‘Now, mate,’ Ken cut in. ‘You’re overreacting here. No need for threats. I know you’ll probably want to tell your dad . . .’
‘No,’ Stephen barked, voice shaking with repressed rage. There was no way he’d burden his dad with this. Rob Hardy would never forgive himself if he found out he’d hired a woman-beater.
Instead, Stephen would hit Ken where it hurt. Jo had said her dad’s job was the most important thing to him, so that’s what Stephen would take away; Ken’s livelihood for not giving Jo and Amy the life they should have had as kids. It wasn’t enough, it didn’t feel enough, but short of murdering the man, it was all he could do. ‘No, I’m not going to say a thing. What’s going to happen is that neither of you is going to try to contact Jo or Amy again unless you’re on your hands and knees begging them to forgive you. You’re going to go back to the farm and hand in your notice and be off my family’s property within the week. No, fuck that, within the next twenty-four hours. I don’t care where you go or what you tell Dad and Clayton just as long as you’re gone.’ He thought quickly, remembering how manic Ken had looked when he’d first rolled up, how he’d threatened Jo. That was never going to happen again. Not if he could help it. ‘And if you ever, God help you, try to threaten or hurt Jo or Amy again, I’ll bear witness to your wife admitting to shooting Jo. Then I’ll get Rachael to add her experience with you on the phone to the mix, and put it together with whatever Jo’s already got on you. Your life would get pretty miserable pretty quick. If the cops don’t get you, your soon-to-be ex-mates at home will. I’ll see to it. Got that?’
Ken nodded, his face ashen beneath the broken capillaries that mapped across his nose and cheeks.
‘Then fuck off,’ Stephen snarled, moving forward, wanting, needing, Ken to disagree with him, to put up a fight so he could work off the rage and conflicting emotions boiling through him.
Ken had the brains to see that Stephen was itching to plaster him all over Amy’s driveway and he beat a hasty retreat to the car, his tyres screeching as he reversed it out into the street and sped off.
Over the sound of the engine, Stephen could hear him yelling something through Shirley’s open window but resisted the urge to yell back. Instead, he stood clenching and unclenching his fists on the porch and waited until the need to rip off someone’s head faded. How was he in yet another situation where a woman wasn’t telling him what was going on? Worse, how had he not known what was going on? How had Jo not told him?
Amy fluttered around the kitchen, doing a whole lot of nothing while silent tears ran down her face. Jo was sitting on one of the kitchen chairs, watching her sister with her head on the table, taking deep breaths and trying to convince herself the pain in her chest wasn’t unshed tears. It was just an impinging heart attack. Probably genetic. The old man’s ultimate revenge.
‘So you think Stephen’d like a cup of tea?’ Amy asked in a small voice after a while. She was holding a pink-and-green-striped teacup in one hand and a dangling tea bag in the other like some demented gothic housewife. Her mascara had formed black rivulets down her cheeks, and her fine blonde hair was still sticking up at all angles.
‘Stephen? Oh, God! Stephen.’ Realising she’d left him outside with her father, Jo stood up so abruptly, her chair fell over, then sprinted to the front door.
She found Stephen standing on the porch with his back to the door, shoulders rigid.
‘Stephen?’ She rested a hand on his shoulder. When he flinched away, she inwardly cringed. She’d been so caught up in her own misery, she’d just abandoned him out here with Ken.
‘What?’
‘Is everything okay?’
‘Don’t I need to be asking you the same thing?’ he demanded roughly. ‘Sounds like a lot’s been going on that I don’t know a thing about. When were you going to tell me, Jo? It wasn’t like I didn’t ask enough times.’ His expression was hard.
‘Today, actually.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Because a good time would have been, oh, I don’t know, years ago, before you girls had to leave your home. Or maybe around when the doctor was stitching up your leg. Or hey, what about when your dad—’
‘Ken,’ Jo interrupted curtly.
‘When Ken threatened to kill my sister on the phone, thinking she was you. How about then? You lied to me, Jo.’ His voice rose with each word, and by the time he finished talking, he was shouting, using every bit of his additional two inches of height and the breadth of his shoulders to loom over her. ‘How bad did he hurt you when you were kids?’
