Page 122 of All In Good Time

He was so angry at her. But what was the point in getting mad anymore? She didn’t know that it wouldn’t help. She didn’t understand it.

He shouldn’t waste his energy making her feel worse.

He was drained. The fight in him was long gone, so he would sit here and wait for his punishment.

It came at 9:13 p.m.

A chill ran down his spine as he heard the front door swing open and hit the inner wall. It shook the house, along with the pounding steps that came down the hallway. Behind them, smaller, trepidatious steps followed. In his mind’s eye, Derek could see Jennifer with her head bowed, following obediently behind a furious Mark.

Derek held his breath and watched the warm line of light coming in from the hallway. Any second now, he would see the dark shadow of his father’s feet stop in the entry, and the door would open, and he would stand, and he would take it all. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad now that he was prepared.

The shadows disrupted the light under the door, and Derek clenched his jaw, closing his eyes to brace himself.

But the door didn’t swing open.

The shadows never stopped.

They kept moving.

The steps passed further down the hallway, and Derek’s eyes opened as the pounding started on another door. Not his.

“Mallory,” Mark’s voice roared through the house. “Open this goddamn door.”

Derek’s body ran cold, and his heart dropped.

He thought he was prepared, but he wasn’t.

Mal told him that Mark hurt her when Derek was gone. She said that it was because he had no one else to focus on. But now Derek was here, sitting on his bed, waiting for the punishment he was sure would come, and it walked right past him—straight toher.

And he didn’t know what to do.

Five more bangs rattled the house, and Derek’s door shook. His body stiffened.

Mal, unlike him, still had a lock on her door. It was her last line of defense against Mark, but Derek knew from experience that it wouldn’t last long.

“Please, Mal. Just come talk to us, okay, honey?” Jennifer’s softer voice was like a perfectly red apple hanging from the branch. The kind that lured you in, hiding the rot behind the beautiful skin.

And Mal loved her mother. She, as disobedient as she was, always did as Jennifer said.

Derek’s mouth grew dry. He wasn’t used to sitting behind the door, watching the storm pass him by like he was a sturdy tree.

This must be how Mal had felt all those nights when she locked herself in her room. Maybe now he understood the fear of opening the door and risking being caught in the crossfire.

There was a moment that the shaking slowed, and the house calmed, and Derek swallowed. The click of a lock echoed in his head, and Mal’s door slowly creaked open.

Derek stood and took a tentative step, two steps.

A slap rang out in the hallway—familiar contact of palm and skin—and then the crash of something falling.

Derek’s shaking hand wrapped around the knob, opened the door, and he stepped into the hallway.

He didn’t know what he expected.

Everything he heard made sense. Everything was exactly as the sounds suggested it would be, but it was like his soul and mind disconnected from his body and he became a ghost, staring down at the scene. Numb.

Mal was slumped against the door with one hand on her cheek, and wide eyes gaping up at Mark, who towered over her.

Her wrists, no longer covered with sleeves, revealed dark bruises in the shape of fingers. Deep purple lines that couldn’t have been made in the last few seconds, but, instead, in the last couple days. And Derek had never noticed.

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