Page 22 of Digit's Deflection
“Okay, I’ll be right back.”
She dashes off, and I lift a hand in greeting as someone I know enters the club. True to her word she’s back in a flash, and I guide her out to the car. Helping Liora into the vehicle, I wait until she’s settled before going around to my side.
The drive back to my condo is made in silence, neither of us inclined to start any small talk. Considering how strained the atmosphere is, I can’t think of a single thing to make banal conversation about. And I’m guessing Liora’s feeling the same. I can feel tension radiating off her in waves.
By the time we’ve made it into the condo and we’re settled, I can feel a tension headache building at the base of my skull. Catching myself clenching my jaw, I make a conscious effort to relax my muscles.
“I know that we need to talk,” Liora says, “but now that we’re here, I don’t know where to start.”
“Yeah, same. I guess the best place to start is way back at the beginning.” She nods but doesn’t say anything more. Taking a bracing, deep breath, I ask what’s been eating at me like acidfor years. “Liora, I have to know. What happened that night? Everything was amazing, until it wasn’t.”
Liora gets up from the sofa, goes over to the cabinet that houses the TV and some random knickknacks, a couple of photos – me with my folks at graduation from BUD/S and one of the team fresh off the plane from some mission or other.
She picks the frame with the team photo up and studies it. “I’ve seen some of these guys. At Nero’s. The day I arrived in town they were sitting at a table there. I remember because the sheer size of the big guy made such an impression.”
I can’t help but laugh. “Yeah, Bear has that effect on people, everywhere he goes.”
It’s Liora’s turn to laugh. “Figures he’d be nicknamed Bear.”
Moving to stand beside her, I point from person to person, identifying each member of my team. When I’m done, I look up to find her studying Bear, her head tilted to the side. Stupid, I know, but I feel the green-eyed monster bite.
“He may be a big, intimidating man but his eyes … I don’t know what he’s suffered through in his life, but holy shit that man’s eyes break a person’s heart. I recognize that haunted look.”
I don’t think she meant to say that, and my suspicions are confirmed when she hastily returns the frame to its spot.
“How?” I take the gap she’s given me, shifting the topic back to the matter at hand.
“What do you mean?” She’s stalling, and I can see she knows that I know what she’s doing.
“Li …” Heaving a massive sigh, she moves over to the window to look out.
“I panicked.” The words fall into the silence after long minutes.
“Yeah, princess, that much I know. The question that’s haunted me for years, though, is why. That’s the bit I’ve neverunderstood. One minute everything was amazing, and then, in the blink of an eye, shit went south, and you were gone. So, I repeat. Why?”
With another soul-deep sigh, she turns back to face me briefly. “You might want to take a seat. It’s a bit of a long story,” she says before turning back to the window. Then in a monotone, she breaks my heart all over again.
“You know that my mother left when I was five. I mean, everyone in town knew, right?”
“Yeah?” I see her nod.
“And everyone knew that my father blamed me. But what no one knew was that, in the privacy of ‘home’ – behind the doors closed and barred – my father punished me for her leaving. He blamed me that she left. He only ever saw it as her walking out on him.
“It never occurred to him that I, too, was dealing with issues of abandonment. Probably didn’t give a rat’s ass. It was always about him and never about me. He sank lower and lower into the bottle, until he finally hit the bottom. And the drunker he got, the madder he got.” For a second her voice wobbles, but she clears her throat and keeps going.
“He didn’t believe that I was worth paying good money on to be babysat if he wanted to go out either. So—” This time her voice doesn’t just wobble, it cracks. Liora reaches out her hand to brace against the window, dropping her head to stare at the floor.
“Li – princess …” She shakes her head, so I stop.
12
LIORA
Jesus. After all these years you’d think it would be a little easier, but it isn’t. In no shape, form, or way is this any easier to think about, let alone talk about, even after being away from the situation for twelve years.
Fuck.
Tears burn my eyes, and it feels like I’ve swallowed broken glass. Bracing a hand against the window, I drop my head. It feels far too heavy for my neck. Every cell in my body is screaming for me to run. To run and never look back. To find somewhere to hide and never come out into the light of day again.
