HUNTER (The Corbin Brothers Book 1)

by Lexie Ray

  “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference,” I said out loud. This was a choice. I just had to have a little courage. Maybe go out for a walk. Get out of the house. Remove myself from temptation so I wouldn’t get burned.

  No, again. I wanted to face down that monster. I wanted to look temptation in the face and tell it that I was too strong for it. I had to stand on my tiptoes to get the cabinet open, and nearly dropped the bottle of whiskey bringing it down from its resting place.

  I set it on the countertop in front of me and stared at the amber liquid inside that shiny bottle as dispassionately as I could. It had been eight years since I’d touched a drop of liquor. Did I really still want it? Could it still have that terrible pull on me?

  Yes, I had to admit to myself. If something as simple as a gasp on the other end of the line of a phone call had upset me badly enough to throw away my sobriety, I had to acknowledge that mine was a wily, pushy demon.

  In its bottle, the liquid perfectly still, the whiskey looked benign, harmless. But I knew it would be different poured in a glass in front of me. That would be nearly impossible to resist.

  It bothered me a little that alcohol still had its claws in me. I thought that AA had worked miracles on me in prison. Now that I was on the outside, though, I was exposed to many more temptations. Liquor stores on every corner. A cabinet in my son’s house that contained everything I ever needed.

  The front door shutting made me jump. Were they back from the doctor already?

  “We’re home, Mama,” Jules called, stepping into the kitchen. She registered my wide-eyed look, observed the whiskey bottle out on the counter, and frowned. “Did something happen? Are you all right?”

  Sweet girl. She didn’t jump to any conclusions.

  “I was trying to make amends with another of the girls,” I said. “It didn’t go very well. I felt like I wanted to drink again, but I resisted. I just wanted to stare the devil in his face for a few moments.”

  Jules smiled. “I’m glad you won the staring competition,” she said. “I’m going to get rid of these bottles, now. I’ve wanted to from the beginning. You don’t need this kind of temptation in your home.”

  “It’s your home, sugar,” I protested. “And these are yours and Marshall’s bottles. I’m not going to make you change for me. I’ve done enough.”

  “What’s this?” Marshall stepped into the kitchen and took in the scene just as coolly as his wife had. “You start drinking again?”

  “No,” Jules said quickly. “She told me she was tempted, but resisted.”

  “Get out of my house,” Marshall said, his eyes flashing, a thunderstorm on his brow. “Out.”

  “No!” Jules cried. “You’re not listening! She said she didn’t touch a drop.”

  “She’s lying,” Marshall said. “I can see it in her face.”

  “I know that you’ve been looking for an excuse to try to boot me out,” I said. “I understand that you don’t want me here. I’ve overstayed my welcome. I’ll leave now. It’s high time I got my own place.”

  “Damn right,” Marshall said.

  “But know this,” I said. “I’m still sober. Eight years and going strong. I didn’t drink your whiskey, sugar. I just didn’t.”

  “I bet I could smell it on your breath if I wanted to come close enough,” he said. “Out.”

  “Marshall.” Jules was scowling—a foreign look on her pretty, smooth face. “The bottle. The seal isn’t broken. Look.”

  “Probably some prison trick,” he said dismissively.

  “Stop it!” she shouted. “You stop it! Give Mama a chance! She’s trying! Why can’t you?”

  “She never gave me a chance when I was a child!” Marshall yelled back, spittle flying. “Why do I have to give her a chance now? I wish she’d stayed in prison forever! I wish I never had to see her again!”

  It was heart-wrenching to see my son and his wife fighting over me when I was standing in the middle of the room.

  “Please, both of you,” I said. “I’m not going to stay here anymore. That much is clear to me. I just need to pack my things and I’ll be out of here. I’ll stay at a motel until I can find an apartment. This has gone on too long, and that’s my fault.”

  “No, you’re staying,” Jules said. “I told you that you could stay here after you got out. I won’t go back on that offer.” Her chest heaved, and I watched her with concern.

