by T. L Smith
Sandy looks down at her food then back up. “You want answers? Is that why I’m here?”
Hayden nods his head. “You know I do, it’s the reason you’re here.”
She starts shaking her head slowly. “I thought it would be a new beginning, a fresh start.” Sandy looks over to Liam again, then around the table. “Maybe you don’t want that, seeing as you have your fake family here. I’m your real family… I’m flesh and blood, after all.”
Liam stands, pushes his chair back. His hands come down on the table as he leans over. “You are not his family. You are what made him. Nothing more. Don’t dilute your recollections, Sandy. I fed him for years before I did anything about what you did to him. How you and whatever man you were fucking beat the crap out of him.”
“I think you should leave,” Hayden states. He looks down at Sandy as he stands. “I thought, maybe you wanted to try. But it’s clear you came for something. What is it?”
Sandy places her hands on her lap as she fidgets with her shirt. “You don’t get to ask me that,” she says.
We all wait. Liam walks off not wanting to deal with her.
Hayden watches him go before he looks back to Sandy. “Why. Are. You. Here?”
“I need a little bit of money, just to get me by.”
Hayden opens his wallet, throws whatever money he has in it at her then turns and walks away.
Her voice stops him. “I need more than that.”
He halts.
Hayden reminds me of Liam when he turns around and gives her a vacant stare. “Get out and don’t come back.”
I hear a knock on the door, Addy’s the first to move to answer it.
Sandy stands collecting the money from the table and the floor then looks at us watching her. “I never wanted a kid, he was never meant to be born.”
My heart hurts at hearing those words, I’m just thankful he isn’t here to hear them.
“You need to leave, Sandy, and you better never come back. No more money will be handed to you.”
“The next time I see you, I won’t be so polite,” Jake says smiling.
Hayden’s girlfriend walks in, looks around and walks away to Hayden’s room.
“Oh, you won’t be hearing from me again. That you can count on.”
“Good, besides my daddy will kill you,” says Isabelle as she smiles, picking up a piece of turkey.
Sandy runs off not even shutting the door behind her.
My heart’s been hurting a lot lately, I don’t think I can keep Liam out tonight.
I need him.
15
Black
Pacing back and forth is all I can do right now, it’s fucking Christmas. Today is not the day to go and kill some fucker. Especially a woman that needs not one but many bullets to her stinking skull. A soft knock comes on the door then it’s pushed open, and Rose comes in, shutting the door behind her.
“You did really well.” Her words help the anger that’s built and ready to explode. “She’s gone, but you were right, she came for money. You might want to check on Hayden.”
Of course, she did, it’s the only reason she would want to come back. That woman doesn’t have a bone in her body that’s motherly, she should have had her vagina cut from her fucking body to stop her from having kids.
Rose rises up, kisses my lips then holds the door open for me, basically telling me to go to Hayden.
Walking to his room the door is closed. So I knock on it. Miranda answers and looks straight to the floor. She pulls the door open fully then steps around it.
Hayden looks up from his bed where his head is in his hands. “You were right. Happy?”
Stepping into his room, I shut the door behind me. Then sit on his office chair opposite him. “I take no fucking pleasure in knowing that.” He looks down, then back up to me. Torment is clear, pain is evident in his eyes. “What does it matter, Hayden? What does it fucking matter what she wanted? You don’t need her.”
He shakes his head. “You don’t get it, you don’t fucking get it. You may have taken me from that life, but I am hers, Black. She created me, and I hoped at one stage she may have even loved me.”
My fists slam down hard on his desk, I feel the crack of wood beneath them. “We love you, your fucking mother loves you. Not her. You know this.”
A stray tear leaves his eye. “You don’t love us, you love killing. Does Mom know you’ve been doing it again? Have you told her?”
A gasp is heard when the door is pushed open as Rose steps in.
“I was coming to make sure everything was okay and I overheard.” Her eyes find mine. “Is that true, Liam? Are you killing again?”
I stand from the desk and look back to Hayden. “I’m not Black to you. I am your fucking guardian. Do you hear me?”
“I’m sorry, Dad. I just—”
“I know, just don’t fucking go there again. Now take the kids to Jake’s while I speak to your mother.”
Hayden gets up to leave, and Rose crosses her hands over her chest as she waits for the front door to shut.
“So you’re back? Back to being the old you. Should we go back to separate lives again? Maybe that’s what you want?”
I shake my head.
How can she see it that way?
Then she gasps. “You killed him, didn’t you? That man that drugged Hayden. You killed him?” I nod my head. “How could you, I asked you not to.”
“He didn’t deserve to live.”
“You don’t get to decide that, Liam. You are not God. You are not who you used to be. You stopped. Why did you go back?”
The truth spills from my lips before I have a chance to stop it. “I missed it. I fucking missed it.”
“I hope it was worth it. I hope you will take great pleasure that you have single-handedly ruined Christmas for me. Now get the fuck out of my house, because you’re not the man I knew. You are selfish.”
“Rose.”
She shakes her head. “I’m afraid right now I will say something I can’t take back. So it’s best you leave right now before I do.”
My feet start moving even if I don’t want them to. Leaving her on Christmas day is the last thing I want to do.
