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“You didn’t leave me any choice. You said it was important information about the past and relates to Shelby. She’s under my protection now, and I will make sure she’s not hurt in anyway. She had enough of that growing up.” My words are clipped and to the point. I just want to know why I’m here and then get back to Vegas and my fiancée.
“She did, and you as well. It should have been so different.” Juana looks out of the window, lost in a fleeting memory. “I’ve been on drugs for so long now, and it’s been hard to distinguish between reality and fiction as I came off them. But these have helped me to remember...”
She gets to her feet, and going over to a wooden chest, she pulls out a small pile of papers from one of the drawers and brings them back to where I’m sitting. She places them down on the table in front of me and retakes her seat.
“Please, Eaton,” she pleads. “I know I have no right to ask. I’ve never been a real mother to Shelby, but I want to make sure she’s safe. I want you to know the truth about what happened between your family and mine. The lies have been told for so long. It’s time the truths came out.”
“Just because you’ve finally regained some clarity doesn’t mean I’m willing to hear what you have to say. It’s probably bullshit if it has anything to do with your husband.”
I don’t need to be here, listening to her lies. I get to my feet and turn to face the door.
“Eaton, you’ve got your father’s stubborn nature, but you need to hear this. I loved my husband. He loved me, but there was a third person in our marriage.” I’ve had enough, this was a mistake. I don’t need to hear what a good man David Jones was. I know the truth. My hand reaches out to open the door and leave. “Eaton, that person was your mother, Eliza.”
“What?” I spin around. “I don’t understand, what are you saying? Keep my mother’s name out of this.”
“I loved her. David loved her. The three of us were in a relationship together.” She places her hand over the papers on the table. “These are letters confirming the truth. I hid them after she died because I didn’t want to believe what we had was real anymore. It was too painful to deal with. We both loved her, Eaton, and we were planning on selling the casino, leaving Vegas, and taking you and Shelby with us.”
I shut my eyes, trying to block out what I’m hearing.
It can’t be true.
David Jones killed my mother.
Storming forward, I pick up one of the letters and start to read the declarations of love between the Jones’ and my mother and their plans to run away. Anger gets the better of me, and I tear the first letter into little pieces.
“If he was so in love with my mother, why did he kill her?” I shout, slamming my fist into the table.
“I don’t have proof, but I know David didn’t murder Eliza. He couldn’t. He loved her. It was someone else. Someone you’ve known all your life. The person who molded you into the man you are right now.”
I shut my eyes and think back to the night my mother died. The muffled words between my mother and Shelby’s father. The sound of the gun going off. I begin to recall that night with greater clarity.
“David, I’m scared.” My mother’s whispered voice floods my head.
“I know. We need to leave tonight. Now.” David grabs my mother’s hand. “We’ll be all right.”
“But he knows about us. He’s not going to let me go. I’m his possession. I always will be.”
“We’ll go before he realizes what’s happened, and I’ll hide us. The casino is in my name. He can’t touch any of the money from that. I’ll sell it to provide for us. Come…” David leans forward and presses a kiss to my mother’s lips. “Let’s go. We’ll get Eaton together, and I’ll message Juana to bring Shelby.
Bang.
The explosion of a gun goes off,and my mother falls to the ground. The hole in her forehead leaves me with no doubt she’s gone.
“No!” David shouts and bends down over her.
Another shot, and David falls next to her. His body twitches for a few seconds before it goes still. He too is dead.
My recollections of that night have finally come into focus. I’m at the window of my childhood bedroom again, watching everything. Hearing everything. Smelling the scent of gun residue and death, but it’s who I see next that finally uncovers the buried memories I’ve been suppressing.
My father, gun in hand, walks out into the open. The look on his face is pure evil. I’ve never seen that expression on him before. It’s like the devil has risen up and is walking this earth.
“My father killed them. He knew about the three of you, and he shot them.” I slump down into the chair, rubbing at my temples as I try to dispel the horrendous memories that have just hit me. “It’s not true. It can’t be.”
“I never realized you saw what happened,” Juana says as she reaches out and grabs my hand. Part of me wants to shrug off her comforting touch, but the part of me that just lost my mother all over again appreciates her compassion. “Eaton, I’m so sorry. If only I’d known. At least they were together at the end.” Her voices breaks, and I entwine our fingers in a gesture of support for both of us. “I didn’t know what happened. My husband was delivered back to our house a week later, his body decapitated, quartered, and castrated. It broke me. Your father told me it was David’s punishment for killing your mother. I knew it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be, and your father knew I wouldn’t rest until I proved it. He held a gun to my head, and I knew I was next. I was going to die, but then Shelby cried. She’d woken from a nightmare. She saved my life with that cry. A needle was shoved into my neck, and I was injected with heroin. Your father did it. We were stolen away that night, and the next few years became a blur. I remember trying to get off the drugs but every time I tried, your father was there, sticking the needle back in my neck.” She gasps. “Oh God, he’s going to come for me again.” Pulling away from me, she gets up and starts pacing the room. “We couldn’t save you. You’ve become him. You’re going to drug me and put me back in that trailer. You’re going to do it, aren’t you? Oh God, Shelby, I’m so sorry.”
“No, no, not at all,” I try to reassure her.
Juana is terrified of me. She’s shaking and as pale as the crisp, white sheets that cover my bed at home. I try to reach out to her, but she curls herself into a ball in the corner of the room.
