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“What?” Richard’s voice came through my half-open door. I jumped out of my skin.
“Rich!” I said, going to stand. I was so relieved to see him. Some silly part of me had thought he wouldn’t come back. As if this wasn’t his house. “Are you okay? Um, Selene told me about?—"
“What,” Richard grit out, the cold in his eyes stopping me in my tracks. “Did you say about the video?”
“J-Just that Jen doesn’t need to analyze it,” I said, shrinking back nervously. I didn’t like the way he was making me feel. I felt small, cornered. I knew the look in his eyes. I’d seen it in my own mother. “Fabrizio told?—”
“So you’re giving up?” Rich erupted, the sudden volume of his voice startling me back a step. His fists were clenched tight at his sides, and for the first time, I felt genuinely unsafe with him.
What happened? How had he changed so drastically?
I took a breath, trying to pull back from my instinctive coping mechanism—shutting down and shutting up. I wasn’t wrong, and I knew Rich was upset, but that didn’t justify the way he was talking to me. He wouldn’t be acting like this if he knew about my mom, but it hadn’t come up.
“I am not giving up,” I said levelly but firmly. “I would never do that. But Jen doesn’t need to check the video because I know it’s authentic.” Richard seethed.
“How the hell could you know that?!” he almost shouted. I took an automatic step back. “How could you know without checking?—”
“Because Fabrizio?—”
“We’re dealing with the Irish Mob, for fuck’s sake, they can doctor videos just as well as we can! Or did you forget who broke into your house yesterday?” I flinched, starting to get frustrated.
“That was uncalled for, and you know it,” I said, pursing my lips. “If you would just listen, I?—”
“No, what’s ‘uncalled for’ is you throwing away what could be the strongest evidence of my brother’s innocence!” Richard yelled. “What kind of lawyer are you? You moved mountains for my dad?—”
“I could prove reasonable doubt?—”
“So prove it again!” Rich roared, and I could feel my throat tightening. Why was he doing this? Just this morning, he’d been so loving; how could he turn on me so quickly? He had to know he was attacking the wrong person, right? “If you were able to prove it when Dad was actually guilty, then you can prove it now that Fabrizo’s innocent!” I gaped.
“Rich, he’s not?—”
“He is!” he yelled, his voice cracking desperately. “He. Is. Innocent. I know my brother better than some—some outsider ever could!” You’re nothing but an outsider, Lauren. Know your place in this household.
My breath jammed in my throat. No. Not again.
“You call yourself a lawyer, but you’ve already decided you can’t clear an innocent man’s name?” Rich continued ranting, oblivious to the way I was shutting down. “You get one big win, and you decide you can slack around like some kind of hero? Get off your high horse! You’ve had one case, that doesn’t make you a courtroom rock star!”
You think you’re so much better than me? You’d be nothing if it weren’t for me. You’d still be rotting away in the system, right where I should have left you. I should have sent you back while I still had the chance. Maybe your next family would really hurt you, then you’d appreciate all I’ve done for you, wouldn’t you?
“And now you have nothing to say! You can’t even talk back; how are you going to argue a case? Weren’t you some hotshot, prodigal student?”
This report card is pathetic. I feed you, house you, clothe you, and you can’t even get a 3.5? I’ve lowered my standards for you over and over again, how much lower do you expect me to go?
“What’s pathetic is you blaming me for something you know isn’t my fault,” I retorted coldly. I swore I’d never feel like this again, and here I stood. I was shaking with learned fear, but I wasn’t a little girl anymore, and Richard was not that bitch. “Where’s your undeniable proof that Fabrizio is innocent? What do you have that will convince a jury? Because big brother’s gut feeling isn’t going to cut it.”
“That’s not my job?—”
“No, it’s mine, so stop telling me how to do it. I know tensions are high, but you can’t speak to me like this.”
“Family is the most important thing in my world,” Richard hissed, eyes narrowed. “If you can’t bring Fabri home, then why should I give you a place in it?”
My heart dropped.
That easily, huh? One thing goes wrong, one thing that he refuses to listen to my very valid explanation for, and he turns his back on me just like that? The flirting, the waiting, the sex, and vulnerability, they meant nothing?
It didn’t mean nothing to me. But, well, apparently, it did to him.
He was the one who’d rushed to me when I was in danger, the one who’d held me afterward like I was the most precious thing he’d ever touched. He had made me so comfortable, so fast, that I even spilled my darkest kink to him. I never talked about my rape kink, not just because it was hard to explain but because it was dangerous. I could be forced for real, no talk about limits or safe words, just real, actual rape. And he could use my desire as an excuse. Hell, he had it in writing.
