I suck in a deep breath, trying to force my heart rate to slow down.
“You need to tell Dad.”
“This would crush him, Slade,” my mother whispers. “You know it would.”
I screw my eyes shut as her next words float over to me. I hate her for them. Almost as much as I hate what she’s done.
“Please, Slade. You can’t tell him.”
“You want me to lie to him?”
I snap my head toward her and whatever she sees in my eyes halts her steps toward me and her eyes pop wide.
I drag in another breath, my nostrils flaring as I stare at her. Stare at the woman I thought I knew.
She sniffs, her eyes shining with pathetic desperation.
She wants me to lie to my own father. She’s willing to put me through what she knows it would do to me. Because my family is everything. And lying to them would fucking destroy me.
And she knows that. Yet, she’s still asking, no, begging.
“Beauforts stick together,” she says in a weak, pleading tone.
I see red. I see fucking crimson, scarlet, blood-red, and every damn shade there is.
“You don’t even fucking know what that means!” I yell, swiping up a glass bottle from a stack.
I hurl the fucking thing at the wall a few meters left of where my mother is standing, in pure rage. She flinches as it smashes against the wall and liquid explodes out, splattering around the room with more projection than I’d have thought possible.
“How dare you use his saying. Of all the things you could say, Mom.”
My voice wavers and I crush my finger and thumb into my eye sockets as the magnitude of what this will mean for my family hits me. We’ll be torn apart. My father will be ruined because of this. He’s always worked so damn hard to make my mother happy. To make all of us happy.
“Why?”
She keeps sobbing, the hint of a rasp slipping in alongside her words. “I’m so sorry, Slade. I didn’t plan any of this. I love you all so much.”
I lift my eyes to hers, unbearable pain swelling inside my chest.
I take one look at her face, at her widening, panicked eyes, and the dark splash marks on her dress, before whipping my head back toward the bottle I threw, lying smashed on the floor.
“Mom!” I yell, racing over to her.
I grab her around the neck, tilting her head up. Her windpipe elongates inside my solid grip as fear runs through her eyes.
She tries to speak, tries to tell me what I need to hear, so I incline my head, bringing my ear close to her lips to make it out.
The rasped words she manages to choke out send anger coursing through my veins. She claws at my hands, struggling harder to breathe.
I look into her eyes as the life behind them fades away.
26
JUDE
My suitcase isopen on the floor, its contents spilling out.
Mel and I landed back early this morning. Callum announced he’s staying with a friend while I get settled in. I still have his number blocked, so he left a message for Mel. The way he said it made it sound like he thinks he’s doing this great, heroic deed. I snort at his audacity. I pay half toward this apartment, the same as him. But he expects things to go back to normal now that I’m home. My mouth sours at the thought, but he’s the least of my worries right now.