  “It was an offer you weren’t supposed to make,” Marshall raged at her. “This is my house to, Jules. My life. My failure of a mother. You can’t just invite her into our lives. It’s my life, too. She’s already pissed all over that. Why are you insisting on doing this to me? Do you think I can bear to have her hurt me again, like last time?”

  His words and obvious pain cut me to the core, so swift and so deeply that I didn’t know I was crying until the tears fell onto my chest. He would never love me. I could never convince him that I had changed, that I was so sorry for who I’d been when I was younger.

  “See what you’ve done?” Jules demanded, looking at me and my helpless tears, then cried out—a soft, sharp, essential sound. She clutched her chest and fell to her knees.

  “Jules,” Marshall said, his voice low and raw. He and I dove for her at the same time, but he got there first. He was so fast and so strong, my son.

  “What’s wrong, baby?” I asked, reaching out for her.

  “Get away from her,” Marshall snapped at me, his eyes wild. “Jules, talk to me.”

  “Be nice to Mama,” she said, each word an effort.

  “What are you feeling?” he asked. “What’s going on in here?” He laid his hand over her heart.

  “Won’t slow down,” she whispered, closing her eyes.

  “Call 9-1-1,” Marshall barked at me, and I got to my feet and hurried into the office. My fingers seemed too slow as I fumbled with the phone, unlocking it and mashing the numbers as fast as I could.

  “What’s your emergency?”

  “My daughter-in-law has collapsed in the kitchen,” I said, hurrying back out to assess the situation. “She hasn’t been well lately, and she was upset—yelling and stuff—when she collapsed. She said that her heart won’t slow down, that it’s beating too fast.”

  Marshall was still cradling her in his arms, petting her hair, her skin, whatever he could reach as he kept talking calmly to her.

  “We’ll send an ambulance to you,” the dispatcher said quickly. “What’s your address?”

  I rattled off the house number and the street, looking at Jules’ ashen face. She had to be all right. She couldn’t be sick because of me. I wouldn’t be able to handle that. And there would be no chance in all of hell that Marshall would ever be able to forgive me. I might as well go toss myself off a bridge.

  “A unit is on its way, ma’am,” the dispatcher said. “Try to keep her calm until we get there.”

  “Please hurry,” I said before ending the call.

  I wet a clean dishtowel in the sink and brought it over, meaning to mop Jules’ brow, to give her what comfort I could, but Marshall slapped my hand away.

  “Haven’t you done enough?” he hissed at me, then soothed Jules as she moaned.

  “Be nice,” she ground out, her brows knitted together.

  “It’s going to be all right, sugar,” I said. “I’m going to go outside and wait for the ambulance, wave them down when they turn onto the street.”

  The evening air was cool and fresh, and it made me realize that I hadn’t stopped crying. The wet trails of tears down my cheeks were cold in the air, and I wiped them away as more continued to fall.

  Why was this so hard? Why did this have to be so hard? All I wanted to do was prove to my son that I could be a good mother to him. Why couldn’t he see that? Why couldn’t he try to accept that? I felt that every look he gave me was a punishment, a reminder that I had fucked up royally. I knew that I’d
fucked up. I regretted it every goddamn day. I just needed him to give me a chance, just like Jules had said.

  I took a deep breath and held it for a moment before letting it out. If I’d toted that whiskey bottle outside with me, it’d be half gone by now. The desire for alcohol in stressful situations was always going to be with me, I realized. Always.

  A siren’s wail made me perk up. The ambulance wasn’t far off now. I wanted to be inside with Jules and Marshall, soothing them, comforting them, telling them that everything was going to be just fine because Mama was there, but I couldn’t. I was relegated to lookout. I was a terrible person. Terrible people didn’t get to have second chances. I just had to resign myself to that. My son was never going to love me. I’d simply dropped the ball on that one. I couldn’t be a mother to him anymore. I’d never been a mother.

