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3
Koah Saint, a.k.a. Saint
VictoriafuckingWalsh.
Seeing her turned my world on its head. She was a black cloud of terrible memories—an acid rain of agony. I had spent the past ten years trying to forget everything she represented. She was the loss of any family I had left and the theft of my innocence. Seeing her again was like getting caught up in a freezing ocean wave of the past. It left me salty as fuck and soaked in a weakness I hadn’t felt since I was thirteen. It infuriated me.
I hadn’t seen Victoria Walsh in years, and that was how I wanted to keep it. But there she was, glaring back at me as if I had done something wrong when I hadn’t. If anything, I had protected her and her sister, Gracie. I had protected other kids from going through what I went through, and I wasn’t going to apologize.
She spun on her heel, her long, dark hair whipping me across my face as she stomped away. Tori had changed since the last time I saw her. She was no longer the meek daddy’s girl crying on the witness stand. She was stronger—meaner—with a bite that would serve her well if she planned on sticking around The Strip. I prayed that wasn’t the case.
Seeing her had ruined my good time. The Strip was my favorite place, and I wouldn’t let her fuck it up for me. The problem was, I wasn’t sure there was a drug circulating that could numb the feeling of seeing her.
My eyes floated down her back, taking in her thighs and round ass. She was thin but long gone was the flat thirteen-year-old princess she used to be. In her stead was a warrior woman with curves I would love to race over and a spitfire attitude that strangely made me proud of her.
Tori was thoroughly cracked; her pieces were lost in the breeze around her like debris in a hurricane. Her spine was stiff, and her head was held high like a goddamn queen, but she couldn’t fool me with her mask of indifference. She was tougher, but shattered people were attracted to other broken things, and I was being pulled to her in a way that left me gasping. She couldn’t hide her blackness from me. I could see the sadness swimming in her dark, fathomless eyes.
I closed my eyes, and memories of another beautifully broken woman flooded my mind. Her strength, determination, and the sad look in her eyes when my father beat her. How she held herself tall and proud for as long as she could, and how quietly she would collapse to the floor without daring to call for help.
She thought she was protecting me. She did all she could to keep me from getting upset, but she didn’t know I felt every hit she took. It rattled my bones and made me bleed inside for her.
My mother.
The only woman in my life who had ever owned my heart entirely, and except for my short friendship with Tori, the only softness I had ever known.
I had watched her die without lifting a finger to help.
I knew she was dead before he did. It was her eyes. They were open with understanding flickering in her gaze, and then they dimmed, slowly growing darker until the light was gone. Her stare remained on me, but she was gone. Her body was a shell of the woman she once was, and I knew when his fists slammed against her shell, he was no longer hitting her.
She departed.
She was safe.
There would be no more suffering, pain, and abuse.
He paused, grabbing her around the collar and pulling her up to face him.
“Thora?” he called out, shaking her lifeless body.
His eyes grew wide as realization set in.
He had beaten her to death.
“Fuck! Thora!”
His deep voice boomed around me, but I couldn’t look away. He had forced me to watch as he beat the life from my mother, and even though she was gone, I was still too afraid to turn my eyes away from her.
He reached up, running his bloody fingers through his midnight hair. “What have I done?”
As if remembering I was there, he turned toward me. I stiffened, sure I was going to be next.
“Koah, go pack your clothes,” he ordered.
I sat there, staring back from my corner, unable to force myself to move. When he realized I wasn’t listening to him, he screamed.
“Go now, Koah!”
I jumped to my feet and ran down the hallway to my room. On autopilot, I tossed clothes into a bag until it was packed. Then I waited at the end of my bed, bag in hand, for whatever came next.
