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Bud, how could we haveforgotten the equipment?” I say to Jackson, opening our front door.
“You’re the assistant coach. We didn’t forget it. You forgot it.” He smiles up at me. My little wise-ass.
“Thanks for throwing me under the bus. But aren’t you supposed to be my helper? You wanted the job. Remember?”
“I’m just a kid. I want lots of things.” He puts his hand on his hips, looking up at me in his uniform. I love this kid. He says the darnedest things. He makes me laugh all the time.
“Now you’re just a kid?” I snatch his cap off, mussing his hair, which he hates.
I laugh harder when he groans, “Dad, you know I hate that.”
“I know. Come on, I’ll load the equipment. You go find your glove—maybe ask your mom if she’s seen it.”
“Okay.” He takes off running, as always. It’ll be a waste of breath to tell him to slow down.
I go in the other direction, downstairs, to the laundry room, to get the equipment I forgot to load in my truck yesterday. Where the hell was my mind at? Probably on Lacey, I smile.
“GET OFF MY MOM! DAD!”
“What the hell—” I drop the equipment, which goes crashing to the floor, and run full speed toward Jackson, who is screaming from the direction of the master bedroom. “Jackson! What’s wrong?” My heart pounding out of my chest, I fear he and Bree are in danger. A hundred different things are flashing through my mind.
Bree yells, “Jackson, no! Go outside. Stop it, baby, leave! I’m so sorry.”
What the hell? Turning the corner, I charge into the room, only to pull up short, almost tripping as I take in the jaw-dropping scene. My soon to be ex-wife’s clothes are disheveled, and she’s looking frantic and wild, holding back our son, while standing behind her is our maintenance man, who is buckling up his pants. What the fuck...
I’m speechless. Shocked. Enraged, when my mind comes back to me putting this picture together of my wife and another man. In front of my son.
I snap, lunging over Bree holding a still-fighting Jackson against her, grabbing the bastard by the throat, one hand fisting his shirt. His eyes open wider than I’ve ever seen anyone’s. My anger and the ear-splitting volume of my words hit everybody in the room, freezing them in place. “Get the fuck out of my house, or so help me I will—”
“Oh God, Landon, Jackson,” Bree sobs, holding her hand against my chest, trying to get between us. I ignore her.
“I don’t want to see your face around here. Don’t come back.” My fist clenches tighter in his shirt shoving him back. He winces as his back slams against the wall with a bruising force that does nothing to calm me down.
I turn my back on this piece of filth contaminating my home, while I focus all my attention on my son. “Jackson, are you okay?” I make my voice calmer but I’m still uncontrollably terse with anger. Not at him, but at what I walked in on, and most of all, what he walked in on.
Tears are streaming down his face, and he shakes, trying to talk through his tears. “It’s Mom—he was hurting her.”
God, I’m livid with her. My anger rises when she bends down, holding his face. Her face, red and blotchy, streams with tears. “Baby, mommy’s fine. Okay? Look, I’m fine. Mr. Reynolds didn’t hurt me. Okay?” She nods her head.
He does it too, his lips trembling. “Okay,” he says in the tiniest voice.
“Good. Can you please, for me, go downstairs, and wait for daddy?” He nods his head again and looks to me. I nod my head tight-lipped touching his shoulder as he passes by.
When I’m sure he’s downstairs, and not able to easily hear, I let her have it. “What the fuck were you thinking?”
“I’m so sorry.” She covers her face, turning away from me.
Hell, no, she doesn’t get to hide. She’s going to face me. I spin her around, dropping my hand away from her like a scalding hot iron , afraid to keep my hands on her any longer, I plant them on my hips, so as not to shake what little sense out of her she has left.
“Sorry? Sorry isn’t going to fix what he saw before I got here. And I saw way too much!”
“I know, I know. I messed up!”
Is she joking? Spilled milk is messing up. What she did was traumatize our son. “God knows how long he’ll have to be in therapy for this. Probably his entire childhood. He thought his mother was being attacked when she was about to get her brains fucked out by our goddamn maintenance man. Instead of fixing the fucking heating and plumbing like I’m paying him for, he was fixing you.”
Her hands fling out at me furiously. “What do you expect me to do? You won’t touch me. How long has it been? How long?” She shakes her head, blonde hair flying around her face. “This is not my fault.”
“Then whose fault is it, Bree? Is it my fault for walking into my own house, not anticipating that you would be screwing another man?” My hand slams against my chest, angry and frustrated. “Is it my fault, Bree; is it?”