Jo flinched. ‘Can we not talk about that now?’
‘How bad? How many times? How many times did he hurt you? How many times did he get away with beating up two little girls?’ Stephen’s voice crackled with fury. ‘On my family’s watch? When we could have helped you? When we could have done something? You said he beat you after the party? How bad are we talking here? Criminal charges? Something that could have locked him away for child abuse?’
Jo felt like she was being torn apart from the inside. ‘I-it was pretty bad. He messed me up and threw a bottle at Amy that cut her lip when she tried to stop him. She’s still got a scar.’
‘Jesus Christ!’ Stephen looked up at the sky for a moment and Jo couldn’t be sure but it looked like he was blinking back tears. ‘Jesus fucking Christ.’ He looked back at her, his voice husky as he spoke. ‘Was I that scary? Was my family that scary that you couldn’t say anything? My God, Jo. The thought of you being hurt—’
Jo swallowed the lump of tears in her throat. ‘We . . .’ She stopped when she heard how choked up her voice was. ‘We were worried that you’d get him fired and he’d go off the deep end and hurt M-Mum.’
‘Jo. I don’t know if you noticed, but your mum doesn’t need or want your help. I didn’t see a lot of gratitude there just now.’
Jo opened her mouth to say something, but all that came out was a choked sob. She looked away and stifled it as best she could.
‘What would you have done if I wasn’t around this morning?’ Stephen demanded.
Jo stuck out her chin, her lower lip trembling. ‘I would’ve handled it. It wasn’t meant to be like this. Scott . . .’
‘Scott? So you could tell Scott all about it but not me? What am I? Just tell me that. Huh?’ Stephen threw up his hands in fury, not catching the way Jo flinched away from him. ‘And you think you were handling things? Screaming phone calls? Your mum shooting at you? Jesus, you must have thought I was a total idiot! Or did you think I was that much of a monster I wouldn’t have helped?’
‘NO! I don’t! And I was handling it,’ Jo insisted in a small voice. ‘Scott and I were going to go down and . . . I wanted to help Mum . . . I didn’t know, I didn’t know it was her.’ She felt as if she’d been kicked in the stomach. The pressure built behind her eyes, but she fought it until her sinuses felt like they were going to explode.
‘Well, you know now,’ Stephen retorted, jamming his hand through his hair. ‘This is so fucked up, Jo. I . . . The fact you thought you had to do all this on your own? That you didn’t trust me? That you carried all this on your shoulders without feeling like you could tell me? It’s not like you didn’t have the chance. We have a shared history. We live together for Christ’s sake! Do you know how much that thing at the Christmas party shaped my life? How much I’ve thought about you over the years? How much I would’ve killed to make things better? That you kept all this from me . . . Have you any idea how that feels? I could’ve protected you. I would’ve done anything to protect you.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Jo hunched her shoulders in misery as something inside her cracked and shattered into a million pieces, leaving nothing but raw emotion and a wash of silent tears pouring down her cheeks.
There was a shocked silence then Stephen groaned softly. ‘Damn. Come here.’ He hauled her up against him in a tight embrace that would have been uncomfortable if it wasn’t so comforting. ‘Jo. Don’t. Please stop cr
ying, Jo.’
‘C-can’t.’
‘All right, then.’ He began stroking her hair, which left her crying even harder.
‘Tissues,’ Amy said quietly from the doorway, holding out a box, her big blue eyes shiny with unshed tears of her own.
‘Thanks,’ Stephen said gruffly. He grabbed a tissue and clumsily dabbed at Jo’s cheeks.
‘I’m all right,’ Jo protested, pushing away from him and taking the tissue out of his hand.
‘Yeah. Right. Looks like it. Jesus Christ. This is too much . . . too much.’ Stephen turned and met Amy’s worried gaze. ‘I’ve got to have some time out to clear my head for a bit. Can I leave Jo here with you?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You’re going?’ Jo asked, eyes wide with panic.
