Page 45 of Keeping Guard
“She never tried to leave?”
Maybe it was that they were sitting in the dark, with only the downtown lights filtering through the windows, or maybe it was the whiskey, or it was just her, but for the first time since it had happened, he wanted to talk about it.
“She tried once, the night he killed her.” Even though she still had no place to go, no money, and she was afraid of her husband. He emptied the cup of tea down his throat. Peyton didn’t say anything for once, and in her silence, he talked.
“He came home drunk after gambling away the grocery money again. There was no food in the house to feed me, and I guess that was the last straw. She told him she was leaving. He told her she wasn’t going anywhere, and no way in hell was she taking me away. Not sure why that mattered since he didn’t give a shit about me.”
Still, she didn’t talk, but she handed him her cup. Why that simple gesture made his damn eyes burn, he didn’t know. He swallowed more of the whiskey-laced tea. Now that he’d started this, he had to get it all out.
“I tried to stop him, but he was a big, mean son of a bitch. He knocked her across the room, and she hit her head on the doorframe wrong. Broke her neck. You know what he did?”
He didn’t wait for an answer, because of course she didn’t. “He fucking cried. ‘Baby, wake up,’ he said. When she didn’t, he got mad all over again, yelling that it was her fault while he went about destroying everything he could get his hands on. I called 911 and begged them to send an ambulance to save my mom.” Tears were falling down his cheeks now, and he swiped his hand over his face.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the pair of dice, dropping them on the coffee table. “These were his so-called lucky dice.” He snorted. “They were about as lucky as throwing rocks in the wind.”
“If they were his, why do you carry them?”
The question finally breaking her silence was a good one. “To remind me to never be him.”
“You could never be him, Noah. You know that, right?”
“That’s one of the few things I know.” Even though his mother wasn’t here to see the man he’d become, he’d never dishonor her by being anything close to his father.
“Where is he now?”
“Prison. He tried to claim that it was an accident, that she tripped and fell, but I testified against him.” The scariest day of his life, facing his father in that courtroom. “Between my testimony and his extensive record, all the times the cops were called because he’d beat her, along with some other things he’d previously been arrested for, he got life.” Hearing that sentence was the first time he’d felt safe from his father.
“Good. What was your mother’s name?”
“Darcy.” He liked that she asked that, but he didn’t like the tears he saw pooling in her eyes. “Don’t cry.”
“I can if I want to.”
How did this woman make him smile when he least wanted to? And how did she keep surprising him, like now when she scooted across the sofa and settled on his lap?
He looked down at her. “Hello there.”
The little termite burrowed into him. “Hi.”
“What are you doing?” Besides sending him dangerously close to stripping off their clothes and literally burrowing into her.
“You needed a hug, and I’m giving you one.”
“My mom loved hugs.” He’d forgotten that. “She’d say, ‘Here comes the hug bug.’ I pretended to hate it, but she knew I didn’t. She’d hug people that she knew in the grocery store.”
“She sounds like she was a wonderful person. I’m sorry you lost her.”
“Me, too. I have a brother...a half brother. We’re the same age. Turns out his mother was pregnant at the same time as my mother.” Someone had sliced open his brain and all his secrets were spilling out.
“Are you close to him?”
“I am now. I didn’t know about him, but he knew about me.” He trailed his hand over her back, liking touching her. “When he tracked me down, I didn’t want anything to do with him.” He chuckled. “Clint’s a stubborn one, though. Kept coming around until I got tired of trying to push him away.”
“I’m glad you have him, that he’s a part of your life.”
“So am I.” He wasn’t sure how she’d ended up straddling him, but she was going to feel his erection in about five seconds. “You need to get off me, princess.” Before he forgot she was off limits.
“What if I don’t want to?”
