I didn’t know what to say.
How could I even begin to find the words to make her okay?
“Did you see me?” I finally asked.
She nodded.
“I was so afraid that you’d been taken again. I… I had to be sure you were where you said you’d be,” she said.
“I’m glad,” I whispered.
I can’t even imagine how she would have felt if she had not seen me, if she’d been forced to imagine where I was - or whether I was alive or dead.
I came back to my parents’ house hoping to vent some of my anger, or maybe to find out that it was all some sort of wacky misunderstanding and we’d all hug and jump around and it would have been some sort of after-school special where everything ended up okay.
It was all some sort of misunderstanding, but I couldn’t call it wacky.
Who had written the note?
That’s all I could think about.
Someone was in their house.
Someone took all the stuff that was mine and put it on the front yard.
Someone wrote that note.
Someone put it on the bed.
Someone moved a curtain, looked out a window.
It couldn’t have been my mother. Maybe, before all this happened, I thought that she could lie well enough to mess with my head about something like that.
Not any more.
She wasn’t so much angry, or sad, as… broken.
The little pile of shards that used to be my mother stood next to me, and I didn’t know how to fix her.
You can fake angry. You can fake sadness, grief, despair.
I’d never seen anyone who could lie well enough to act like a puppet with cut strings.
If it couldn’t have been my mother, though…
The thought I was avoiding almost escaped then, but I tamped it back down.
If it couldn’t have been my mother… maybe it was El Jefe?
The note wasn’t written by him, unless he was faking mediocre English… but plenty of people who worked for him could have written a note like that.
Could he have been planning to kidnap me, to take me away?
Did we mess up his plans, interrupt him so that I went away with Merle instead?
Did I end up with the wrong - the right? - gang?
Or…
Was it my father?
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck fuck.
I couldn’t tamp the thought down long enough. I couldn’t bury it no matter how hard I tried.
Was it my father, who ransacked my bedroom and dumped out the drawers and tossed everything on the front lawn?
My Dad.
It could have been him.
It made me sick to think about, but it all fit.
He had access to the house.
Bear wouldn’t have barked at him.
He would have known where everything was.
Hell, he was the only one who could ever use the fucking printer on the first time.
He’d have known he couldn’t fake my handwriting well enough for my mother.
So, if this was him… this was all for my mother’s benefit? All to convince my mother that I didn’t care about her?
Why would he - why would anyone - have done anything like that?
I looked again at the shards of my mother’s face.
How could he possibly have done anything to hurt her?
He was supposed to love her.
I couldn’t imagine Merle doing anything like that to me.
Shit.
Merle.
I’d fucked that up. He wasn’t totally in the wrong. If he’d known about Chad and William trying to rape me… he would have been there.
If I had said “I need you,” he would have come.
I didn’t. I half-assed getting his attention.
I wasn’t being fair to him.
I don’t know how long my mother and I stood there. Neither of us said anything.
We stared.
Our eyes burned too bright to cry.
I took a step closer to her, and then another.
“Mama,” I said, my voice barely audible.
She turned to me. She reached out a hand, and I took it.
I led her to the bed and sat on the bare mattress, tugging her arm a little.
She sat by me, and I put my head on her shoulder, like I was eight instead of eighteen.
I think she needed the comfort. I definitely needed the comfort.
When my father got home… I would know. I would know if he did this to me.
I heard his car driving up the street long before I could have seen it if I’d turned to peek out the window.
It wasn’t a particularly loud car, or anything, but it was his. It was the same rumble that had approached the house every day for ten years.
He pulled into the drive and I held my breath.
He didn’t call out when he walked in the house.
No “Hi, Honey! Where’s my little girl?”
I felt like I was in a horror movie, the damsel in distress, waiTIng, frozen with fear, for the man with the chainsaw.
Please let me be wrong.
Please let it be anyone but my father.
“Sweetheart?” he called, softly, his deep voice soft.
Neither of us said anything in response.
Neither of us moved.
He came down the hallway.
We still did not move.
