Page 56 of Daughter of a Monster

I clutch the phone so hard my fingers turn white. I can hear the pain in her voice, the confusion as to why I won’t come home. But she doesn’t understand. She’s found nothing but comfort in the fact that people know who she is, what he put her through, but it’s not the same for me. I was never his victim and therefore people treat me differently. They treat me as though I had a choice. As though I knew about him and simply turned a blind eye to his despicable acts.

Emotion rises at the back of my throat, choking my words. “I’ve got to go. Talk later.” And I hang up the phone as though it burns.

“Everything okay?”

I whirl around to find Jericho right behind me. Even fresh from a workout, his scent is intoxicating. I look up at him through my lashes, just as tears begin to well. A choked sob rips from me unbidden and Jericho reaches out, crushing me against his chest.

I allow myself the comfort of him for a moment before pushing away and wiping my tears with the backs of my hands. “I’m fine.” I seem to be saying it a lot lately. Maybe if I say it enough times it will come true.

“Why does your mother think you might not be safe?” There’s concern in his eyes. They scan my face as though the answer is hidden somewhere in my features. “Is that why you don’t use your real name?”

My head snaps up. “How do you know it’s not my real name?”

“I’m your employer. I know Berkley isn’t your real name just like I knew whose daughter you are.” He steps forward. “Tell me, why don’t you go by Everly? It’s such a beautiful name.” He reaches out to stroke my cheek and for a moment I’m frozen by his touch, but then I remember myself and jerk away.

“Because that’s not who I am and I despise everything that name stood for. Everly Jane Atterton.” I whisper the name as though it’s a stranger’s. Looking into his eyes, I search for a flicker of recognition, or guilt, or regret. But there is nothing.

“You can talk to me, Berkley. I won’t spill your secrets.” His gaze is fixed on me so intently it hurts.

I turn away, too scared to look at him. I lift my chin as I talk, regaining some of my resolve. “I barely know you.”

“You know me well enough.”

I laugh. “Well enough. The only things I know about you are that you’re rich.” I roll my eyes as if to emphasize the extravagance of the place. “And that your brother said you killed your own father.”

I don’t know why I say it. Not after the last time. And I don’t know why I say it with such vehemence. It’s like I want to hurt him, just the littlest of bits. Hurt him like he hurt me by running away. It’s torturous to look at him, to see the flinch of pain that crosses his face, but I don’t move my gaze.

Jericho sighs. He runs his hands through his hair in the way that he does and it falls back into place slowly, reluctantly, like it wishes for once to be free.Hedoesn’t speak. But he also doesn’t storm off like he did last time. There’s something resigned in his stance. Something defeated.

“So it’s true?”

Jericho takes a seat and I lower my butt to the corner of his desk. He leans forward, his head hanging dejectedly. “He was a drunk. Not an alcoholic, an alcoholic at least tries to get help. He was a downright nasty drunk.” He looks up at me briefly, as though testing to see whether I believe him, and then takes a deep breath before continuing. “What Gideon said was true. And he’s hated me ever since he was old enough to comprehend what had happened.”

I shuffle back on the desk, letting my feet dangle in the air. “How did you….” I don’t finish the question. It seems crass and cruel to push him for the details. He was only a child. I can’t imagine the torment he must have gone through to drive him to that point.

Jericho keeps talking, his voice distant and strained, like he doesn’t like the way he sounds. “He never held down a job for long. My mother was the one who supported us financially. All he ever did was drink the money she didn’t hide well enough. He wasn’t too bad in the afternoons because he only drank beer. He didn’t start on the whiskey until five o’clock. In his twisted mind, that somehow made it okay. As if five o’clock was some magical time when he was allowed to behave in a way he wouldn’t during the light of day. We never knew what to expect. One minute he’d be dancing around the living room, spilling his drink on the floor and dragging my mother up to dance with him, and the next, he’d just snap. We never knew what would trigger it. Or if something triggered it at all. And that one night when he found her birth control pills…” Again his voice fades. He looks down at his hands as though they’re still covered in the blood of his father. “She didn’t want to get pregnant again. He’d waited years before his violence turned to me as well as her, but eventually it did, and she didn’t want to provide him with another punching bag.” He clears his throat and twists his head from side to side. “Things got even worse after Gideon was born and, well,” he clears his throat again, a wave of determination washing over him, “I just couldn’t stand it anymore.”

His gaze screams for me to judge him, to be repulsed by him, but I’m not. I’m swept up in the story, imagining what I would have done to my own father given the chance. Once I knew who he really was.

“The police originally tried to pin it on my mother. That’s when I confessed.”

I want to reach out to him. I want to take him in my arms, hold him close and tell him everything is going to be okay. I want to kiss away his pain.

He stands and starts to pace the floor. “She was never the same after that. I think she mourned him. In some twisted way, for reasons I’ll never understand, she still loved him. She hung around for the time I was in juvey, not that she was really present. Half the time she was either drunk like the old man or high as a kite. She never touched us though. Not like he did. I’ll never forgive him for what he made her become.”

They are almost word for word the same sentiments Gideon uttered. Both brothers filled with so much pain, everything the fault of their father. It makes me feel like I hold some sort of kinship with them. Our lives devastated by the actions of a man whose blood runs through our veins.

I walk over, lifting my hand to his chest. His heart beats erratically beneath his shirt. I look up into his eyes, hoping mine echo the pain of his and show him that I understand, that I feel it too. Leaning forward, I rock onto my tiptoes, brushing my lips over his. Jericho stiffens. His stance changes, hardens, and he slams down a wall between us.

“Is that enough truth for you, Miss Berkley?” His voice has changed back to its usual gruff manner. His eyes hold none of the pain they did before. They are cold and empty. “Do you know me well enough now?”

He pushes past me, storming out of his office as though he can’t get away quickly enough. I follow, anger igniting my steps.

“You can’t just keep storming off like that,” I yell at his back. But he ignores me, keeping up his stupidly fast pace down the hall. “You can’t just ignore me. Not after what happened.”

He whirls around, and I almost cower from the rage which trembles through him. “That was a mistake. It won’t happen again,” he growls. He has no doubt as to what I was referring to. He knows.

I walk straight up to him. “A mistake? I thought you didn’t make mistakes. I thought when you did something it was because you chose it. Because you wanted it.”

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