Page 130 of Clean Slade
“What? What happened? What did you do?” Nino asked him and turned from Tony to me and back to Tony.
“You needed to remember what kind of monsters we deal with in this world.” Tony ignored Nino and stared at me.
I laughed. It was a dry, sarcastic heave of a laugh, but it was a laugh nonetheless.
“You think I forgot? I was raised by one.”
The muscles in his face flexed, his eye twitched, and I knew the real Tony was coming out again. The no-bullshit Tony. Not the one he’d tried to present ever since he came back into my life.
“Dad, what did you do!” Nino shouted, but once again, he went ignored.
“Call him,” Tony told me.
“No.”
“Call him.”
“I’m not calling him.”
His color went even redder than my wall, and I was starting to enjoy how much I made him lose his composure.
“You’re so afraid of what Raymond might do, huh? And you’re not afraid of what I might do?” He opened his coat and put a hand inside the inner pocket.
“If you think pulling a gun on me will work, think again.”
But it wasn’t a gun he pulled. It was a cell phone.
I peered at it, but I wasn’t sure what was so special about a cell phone. It wasn’t even a nice one. It was clunky and too big, even for my father’s hand.
“Call the man, or…” He pulled the phone back and tapped a couple of times before pointing the screen at me. “They pay the price.”
The screen was filled with an image of Grams and Mac sitting together, reading a picture book.
No. It wasn’t a picture.
It was a video.
A live video.
The blood drained from my body and a knot formed in my throat so large I thought it might choke me.
“What. Did. You. Do?” Did I hiss? Did I shout? Did I cry? I didn’t even know. I didn’t care. All I cared about was Mac.
“I knew you needed some…convincing. So I took matters into my own hands. What? You think I didn’t know about your little meetings? Please!” Spittle came out of his mouth, and my heart pounded faster. “Call the man, or you can say goodbye to your Grams and little clone.” He pulled his fingers into a fist and then stretched them out, imitating an explosion.
“What the fuck?” Nino shouted, and I glared at him. “King, I didn’t know about this. I swear. What are you doing, Dad?”
This is it.
My worst fear has come to life.
Everything I’d always dreaded was happening.
And I was going to lose a piece of my heart because of this soulless motherfucker.
The tears were there, ready to spill, but I didn’t let them. Because everything inside me raged.
Because I should have listened to my gut and gotten the fuck out of here.
