Redemption Road

by Katie Ashley

  “That’s not true.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Oh, please, Rev, like you could actually acknowledge the crazy, broken sex slave as your old lady. What would your brothers say?”

  His expression darkened. “I don’t give a damn what they might have to say. That’s not what this is about.”

  “Then please enlighten me. Because I find it extremely ironic that after being with you for a month, you just happen to call my parents on the night we kissed.”

  “What I did last night was not fair to you with all you’ve been through.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You’re still recovering. I should’ve never made a move on you.”

  I snatched up a pair of my shoes from the floor and spat, “In case you missed it, I was the one who made a move on you.”

  Rev exhaled an agonized sigh. “Because you’re confused and mixed up. For Christ’s sake, Annabel, a month ago you were imprisoned and enslaved by a fucking maniac. You don’t get over that shit so quickly. You’ve been through too much to know what you really want.”

  Anger and hurt flickered and flashed through me like lightning slicing across a troubled sky. Although I’d been raised to always temper my emotions, I couldn’t hold myself back. With all the strength I had within me, I threw one of the shoes at him.

  Rev ducked just in time, and it narrowly missed his head. Closing the gap between us, I demanded, “How dare you tell me what I feel? I’m not crazy when it comes to how I feel about you!”

  “I never said you were crazy,” Rev argued softly.

  “You’re implying it, which is just as bad.”

  “I didn’t want to do anything to hurt you.”

  “Too. Fucking. Late,” I spat before I rushed past him and slammed the bedroom door. Hot tears streaked down my cheeks as I went to the closet and grabbed the small suitcase Rev had bought me on the way home from Texas. As I threw my clothes and toiletries inside, I expected him to come into the room and continue our argument.

  But he didn’t.

  It was like he had raised the white flag of defeat when it came to us. He wasn’t going to fight. He was going to do what he thought was the honorable thing and just let me go.

  Once I finished packing, I threw open the bedroom door to find Rev standing in front of me. His mouth opened, but then he quickly closed it. When he reached for my suitcase, I jerked it away from him. “Please, Annabel. You’re still recuperating from surgery. You shouldn’t be carrying that.”

  Angrily, I slammed it down at his feet. “Fine, then. Since you seem to still have concern for my physical state, you take it. I want to say good-bye to Poe.”

  Without another word to him, I turned and fled to the back porch. At the sound of the back door opening, Poe was already standing up and waiting for me in his pen. I stepped off the porch and walked around to him. It was amazing how much he had grown since he had moved from the crate to an old dog run that had belonged to one of Rev’s MC brothers.

  “Hey, sweet boy,” I said as I unlocked the latch on his pen. He came out tentatively like he always did, cautiously surveying his surroundings. Tears filled my eyes as I stroked his head. I could never regret my time here with Rev because it meant saving Poe’s life. He had given me a focus and shown me once again there was nothing else on earth I wanted more than to be a veterinarian.

  I kissed the top of his nose. “Be a good boy. You’ll be leaving soon. You’ll be big and strong enough to go back to the woods. I know you’re going to do just fine.”

  I think I was saying the words more for me than for Poe. In a way, I had just had my own release back into the wild. More than anything, I needed reassurance that everything was going to be all right.

  At the sound of Rev approaching behind me, I asked, “You remember what to do for him when it’s time to release him?”

  “Yes, I do,” he murmured.

  “Good.”

  “Annabel, don’t leave like this,” Rev pleaded, his voice thick with anguish.

  “You ask me not to leave like this, yet you haven’t once told me to stay.” I glanced over my shoulder at him. “Considering all of that, how else would you presume I left? You’ve told me I don’t know what I feel, but more than anything, you’ve made me feel that my feelings for you are based on some sort of reverse Stockholm syndrome, like kidnapping victims experience for their captors.” I shook my head. “I just wish you could see what’s truly in my heart.”

  With a resigned sigh, I eased Poe back into his pen. As much as I hated to leave him, I knew without a doubt that Rev would take good care of him, even after he was released into the wild. I stood up and breezed past Rev to the porch steps. After making one last sweep inside the house for anything of mine, I went out the front door onto the porch.

  As I started down Rev’s front steps, I saw that my parents’ limousine had pulled around to the cul-de-sac. I started walking to the car, but a small voice behind me caused me to stop.

  When I turned around, Willow was staring up at me with her big brown eyes. “Belle, are you leaving?”

