by Dee Tenorio
“Do you remember her father?” Kyle said in exasperation. “Truck driver. Roughly the size of a redwood. Lots of plaid and baseball caps? Is he ringing a bell, because it should be pretty damn obvious, Lucas.”
“I remember him, all right.” He just didn’t like to think about him. It wasn’t often, but nights when Adam Riggs was home, sometimes the yelling next door went into the early hours of the morning. There were times he’d snuck out to check on Belinda through her bedroom window. She was often there, arms around her endless supply of siblings. He still hated himself for the nights when she wasn’t.
He’d told her once that he’d keep his window open for her, if she ever needed somewhere to hide. She’d punched him in the shoulder, pretending he was out of his mind. But he still kept that window open for her, and every now and then, in the earliest hours of the morning on the nights when the yelling had been at its worst, he used to swear she’d been there, sitting on the sill.
“You think that kind of childhood’s not going to leave a person with scars?” Kyle demanded.
No, he knew she had her scars. Knew each and every one as if they were on his own body, evidence of his inability to protect her. The slim crevasse at the corner of her eye, the two empty spaces in her teeth on the right side, the deep dent in her left side where her ribs had been cracked when she was fifteen. No one could ignore the small shift of her nose, high on the bridge, giving her beauty a hardened edge. He remembered the broken fingers, the split lips, the days when she didn’t talk because her jaw was too sore… He’d seen them all—on her body, in her eyes—and he’d certainly felt the results of them over the years. “Her sisters have scars. They’ve gotten married.”
He’d reassured himself with that as each Riggs daughter found a mate, given himself hope with the thought that, someday, he might be able to bring Belinda around. First marriage, maybe even children. A simple dream for so many, probably the most difficult goal he could imagine for himself because if it didn’t happen with Belinda, it wouldn’t happen with anyone.
“You and I both know she is not like her sisters,” Kyle continued, making Lucas’s hopes sound foolish. “They won’t talk about those days, but how many scars do you think they have compared to her? How much guilt do you think they drag around? She protected them like they were her kids. Why do you think they let her get away with whatever she does?”
“Her mother doesn’t.” Belinda complained often enough about her mother’s patent confusion concerning why her eldest was not a housewife yet.
“Amanda lives in her own special land of denial and you know it.” Kyle didn’t have to remind him that Adam Riggs had retired last year, putting more strain on the complicated relationship between mother and daughter because now Belinda never went home. If that wasn’t a clue, nothing was likely to make Amanda face reality anytime soon.
“What am I supposed to do?” He couldn’t change her childhood. He couldn’t kill her father for her—though there would be some mental satisfaction at the prospect of beating him to within an inch of his life. But nothing he could do would change what she’d been through.
“I wish I knew.”
Lucas willed the frustration to go away, but his brother stayed on the line anyway. “You bring up her past and tell me to think about it, but you don’t know why?”
“I bring it up because even I can see the castles in the sky you’re building, but they aren’t there, Lucas. They never will be until you get Belinda to work past the fact that she doesn’t trust you to be any different than her father. She thinks all of us are that way.”
A memory of her face that night at the beach flashed uncomfortably in Lucas’s mind. And the moment in the bar, when he’d held her hands in his own and left her defenseless. Could he really slip between her and decades of self-preservation? Did he have the right to try?
“I love Belinda like a sister, but you’re my brother,” Kyle continued. “My priority is you. Right now, your priority needs to be getting your head out of your ass before she breaks your heart. Again. You can’t keep daring each other for the rest of your lives. The game will end sooner or later, Luc. You need to be prepared.”
Kyle was right. So right Lucas felt it like a sucker punch. Eventually, the game would be over and someone was going to lose. She’d either be trapped into a relationship she resented or he’d never see her again. When he looked at it that way, it seemed like both of them were doomed to lose.
