by K. J. Dahlen
“Was Estelle buried next to him?”
Carla glared at him. “Hell no, that bitch was not buried next to her son. She was buried in an unmarked grave as far as I know. Nick didn’t want her anywhere near his kid. She was the one behind Benny getting shot in the first place.”
“How so?” Deke frowned. This is the part he never heard about before. Gator had told him something different as he’d been with Sam since the military days.
“The stupid bitch was finally leaving them behind. She was pregnant again and this time, she was leaving Nick and the boys behind to take up with her biker lover. She was in her late thirties already and knew the baby she carried would probably be her last. Nick didn’t care if she left him or not, he figured things would be better if she was gone anyway, and I don’t think Sam cared one way or the other either, but Benny still had hope in his heart that she could change and finally be the mother he always wanted her to be. When he confronted them that night the biker she was with laughed at him. He told Benny that his mother was nothing more than a good fuck and he almost felt sorry for the boy, if he expected her to be any kind of mother to him.”
Deke shook his head at this.
Carla shrugged. “I guess Estelle hadn’t told the dummy she was pregnant with his kid yet and when she did that night the biker was furious. He told her he didn’t want any kid she might have in her belly and that if she was pregnant, it wasn’t his. They got into a big fight and things were said that no fourteen year old kid needs to hear about his mother. Benny got mad as hell and picked up a gun. The biker shot him before he realized what was going on. Then when Sam saw his brother fall, he grabbed the gun and shot the biker.”
“How do you know what happened that night?” Deke asked. “Where you there?”
Carla shook her head. “No I wasn’t there but Nick was. He followed his boys and was close enough to see and hear everything. When Sam picked up Benny’s body Nick walked behind him all the way back to the house.”
“What did Sam do when he saw his dad?”
Carla shrugged. “I don’t know if Sam ever knew his dad was even there. Sam can be very stubborn when he wants to be. He was only looking out for Benny that night. I don’t know if he saw anybody but his brother. It broke Nick’s’ heart that night to look into Sam’s eyes and see nothing but hate for him. He told me he lost both of his sons right then and there.”
Deke stared at the woman sitting next to him. “And did Nick expect you to make it all right again, by coming here and blindsiding Sam with this story?”
The little girl got to her feet and faced Deke. Her small hands were curled into fists and the rage on her face rivaled the same type of rage that filled Sam. “My grandfather never asked Mom to come here and he doesn’t know we’re here now. He’d be pissed off if he did. This was something Mom wanted to do. She wanted the chance to know her brother after all these years. Having met the man in question, I’m not impressed. I think Sam Tory is a douchebag and the meanest man I’ve ever met. He’s also the stupidest man alive.”
Deke almost laughed at the little girl’s attitude. When he stood up to his full height he towered over her but she didn’t back down. He quirked his eyebrow at her defiance but she didn’t even flinch. He turned to Carla. “I think for now, you two better leave. I’m not sure Sam will ever want to talk to you or Nick but that’s his choice.”
Carla got to her feet. Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out an envelope and handed it to Deke. “Would you give him this? I want him to have it.”
Deke took it from her and nodded. “I can’t guarantee he’ll open it but I will give it to him.” He watched as they walked to the door and went through it. He followed them all the way to the front door and stood there while they got into their car and left the compound. Then he turned and went back inside.
He found his father sitting alone at one of the tables with a bottle of Black Velvet in front of him. Deke went over and sat down next to him. Carefully placing the letter on the table he didn’t say anything. Instead, he got up again and walked away, noting his father’s eyes never left the letter on the table in front of him.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Sam stared at the letter and downed a couple more shots. The whiskey warmed his belly but never took the edge off. The writing on the outside of the envelope was his father’s. He knew it the moment Deke set the letter down. He hadn’t seen his father’s handwriting in years but he knew. Sam just wasn’t sure he wanted to read it. He hadn’t spoken to the man since the night Benny died and he wasn’t sure he wanted to ever again.
His father had let him down most of his life and he couldn’t wait to leave home. He’d done just that after his brother was gone. He couldn’t even stay to see him buried and had only come back one time. He cried when he saw Benny’s grave on that one visit. He felt he let him down somehow, as if he were responsible for Benny being where he was. He tried to tell Benny this, the very night he died, but he couldn’t get the words out.
Sam poured and drank another round and as he placed the glass on the table, he reached for the letter. Tearing it open, he read the words his father wrote,
Sam,
I know you have no interest in whatever I have to say and maybe I should have told you this a long time ago but I think you need to hear the truth at long last. I know I never seemed like much of a father to you or Benny and maybe I wasn’t there when I should have been but that’s on me. I have to live with that fact the rest of my miserable life.
I made a mistake when I got hooked up with your mother, a mistake I compounded when I stayed. I never should have gotten mixed up with the crazy woman you called Mom. She wasn’t much of a mother to you or your brother either. The only reason I stayed was because she threatened violence against you if I left. She once told me she brought you into this world and she would take you out if I left her high and dry, but she wouldn’t have been left high or dry. She had other men in her life, Benny’s father being one of them.
