Page 64 of Revere: A Legacy Novel

“Catherine!”

She did not care that she was being rude. After everything she learned, and what it meant to her, a bit of attitude was needed.

“I said what I said, and I meant it,” she said with a shrug. “You could at least respect it and not push me, Daddy.”

Catrina frowned as her gaze darted between Catherine and Dante. “How much time do you need, Catty?”

“I don’t know.” Catherine crossed her arms, and gave her mother a look. “Did you know?”

“About what?” her mother asked.

“What he did to Cross.”

Catrina let out a hard breath and admitted, “No, I did not. Apparently that happened when I was asleep in a hospital waiting room. I wasn’t filled in on the details until recently.”

“Huh.”

Catherine wasn’t sure if that made a difference to how she felt, or not. At the very least, she couldn’t be angry with her mother. That was a good thing, right?

“I was overwhelmed with everything that happened,” Dante said from the couch.

“I said I don’t want to talk—”

“Catherine, you don’t understand. I had just pulled you out of a tub the day before with your wrist flayed open like a fucking piece of meat. We had admitted you to the hospital for a seventy-two hour hold on a suicide watch. I was overwhelmed. I was enraged. I needed an outlet, and went to the person I felt deserved it.”

Catherine scoffed as she turned on her father. “That is the shittiest justification I have ever heard for beating someone nearly to death and shooting them.”

“Let’s not forget telling the young man to get out of state and stay gone,” Catrina added.

She waved at her mother. “And that!”

Dante glowered at his wife. “Not helping, Cat.”

“Own what you did,” she replied quietly.

“I am trying.”

“No, Dante, you’re not. You’re attempting to make her forgive you by explaining how you felt. As if that makes it okay. It doesn’t.”

Catherine appreciated her mother more than she could possibly explain in that moment. Catrina reached out and stroked a hand down Catherine’s hair, as though she were smoothing wayward strands. She saw the action for what it was—silent support.

“Do you know that I thought he left me?” Catherine asked quietly.

Dante’s brow dipped low. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“Yeah, it does. That’s why a few months after I started seeing Cara, I had a setback and had another spiral into depression. I was doing so well. I wanted him to know it, but I thought he left me.”

“He did leave you, Catherine. He kicked you out. Two weeks later, you tried to bleed yourself out in a fucking bathtub!”

Catherine ignored her father’s shout. “No, not that, I meant after.”

“He can’t leave you a second time when he’s already left you, dolcezza.”

Wrong.

Catherine didn’t bother to explain the promise Cross had made to her that day almost seven years ago. A promise she thought he had broken without care. To be honest, she didn’t think her father would understand.

“You know what,” Catherine said quietly, “I’m really not ready to talk to you, Daddy. I need to figure out how I feel without you trying to tell me how you would like for me to feel right now.”