Page 101 of Deacon

He picks up the case of butterflies and brings it down hard. I lurch forward, but he’s too quick. My hands close on air, and the casesplinters. Of course it does. I made it from milk crates and plastic sheeting. The fragile wood disintegrates as it hits the back of the chair, and a shower of jewels fly up and fill the air.

Little wings.

Rainbow shells.

Velvet antennas.

All the pieces of my heart. I hear my own scream. It sounds like somebody dying, like raw anguish.

He snatches up the case with the beetles and throws it down hard. Frozen, I watch it burst into a million pieces. His boot comes down, grinding, and my beloved beetles are nothing but dust.

I can’t stop screaming, it just pours out of me like I’m possessed, all years and years of pain and hurt I can’t hold back anymore.

Dropping to my knees, I start frantically trying to take the fragments back. My nails scrape at the wood, grabbing at the biggest pieces. Everything is so fragile from not being stored properly that the minute it hit the chair, the parts of each insect exploded. My floor is a mess under Aiden’s boots, all dust and carnage.

He picks up the last case. I see it for a second, in the air. My hand goes up, trying to take it back. The corner of his lip curls. His forehead is flushed, a vein pumping through it.

“No.” The word falls from my lips.

He throws it hard against the wall, and it shatters. Then, he turns and heads for the hall, stopping in the doorway to look back.

In the center of the room, everything falls like snow.

Little wings, so delicate they could belong to fairies, flutter to the ground in a soft flurry around me. I catch one in my hand, staring down at it.

This is all I have. All I’ve ever had. It was beautiful, and it never hurt anybody.

And he took it from me.

Rage floods my veins. My vision goes red, and I scramble to my feet.

“I hate you.” The words burst out in a feral scream. “It’s no fucking wonder they left you, you horrible, awful man.”

His eyes blaze. I’ve never stood up to him before.

“Talk to me like that, girl, and I’ll snap your neck.”

“Do it,” I scream, my voice breaking from the force. “You fucking kill me, Aiden Hatfield. It’s better than living with you and watching Bittern die from black lung because you can’t spend the fucking land money on your son.”

It all pours out of me, everything I’ve kept dammed up. I hope it hurts, hope it stabs right into what’s left of his heart.

Distantly, I become aware of boots pouring up the stairs. They’re like thunder rolling over the hills. Bittern bursts into the room and sees me, my fists full of smashed wings.

There’s a second of shocked silence. Then, he turns on Aiden.

“You go,” he says, voice low. His brow is knotted.

“Get back,” Aiden roars, shoving his chest.

Bittern snaps. His head goes down, and he barrels into Aiden, headbutting him through the doorway and into the hallway wall so hard, the house shudders. The voices downstairs fall silent. I rush to the doorway and see Ryland on the far end, clearly unsure what to do as his father and brother fall to the floor, limbs flying, cursing under their breath.

“Ryland,” I gasp. “Please do something.”

He’s staring at them, frozen. Two big bodies push past him—the McClaine brothers—and dive onto the hall floor. It takes a second, but they get them pulled apart. Seeing Aiden panting, hair messed, with a bruise on his face seems to snap Ryland into action.

“Get them downstairs,” he says.

For a second there, Ryland looks like a bullied child, but then the hard angles in his face, the ones he inherited from his father, come back in full force.

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