Page 124 of The Secrets That Kill

“I’m sorry, I…” I swallow.

Mercer looks at me and puts the tomato in the bowl withthe herb mix and baby cucumber. He has a lemon and extra virgin olive oil set out neatly, but he just sighs and puts the knife down. “For what? Something stupid I said?”

“For…everything. I’m just…sorry for everything.” I look at my hands. “Y-you know that before I called the police, that Jaxson was furious at Dad. He threatened to take off, to do something Dad would hate. And he did. He joined the military, fought, and died in action. Because of me. I was the last straw. Then your life was ruined, too, because of me.”

“You stole years from me. But…it wasn’t ruined. We’ve been over this.”

I swirl my wine in my glass. There’s something I’m missing here, I know it. And I try to reach blindly for it. Maybe it’s just the further along we go, the more complicated the hate becomes, the more it morphs into something softer, sweeter.

In the car ride here, I told him that if he feels nothing for me then I can’t be here. Because even though I didn’t say it, he has to see it, has to see I care and have feelings. Complicated, wild feelings I don’t know what to do with, but if I’m honest, they’re nothing at all to do with hate.

He could have lied. He could have also said he doesn’t feel a thing. He didn’t do either. I think he told me the truth as best he could.

Mercer said it had to be a game, that he wasn’t made for anything more.

He really believes that. But it’s not true. His life…I can’t begin to fathom that cycle of violence, of a little boy named Mercer who couldn’t protect his mother, who watched her bring him and herself back into the arms of danger and horror and violence.

It’s complicated, all so complicated, and I have no idea how a mother could do that to a child.

On a visceral level, I don’t understand it. I want to go back and save him. I want to tell her to destroy her life but not his.

But he didn’t abandon her even though she did that to him, time and again. Hell, he killed his own father to save them both.

He thinks he can’t be more, give more, but he’s wrong. I don’t think he understands how much he’s already given.

As I continue to watch him, he makes a vinaigrette. It seems so casual, but I see the bite of his fingers when he picks up his wine to take too big a sip. I catch the violence of the knife when he chops herbs to add to the jar.

Mercer’s waiting for me to say something.

And my heart, my stupid heart, bleeds for him.

He killed his violent father, and his mother not only took away unconditional love, but she looked at him differently. Then she went and found another, violent man instead of doing the job of protecting her own blood.

Right now, I’d love to track her down and shake her. Show her how far her son’s come without her.

I press a hand to my forehead and bite back a sigh.

Jesus. I’m a freaking mess. Blaming a victim of abuse.

But I just…I need…I want to bathe him, give him aftercare of a different kind. Something he’ll never, ever take.

“You never told me what you really do, Mercer.”

He doesn’t look up. “I make a fuck ton of money.”

“Not an answer.”

“What do you want, Pollyanna? Me to say I’m redeemed? That I help orphans and puppies and kittens? I do shit on both sides of the law. I prefer the dark side. Obviously.”

“So this thing, this man…Henderson…you want to just kill him because you can.”

“Yes,” he says quietly. “I do.”

He’s told me some of it all, of doing things because of Ruby, and that jealousy of a dead girl flares once more.

“For Ruby.”

“Fuck, you say that like the naïve girl you are. Like I carry a torch for her. I don’t. If I’d been in love with her, I wouldn’t have let Jax touch her. But like I told you, it’s complicated.”

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