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“Where are you taking me?”
“Home. To our new home.”
I don’t know why this conversation had me breaking out into goosebumps. “Uncle Darren, please—”
“What is wrong with you?” He glared. “Don’t you want to find your mother? Do you want to help me look for her or not?”
“Yeah,” I offered. “But—”
“No buts. I’m not driving back and forth every day to pick you up from the campus. That is a waste of time and gas when you could just stay at home—your real home. With me.”
“Okay.”Whatever. Not my home, but there’s no reasoning with delusional.
“Why were you in Italy?” Uncle Darren grumbled. “You never said.”
“I got offered a free trip.” I didn’t need my uncle riding me on top of everything else. “Went with my Italian professor—”
“I know all about how you get your grades,” he interrupted, “and how you put out for that professor of yours.” My uncle shook his head. “Now he’s taking you on trips. What would your dad think, you whoring yourself out like that? And your poor mother. I know she raised you better.”
I said nothing to that bullshit, just turned and looked at the window. It wasn’t true. At least not about the grades, but I didn’t want to argue about it. My family always thought bad of me. I don’t know why I had expected things to change.
I wasn’t even sure how my mother got out of jail to go missing. Last I heard, she couldn’t post bond. She was bailed out, supposedly, but by who?
“Slut,” my uncle muttered under his breath before adding more volume to his insults. “You are too much like Brianna. That’s why you needed to come home and have your family look after you.”
I continued to stare into the passing scenery. I knew there was no point in debating the facts—like my mother, he’d made up his mind.
We pulled up into the driveway. He parked and turned off the ignition.
“Brianna was so sweet. She smelled like you. Did you know that?”
“Wh—what?”
“I went to your practices. Every single one of them. You were adorable in your uniform. You knew all the steps. You were perfect,” he rambled on.
I pressed a hand to my stomach. I had a seriously bad feeling—he was scaring me. It was in the way he breathed. It was too familiar. I’d heard it too many times over the last few months.
“The only problem was I could never be alone with you. Every time I tried; you’d run away. Why did you run from me?”
He didn’t pause for me to answer, just kept talking like he couldn’t stop.
“I couldn’t have you, but in the dark, Brianna looked just like you. She was smaller than you, and her breasts weren’t as big. But it was close enough. I had her almost every night, but she could never be you.”
I tried to scramble out the passenger door, but he hit the car lock. Strangely, the handle seemed broken. Why wasn’t the door opening? I tried disengaging the lock.
“Brianna was my precious flower.” He sighed, leaning down to retrieve something from under the seat. I increased my efforts to open the door. “But then she left me because I couldn’t get you off my mind. You made her leave me. It was too soon. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.”
Realizing I would not be leaving the car until Uncle Darren wanted, I inhaled a shaky breath for fortitude and glared at the revolting motherfucker. I wanted to vomit.
“I thought boys were sneaking into her room,” I whispered in accusation, noting he now had a gun resting in his lap. “I thought she was having sex with b-boys in her class.” My teeth chattered. My heart was pounding, and I felt dizzy.
“That was me. She was such a good girl. But I needed you. I’m sorry I took Brianna instead of you. I still love you. You are my special girl. The only one I see. I was only with her because I couldn’t have you.”
“That’s sick,” I hissed.
“I tried to go on without you or Brianna, but I just couldn’t. They looked just like you,” he cried, “but they weren’t you—or your sister. I couldn’t make it work. Those other women just didn’t compare.”
Like the climax of a horror movie when the monstrous villain was revealed, my startled gasp had me grasping at my chest, as if to protect the heart threatening to thump itself out of my body.
