Still Falling (Falling Series Book 2)

by Lucia Grace

  “We took up for you, Damon.” Ember’s voice cuts into the night air. Disappointment clear in her tone. “When you slept with her and then ignored her for weeks, when she finally told us, we took up for you because we knew her feelings for you. And we knew your feelings for her despite how badly you tried to hide them. So we knew you two would eventually get your acts together and find your way to each other.” Her shoulders drop as she steps from the doorway onto the porch with Sam and me. “Then we watched it happen. You swept her off her feet. You took care of her and protected her when she needed it most. We watched a relationship blossom between the two of you so quickly that we couldn’t believe it. But you two just made sense together; you worked.”

  Sam walks back into the house, shaking her head with disgust. But I don’t take my eyes off of Em. Drinking in every word she says, hoping to fuck she’ll take pity on me and let me see my girl.

  “But now, I don’t know how it ever did. We don’t know what happened, but we don’t need to. All we need to know is that girl in there is fucking breaking, shattering into a billion pieces, and it’s all because of you.”

  Then without another word, she walks back into her house and shuts the door on any hope I had left.

  Pulling up the dirt driveway, I pull my cruiser to a stop alongside the other two lining the drive. Blue and red lights bounce off the tin of the double-wide’s aluminum siding. I clench my jaw at what I’m expecting to find inside.

  After leaving Ember’s without speaking one fucking word to Ace, I had to start my shift at the station. Terrible fucking timing, but I couldn’t call out last minute even though I wanted to. If I could, I would have sat on Em’s front porch all fucking night waiting on Ace to see me. But I couldn’t. So I reluctantly made it into work, and as soon as I was in uniform and heading to my cruiser to start patrolling, I was radioed in for backup on a domestic call.

  Without a second thought I hopped inside my car, turned on my blue lights, and sped off to the address recited to me over the radio. On the drive I took the time to clear my head of all the bullshit I caused with Ace. My revelation to her. Her sad fucking eyes. Her tears. Knowing she doesn’t want to fucking see me or speak to me after I walked out on her. All of it. Because in order to do my job, I need a clear head. So that’s what I did.

  But now sitting here, it all starts to slam back into my mind, so I shake my head to rid my thoughts of earlier and step from my cruiser. Ready to do my job.

  My boots crunch the gravel of the walkway as I unholster my gun then make my way to the front door.

  I walk through the busted down front door, Glock in hand, to see Brinley cuffing some grizzly-looking motherfucker who’s busy cursing and spewing bullshit as his face is eating the carpet below him. From what I can see his graying hair is disheveled, his even grayer beard could use a trim, and his plaid shirt and tattered jeans are full of grease and grime. Brinley doesn’t seem to care though. He’s ignoring every ‘fuck you’ and hurled insult tossed his way as his finishes up tightening the cuffs.

  As I keep walking through the hallway, I holster my gun and come to a small eat-in kitchen with an even smaller dinette set where Thompson sits with a frail, middle-aged looking woman. Her greasy brown hair is thin and scraggly. Her bare shoulders bony. Her thin nightgown stained and frayed. But what catches my attention, and has my jaw clenching so hard I’m surprised I’m not cracking molars, are the very visible black and blue bruises covering her forearms, face, and probably the rest of her fucking body.

  That motherfucker.

  Thompson catches my arrival and stands from the rickety seat as he excuses himself. I offer the timid woman a small smile when she looks up at me. “Ma’am,” I drawl. She quickly looks down. I make sure to keep my fists from clenching so I don’t scare her, but fuck, that scared look in her eyes has my simmering rage sparking to life.

  Stepping into the hall that separates the kitchen and living room, I turn to Thompson and say in a low tone, “His own personal punching bag I see.”

  His jaw clenches before he gives a curt nod. “Call came in from the neighbor. Said she heard Mr. Jensen yelling for a good half hour before the wife and kid started screaming.”

  My blood is fucking boiling. Who the fuck does this prick think he is beating on his wife and kid? Lowlife piece of shit.

