Page 125 of Finding Noah

I'm not your friend. The thought screamed through my mind, but I bit my tongue until I was certain I'd make myself bleed, waiting for him to start talking again.

“Ah, but you know, dealing mostly,” he went on, tipping his head back and nodding toward the ceiling. “Stealing sometimes. Kidnapping if I have to. On occasion, I get lucky and get to fuck someone too.”

I tried to ignore the burning, searing pain radiating from the places he’d used for his own depraved pleasure just the night before and the night before that, knowing he’d undoubtedly take advantage again and there would be nothing I could do about it but beg and plead and cry until I either passed out or he had to scurry back to whatever rathole he’d come from.

Swallowing my dread and fear, I decided to be bold and asked, “You ever kill someone?”

“You mean, the way your daddy killed mine?”

I nodded.

Benjamin seemed to give it some thought, then shook his head. “Not like that, no. Can't say I have.”

“But you've killed before,” I stated.

“Well, man, you know, that's the business.” He offered a nonchalant shrug, like to take a life was akin to taking a piece of candy without permission. “But don't go thinkin' that's what your daddy did when he blew my father's head off. That wasn't part of it. And neither was you nosin' through our shit.”

There was a residual pain glinting in his eyes. Two decades’ worth of hurt and sadness, and I dared to feel an iota of sympathy for this monster of a man. Something in me wanted to reach out to the sad kid trapped inside him, and against my better judgment, I allowed it.

“Benjamin … Ben … h-have you ever considered that we were both just kids, doing what our messed-up dads wanted us to do?”

He glared at me like I was an absolute moron and lifted one shoulder. “Of course that's what it was. I'm not a fuckin' idiot.”

I exhaled with a deflating sigh and began to ask, “Then why—”

“God, dude, we've been through this!” He leaned forward in the chair, resting his elbows on his knees as a look of unabashed victory blanketed his face. “It's revenge. It's poetic. Your father took something from me, and I'm takin' somethin' from him. Simple as that.”

I shook my head. “But … Ben … my father is dead.”

That seemed to be news to him as the triumphant look he wore fell. “What?”

My arms and legs rattled with life against my restraints as I tried to lift my head, hope buzzing beneath my battered skin.

If he realized this was all for nothing, if he realized there was no revenge to be had, he might let me go, I considered, but the more logical side of my brain reminded me that nobody was ever let go in situations like this. There was only escape or death.

“He hated me, Ben,” I went on. “He tried to kill me. He never cared if I lived. He—”

“But he saved your life!” Ben fired back at me, the heat of his immediate anger evident in his furious glare.

“Yeah, probably because he didn’t wanna have something to explain to my mom!” I fired back, shocked by the strength behind my voice. “God, you can't make a thousand assumptions from one fucking incident, man. You have no fucking—”

“Shut up!”

He rose to his feet and slapped me across the face, and my lip stung with the fresh opening of a cut that'd only just begun to scab over.

I licked at the blood and stared at the other side of the room, away from him, as I continued, “He would rape her, over and over and over again. That's how I came to be. I was the product of that rape. Nobody wanted me dead more than that bastard. Well, except maybe you, for some stupid fucking reason. All I did was what he told me to do, and I did it so he wouldn't beat the piss out of me or my mom.”

Ben stood over me. I turned my head an inch, just enough to peer at him through my one good eye. His chest heaved with anger and fury, his fists clenched at his sides. There was no telling what he might do right now after I divulged more than he'd allowed me to in all the days I'd been chained to this bed. Would he give up? Would he kill me now? Would he kick the shit out of me until my bones were broken down and jagged beneath my flesh?

Will he let me go?

Stop. He’s not letting me go.

“Who killed him?” he asked then in a calm, even tone, a stark contrast to his stance.

“M-my mom,” I answered.

“Is she alive?”