‘Yeah. If I stick around, I’m probably going to say a lot that I don’t mean. I want to be there for you Jo but—fuck—right now? Right now I know I’m just going to keep saying stuff that makes this whole thing worse. I’ve got to sort this out. I’ve got to make it right.’ He blinked quickly a couple of times, not meeting her eyes and looking to Amy instead. ‘Can you call me a taxi?’
‘Yeah.’
Jo ran her palms over her eyes, fighting the urge to ask—beg—Stephen to stay and hating herself for being so weak. Shame and guilt pressed so heavily on her chest she felt as if she was suffocating, but she drew in a shaky breath, straightened her shoulders and met him square in the eye. ‘I was going to tell you today.’
‘Yeah? Well . . . I can’t talk about this right now. I don’t want to hurt you any more and I don’t have it together enough not to say the wrong thing.’ He looked away, breathing deeply. ‘We’ll talk later. You need to be with Amy and I need . . .’ His words were interrupted by a yellow taxi pulling into the drive. It must have been in the area when Amy called.
‘You going to be all right?’ Stephen asked.
‘Yeah.’ Jo willed herself not to cry again until he left. Devastation was a black hole in her chest, and she was worried if she started again, she’d get sucked into it and never come out.
‘I’ll see you soon, right?’
‘Yeah.’
He took a step towards her, but she didn’t want a hug right now; any form of affection would just start the tears again. Instead, she held up a hand in a wave, the other wrapped tight around her waist. ‘Bye.’
Stephen opened his mouth to say something, then he nodded, turned and got in the cab.
Jo watched him go with both hands wrapped around her waist. It wasn’t until Amy gently but firmly steered her back into the house and wrapped a blanket around her before pulling her head into her lap that she realised the heaving sobs she was hearing were hers.
Chapter 18
‘Anyone home?’
Jo blearily squinted up from where she was lying on the couch to see Scott cautiously walk through Amy’s front door. She waved a limp hand at him. She still had a lump the size of a tennis ball in her throat and didn’t have the energy to say something as banal as hello.
‘That bad, is it?’ Scott gazed sympathetically down at her.
She nodded, eyes red with misery.
‘Poor baby.’ He crouched down and gently ruffled her hair. ‘Want to talk about it?’
Jo shook her head, lip beginning to wobble.
He heaved a big sigh. ‘Okay then, I can see I’m gonna be cheering you up some other way.’ He looked around speculatively before settling on the TV, which was playing an ancient episode of Seinfeld. ‘You been watching this all yesterday and today?’
Jo nodded again.
‘Right, then. I think you two have had enough.’ Scott walked over to the TV and flicked it off.
‘Hey!’ Jo protested, voice croaky from lack of use and crying. ‘Put it back on.’ She waited for Amy to back her up, but Amy was fast asleep in a bright-red beanbag on the floor. There was a large, half-melted tub of Baskin & Robbins next to her.
Scott walked over and poked her with his foot. ‘What is this? An ice-cream coma? It’s ten in the morning!’ he exclaimed softly, gingerly prodding Amy’s shoulder with his bare toe again but only getting a small snorting sound in reply as she burrowed deeper into the bean bag.
‘Leave her alone, you bastard,’ Jo croaked. She threw a cushion at him. ‘She deserves a bit of peace and quiet.’
‘What? So she can drown herself in misery and goo? You both look like shit, you know.’
‘Gee, thanks.’
‘Welcome.’
Scott disappeared into Amy’s kitchen. Jo heard him clanging around and pouring water.
‘Black. Two sugars,’ Jo rasped out and then winced at how the noise caused her head to hurt.
‘Not until you have a shower. That goes for Twinkle-toes too.’
‘Twinkle-toes is in never-never land.’
‘So what’s your excuse?’
‘All right, I’ll have a shower. Just make sure that coffee is ready when I get out,’ Jo grouched, rolling off the couch and getting unsteadily to her feet. Her eyes felt dryer than the Sahara, and her chest felt battered and beaten. She wobbled to Amy’s bathroom, hoping that the TV and comfort-food-induced numbness of the night before would hold on a bit longer.