  “We called you in because the kid won’t say a word. Or leave his room. And we need to get his statement and get them the fuck out of here. We figured you could help us out with your magic.” It’s true. I don’t know what it is, but for the almost three years that I’ve worked for the Pleasant Beach PD I’ve never had any issues with victims opening up to me. Kids especially.

  Because I know that feeling of absolute desolation and fear that’s running through them.

  I nod my head in understanding, clearing my throat of yet another painful reminder before I ask, “Where’s the kid?”

  Thompson runs a hand through his buzzed hair before pointing over my shoulder. I turn to look where he’s pointing to see the opposite end of the trailer has another small hallway as he says, “He’s in his room. Name’s Drake. Last door to the left.”

  With another nod of my head, I turn to make my way back through the living area to the opposite hallway to see the kid. When I start to pass by Brinley and that lowlife motherfucker who gets off on beating his wife and kid, Brinley stands him up to bring him to the squad car. But before he does the piece of shit decides to open his mouth when he sees where I’m heading.

  “Don’t you dare step one fucking foot near my son! You hear me?”

  I stop in my tracks behind a tattered, old, stained couch and glare over at Jensen to see he looks exactly as I pictured. Plaid shirt open to reveal a dirty, old white tee that stretches right across his beer gut hanging over his pants. His face is in a snarl. And he’s panting like a rabid animal.

  I step around the couch and in a low, threatening tone I get into his face. “I’d watch what you fucking say, Jensen. Don’t want to go and add threatening an officer to your rap sheet, now do you?”

  “I didn’t threaten you, fucking pig!” he growls. Testing the restraints of his cuffs as Brinley tightens his hold; one hand to the chain of the cuffs and another on his right shoulder.

  “Who are you calling a pig, motherfucker? Seems the only pig around here is you! You get off on beating your family, you piece of shit. Huh?”

  Seems my taunting words do the trick, because as I step back to take a deep breath to rein in my quickly escalating temper, Jensen lets loose and attempts to break free from Brinley.

  “You asshole!” he roars.

  But Brinley beats him to it. Yanking back on the cuffs and with a heavy hand still to this fucker’s right shoulder, he pulls him back a step then guides the piece of shit around me to take him to the cruiser. “Let’s fucking go,” Brinley spits out between clenched teeth.

  As they pass by me, Jensen spits at my boots. I snarl and go to move but Brinley shoves the fucker through the door before I can even take a step.

  I shake off the altercation and rid my mind of that piece of shit to get to the kid. He’s the priority in all of this.

  Huddled on his bed, small arms wrapped around bony knees, a dark head rests atop them. His small frame shakes slightly. He can’t be more than five or six years old. I swallow hard. The comparison slamming into me, bringing back memories and tearing open old wounds that have never fully healed. Especially after tonight’s admissions to Ace. But I swallow it all back and focus on the now. This kid. This young boy who’s way too fucking young to know this kind of pain.

  His head snaps up when the floor creaks beneath my weight. Terrified gray eyes rimmed with red and filled with tears stare back at me.

  My rage ignites all over again. Not just because of the fearful look on his face. No. That pisses me off to no end. But what really sets my blood boiling is the black eye darkening the right side of his face along with his split bottom lip.

  I take three control
led breaths before I speak. “Drake?” I ask. Even though I know it’s him.

  He timidly nods his dark, shaggy head.

  “Can I come in?”

  Another timid nod.

  As my large, bulky frame passes through the narrow doorway into his sparse bedroom, I notice how he leans back. As if to shy away from my presence. I take another three calming breaths, while cursing his sorry excuse of a fucking sperm donor.

  I so fucking wish I were the one arresting that motherfucker.

  Another deep breath and I’m standing by his bed. Hands up in surrender to show I’m no threat. I tell him as much. “It’s okay, kid. I’m here to help. No need to be scared.”

  He swipes his arm under his nose. Wincing when the sleeve of his pajama top snags on his busted lip. “No one can help me.”