He paused outside the door. Maybe he knew I would be there.
Maybe he didn’t.
The pause seemed like it would last forever.
He rounded the corner.
Our eyes met.
For a brief moment, I saw him. Not my father. The man I was afraid he was.
I saw the cold calculation, the shock.
Or did I imagine it? He was sweeping across the room and all I saw was relief.
“Daddy,” I said, leaping up to accept his bone-crunching hug.
“You’re safe, oh, thank God,” he said.
I wanted to believe he was who he said he was. I wanted to believe his emotion was genuine.
I had doubts.
How could I have doubts about the man who had raised me, the man who had always cared for me?
I gently pulled myself away and sat back on the bed by my mother. The side where there was no room for him to sit by me.
He leaned on the wall and stared at me, beaming with joy.
My mother grinned too, the light coming back to her eyes.
They were so fucking happy and all I wanted to do was run as far and as fast as I could.
I wanted freedom. I felt trapped.
I wanted Merle.
“I’m so glad you didn’t cut me off,” I said, to break the awkward silence.
“We could never,” said my mother immediately. “We’re your parents and no matter what you do we will always love you.”
I waited for my father to repeat the words, but he only nodded and smiled.
I smiled at them. What else could I do?
It felt like I was on the edge of crawling out of my own skin. I could hardly breathe. The room was too small, too close, too sad.
My mother was too small, too close, too sad.
I couldn’t stand it any longer.
I finally got up, smiling and nodding and heading out the door.
Bear nosed his slow way into the bedroom and I sat in the hallway, grateful for the excuse to get out of that room.
“I missed you, Bear,” I said. “You’re the best puppy.”
I hugged him and buried my face in his fur.
He was old, and he didn’t smell great, but he was my dog, and I adored him.
“What do you need?” I asked him. “What’s up?”
I always did that. He got sick when I was little and I got in the habit of asking him what he needed, as though I could provide it.
I wish I could ask him who was in the house that night. The night I got kicked out.
“I’ve gotta go
to the bathroom,” I said, looking embarrassed.
The hairs on the back of my neck were prickling. I wanted to get the fuck out of that house.
Something about the way my father was staring made me go cold.
They nodded, and I heard them murmuring to each other as I left. “I’m so glad-” “-Our baby girl is back.”
In the bathroom, I shut the toilet lid and sat on it.
“I’m at my old house. Can you pick me up soon?” I texted Merle.
Almost instantly, got a reply. “Yes. OMW.”
“I’m sorry I yelled,” I sent. I’d apologize again and again, in person, but I needed to say it right away.
I needed him to know.
Before I left the room, I flushed the toilet and washed my hands.
I don’t know why I was being so secretive. I hated suspecting my parents - one of my parents - of… of what? Kicking me out and lying about it?
What would my father have to gain?
It was all too confusing.
I walked back to the door of my old room.
“Merle’s on his way,” I said.
My father immediately opened his mouth to protest.
My mother held up her hand. A few deep breaths, some time with her whole family in the room, and she seemed at least somewhat restored.
“You’re angry, I would imagine,” she said.
I looked away.
“Is your apartment safe?” she asked.
I nodded.
“Are you happy there?” she asked.
I nodded.
“I… I wish you would come back home. I wish you would move back in, but… it wouldn’t be right,” she said.
My father and I both stared at her as though she’d grown a second head, which was singing showtunes.
“You… you’re an adult now,” she said. “I have been treating you like a child for too long. You have a life outside of us, and that’s… that’s good. It’s healthy.”
I nodded, cautiously.
“What’s not healthy,” she said, sounding more and more like her old self, “Is anyone cutting anyone else off. You have our numbers. Please give us yours.”
I had already programmed their numbers into my new phone. I pulled it out of my pocket and sent my mother a text.
“Done,” I said, with a small smile. “And done,” I added, sending my father one as well.
I couldn’t think of a good reason not to. Besides, if my mother had it, so would he, and I couldn’t bear to break her heart again.
It had just started to mend.
