Page 36 of Jonny’s Redemption

“Ordering in then.”

“Fuck.”

“Let’s get home.”

Then I wasn’t standing in front of Jonny. I was pinned to the side of his truck with his face buried in my neck. I wrapped my arms around him. His body shook and I held on.

“Goddamn. Fuck.”

I held on tighter.

Jonny shook harder.

I couldn’t be a hundred percent sure but I could’ve sworn I felt wetness on my skin. I held on with everything I had and found it was easier to hate Anita Spencer than I thought.

13

By the time Jonny pulled into his driveway, the pressure had built. It was trapped in his lungs past the point of pain. The scene in his mother’s living room had replayed over and over like a bad highlight reel. In private, Anita had never been particularly caring but she’d never told Jonny she hated him. Thinking back over his life, reasonable deduction would draw that conclusion but he’d never wanted to believe it. Publicly, Anita had been the perfect wife, the picture of a loving mother, a good neighbor. An image she’d wrested for the truth and clung to.

All lies.

All fucking lies.

Why it mattered what everyone thought Jonny could never understand. The question had plagued his every waking moment. He’d walked a minefield every damn day. And after his father died, it had become unbearable listening to people talk about Calvin in high regard. The man was a fuckwit. But his mother? She soaked that shit in every time someone offered their sympathy, told her how wonderful her husband was, how sorry they were about Doug, how they’d done everything they could to love an orphaned child. His mother hung on every disgusting word.

Critical mass—that was where the bomb that had settled in his gut was at. The explosion was imminent and he no longer cared about the chain-reaction the fallout would cause. He didn’t give two shits if everyone in town knew who his father really was. He gave zero fucks if his mother’s drinking problem was plastered across the front page of the weekly newspaper. And if Anita cared, she shouldn’t have been selfish and driven drunk.

Jonny was no longer protecting the Spencer name. It was meaningless.

His whole damn life had been meaningless.

His truck door opened and he was surprised to see Nixon standing there.

“Come inside, brother. Bobby already went in.”

Jonny looked beyond his friend and saw lights turning on in his house. How in the hell had she gotten in?

“I gave her my key,” Nix answered his mental question.

Jonny had forgotten Nixon had been looking after his house while he’d been gone.

“Did she call you?”

He wasn’t sure how he felt about Bobby calling in reinforcements. Did she not want to be alone with him? Not that he could blame her after he’d lost his temper at the beach and shattered a glass canister. Fucking hell. Did she not trust he’d never hurt her or put her in danger?

“No. It was good timing. I was coming over under the bullshit excuse I was dropping off your mail when I was really coming to check on you. Drove up, you were sitting in your truck staring off into space, and Bobby was waiting on your porch giving you time. I gave her the key and came to you.”

Christ, how long had I been zoning out?

Apparently a long ass time. And of course Bobby would give him time to pull his shit together. Jonny wasn’t under the illusion she didn’t feel his pussy tears in front of his mother’s house. The fuck of it was, they hadn’t been tears of loss. He’d lost his family long ago. They were the result of failure and frustration.

“Let me get out.”

Nixon stepped back and Jonny climbed out of the truck, more like dragged his heavy carcass out of the vehicle and swayed when he got to his feet. Some tough guy he was. Mommy shouted at him and he turned into a sniveling cry-baby who can’t even stand upright.

Not ready to face Bobby, Jonny opted to go around the side of his house and climb the stairs to his back porch. He could at least offer his friend a place to take a load off while he told his tale of woe.

Jonny sat and waited for Nix to get comfortable before he launched in.