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Fuckface reads the clause and lets out a string of unoriginal curses, he breathes hard for a long moment, then strides out of the room.
“Good, now let’s go back to the suite.”
I see Mike cradling a crying Theo in his lap, and Harrison is still catatonic, staring unblinkingly at the wall.
I take his arm and pull him to stand. I give him a quick kiss and he blinks at me. “C’mon, let’s take all of you home. You can all fit in one SUV. Paula and I can go with Matt, he’ll take us home.”
“No,” Harrison tells me, his voice scratchy, and the first tear falls down his cheek. “You stay,please.”
I can’t bear to leave him if he wants me next to him, so I nod.
I’m confused as fuck, about a lot of things, mainly who the fuck is Fuckface? And what was he talking about pinching and Theo’s mother not loving him?
ELEVEN
Harrison
As Tris guides me,Mike, and my children to the SUV I try to snap out of the frozen spell that came over me when I saw the truth in Theo’s eyes after his piece of shit ex said those things. I saw how upset he was, then how angry.
I’d be angry too, I suppose, if a secret I’ve been keeping for more than a decade was revealed without my permission.
My mind has been going a million miles an hour, and I think I have a good enough grasp on the what, how, and why of it all. That doesn’t mean I don’t want answers from Theo. It doesn’t mean I don’t want to actually commit murder for the third time in my life.
First time was Theo’s grandmother when he confessed she hit him, then it was Fuckface himself when his true colors came out, and now my ex-wife. Maybe I have more of that Dempsey temper in me than I thought.
I feel Tristan’s hand on my thigh when we settle in the car, but I still can’t seem to do more than exist at the moment.
Because everything I believed about myself is now a lie.
I’m not a good father.
I’m not as smart as I thought.
And I’m not a good man.
No, what I am, is an idiot who married a narcissistic, evil bitch of a psychopath who abused my son all his childhood. Ten years right under my nose, and I never saw her pinch him. I believed the look of love in her eyes when she looked at him.
I believed that next to her was the best possible place for him, I let her take him to another fucking state when we divorced.
I gave Theo the fuckingoptionto keep living with her at fifteen when he told me his maternal grandmother hit him. I left it up to him when I should’ve protected him. I should’ve taken him out of that situation.
But I believed Mary loved him, she was too depressed and simply didn’t see the abuse her mother was inflicting on Theo. I believed she was too depressed and would spiral even more if I took Theo. I believed she was a good mother.
I was the one who cheated after all, I thought ‘it was never her fault I didn’t love her, never could learn to love her after our one-night stand in college’.
And now, now… a buzzing in my ears halts all my thoughts, I can’t think anymore, I can only stare at the front of the SUV.
It’s better if I just. Don’t. Think.
* * *
“Sir.”I focus and see Connor in front of me. Why is he here? Shouldn’t Matt have driven us? And why is he calling me sir?
“Connor,” I rasp out.
“We’re home.”
“Okay.” I see we are after he points it out, and I’m standing next to the car, right by the front door. Where is everyone?
