Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 154728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 774(@200wpm)___ 619(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 774(@200wpm)___ 619(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
“Why do you do things with such high stakes?” I asked him, trying to swallow that terror.
He continued drawing circles on my navel for a few seconds before replying. “I had a shitty childhood,” he said to my belly button. “A really shitty childhood. Cliché, which fucking sucks that the experience is so common, but such is the world. Deadbeat dad. Mom who was trying to make ends meet with two boys and not even a high school diploma. She did what she had to do, kept thinking the next man who came along would be the one. The one to save us.” He looked up at me. “My mom was, and still is, a romantic, you see.” He sucked his teeth. “Romantic love is her top-tier, a man to worship her. Further up than her sons’ well-being.”
I ground my teeth. Even though there didn’t seem to be resentment in his tone, I instantly bristled toward his mother. No one would ever describe me as maternal, but even I knew that children came before romantic love. Keeping children safe came first. Baby Kane had deserved unconditional love, and I hated that he didn’t have that.
Not knowing my interior thoughts, Kane kept speaking. “She thought it’d happen. A happily ever after, someone would save her, save us.” He shook his head, a small, sad smile on his face. “The world quickly showed her the reality. Not every boyfriend was bad. Some were okay. Nice even. Somehow, the nice ones lasted the least amount of time. And somehow, she married the worst of them all.”
Though his tone was light-hearted, I could feel the change in him, the tension in his body.
“Knox, my brother, knew there was something wrong about him from the start, even though he went out of his way to talk to us, made an effort.” Kane’s palm crept up to my chest, though not a sexual touch. No, he laid his tattooed hand over my heart. “Knox tried to warn my mom off, warn me off. I guess I was kind of a romantic too. I was waiting for the guy to take over, take care of my mom and show us how to be men. Thought we’d found him. It wasn’t until after they got married that he changed, showed us who he really was.”
Kane sucked in a long breath. Deep, as if he were trying to gulp in the air he couldn’t get while drowning in the memory.
“Knox protected me from the worst of it,” His easy tone vanished, pain so deep in his words that I could feel the point of each letter. “He offered himself up when it became clear that he married my mother not because he wanted her, but because he wanted … us.”
When the realization of what he was saying hit me, I tasted bile. My stomach lurched with the knowledge of what Kane meant.
This man, this monster, had married Kane’s mother to get close to two small boys.
His eyes were clear and strong, remaining glued to mine. I forced myself not to let my horror and pain show on my face. “That fucked with me, for a long fucking time. Not only did I not know how to be a man, I felt like I couldn’t be because of what happened to me. So I chased down every single thing I could find that made me look more masculine. I rode dirt bikes, I got in fistfights, I raced cars. And doing that shit when you’re a dumb kid full of pain and unhealed trauma is the quickest way to get yourself arrested. So I did. Coupl’a times.”
His eyes bounced between mine, gauging something. I didn’t know what, I was still trying to digest the horrific information he’d served up.
“One night, I was drunk. Reliving shit that had happened. I was angry. Jesus, it was like a dragon was inside me. Like I was a dragon. It was bursting out of me.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “Some guy bumped into me. Said something smart. That was it. His sin. Got in my space, touched me, made me feel like less of a man. So I did what I thought would make it so no one could ever confuse me for any kind of victim again. I beat him half to death.”
The silence in the room after that was oppressive. Even more oppressive than when he talked about the abuse. I could feel it. His shame. Guilt. He was coated in it.
“Pure luck the guy survived. Wasn’t brain damaged for life. He’s now blind in one eye, though.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I had a record at that point. Was officially an adult. No money. I would’ve gone down for a decent amount of time, possibly ten years for attempted murder with my record. But Knox was there again, saving the day. He got the money for a hotshot lawyer who got it down to six months.”