  When the ambulance was in sight, I waved the damp dishtowel I was still clutching, grabbing the attention of the driver. It pulled right out in front of the gate, and I threw it open.

  “You’ll need that gurney,” I called. “I don’t think she can walk.”

  I led the paramedics up the walk and onto the porch before pushing the front door open and standing aside, watching them file in.

  “Through the kitchen,” I said. “She’s in there with her husband, on the floor. Be quiet, please. Try not to stress her out anymore than she already is.”

  One of the EMTs smiled. “You remind me of my mother,” he said. “Never afraid to tell people what to do, especially when it concerned her children. This young lady’s lucky to have you, ma’am.”

  Just that one statement, that simple kindness was enough to cut through my despair.

  “I’d like to think I’m pretty lucky to have her,” I said. Without Jules, Marshall wouldn’t even tolerate the thought of me. I would’ve been thrown onto the streets after I was released from prison, and who knows what I would’ve done to survive. I probably would’ve had to kiss my sobriety goodbye. And I’d never have the chance to try to reconcile with my son.

  In no time, the EMTs had Jules strapped to the gurney, an oxygen mask over her face. They were attaching sticky plastic discs to her chest, the wires curling to a little electronic box. Jules reached out and grabbed my wrist as they wheeled her past, and I gave her hand a squeeze.

  “Don’t you worry about a thing, sugar,” I told her. “You’re in good hands.”

  “I’m going to follow in the car,” Marshall said, walking behind the gurney, speaking to his wife. “I’ll see you at the hospital, honey.”

  Jules couldn’t speak, not with the oxygen mask on, but she leveled a look at her husband, still holding my hand, and lifted her hand to show him just who she was holding onto.

  “We’ll both see you at the hospital,” Marshall amended, glancing at me.

  The car ride was silent, but I was thankful for it. It gave me time to think—and to pray. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Was my son’s attitude toward me something I could change? I used to think so, but now I wasn’t so sure. He hated me completely. I didn’t think there was room for any love in all that hate.

  I had to keep trying, though. As long as I was staying in his house, I needed to keep trying to make those amends. Jules accepted me. Why couldn’t he accept me?

  Despite the Serenity Prayer, I was still nervous. Would I ever be able to accept that he wouldn’t call me Mama? Even if it was something I couldn’t change? That was harder. And what about Jules’ health? I wasn’t a doctor. I couldn’t change that one bit. Where was my wisdom? How could I pick my way through this tricky situation?

  “Marshall,” I began, but he shook his head sharply.

  “I don’t think I can talk to you right now,” he said, his eyes on the road.

  “Can you stand to listen?” I asked.

  When he didn’t say anything, I took it as a good sign. “I was a shitty mother to you,” I said. “I know that. In fact, the only mothering I did for you was to push you out of my body and give you life. That’s the most essential, most basic, most visceral part of motherhood, and it’s the only thing I did right. I know that there were other, more pressing responsibilities that I didn’t even try to do.”

  I took a deep breath. I hadn’t wanted my son to know all the gory details of my past, but it hadn’t done either of us any good so far keeping a lid on them.

  “I became pregnant with you when I was fifteen years old,” I told him. “I don’t know who your father was. At the time, I was a prostitute. I had regular johns, so I could probably narrow it down, but I don’t think there’s any real hope of finding him. I don’t know, though. Maybe he’d be a better parent than me. Anything could be a better parent than me. Sharks. Flies. Monsters. There has to be a monster out there who’s a better parent than me. She’s gotta teach her baby monster how to grow up to do monster things. And I never did that.”

  I knew I was babbling, but this was the hardest conversation I’d ever had in my life. It was worse than the first time I’d shared at AA in prison. There, at least, everyone had been supportive and receptive. Here, Marshall drove, his face pointed straight ahead, his hands gripping the wheel tightly, silent. He wouldn’t tolerate this if he could walk away from it. I guess having him trapped in a car made him the perfect captive audience to what I felt like I needed to say.