He closed his eyes and pushed logic away. He didn’t care what the odds were. He didn’t care how much he might get hurt. Somewhere, somehow, there was a single solution that would make it all work out for the best. He just had to find it.
“Bye, Kyle,” he said, hanging up the phone over his brother’s protestations. It rang again almost immediately, so he pulled the plug out of the back and listened to the blessed silence. Out of it, he had to find his next step.
If only Kyle’s warnings didn’t keep playing in his ears.
“Leave it alone, you look great.”
“I’m a Clorox commercial.” Belinda glared at herself in the mirror while Corrine beamed from behind.
Not sure she wanted to attempt to go back to her white blonde hair by herself, Belinda had called to see if her sister would be interested in helping her with another mini-makeover. The rest happened so fast she was sure Corrine had called in her husband’s fellow marines. In truth, all she did was drag Belinda to a man named Pablo. But if he was Latin, she was a Nubian princess.
“This is style, darling,” Pablo said, fluffing the remnants of her hair. “That nasty black…thing you were doing had to go.”
“Along with my scalp?”
“We all pay for beauty. Speaking of, my front desk will take care of you now. Ciao. And Corrine, sweetheart, set up an appointment. Your roots are this close to offending me.” In a huff of perfume and glamour, Pablo was gone.
“Lucas is going to kill me.” Belinda stared at her reflection, horrified and afraid to touch what was left on her scalp.
“Why would he do that?” Corrine fluffed the top of Belinda’s head with plucky fingers. “You look beautiful.”
“I look bald. Like some sort of freaky duck fresh out of the egg.” At least before her hair came down to her shoulders in the front. Now it feathered around her face in something slightly resembling a skullcap. “The dare was to color my hair, not shave it off.”
“Well, going from black to white can damage even healthy hair, which you didn’t exactly have after years of…what did you use, shoe polish?” Corrine unsnapped the plastic tarp draped around Belinda’s neck and gestured for her to get up. “Plus your hair is thin already and lightening it damaged a lot of it. It had to be cut. You’re lucky he was able to save this much.”
Belinda finally touched the baby soft ends of her hair. Lucas had always loved her hair. He’d never said it, but he was always touching it, even while it was black. He was going to be disappointed to see it all gone.
“It’ll grow,” Corrine soothed, hugging Belinda as she stood, brushing away her own mid-back-length hair before doing so. Belinda felt her black mood growing. Corrine, oblivious, all but pranced away toward the reception desk. “This is my treat, okay? Oh, I may just have to kiss Lucas. First he tells you to quit smoking and now he’s making you get that junk out of your hair. I might just love him.”
“It was a dare,” Belinda reminded coldly. Her body tensed to a standstill at the prospect of what Corrine was hinting. “I didn’t do this to make him happy. Lucas doesn’t tell me to do anything. Even if he did, I’m no obedient dog rushing off to do what he says.” Let her pick on that hint.
Corrine, the only one of her sisters who was of a similar height, turned her regal head and perfect mom-hair so that she could pin Belinda with surprisingly angry blue eyes. She might look pristine at all times, but Corrine always gave as good as she got, no matter how dirty Belinda chose to make it.
Right now, she looked to be ready to give a little extra. �
�Don’t say another word until we get in the car. I don’t want to have to correct your sad little preconceived notions in front of a crowd.”
Belinda crossed her arms, bristling. “Afraid you’ll be embarrassed?”
“Only by you,” Corrine muttered, stunning Belinda into the requested silence as she crossed to the reception desk with brisk motions.
Belinda waited, not liking the sudden wrenching twist on the day. Couldn’t she go through a single day with someone she cared about and not completely piss them off?
Corrine indicated she was ready with a nod of her head toward the doors and Belinda met her there. They walked tersely toward the parking lot, and when they both dropped into the low-slung station wagon, the tension was palpable.