It’s getting dark as I exit the house, the kids are playing in Jake’s front yard when I walk over. Addy turns and smiles before she calls the kids to her. Walking inside, Jake’s ready with a bottle of beer in hand.
“Addy will go and spend the night with her, don’t even stress.” He knows before I even ask.
“Maybe I should marry you.”
He spits out his drink. “You were going to ask her to marry you?”
I pull out the ring from my pocket. It’s been burning a hole in there for days.
Tonight was going to be the night.
Now it’s not.
It’s ruined.
“Holy fuck. Holy fuck.” He shakes his head. “You sure as hell fucked up killing those assholes then.” I don’t even bother to deny it in front of him, he knows me better than that.
“What am I meant to do?”
Jake starts laughing. “You’re asking me for advice? You must be desperate.”
I punch him on the arm as Hayden walks in. Jake looks back to his television as Hayden waits for me to speak.
Hayden fucked up, badly.
But he was hurting.
His hopes were up, and then they were crushed right in front of him.
Hope is not something I like, it ruins people’s lives. Maybe that’s where I went wrong. I hoped that the day would go smoothly, and of course, it did anything but do that.
“You’re mad.” His eyes find the ring that’s still in my hand. “Fuck, were you going to—”
“He sure fucking was. About time too if you ask me,” Jake pipes in.
I restrain myself from hitting him again.
“Did I fuck this up?” The pain in Hayden’s voice is evident, it hurts him more than his rent-a-womb mother.
“No, you didn’t. I did.�
��
Hayden’s eyes lift from the ring in my hand. “She’s going to be so upset. We ruined Christmas. It’s her favorite day of the year.”
We all go silent.
It is.
And we’ve royally fucked it up for her.
“You better fix it. And it’s best to start on her favorite day, so it’s not ruined forever,” Jake says as Hayden sits next to me.
I tap his leg letting him know he’s okay and he offers me a restrained smile.
16
Rose
If I could pull my hair out I would. I pick up the wine bottle and drink it straight from the bottle. Addy walks in after playing with the kids and putting little Liam in his room, with a bottle of wine in her hand. She laughs when she sees me. “I see you’ve got a head start on me already.”
I hold up the almost empty bottle. “Time for you to catch up.” So she does just that and soon we’re both drunk, so fucking drunk that when Liam walks in, I don’t kick him out. Addy merely gets up and leaves or stumbles—not sure which really.
“Rose.”
Rolling my eyes at him, “Rose. Rose. Rose. That word dripping from your lips doesn’t make everything okay, Blac—”
“How much have you had to drink?”
I grab the Christmas ham and start eating it. “What a waste.”
He picks up some of it and starts eating as I swat his hand away. “Go away, Liam Black.”
“No, Rose, I will not.”
I poke my tongue out at him and he gets up, walking around to me. “Don’t touch me.” I know I’m being childish, but I just can’t help it.
“I want to touch you.” His hands do exactly what he says. He touches. And despite myself, I don’t knock him away. He spins me around so we’re face to face. “I will touch you because I fucking love you.”
“You love yourself more,” I say against his lips.
“That’s not humanly possible.” He picks me up, starts carrying me to our room. He lays me on the bed and begins undressing me until I’m naked.
“Do you plan on fucking me now? Hard. Pull my hair maybe?” I get up on all fours, crawling to him. “Maybe spank my ass while you’re at it?”
Liam growls when I turn, pushing my ass at him. “You, my love, are going to bed. Tomorrow if you are up to it, I’ll spank your ass and pull your hair all you fucking want.”
“Promises, promises,” I mutter, dropping on my stomach and closing my eyes.
Liam pulls the blanket up over me, and that’s all I remember.
“Mom, Mom, Dad’s doing Christmas again. Get up. Get up.” Groaning as I move, next to me is something for my headache, plus a glass of water. Little Liam leaps on my bed and starts jumping with excitement.
“What are you talking about, baby?” Reaching for my clothes, I pull them on while little Liam doesn’t stop bouncing around with enthusiasm.
“Dad set it all up. You slept so long, Mom. It’s lunchtime already. Dad said we can’t eat until you get up. So, get up, Mom.” Then he’s gone, running out the door.
Going to the bathroom, I quickly wash my face before I walk back out.
Little Liam was right, everyone’s here.
My eyes find him, he’s in the kitchen watching me already.
“What’s going on?”
“We’re doing Christmas today.”
“It’s not Christmas,” I say walking over.
Jake and Addy smile as they sit at the table with the kids. Even Meredith is there.
“Redo,” Liam says like it’s as simple as that.
“You can’t redo Christmas,” I say shaking my head.
“We can and we will,” he retorts back to me.
“Fine, let’s have a new Christmas.”
If Liam smiled, he would smile now. We all sit down and eat and it’s better. Way better. Jokes are told and everyone’s laughing.
“Mom, can we do this every year?” Little Liam asks before he kisses my cheek and runs off. Everyone else has gone silent, the tension seems thick.
“Isabelle, Hayden… can you please leave and give us a few minutes?”
Isabelle stands walking off. Hayden is hesitant, though.