  “What I said earlier about leaving you to help build a life for you,” I said. “Not true. I lied to myself a long time about that, but it took sobriety to help me face the facts. I left because of me. I left because I didn’t want to be a mother. I couldn’t earn money with you around. And that’s what I wanted above all. Money. That’s why I started the nightclub—so I could be my own pimp. I wanted the power, I wanted the control, and I wanted the money that pimps got. It’s as plain and simple as that. I didn’t care who I had to mow down to get what I wanted. I—it hurts me to say this, Marshall—I even forgot about you until I got the call from child services.”

  “When you finally got the chance to be rid of me for good,” he said bitterly.

  “Yes,” I agreed, choking on the admission. “Yes, that’s how I felt about it. The world I had built had no place for you in it. It had no place for anything innocent in it. I was a criminal, sugar. I was one of the bad guys, and I was bringing in more and more of them every day.”

  “You have no idea what my life was like,” he said, the words spoken through gritted teeth.

  “No, I don’t,” I said. “But I would like to. I would like for you to tell me. I want to know.”

  We pulled up to the hospital, right behind the ambulance, and Marshall pulled aside and into the valet parking.

  “I’m going in with her,” he said. “Stay close. She’ll probably want to see you and I don’t want her getting upset, thinking I left you at home.”

  “All right,” I said, resigning myself to the fact that my son wasn’t ready to open up to me yet.

  I thought Jules’ color looked better as they unloaded her from the ambulance, but it was hard to tell in the harsh lights of the emergency entrance.

  I stopped in the waiting room and sat down as they wheeled her into the emergency unit. It was a long time before anyone else came out of that door. I watched the evening news on the television, watched the fish swim around in the aquarium there. I watched the people come and go, battered by whatever accident or incident had brought them to the emergency room in the first place. One woman had wrapped her bleeding head in a towel for lack of bandages for her wound, and it looked like she had just stepped out of a shower from hell.

  Finally, the doors that Jules and Marshall had vanished behind opened again, and Marshal stepped out alone. I stood up.

  “They’re going to keep her overnight for observation,” he said. “Run some tests tomorrow. Her heart rate’s back down to normal.”

  “How is she?”

  “Resting,” he answered, running his ha
nd through his hair. “She was doing all right, though. Asking about you. Made me promise that I hadn’t left you at home with that whiskey bottle.”

  I shook my head. “I’m glad you didn’t. Earlier, I wanted to prove to myself that it didn’t have the same hold over me. After tonight, I feel its claws sharper than ever in me. This is something I’m just going to have to cope with for the rest of my life.”

  “Doesn’t it get easier?” he asked.

  “I’ll let you know if it does,” I joked lightly. “Right now, though, it’s good to be around family, not the bottle.”

  Marshall winced at that and I wondered if I’d taken it too far. All I’d wanted to do was tell him that I appreciated him and Jules. I knew that he didn’t want me there. All the same, he’d opened his life to me. That was a big step right there. I hardly deserved even that.

  “Let’s go on home,” he said. “Jules made me promise that we wouldn’t spend the night in the waiting room. These chairs are awful to sleep in, if you were wondering.”

  The valet brought Marshall’s car back and we set off, back home without Jules. I wanted to ask my son about his life, remind him that he could lay anything on me that he needed to, but I forced myself to stay silent. If it happened, it happened. I couldn’t make him open up to me anymore than I could force a flower to bloom. It happened at its own pace, in its own time.

  We were perhaps ten minutes from home when Marshall finally cleared his throat.

  “You really want to know how my life was without you?” he asked. “My life in the system?”

  “I really do.”

  He took a deep breath, the same breath I always took before I was about to do something painful.

  “In the system, everything finally made sense,” Marshall said, keeping his eyes on the road in front of us. “There are lots of horror stories in the system, but mine wasn’t one of them. My horror story was when I was with you, when I was your son.”

  My heart constricted at that, but I didn’t say anything. This was my son’s story. All I could do was listen.