Corrine tightened her hands around the steering wheel one finger at a time, letting out a slow breath. “Out of respect for you and what you went through for us when we were kids, I have let you get away with your snide little comments, but I’ve had it, Belinda. For years you have treated my husband like some kind of leper. Now you’re doing it to the other girls and I’m sick of it.”
“It? What exactly are you sick of?”
“You. Acting like the last virgin on the planet, as if every man is some autocratic despot just because he has the nerve to want to get married and have a family. I’m especially tired of you insulting us because we found happiness when you’re so utterly incapable of it. Each one of the girls has found someone she thinks is amazing and treats her well. Instead of being happy for them, instead of being proud of them, you have to belittle their efforts to overcome as painful a childhood as you had. You don’t have the monopoly on anger or fear. We were all there, we all saw what life with Dad was like.”
I will not slap her. I will not slap her. Belinda made herself take a slow breath in and push it back out. But her skin still prickled with anger.
“That’s right, Corrine,” she admitted, her mouth barely moving around the words. “You saw. Because you watched. It was never you taking the brunt.” No one else was interested in that particular role. Not even their mother.
“Oh, sure, you were the only one who ever got hurt by Dad. It wasn’t Mom. It wasn’t us. Just noble little Belinda trying to protect us all.”
She could say one thing about her sister, Corrine could sneer beautifully. Even with her head that far up her own ass.
“Yes, it was. I never saw you in a cast. No one knocked out your teeth. You never did anything but hide in the room with the others and pretend it wasn’t happening. That’s what you’re still doing. Burying your head in the sand, as full of shitty excuses as Mom, acting like his ability to speak to people without slapping them means he’s someone else. The truth is someone had to protect you and it wasn’t her. It was me.”
“No, don’t try to make this about us kids. It was never about us. You just had to prove you could take it. That nothing he did was going to beat you down. You had to be better than him.”
Belinda sucked in a breath, stinging hurt and indignation a bitter pill to swallow. Did Corrine truly believe she’d taken blow after blow for them because she wanted it? Did they all?
Didn’t they remember how it really was? Or had listening to themselves make pathetic arguments in his favor wipe all the truths and terrors away?
“Congratulations, Belinda,” Corrine said, full of ripe resentment, not even realizing Belinda had gone numb next to her. “You’ve managed to become an even bigger bastard than he ever was.”
Belinda wanted to argue, but what could she say? What had she said in the last ten years, whenever they went over this same verbal ground, that had made any difference? Her sister thought she was no better than an abusive drunk. For all she’d done, all the secrets she kept, Corrine—maybe all of her siblings—believed she was worse than their father. Was there a response to that?
Other than wondering if they could possibly be right?
She reached inside herself for her usual barriers. The sarcasm and the impassive mask she needed to avoid these situations, but they stayed firmly out of her grasp. It was Lucas. It had to be. While she did her level best to reduce their attraction to repressed sexual impulses, he’d been slowly but surely melting her reserves and peeling away the things she used to defend herself. A gentle kiss, a sweet caress, a thought-out gift hidden beneath her pillow or next to her toothbrush. He was getting inside, damn him, and leaving the doors to her heart wide open while he was at it.
“I am not my husband’s dog.” Corrine fixed her with a solid glare even Belinda couldn’t look away from. “I’m not his slave. I’m his equal, something I shouldn’t have to explain to my own sister. He’s my husband and you will damn well give him the respect he deserves.” Corrine’s eyes clearly telegraphed how deserving Mike really was. She sighed heavily, sounding tired and sad all of a sudden. “Do you really think I have so little respect for myself that I would stay with someone if he treated me the way Dad treated Mom?”
Belinda shrugged, more than ready to see this discussion end. All she wanted to do now was go home and get ready for her next nightmare, the gala for the Cultural Artists of the 21st Century competition. Why she’d let Kyle talk her into entering it was a mystery. Probably had to do with all that pride Corrine seemed to think she had. “All I know is the longer you’re married, the more I see of Mom in you. It freaks me out.”
“It shouldn’t. Mom’s a good woman.”
