Page 17 of Lies He Told Me (Bratva Crime Syndicate 1)

I only realize I’ve fallen asleep when I wake up.

“What the fuck are you rambling about? Can’t you let a man watch his hockey in peace, for Christ’s sake? Don’t I do enough?”

Damon’s at it again.

An indistinct reply filters in. Probably Mom pointing out that he doesn’t work, has been sponging off us for years.

“What the fuck do you care? Do you want me here or not, you stupid bitch?”

My fists ball and my whole body jabs upright. You donottalk to my mom like that.

More yelling, though I hardly hear it as I storm there. Maybe money can’t fix this. But I can.

“Actually, we don’t want you here,” I snap, coming to a stop around the corner.

Damon shuts his stupid mouth, eyeing me.

He might’ve been handsome once upon a time, but that was a thousand beers and ten thousand cigarettes ago. Now, he’s a nightmare. Caved-in eyes, jutting beer belly, yellowed gravestones for teeth.

“We would be more than happy for you to screw off.” I smile at him. “You know, stop eating our food and spending the little extra money we do have on beer.” I glance at Mom—please, please, back me up just this once, just this one time, please—“Wouldn’t we, Mom?”

Mom is all trembling and flashy-eyed from their argument. But at this, the final conclusion, she wilts.

I can see it. Her thinking of Randy the abuser. Of Carl the coke addict. Jerry the cheater and Paul the suicide.

She’s thinking that, even if we do get rid of Damon, there will always be another ready to step in line. One with even worse vices. Every successive man has been a downgrade from the pile of human garbage who preceded him.

I grab Mom’s hand. “Mom. Please. This has been going on long enough.”

Even Damon can tell when his gravy train is in danger of stopping.

His eyes lower, and he ekes out the script he knows so well, “Shit, Terri, I’m sorry. You know how I can get carried away when I’ve had a few drinks. And your daughter’s right, I am fucked up. I’m sorry. Tomorrow, I’ll …” His chest heaves. “Tomorrow, I’ll …”

He sneaks a look to see if Mom’s buying it. No need for him to actually finish the sentence, to summon enough brain cells to actually deduce what it would take to change. He’s not going to do that; of course he’s not. Not even close.

I could smack him, but I squeeze Mom’s hand harder. “Mom, c’mon—how many times has he given us this bullshit spiel? You’ve said it yourself—he’s leeching off us!”

Damon’s whole body jerks, as if we’ve smacked him, mumbles, “My injury … if you don’t … nowhere to go …”

For fuck’s sake!Mom’s face shows she is caving.

Damon knows just how to play her. His vice may be doing fuck-all and yelling at the hockey games on TV, but her vice is kindness. The kind of kindness that has her accept shit jobs and shit men, time and again.

I want to shake her, to scream at her, but I know there’s no point.

It’s more than that. My mom suddenly looks twenty years older, with the way her hands are lined and her head is bowed.

She has to believe him, not just for his sake, but for hers. So she can believe she hasn’t made the same mistake she always has, the same mistake she always swears she’ll never make again.

“Please, Joy,” she says. She won’t look at me. “Damon and I will talk this over. Go back to bed.”

“No, you won’t!” My voice is too loud. I’ve lost and I know it. “He’s just going to lie to you, like he always does. Mom, look at me!”

But she won’t. Instead, quietly, sadly, she says, “I’m not going to ask you again.”

I stand there for a few seconds, my mind rebelling against it. It can’t end this way … not again.

But Mom and Damon go over to the couch, sit down, and don’t look over, talking in low voices. There’s nothing I can do.

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