  “It may feel that way, kid. But—”

  “It isn’t how I feel. It’s what I know. No one can help me.” His bluntness surprises me. So much so my head snaps back in shock at his remark. His monotone reply has me realizing quickly that this isn’t the first time he and his mother have gone through this. Which I expected. But still it has my jaw clenching tight.

  “Well, I’m here to make sure you get the help you need now. To make sure you’re safe and that your father can no longer do what he’s been doing.” I try to explain as simply and evenly as I can. I don’t want to scare him, but I want him to understand that he isn’t alone anymore.

  “It won’t matter. It’s my fault anyway,” he replies quietly. Dejectedly.

  “Drake, this isn’t your fault. None of it is or ever was,” I answer empathetically.

  His small shoulders tremble as he fights hard to hold back his tears. His face pinched tight. Arms wrapped like a vice around his middle. But the pain wins out and a small sob breaks free. “Why couldn’t I ever be good enough? Why couldn’t he just love me like other daddies love their kids?”

  My heart splits and my rage explodes like an atom bomb. My own body trembling now as I try to keep my anger at his piece of shit father at bay. I need to be the strength this kid has never been shown.

  Biting back my anger, I rest a hand to his thin back. Keeping to protocol, but showing compassion to a broken kid like I once was. Not allowing him to get lost in his pain. And I say everything that no one ever had the chance to say to me. “Drake. You listen to me, kid. None of what your father has done is your fault. His anger is his own. Not yours. Never yours.”

  “No. He said it was me!” he yells. “Said if only I could be a good little boy then he wouldn’t have to be so angry…so mean. He said it was me…” His small voice trails off. Hitching with his pain.

  Hearing the anguish saturate his words fills me with even more hate for his sorry excuse of a father. “I promise, Drake. It isn’t you.” He looks up at me with wide gray eyes. “It was never you. None of this is your fault. You have nothing to feel guilty for. Nothing to be shamed about. You hear me? Nothing. What your father ever did to you or your mother is on him, only ever on him. It isn’t you, it isn’t her. It is him and his anger and issues.”

  And then, like a light bulb goes off, it all clicks.

  His words replay through my mind on a loop. Flashes of his devastation, shame, and anger keep me from closing my eyes. Both tearing through my already broken heart.

  The tears haven’t stopped since Damon walked out on me a few short hours ago. Each hour that ticks by seems like a lifetime or more.

  When the shutting of the door stopped echoing throughout the hall, I gathered the shattered pieces of my heart and packed up as much as I could in five minutes. Then through a river of tears streaming down my face, I left as quickly as possible and drove straight to Ember’s.

  I had nowhere else to go. I canceled my lease last week when Damon asked me to stay. Foolishly thinking that we could work. Amber and Sam lived the farthest from Damon’s and I didn’t want to drive any longer than I had to. And I didn’t want to show up at my parents’ house this upset and bother them with this. I’ve worried them enough lately.

  As soon as I pulled into Ember’s, she opened the door and her arms to me without question. Never even asking what had happened between us, just knowing it had to do with Damon when I whispered his name through a ragged sob. She then rallied the girls, knowing I’d need all of them, and Sam and Amber showed up without question. They all stayed with me as I cried.

  Then when Damon showed up here, hearing his voice almost shattered my resolve and had me running out to him. His deep, graveled voice drifted down the hall and up the stairs like it was calling out to me. And it was. But I didn’t move. I was too hurt. Resolved to the fact that he made his decision when he walked out on me.

  It may seem selfish, especially with everything he revealed to me. With how he laid this burden he’s been carrying around for all these years at my feet. Which is exactly why I almost crumbled, gathered him in my arms, and told him all would be okay. But as much as I want to help him heal and love him through the pain, I can’t help him if he doesn’t want to help himself.

  I hear Ember enter the room and my heavy lids crack open. I wince, my eyes pained from the hours of crying they’ve suffered.

  “Amber and Sam just left,” she whispers as she sits next to me on the bed. I’ve been lying here in one of the spare rooms since I walked through the door. Breaking into a million pieces and crying a million tears.

  “You ready to tell me what happened yet?”