She wasn’t that lucky, and sometime in between the soaping and shampooing she began crying like a baby again as the day before washed over her along with the water. Stephen’s hurt, furious expression when he’d learned what she’d kept from him played through her mind over and over again, feeling like a stab to the chest every time. His disappointment in her had been somehow worse, so much worse than her mother’s flat expression as she shattered the last of Jo’s illusions about being wanted and loved.
Jo cursed out loud and shoved her face under the water. With the rose-tinted curtains pulled back and stark light shining on her past she could see both she and Amy had been building castles in the sky.
It shouldn’t hurt like this. Shirley had always subscribed to the children-should-be-seen-and-not-heard-because-they’re-somewhere-else-preferably-not-here-and-far-away school of parenting, but for some reason it did hurt, and she was crying. All the years she and Amy had thought that if they could just get Ken out of the picture, their mum would be free to care for them, had been for nothing. All the beatings she’d put up with thinking she was protecting her mum, all the times she’d convinced herself that Shirley really cared, for nothing. It was too much. She sat down in the bathtub under the spray and began to sob in earnest again.
The sound of banging on the bathroom door interrupted her mid-blubbering hiccup. ‘Coffee’s ready, so get up and get out here.’ Scott’s words filtered through the door.
‘Fuck off.’
‘No thanks. You’ve got three minutes or I’m coming in there with a camera.’ His voice had enough threat in it for Jo to believe him. A determined Scott was a devious bastard.
Jo washed the tears off her face under the spray then stepped out of the shower, dried off and wrapped a bright-pink bath sheet around her before emerging from the bathroom. The pile of clothes she’d been wearing for the last two days looked too crumpled and filthy for her to wear again. She shoved them into the washing machine next to Amy’s small bathroom vanity and flicked it on.
‘Nice look,’ Scott said when she made it into the kitchen. He was sprawled out on one of Amy’s mismatched ladder-back chairs, his legs taking up half the tiny kitchen, coffee in hand, and looking disgustingly perfect. Jo was glad he’d lost the sympathetic expression from before. She couldn’t take that right now.
‘Thanks. I’m working on it.’ She sat down on the other side of the table. He’d remembered to make her coffee in her favourite blue-striped cup from their university days. It was chipped and stained, and she left it with Amy because it was so comforting to drink out of whenever she visited. It was comforting now. She took a small sip of coffee, making sure it wouldn’t burn.
‘I was just at your place,’ Scott said after she’d taken a few more and felt it workin
g magic on her overwrought system.
‘Yeah?’ she asked cautiously.
‘Stephen was there. He told me what happened.’
‘And how . . . how is he?’ Jo set down her cup and pulled her towel tighter around her, making sure the knot was secure under her arm as a distraction.
‘Told me about your mum.’
‘Yeah?’
Scott turned his head to face her, and she leaned back away from the intensity in his eyes.
‘I’m going to say this once because I’ve watched you rip yourself to shreds with guilt for over half your lifetime and it has to stop,’ he said slowly in a low voice that contained a wealth of barely suppressed anger on her behalf. ‘They’re not worth this thing you and Amy are doing, they’re not worth this.’ He gestured to her bloodshot eyes and sad expression. ‘When you work that out, you’ll feel better than you ever have because you’ll realise you and Amy are worth so much more than you’ve gotten over the years.’
He paused for a moment, allowing her to digest his words.
‘You deserved better, Jo, but you didn’t get it, and I’m sorry you had to realise it this way. I wish that it could be different for you. I wish you could’ve had parents that love you and care for you, but you don’t. It’s so shit and it tears me up inside to say this to you, but someone has to. I don’t want to see you go through this kind of pain ever again. Not over them. Your life is so much more than this. You’re one hell of a human being and the people who matter, the people that count in your life can see that and appreciate you for it and that’s what you deserve. Your friends love you. I love you, so does Amy and that fuzz ball of a cat you have. Who’s at my place, by the way.’
Jo stared at him, her thoughts warring with her emotions before the corner of her mouth twitched in a sad smile. ‘When did you become Dr Phil?’
‘Daytime TV is a wonderful thing,’ Scott said, pulling a deadpan expression. ‘You get all that?’
Unforgettable You: Destiny Romance Page 26