I knew I wasn’t his dad as soon as she told me she was pregnant. I hadn’t been with her in years the day she told me she was pregnant but I knew I couldn’t leave. I tried to look after you boys but I wasn’t always there and for that I’m sorry. I was a selfish bastard and found me a real woman with a heart in another town. I know there is no excuse for what I did but there it is. I know I made mistakes and you probably hate me but I always loved you. You are my son and I truly wish we had a second chance to discover each other.
Carla is the daughter I had with Shawnee. Shawnee is the woman I found my happiness with. Your mother was cruel and crazy. She was so high most of the time that she didn’t know her own name. The biker she was sleeping with when Benny was killed had been passing her around to his brothers and she didn’t care. She thought they loved her but they were using her the whole time.
I’m not telling you this to hurt you, I need you to understand what was happening at the time you left. Estelle’s body was found the day after Benny died. The man you shot had a brother and he killed your mother the same night. I buried Benny where you told me to, but I buried your mother as far away from him as I could. I didn’t want her to taint him in death as she had in life.
I know I have no right to ask this of you but I would give anything to see you one more time before I die. If nothing more than to apologize for what I didn’t do, when I should have been a father to you and Benny. But I feel I owe you more than that.
I’m being selfish again, in hoping you and Carla will meet one day and get to be friends. I know I have no right and if we lived in a perfect world, one of you would not exist but the world we live in is not perfect and neither am I.
Shawnee, Carla and Caitlyn are my whole world but there has always been something missing and that something was you. I’ve watched out for you over the years but I never got too close. I know you found your own son a while back but I also know he didn’t stay long. I have a feeling that was my fault. I couldn’t teach you how to be a dad when I did
n’t know myself how to be one.
I have a lot of regrets in my life but you are not one of them. From the moment you were born, I loved you and I will love you until the day I die. You may not believe it but I do. A man only has his name and his honor, if he loses his honor his name doesn’t mean much. For a while, I lost my honor but I finally have it back. It was partially because of the good woman I found in Shawnee. I don’t know what your life has become because I tried to respect your wish and stayed away but I pray that you found a good woman and have with her what I found with my Shawnee.
I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me someday, for the mistakes I made with you and your brother. I loved that boy as much as you did and the day he died, a big piece of me died with him. When you walked out the door that night, you took another huge piece of me with you. I was so lost for so long without you, I didn’t know how I could go on living but Shawnee and Carla showed me I could. They healed a big part of my soul but there is still another part only you can heal.
I know I don’t have the right but someday, I want to be buried next to Benny. I’ve already told Shawnee this but I wanted you to know as well. You may or may not ever read this letter but I hope you will someday.
I love you son, Dad.
Sam grabbed the letter and held it tightly in his clenched hand. The words were forever burned into his brain, as he tasted the ashes of his childhood in his mouth. Memories he thought long forgotten flashed in his mind. Benny’s face smiling at him, the sound of his brother’s laughter ringing out, Benny calling out his name, even the sounds of the many nights Benny sobbed himself to sleep, tired and scared. Sam’s arms around him holding him in the dark while they both had to listen to the sounds of yelling and screaming from their parents.
These were the memories of his childhood Sam had tried to block out. There wasn’t any good moments between him and his parents’ only harsh words, slaps, sneers and yelling. Sam had secretly hated his mother long before he ever knew he was supposed to love her. He’d cringed when Benny made the mistake of trying to tell her that he needed her. She had shown the boys that she didn’t need or want them near her.
She kept pushing them both away and while Sam finally figured it out, Benny hadn’t yet. He died because Estelle couldn’t be the mother he craved.
Sam poured another drink and slowly sipped it. Now this woman came to him and told him she was his sister and that she knew his father. She knew him and loved him. Sam felt furious. His father had told him in a letter that he had loved this woman. He loved her as he had never loved Sam or Benny. He told Sam he loved his daughter while all Sam could remember of his father was nothing.
Sam got to his feet and walked out of the clubhouse. He got on his bike and roared off. He didn’t know where he was going he just had to get away from his demons. Riding on the open road gave him some peace and the longer the ride, the more he felt at peace. When he finally stopped, he was surprised to find himself at the Haven Cemetery in Quincy, Massachusetts.
Looking down at the headstone buried in the ground he saw the name Benjamin Daniel Tory etched onto the stone marker. Sam got off his bike and sat down next to his brother’s grave. “Ah Benny, how did our lives get so fucked up?” he asked softly.
“I think I can answer that,” a woman’s soft voice spoke from behind him.
Sam twisted around and stared at the older woman. He hadn’t seen her sitting on the bench behind his brother’s grave.
She was older but she stilled looked good. Her hair was mostly grey but he could see dark strands running through it. Her eyes were brown and she gazed at him with warmth.
“Who the fuck are you?” Sam growled.
“I’m Shawnee,” she told him quietly.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Sam seethed. “You have no right to be here.”
“I know I don’t have the right. But somebody had to come. Your dad couldn’t make it today, so I came instead.” She motioned to the fresh flowers at the base of the stone.
