Page 14 of Deviant Desires

He told our parents. At the time, I hated him for it. If he would have turned a blind eye to my shenanigans, then perhaps I would have gotten the revenge I was searching for. “I had a bat in my car. Nothing special,” I tell Bambi, “just a wooden bat from my high school baseball days.”

The most satisfying moment of Carter’s beatdown was when his front two teeth went flying across his kitchen. One skittered under the stove and the other hid beneath the kitchen counters. I wanted to keep them as souvenirs. Drill holes in the enamel and put them on a necklace that I could wear everywhere.

“The cops showed up about fifteen minutes later. They probably saved his life. God knows I wasn’t going to.” A lump forms in my throat as I say those words. I spent a lot of nights thinking about what my life would be like if I’d killed Carter Larsen. What penitentiary would I have wound up at and how long would I have been there? Would I have been eligible for parole one day? Would the defense have sought the death penalty? Or would I have spent the rest of my days rotting in a cell in maximum security prison?

“I meant to kill him, B. He had hurt someone I loved, so I wanted to hurt him back. I just took it too far.” Thankfully, the years I spent paying for that particular crime had gotten me straightened out. A prison counselor took an interest in me and helped me seek the appropriate resources to get my anger under control. I still struggle with it some days, but I’m nothing like I once was.

Unfortunately, Bambi can’t compare who I am now with who I was then. She only has the knowledge that I’ve equipped her with and it makes her hyperventilate.

Her breaths come in sharp, quick bursts tinged with fear. Her feet shuffle along the carpet, but I can’t see her in the living room anymore. “You need to sit down,” I order quietly.

“You tried to kill a man,” she whispers frantically. “And they let you out of jail. The cops let an attempted murderer out of jail.”

I don’t dare tell her that family money and good lawyers are the only reason I’m standing here today with an eye now focused on her bedroom window. I can see the outline of her body as she leans up against the closet door, a hand pressed to her forehead in despair. “Bambi, please, sit down on the bed, drink some water, and take some deep breaths. It’s complicated. Back then I was a different person. Not just that, but I was protecting my family. I will always do whatever it takes to defend the ones I love.”

“I don’t want to sit on the bed,” she responds petulantly.

I pinch the bridge of my nose and tell myself not to lose my cool. She is, after all, just hearing about this for the first time. Everybody else in my life has known about my charges for years. They’ve had time to come to terms with the violent crimes I committed in my youth. “If you don’t sit down, you’re going to worry yourself into a panic attack. Then you’re going to start hyperventilating and the paper bags are downstairs in the kitchen.”

Bambi lets out a growl of anger. “How do you know everything, Mateo?” Her question comes in an angered outburst. “How do youknowI’m in my bedroom? Or where my paper bags are? Or where I was keeping the engagement ring the other day?” Before I have a chance to respond, she reads me the riot act. “I have cameras all over this house. You couldn’t get past the front door even if you wanted to. So what the hell, Mat? How do you know all this stuff?”

I knew I’d have to come clean eventually, I just didn’t realize it’d be today. I take a deep breath and steel myself for her anger. “I live across the street. Half the time, I can just see into your house. Like right now you’re in your bedroom, back against the closet door, and your hand is buried in your hair.”

She immediately releases her locks, letting her hand fall to her side. “Tell me you’re kidding.”

The betrayal in her tone makes me wish I was. “I also got Vince, one of the family guys, to hack your security system. I’ve been coming in and out of your place for the last eighteen months.”

I expect an explosion of anger. I wait for Bambi to scream, hang up on me, and call the cops. But the line is dead. Her breathing is even as she regains control of herself. I brace myself for the inevitable only for it not to come.

“Come over,” she finally says after several tense moments. “We should talk in person.”

The deadly calm in her voice tells me that this isn’t going to end well. I hang up the phone and head for the front door. Anxiety builds in my chest with each step that I take. If I’m just walking across the street to chat with the love of my life, why does it feel like I’m ascending the executioner’s block?

12

BAMBI

Once upon a time in a faraway land lived a pretty blonde college girl that just wanted to have a night out with her friends. She drank and she danced and she had the time of her life. Then she ran into a handsome older man that swept her off her feet. They were going to live happily ever after…

Until he killed a man.

I open the front door as I see Mateo making his way across the lawn. His hair is mussy and he looks apprehensive. His nervousness strengthens me.

“Good morning, beautiful,” he greets as he arrives on the front porch.

I spin on my heel away from him and leave the door wide open behind me. Mateo follows suit, shutting the door quietly behind him.

“B,” he calls after me as I head for the living room, “I need you to understand that what I did to Savina’s boyfriend was deserved.”

I grab the engagement ring off the coffee table and hold it in my hand. It feels heavy now, somehow as large as a bowling ball. It isn’t the diamond or the band that weighs me down, but the attachment that comes with it. “What happened to the guy you killed that night?”

Mateo stares at the black box in my hand and then meets my gaze. “He threatened the family,” is all he can say. The words hit me like a ton of bricks straight to the chest.

“It’s always going to be like this, isn’t it?” I think I realized it when he was telling me what happened with Carter. Mateo made it clear, after all.

“Like what?” He asks.

I cover the distance between the two of us, closing the box and reaching out to give it to him. “You’re always going to do what your family needs you to do.”

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