Page 55 of The Marriage Deal
“Physically. Mentally. Emotionally. Like I said, he wasn’t a good man.” Briggs doesn’t take his eyes off me as he speaks. “He played mind games with my mom. Games that took her years to heal from. To recover. She didn’t trust easily after Daniel. His abuse was subtle inthe beginning, so subtle she didn’t realize she was being abused at all. He had her on a loop. Give her praise then tear her down with blame and shame. Then he’d tell her he loved her, that he needed her. That went on for years before he started getting physical. I don’t know the extent of that, she never told me. All my life, she refused to talk bad about Daniel to me. But she also did her best to keep me from him.”
“She never talked about his abuse to you?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know about it?”
“My stepfather. And the way my mom raised me.”
He watches my frown. “How did she raise you?”
“To be a gentleman. To care for women like they’re precious, something to be cherished. To be a good man. At the root of every lesson she ever taught me was to always be a good man. A loyal and kind man.” He chugs back the last of his coffee, sliding the cup to the counter. “But it was my stepdad who told me the truth of Daniel Alder. The ways he’d abused her. The damage a narcissist could inflict on a good person. It was him who entrusted me with the truth.”
“I’m sorry.”
“My stepfather was a good man. I told myself I’d be like him one day. I wanted to be like him.” Briggs huffs a small laugh in memory as he adjusts where he leans against the counter, folding his arms over his chest. “He had a farm in Alberta. A big and profitable one. He worked hard.”
I tense for the bad I suspect is coming.
“He died on the job. A fluke accident with a piece of machinery. It was instant.”
I gasp. “Briggs…”
His eyes cut to mine, severing breath with their intensity. “I was young. Too young to take over, even though I wanted to.”
“Oh, Briggs.” My hands ache to touch him, but that’s not what this is. It’s not what we are.
I feel helpless.
“Mom was forced to sell. I lost my father—the only dad I’d ever known—my home, and my future all in one go.” He pulls in breath as I fight to swallow down the swell of emotion I feel for him. “Mom got a lot for the farm. Enough to set us up for a comfortable life if we were smart. But I was lost with the loss of everything I’d ever known. I went from waking up before the sun every morning to help my father with the farm to aimlessly wandering the concrete streets of the neighborhood Mom moved us into. I think most kids would have started sleeping in, but I couldn’t. I’d woken before the sun for so long, I just couldn’t break the habit. Still can’t.”
He laughs, and I ask, “So you just walked?”
“I walked and I thought. I thought about a lot. And then I turned to computers. I’d always been good with machines. With technology. We didn’t have any machines after we sold the farm. Computers were thenext best thing.” He gives me a slow grin. “I’ve never been great with people.”
“I think you’re all right with people.”
“You’d be the only one.”
I smile. His eyes drop to it and my belly flutters in response. Another shiver has his eyes dropping again to my chest and I remember I’m only in silk pajamas.
I clear my throat and prompt, “You turned to computers?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“I discovered I was good with them. Really good. So good that I independently studied robotics, cyber security, and weapons design. Truthfully, I was obsessed. When I turned eighteen, I received my inheritance and put nearly the whole of it toward my first startup, a simple robotics automation algorithm I combined with cyber security. The company was my single obsession for the next six years of my life. I thought I’d manage that company forever, took business courses to ensure I’d have the intelligence to do right by it. I thought I’d make enough from the company to buy back my dad’s farm.” He chuckles again. “I don’t think I had the ability to understand just how big that company would become. Keep in mind, computers were relatively new then. Not a lot of people had stepped into that field. And those that did didn’t stick with it. Anyway, I sold it when I was twenty-four for more money than I ever could have imagined possessing.”
“Did you buy back the farm?” I ask quietly, hopefully.
He shakes his head. “The family wouldn’t sell. It had become their legacy, and there was no money that could convince them to hand it over.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I understood where they were coming from. Had someone tried to make my dad sell, he’d have said no, too. That farm is a way of life. A legacy. It’s part of the soul, and that’s not something you give up unless there’s no other choice.”
My heart aches, because in Briggs’ case, no choice meant the tragic and unexpected death of someone he dearly loved.
