Page 107 of A Kingpin's Weakness
Jo’s voice broke, trembling like she was barely holding herself together. “I think that’s the day my heart left my body.”
I felt a cold knot twist in my stomach. The way she said it like a piece of her just shattered and never came back.
“He kept taking advantage of me,” she whispered, voice ragged, “almost every night for two damn years.”
Her eyes were glassy, haunted by memories no one should carry. “Sometimes, I wondered if him and Sweetie even did anything because every night, that man was climbing in my bed.”
Her hand reached out, shaking as it touched my face so soft, so desperate, like I was the only thing holding her steady. I couldn’t stop the tears sliding down my cheeks. “Jo… you didn’t deserve any of that. None of it.”
She gripped my face tighter, as if she needed my strength more than I needed hers. “I’m telling you this because I want you to know I’m not that scared girl anymore. You’re the light I’m holding onto.”
Her pain settled in my chest like a weight, but also this fierce fire took over me. It was a fire to protect her, to protect us both. I wanted to scream at the world for her. For me. And in that raw silence, all I could do was hold her both of us broken, both of us trying to breathe again.
Jo’s voice cracked, heavy with pain. “I was sixteen when I found out I was pregnant with you.”
The words hit me like a blow straight to the chest. I couldn’t breathe for a moment.
She swallowed hard, eyes burning with old wounds. “I came home and showed Sweetie the doctor’s paper. She blamed some boy from the neighborhood and refused to believe it was her own man. But she knew. Deep down, she knew.”
“I begged. I begged them for an abortion. But Sweetie… she wanted me to learn what being a woman really meant since I was out on the streets, being fast.’”
Her voice twisted with bitter laughter. “Leon agreed. Something sick, something twisted inside him wanted his stepdaughter to carry his child, while letting her mother live in a lie.”
Jo’s hands trembled as she clenched them tight. “One night, Sweetie said she was going out. But Leon? He didn’t wait for the car to pull away. He came straight into my room. Told me how happy he was that I was carrying his child.”
I felt tears sting my eyes before I could stop them.
Jo’s eyes glazed over with pain. “Sweetie said she forgot something that night, but I knew. I knew she heard everything.”
Her voice dropped to a broken whisper. “He was too busy inside me to even hear the front door open. Didn’t hear Sweetie come back in. He didn’t even hear her open the door,” Jo’s voice was barely more than a broken whisper, soaked with a kind of pain that rattled my bones. “As he finished inside me, he told me I was the best thing that ever happened to him.”
Her eyes locked onto mine, and I swear I saw every shattered piece of her soul laid bare, the weight of years I could never carry. “Sweetie looked me in the eyes that night. I couldn’t tell if it was sorry or disgust. But I know this… she never came back. Didn’t come back to hold me. Didn’t come back to wipe my tears.”
Jo’s hand trembled as it reached out, brushing my cheek, wiping away my tears like I was the only thing left to save.
I leaned in and did the same, wiping hers away softly, reverently, like holding on to a broken part of myself. Because tonight, I wasn’t just wiping my own tears. I was wiping away the pain of that terrified little girl inside her. The girl who begged for a mother’s protection. The girl who was betrayed by the one who was supposed to keep her safe. The girl who carried the scars of my father’s monsters. And as I sat there, holding her, the silence between us screamed louder than words ever could.
“When I had you,” Jo’s voice trembled, like every word was breaking her all over again, “Sweetie couldn’t stop showing you off. She called you the baby she should’ve had like you were a reminder of what she lost.”
Her eyes filled with a sharp, deep pain. “I thought maybe things would change when she kicked Leon out. But no. That woman… she hated me. Hated me because the man she loved, loved her child and had created a child with her child.”
Jo’s fingers clenched into fists, trembling with the weight of her memory. “She told me I had to figure out how to take care of me and this baby… since I ran off the only man ‘taking care of us.’”
My heart broke. “Instead of my mother protecting me…” Her voice cracked, raw and bitter, “She became my pimp.”
Jo swallowed, her breath hitching. “Her words… her exact words were, ‘You’re already giving it up to grown men. Might as well get paid for it.’”
I could feel the air around us freeze, the silence thick with years of pain and neglect.
“I got high,” she said, voice barely above a whisper, “to run away from all of it. From my life, from my pain. And I couldn’t stop. I just couldn’t stop.”
Without thinking, I stood and pulled her into my arms, holding her like I could shield her from everything.
I whispered through my own tears, “I’m so sorry, Jo. I’m so sorry you had to carry all of that alone.”
“Stormi,” Jo said, her voice steady but soft, eyes searching mine, “you don’t have nothing to be sorry for. Because out of all that pain… you’re here. You’re the light to our lives.”
She took a shaky breath, and I could see the weight lifting off her shoulders. “That day in the hospital, I realized it was time. Time for me to get clean, to take control of my life.”