“We just need to talk, just the parents.”
Hayden stands, looks to Jake and smiles. “He shouldn’t be here then.”
Jake flips him off making us smile before he walks out.
“How many? I need to know how many.”
Addy looks down, Jake doesn’t say a word, just watches. He knows better than to talk. Liam, on the other hand, his eyes don’t leave mine, he knows not to lie to me. The truth is what I want, and if it’s what I don’t get I’m afraid of where that will leave us.
“Is this something you really need to know, Rose?” he asks as if he believes his words are true. That it’s something I don’t need to know.
Looking away, the house is the same, the decorations still on the walls and food everywhere. It looks like Christmas, even tastes like Christmas. But is it really? No. It’s not. That day was ruined, and my son was hurt in the process.
“Tell me. And do it fast like you’re ripping off a Band-Aid.”
He sucks in a breath, and I know whatever’s about to leave his mouth I won’t like. Not at all. “I’ve killed three people. Each one worse than the last.”
“Th-Three,” I say after him, my voice breaks in disbelief. Shaking my head, I stand. My legs push the chair back and it falls over. My legs are shaky, but I manage to stay standing. “You killed… three people?”
He nods his head. “You knew who I was to begin with. I tried to stop. I did stop for ages. It just… crept back in.”
My head starts shaking back and forth. “Do you want that life? You don’t want this life with us anymore?” I try my hardest not to let the tears fall, to keep them inside but Liam notices and he stands and walks over to me. He looks down at Jake and Addy, nods his head to the door and within seconds they’re gone, leaving us alone.
“Never say that, you are my life. That, I just can’t help.”
“I’m trying to understand, really I am. But you chose this, you chose us over that. It sounds to me like you want to go back to that other life.” I search his eyes for some truth like I can see what he’s thinking. I can’t. “It’s okay if you do, Liam. It’s what you know. I’ve been proud of the person you are, always have been. But if you choose to do that again, I can’t have you living here. I can’t have that in my life and our children’s lives.”
This time his hands drop from holding my arms.
He steps back.
“You…” is all he says.
My ears ring from my heart beating too hard in my chest. It’s almost deafening.
“Me,” I say in a small voice. Taking a step back from him.
As I look down at the floor, hands wrap around my waist and cup my ass, he lifts me up as I wrap my legs around his waist.
“You, Rose. I pick you. It was an itch I had to scratch. It’s scratched. It was the last time. I promise with your heart, and you know I’d never want to hurt that.” His hand comes up and wipes a tear that went rogue down my cheek. “Don’t cry for me, those tears are wasted.”
I shake my head. “Nothing is wasted on you, Liam. You’re worth every tear and then some.”
His lips touch mine, and I take all that he’s willing to give.
17
Black
Have you ever seen an angel? Felt one? Been consumed by one? I have and as of this very moment I’m being consumed on a daily basis. Whenever she touches, kisses, or even looks at me. It’s what she does, she devours me.
Her hands grip my back as I slide into her, nails digging in leaving her imprint. She hasn’t fully forgiven me, I can feel the tension still in her. But she’s willing to try.
I don’t deserve her.
I never have and never will.
Trying to be the better man for her is all I can be.
It’s what she needs.
Sliding in and out
of her I can feel her tighten around me, she’s close. Her hair is fanned all around her, her eyes closed while riding the wave. Then it hits her. Her pussy squeezes me tight. Fucking ecstasy.
“Black,” she says as she comes. I don’t think she even realizes she says that name, she never calls me that. It’s always Liam.
Biting her nipple, she arches as I come inside her, clinging to me as I take what’s left. Everything that’s possible.
Turning over, I lay her on my chest. Her finger draws lines around my nipple.
“It never gets old. You know. Us. Never.”
I nod my head. “I don’t think it ever will. I can’t imagine a time I wouldn’t want you.”
“I’m still mad. Don’t think I’m not.” She looks up at me then turns around and lays back on me.
“Forgive me. You being mad is not something I want.”
“It’s not as easy as that.”
Sitting up, I take her with me as she wraps herself around me. “Tell me what I can do… to make you forgive me.”
“It hurt. You hurt me. I didn’t realize you’d hide things from me, then lie to me on top of that.” Brushing her hair away with my fingers, I kiss the tip of her nose.
“There’s no excuse for doing what I did, but I felt like I had to do it. I didn’t tell you because I knew it could put you in a position you didn’t need to be in.”
She looks at me unblinking. “Next time, tell me how you feel, instead of going off and doing something like that again. Okay?” she asks.
“Yes. I will come to you when I feel the urge to kill.” I tell her the truth. She visibly relaxes then slides forward over my hardening cock.
“I’m sure I can always make you feel better, in more ways than one.” And she does, with her mouth, her hands, and her sweet, sweet pussy.
“It has to be perfect, everything has to be perfect.”
“Fuck! You sound like a bitch,” Jake mutters while cleaning the backyard. Addy helps me decorate, adding roses and fairy lights everywhere. Rose is out with Casey right now, and not due back until after dinner. The kids, Addy and Jake have been over here helping me set the backyard up for the last hour, and for the last hour Jake has bitched and moaned the whole time.