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But he couldn’t leave her.
He couldn’t leave her with him.
He couldn’t.
He couldn’t.
Who would protect her?
He would tell his pap. Pap would have to protect her until Whip was big enough to do it himself.
He felt the weight in his hands. He glanced down and saw the shotgun. The one he was forbidden to touch.
Not caring, he strode to their bedroom and grabbed the door knob. But the hand wasn’t a four-year-old’s. Fuck no, it was a man’s hand. Calloused. Permanent stains under the nails. Mechanic’s hands. Working hands.
Hands that held that shotgun easily.
Hands that could turn a door knob.
Only the door was locked.
Whip took a step back, got a better grip on the shotgun, lifted his boot and kicked the door next to the knob. Once the jamb splintered with the force, he shoved open the door the rest of the way to find his mother still crying.
She was now naked from the waist down but Whip couldn’t see anything he shouldn’t because his father was blocking that view. The bastard had his jeans pulled down far enough that Whip could see his naked ass pumping but that was it.
He was grunting with each forceful thrust. Non-stop bullshit spewed from his mouth. Telling her that she was his wife, that he could do anything he wanted to her and she couldn’t do shit about it.
He called her a whore. A slut. A stupid bitch.
She was useless. Good for nothing.
She sucked at being a wife. She sucked at being a mother.
“I shoulda k-killed you, you m-motherfucker. Not P-pap. M-me!” Whip shouted, raising the double-barreled shotgun and pointing it dead center at his back. “G-get off her, you worthless p-piece of fuckin’ shit. Nothin’ but a d-deadbeat drunk.”
His father acted like he couldn’t hear Whip and just kept pounding his mother, squeezing her throat, fisting her hair. His mother’s hands tightly gripped the wrist of the hand cutting off her air. Her mouth was open, her eyes wide, her face turning colors from the lack of oxygen.
That drunk motherfucker was going to kill her.
He was going to snuff the life right out of her.
Whip wasn’t going to let that happen. He wouldn’t let the wrong person die.
He slipped his finger through the trigger guard, the pad of his index finger sliding over the cool smooth metal of the front trigger.
But he didn’t pull just that one, he pulled them both at the same time.
The deafening blast rattled his brain and the recoil knocked him backwards, making him lose his balance and begin to…
Fall.
Fall.
Fall.
He jerked awake and the air rushed from his lungs as he landed hard.
Not in his parents’ room, but in a bed.
Not his own, but still familiar.
Fuck.
He blinked once, twice.
Sucking in oxygen, his heart raced, sweat beaded on his forehead.
For fuck’s sake, this happened almost every goddamn week.
Not the same nightmare, but always one similar. Always a memory he wished didn’t exist.
He hated that fucking house. He was putting his fucking boot down and getting her to move if it was the last goddamn thing he did. If she refused, he wasn’t going over there for dinner anymore. They’d meet at some restaurant halfway between Liberty and Manning Grove.
Would he miss her home-cooked meals? Fuck yes, but he was done reliving that nightmare. Homemade meatloaf with smashed potatoes and gravy was not worth the shit he dealt with afterward.
He scrubbed his hand over his eyes and stared up at the ceiling through the dark.
He should’ve killed that motherfucker instead of his pap.
It should’ve been him.
Maybe his pap would still be alive if he had. Still planting his ass in front of the TV every night at seven. Still heading to bed at eleven.
Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. His pap repeated that Ben Franklin quote every night when he rose from his recliner with a groan.
Like clockwork.
Whip missed his fucking pap every goddamn day.
That goddamn abusive, drunk motherfucker destroyed Whip’s family.
If he could go back… For fuck’s sake, if he could do it all over again…
“You okay?”
Fuck.
He cleared the thick from his throat and took a breath to make sure he didn’t stutter. “Yeah.”
He should have followed his first instinct to sleep in his bunkhouse rack tonight. He tried to roll out after he and Fallon fucked earlier but found it impossible to tear himself from her side. He didn’t want to miss one fucking second with her while she was in town.
She’d be gone soon enough.
And his bastard father had already done enough damage. He wasn’t going to chase Whip away from Fallon.
“What was that about?”
He took another deep breath, calming his thoughts before he spoke. “Nothin’. Just a fucked-up dream.”
She rose onto her elbow, propping her head in her hand. “You yelled about killing a motherfucker.”
Shit. He had been talking in his sleep. He wondered if he had stuttered, too. “Did I? Don’t remember.”
