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She’d fucked it all up, broken our family in more ways than one, and she wasn’t the one who didn’t have to live with it.
When she died, her pain died with her.
Not that I gave a fuck about her self-inflicted pain. I gave a fuck about her actions, about the way she’d stolen life, about the hurt she’d forced on the people who once idolized her.
I took a deep breath.
Dahlia’s words—her decision to tell me what she had—made sense. Hit me like a motherfucking freight train going faster than it should.
Anger.
I was fucking angry, even that description wasn’t enough. I didn’t think the pure frustration and fury that rolled inside me was describable. It burned and it stung, consuming me one heartbeat at a time.
Yet, at the same time, it was freeing. Something inside me gave out, moving aside for a fucked-up form of acceptance.
Acceptance that it had happened.
That my baby sister was the cause.
That my mom had responsibility, too.
That there was nothing wrong with me.
But most of all, acceptance that this anger, this gut-wrenching sickness I’d been holding onto for the best part of the last ten years, was o-fucking-kay.
***
My dad was waiting for me in my driveway when I got home. I was sick and sweaty, covered in dirt and dust from the graveyard. The first thing he did when I walked in was to take a good, long look at the grass stuck to my sneakers.
His nostrils flared as he did so, and the downturn of his lips proved something else to me—in his eyes, I’d never be the success who’d kept his business up on cloud nine.
I’d always be the little failure, paling in comparison to my perfect sister.
My perfect, dead, addict sister.
My father said nothing, so I turned upstairs before he could change his mind over his silence. He knew exactly where I’d been from the grass on my sneakers, so there was no doubt he was furious.
He hadn’t been in years. Not that I knew of, anyway. I didn’t want to know. I was pretty sure that, by this point, whatever heart he’d once had, had died with my mother.
In reality, Penny hadn’t stolen just one of my parents.
She’d stolen them both.
My hand went to the scar that curved around my eye. I rubbed, the sting in it brought to life by the thoughts that’d been streaming through my mind for hours.
That night. I remembered it.
All too well.
I pushed it back—temporarily—and got into the shower. I had work to do after this. There were emails and phone calls, plus two interviews. I had to contact the realtor to set up a surveyor for one of the club buildings because I’d made up my mind.
We would distribute the strippers in the failing club. We’d send them where they’d be happier. We’d put the building up for sale and plow the money from it into the other clubs.
My father had been living in the past, and so had I. Except, he’d lived it over and over, and I’d ignored it. Either way, the result had been the same.
I got out of the shower and dressed.
I found him in the kitchen, nursing a hot cup of coffee, sitting at the marble-topped island. No doubt the coffee was laced. A glance toward the liquor cabinet confirmed that suspicion. The door was ajar.
I kicked it shut and leaned back against the side. He barely glanced up before taking a big gulp of his coffee.
Tension tightened in the air between us.
“You went to see them,” he said gruffly.
“I go more than you realize. Just because you’ve forgotten them, doesn’t mean I have.”
He snorted, putting the mug down with a clink. “I haven’t forgotten them. I just choose to think about them differently.”
“I’d say that by the time you reach the bottom of the bottle, you don’t possess the mental ability to remember your own name, much less two people who died eight years ago.”
Another snort. Another swig of coffee.
“I’m calling the realtor today. It’s time we sold Thunder. I already have it planned out. I’ll be running it by the staff today and rearranging everything through the rest of the week. The building isn’t prime real estate compared to Spark and all the others.” I folded my arms across my chest. “It’ll be quick and painless, and you won’t have to do a thing.”
“Is that a fact?”
“Isn’t that how you want it?”
He grunted.
Apparently, he’d already exhausted his conversation for the day.
“You got that fucking bar yet?”
I should have known that was coming. “No.”
He drained the rest of the coffee, which I was sure was actually more alcohol, judging by the fact that smell outweighed the one of caffeine. “Why not?”
I rubbed my hand over my jaw, wondering how to break it to him. Had I decided fully? Had I made a decision to stop, to let her keep it?