“Why would you come here?” Sam sneered. “You didn’t even know Benny.”
“I came here because this boy meant a lot to Nick and Nick means a lot to me.” She turned her head and stared at Sam. “Nick should mean something to you too.”
“Nick Tory means nothing to me.” Sam seethed as he turned around to stare at the marker with his brother’s name on it. “He lost that right a lifetime ago.”
The silence between them was filled with tension. Sam didn’t know why he had come here but he was glad he had. It’d been too long since he’d been here last. He couldn’t make up for his absence but he could sit here for a while.
Shawnee got up and left without saying a word.
Sam was happy to see her go. He resented the fact that she’d been here at all. She didn’t belong here. Sam waited for a long time before he began talking to his brother. Then without warning, everything began spilling out. Sam ranted and raved for a while, then his words grew calmer. At first, he’d been angry. All the pent up anger had spilled out, the rage of the way his parents treated them, feeling so helpless as a kid to protect his little brother. At the events of the night Benny died, at what happened after he left. Next came the disbelief of what happened earlier when Carla came to Troy to explain who she was.
Sam held his head in his hands as tears dripped down his face. “I couldn’t fucking believe it, Benny. She came to see me and claimed she was my sister. Said Dad had her with another woman but kept her a secret. God, I wanted to fucking kill him. He couldn’t bear to be in the same room with you and me but he raised her? He lived with them after you died and I left. Ahh Benny, why did you have to leave me all alone like you did?”
For a moment, there was silence then Sam heard footsteps behind him. He turned and asked, “What the fuck are you doing here?” He glared at the one man he never wanted to see again.
Nick Tory gazed at his first-born son for a long time before he answered, “Shawnee told me you were here. I had to come.” He motioned at the headstone and sat down on the bench behind Sam. “I come here often to talk to him. We both take care of his grave.”
“You have no right, no right at all!”
Nick nodded. “Probably in your mind but in my mind, he’s still my son.”
Sam’s grabbed a handful of grass. “But he wasn’t your son, was he?”
Nick shook his head. “Not by blood but by love he was. I loved that boy.”
“Yeah, you had a funny way of showing your so called love.” Sam scorned.
Nick hung his head. Then he raised it and glared at Sam. “I admit, I made my share of mistakes, what man hasn’t? Have you been right in all your decisions? Or has the infamous Sam Tory never made one fucking mistake in his life?”
Sam matched his father’s stare. “I’ve made mistakes but my kids were never one of them. I took care of them all the best I could.”
“Them?” Nick frowned. “I thought you only had the one boy?”
“I have four kids,” Sam admitted. “Deke is my oldest, then I have Quinn and Adriana and finally, I have a baby, Talon.”
Nick’s eyes rounded and soon a smile split his face. “Four kids, huh? That’s great.” Then his eyes went to the headstone again, and his smile faded. “Why did you come here today?” he whispered. “You haven’t come back here in years.”
Sam turned around, so he couldn’t see his father. “I came here because I had a visitor today. She claimed to be your daughter.” Sam scoffed. “I didn’t know you had another kid. You weren’t much of a father to Benny and me but you could be to her, I guess.”
“Son, there are so many things you could never understand—”
“Don’t call me your son!” Sam seethed interrupting his father. “You lost that right the night he died.” He motioned toward the headstone.
Nick pressed his lips together and anger flashed in his eyes. Very carefully, he reached inside his jacket, pulled out a small wooden box and laid it carefully on the bench besi
de him. “I lost more than Benny the night he died. I know that. I buried him just the way you wanted him buried. I hoped I would be able to talk to you finally, but you won’t let me, so I’ll leave this for you. Benny had some things he wanted you to have.” Then he got up and with a defeated look in his eyes, Nick Tory turned and made his way down the hill.
Sam turned his head away and didn’t watch him go. He waited until he knew the old man was gone before he turned and looked at the box. Getting to his feet, he walked over to the bench and sat down.
With shaking hands, he lifted the box and smiled. He knew this box. It used to hold his own treasures. It was an old box of cigars that old man Weston had thrown away when it was empty. He smoked only the best cigars. Sam could still remember the scent of burnt tobacco.
Benny had seen the cigar box one day and begged Sam to give it to him. He needed something to keep his treasures in. Sam had given up the box without any trouble. He’d only been using it to keep his cash in anyway. But Benny had been ecstatic about having a place to hide his treasures.
Sam opened it and the first thing he saw was a letter with his name on it. The handwriting was childlike and scrawling—it was Benny’s! For a moment—Sam couldn’t breathe. He carefully lifted out the letter and opened the envelope. A single sheet of paper was inside. Sam pulled it out and began reading the words Benny had written over thirty five years ago.
Sammy,
You’ve been the best big brother a boy could ever have. I love you so much. You loved me even when you didn’t have to. I know you’ve always taken care of me, better than mom ever did. I hate her so much sometimes. You may not know this but Nick isn’t my real dad. Mom made sure she told me about it one day. She told me that my real dad was some guy by the name of Brett Matthews but he’d left her when she told him about the baby she was carrying. The baby being me.