I heard the louder roar of a motorcycle coming down the quiet street.
“That’ll be Merle,” I said, still awkward.
They nodded.
“I should head down,” I said.
“Come back tomorrow?” my mother asked.
“I… I have work. Dinner on Monday?” I asked.
“Your mother wasn’t asking a question,” my father rumbled. “You need to obey her.”
“No,” my mother said, her voice calm, “She does not. Did you not just hear me? Did you not hear what I’ve been saying for weeks? Our daughter is an adult and she does not have to obey us.”
“Under our roof-” he began.
“She doesn’t live under our roof any more,” my mother said. The sadness was creeping back. The light was Fading from her eyes. “She has her own place and her own life and if you make her not want to come back to see us, so help me God I will leave you.”
It was still calm, very matter-of-fact.
My mother was always straightforward and practical.
I almost couldn’t believe that she would say something like that to my father. She adored my father.
But… this new version of my mother, this broken version, maybe she was different.
Maybe I had to get to know my parents all over again.
It was a weird thought. Looking around the house, I realized that it felt different, too.
Only Bear was the same.
The silence was broken by a knock at the door.
“At least let us give you a ride back, instead of getting on that motorcycle,” my father said.
I almost said yes. Merle loved riding on his bike, but I still wasn’t a big fan.
Something, though, made me pause.
If it was my father who did all that, did I really want him to know where I lived now?
No.
I didn’t.
Merle knocked on the front door again, a little more loudly.
“Okay, okay,” I called down to him.
I turned back to the frozen tableau of my parents.
“I’ll come by soon, okay?” I asked, a small smile on my face.
I didn’t know how they’d react. Apparently everything that had happened in the past few months had changed my parents so much that they were swinging back and forth between acting like my old parents and acting like strangers.
I held my breath, hoping for my parents.
My mother stood up and smiled back, with tears in her eyes.
“I love you,” she said, simply. “Please come back soon.”
She held out her arms to me and I went to them, giving her a quick tight hug.
My father and I exchanged a long look and a wordless hug.
I wish I knew what that look was supposed to mean.
Merle knocked a third time, louder yet, and poor Bear finally realized someone was at the door and barked.
He was getting a lot older. Maybe someone could have been in the house without him noticing. Maybe it wasn’t my father.
I made my way downstairs, my shoes clicking on the hard wood of the stairs. That, at least, was familiar, unchanged.
I opened the door to find Merle and Jackson. Jackson grinned at me, but Merle was wide-eyed and angry-looking.
When he saw me, he relaxed, a little.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come to the door,” I explained. “I had to say goodbye.”
Jackson nodded. “Not a problem.”
Merle, too, nodded, in a more distracted way.
I looked out over their shoulders.
One motorcycle and one car were parked out front. I hadn’t heard the car over the noise from Merle’s bike, I’d thought it was just a little louder than normal.
“I met Merle here so you wouldn’t have to ride a hog,” Jackson said. He elbowed Merle. “Give me the keys, asshole.”
Merle reached into the pocket of his jeans and handed a key to Jackson, but his eyes were on me.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
I nodded. I almost burst into tears, but I nodded.
“Very convincing,” Jackson said. “Try practicing in the mirror.”
After a few more awkward moments, we left. I followed Merle to the car and we headed out.
We didn’t speak until we got a few blocks away. Merle pulled over by a city park, the playground deserted.
He looked at me, and I felt a rush of love and protection.
I smiled at him, a real, relieved, heartfelt smile, with none of the fear or worry or doubt that I felt around my parents.
“Are you okay?” he asked, taking my hand.
“No,” I said. I was still smiling, but my eyes burned with unshed tears. “I’m really not.”
“What happened?” he asked.
“Okay, first of all, I am so, so, so sorry for yelling at you,” I said.
He frowned. “I should have been paying more attention,” he said. “I realized that something was wrong, but I was… distracted.”
I nodded.
“We both were,” I said. “No harm done, right?”
Greatest Height (New Adult Biker Gang Romance) (Night Horses MC Book 6) Page 3