  Like a tsunami, the feelings I was so badly trying to fight against roll over me. Washing me away and taking me under.

  I shake my head through a sob. Then sniffle back my tears. “I can’t,” I croak out through a dry throat full of sorrow and pain. “But he doesn’t want me anymore,” I stutter out.

  “Oh, sweetie, does the man who was here tonight sound like a man that doesn’t want you?”

  I shake my head. Because it doesn’t matter. “I’m just not enough.”

  And it’s true. I’m not enough to help him get over his demons. I wish he could see he doesn’t have to take them on all by himself. He’s never had to, but he chose to. Now though, now he has me, and I want nothing more than to help him heal. I’d slay the hounds of hell to free his mind from the pain he’s lived with for too many years. Because I love him that much.

  My eyes slide shut as I lift a hand to my mouth. When I open my eyes it’s to see a blurry Ember staring at me. “What’s wrong?” Concern laces her voice.

  “I never told him.”

  “Never told him what, Tracey?”

  “That I love him.” I look at her, my heart physically hurting as it beats in my chest. “I never told him that I love him. I never spoke those three words to him.”

  I know it wouldn’t have made a difference, but despite that I wish I had. So badly. He deserves to know, he needs to know, that he’s loved despite what happened to him. Despite what he thinks. Despite how he feels. He deserves to know that I love him.

  I’ve loved him every day of my life since I was seven years old. And what I found out today changes none of that.

  If anything, it makes me love him even more because he survived it all.

  “Oh, Tracey,” Ember breathes through a sigh before wrapping me in her arms. Trying to soothe the ache that’s spreading through me like wildfire.

  I slam my fist to the steering wheel as I drive the back roads to the station. Trying to clear my head of the fucked-up mess I just left. Child Protective Services came by to pick up Drake once they deemed his mother unfit in her state to take care of her son. She vowed to finally leave her piece of shit husband to make a better life for her and Drake. I hope she means it. That kid needs some good in his life.

  My heart races. Beating a frantic rhythm against my ribcage at the reminders that broken boy brought to the surface. From my past. From tonight. Ace. Our fight. All of it. Swirling in my head and in my heart into a toxic cocktail of disgust and turmoil, longing and want, pain and regret.

  So much fucki
ng regret. I’ve lost out on so much because of how I allowed that piece of shit to control my life. Even beyond the grave. And that’s the one fucking thing I was trying to avoid, letting him or anything else control me. But that’s the one thing that ended up happening. I allowed what he did to me to consume me and make me feel worthless, when in reality, none of it was ever my fault. Talking to Drake made me realize that. It’s fucking ironic how for so many years of my life I’ve been running from my past and keeping what happened to me locked up tight, but one talk with a six-year-old has me seeing things more clearly than ever.

  And nothing is more fucking clear than Ace.

  Earlier tonight when I told her what had happened to me as a kid, beneath the shame and disgust came relief. Because I had finally told someone what I suffered, and even though it fucking killed me to let someone else know—and made me feel weak—I couldn’t have been more relieved that it was her. Because out of anybody she’s the one to understand why I kept it hidden for so long.

  Fuck, I’ve been such a fucking idiot when it comes to her. First by keeping her at a distance while sleeping with anything that had a fucking pulse to make me feel like a fucking man. Then when I finally came to my senses after her attack, but told her I could only give her so much because I wasn’t capable of giving her the love she deserved. But I had been giving it to her all along, my fucked-up mind just wouldn’t realize it. But I realize it now and it’s time she fucking knows it.

  I’m done hiding from my past. I’m done letting it control me. And I’m certainly fucking done keeping Ace at arm’s length and only allowing her so close. I’m fucking ready to love her, to tell her I love her, and to let her love me back. I’m going to prove to her that despite how badly I fucked up tonight by walking out on her, that I’m ready and that I get it. That I get it and know that her love will fucking heal me because it already has.

  As a new sense of resolve and peace settles over me, I press a little harder on the accelerator, anxious as fuck to finish this shift and go claim my girl once and for all.