“She’s a doormat.” No amount of restraint was going to pull the truth out of that statement. “Worse, she likes it that way.”
Corrine’s eyes flared again. Damn it, I should have kept my mouth shut.
“As if you’d know what Mom is or isn’t. When do you ever go home, Belinda? Or talk to her about her life? When’s the last time you came back for family dinner? You’re still walking around pretending Mom and Dad are just like they used to be, but they’re not. They love each other better now. Things have changed. He’s changed. The only one still the same is you.”
Something that felt like instant hives formed in the middle of Belinda’s back, just like they always did when she thought about her father and the guilt he’d stained her with.
As much as she hated to admit it, Adam and Amanda Riggs did love each other. Desperately. But their love consumed them. It ate up everything good in their lives as they searched out ways to hurt each other. Until the day Belinda found a way to use that love to her own ends. The day no one but her father knew anything about.
After that, Adam Riggs had straightened up, if only outwardly. He came home to his wife, he agreed to join AA and not so much as a beer had come into their house since. Of course, he and Belinda still fought. She maintained the upper hand and he resented the hell out of her for it. Her mother had let the abuse fall into a deep dark hole of forgetfulness, pleased that her husband acted nearly like a decent human being for once, admonishing Belinda for not acknowledging the man’s efforts.
To everyone else, Adam had overcome his addictions.
To Belinda, he was still the same selfish bastard who hated her because she’d ruined his life.
If she gave in, how long would it take Lucas to develop the same opinion?
How long would it take her to lose her strength and beg him not to look at her with empty eyes? How long would it be before she ignored his hours away from her side, pretending to herself she didn’t know he was with others? Pretending her love for him wasn’t eating at her like acid.
Fear made Belinda curl her fingers into fists, but they trembled anyway. She could never give in. Never.
“There’s no talking to you.” Corrine sighed, probably mistaking the action for anger, and started the car as if it were punctuation for emphasis. “You’re just as unreasonable as Dad.”
“Don’t compare me to him,” Belinda said, her voice deadly quiet in the tense atmosphere. “You’re probably right about your husband. About the way I treat them all. But I don’t do it on purpose, so don’t ever compare me to him.”
Corrine shook her head, looking behind the seats as she pulled out of the parking space. “At least he’s been able to change. Can you say that about yourself?”
Belinda began to tell her what she could do with her ability to change—and not in words Corrine would appreciate—but thankfully her cell phone rang, saving her from getting in any deeper. She’d barely answered before Kyle’s panicked voice interrupted hers. “What?”
“I can’t do that thing with you tonight. A friend of mine is in the hospital. I have to stay here until her son arrives.”
“What?” Belinda covered her eyes. “Kyle, the Cultural Artists dinner has been planned for months. You got me into this. You can’t just drop out.”
“It’s an emergency, Belinda. I don’t have a choice.”
“What am I supposed to do, go alone?” She pictured the various people she’d have to see and talk to and something inside her withered further. It’d be smarter not to go at all. She’d have a better chance at landing the commission.
“Ask Lucas.”
“Are you insane? Lucas? I have to impress these people, not inspire them to take hacksaws to my art.”
“He’s not that bad in social situations,” Kyle mumbled, but he didn’t even sound convinced. “Tell him to do the arm candy thing.”
She snorted.
“Sorry, kid, but I can’t leave. Lucas is your best bet. But you already knew that, didn’t you?”
She narrowed her eyes, even though he couldn’t see it. This was apparently her day for confrontation. “What are you getting at?”
“Belinda, come on. Be honest. When something goes wrong, I call you. Probably won’t be the case anymore, but that’s the way it’s always been.”
“It’s been the same for me.” Sort of.
“Sure, you call me. Who do you think of first? Who do you want to call?”
Lucas. Damn it. And damn him for knowing. For knowing her answer right now just by her silence.
“Call him. He’ll be there for you, like he always is.”