment barely glaze her comment, but I still sense it.

“Your momma needs to believe what she believes to justify her life and why she stayed with a man who was not only brutal to her, but to her only child.”

Becca watches me, listening closely. “From the start, your momma wanted what her friends had. What her momma had. The grand estate, the pretty clothes, and the handsome husband with money, so all she had to do is play the part of a traditional southern lady. An elegant woman, who belongs to all the right clubs and who is seen in the proper circles. The difference is the man she chose wasn’t a real gentleman, not like your granddaddy was. He was one of the richest, best looking men in his day, but he was also a monster, Becca.” I kiss her lips. “A monster my lamb defeated when she showed her teeth.”

“Thank you,” she whimpers.

Her head falls against my shoulder, right where it belongs. My knuckles glide against her arm, trying to soothe the pain that remains. But that pain should never have come.

“You should have told me, baby,” I say. “We would have faced those fucking lions together.”

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