  Fighting back tears, I nodded. “I wish I could stay longer, but I really have to go back home now.”

  Willow’s lips turned down in a pout. “But I’m going to miss you so much. Will you come to visit?”

  Although I knew the answer to her question was no, it broke my heart to disappoint her. “Maybe one day.” I bent down to her level. “Will you help Uncle Rev with Poe? It won’t be much longer before he’s ready to be released.”

  “Yes, I will. I promise.”

  I pulled her into my arms. “Be a good girl for your mommy and daddy. I know you’re going to be a wonderful sister to your brother.”

  “I will.”

  I kissed the top of Willow’s head and then slowly pulled away. Beth stood behind us, a stricken look on her face. I don’t know if it was because of Willow or because of the weight of the emotions, but neither of us spoke. Instead, our eyes conveyed everything we needed to say. Beth wanted me to know that Rev was struggling with his feelings. But the tears in my eyes let her know he had made his intentions clear. He wasn’t fighting for me . . . for us. So there was nothing left but to go.

  She put her arms around me and hugged me tight. I clung to her, realizing how close I had grown to her in the last month. She was the mother I wished I had—the kind which, if fairy tales were true, I would have wished for. But this was real life.

  In fairy tales, this would be the moment when Rev swooped to my side and told me everything I wanted to hear. He would hoist me into his arms and carry me back into the house, and we would live happily ever after.

  But this was real life. And I had already learned how much real life could hurt you.

  When I pulled away from Beth, I let the sobs overtake me as I hurried to the waiting limousine. I slid inside without looking back for him. At the sight of my tear-streaked face and my chest heaving with sobs, my mother recoiled in her seat. “Annabel, honestly,” she chided. I knew she was at a loss to understand how I could be so bereft at leaving such people.

  She would never understand that within the walls of Rev’s small house and among the salt-of-the-earth people who were his family, I had learned how to truly live for the first time.

  SIXTEEN

  REV

  Sometimes we find ourselves damned to hell by outside forces. But then sometimes we are the very ones who damn ourselves. The burden of suffering I had taken on after Annabel left was of my own doing, and I had no one else to blame but myself. Doing what I had assumed was the right thing had never been so wrong.

  Since I had never been one who couldn’t admit his mistakes, I tried calling Annabel several times. Each call went unanswered until the number was changed altogether. My wounded male pride then overrode any other overtures I should have made to make things right between us. Instead, I did the immature thing and drowned my sorrows in Jack Daniel’s.

  My days and nights became a boozy haze. I slept until noon, and I
didn’t show up for work at the pawnshop. I basically became one of the walking dead or, I guess more aptly, a dead man walking. The only time I took life seriously was when it came to the club and club business.

  No one could reach me. Deacon and Bishop talked, yelled, and cursed until they were blue in the face. Even Alexandra tried using her feminine approach to get through, but I was a hopeless case. No one was more frustrated by my behavior than I was. But each day, as I poured another glass of Jack, I reasoned that what I had done was for the best for both Annabel and me. She’d had one traumatic life experience, so she sure as hell didn’t need to end up with me. I could only imagine her waking up one day and looking at me with a regret that would have broken my heart even more than letting her go had.

  Mama Beth was the only one who didn’t try talking to me. I think she was so disgusted by what I had done concerning Annabel and what my life had become that she was for once washing her hands of me. Of course, her disappointment wounded me deeply. One day, three months after Annabel had left, I lashed out at her in a way I never would have believed myself capable of. After talking it over with Deacon and Bishop, we had all decided it was best not to tell Mama Beth about my rape. As sensitive as she was, it would be too horrific and painful for her to have to endure.

  But in my drunken, self-loathing phase, I forgot all about that. Since I was surviving on a liquid diet, she had brought lunch to my house. I never intended to let her in, but she had a key of her own. Being her stubborn self, she had come on in and promptly poured a pitcher of cold water on my ass to get me awake. To get her off my back, I had finally come out to the kitchen.

  When I peered down at the table, a simple piece of her chocolate cake set me off. “What the fuck is that?” I demanded.

  Mama Beth’s blue eyes popped wide at my language and tone. “Why, it’s chocolate cake. Your favorite.”

  Once upon a time, it had been my favorite. After my attack, I could barely stomach it. But to keep the secret and the peace, I would smile and eat it, only to excuse myself and throw it up moments later. Too much had happened for me to do the same thing now. Lunging forward, I grabbed the cake and took it straight to the trash. I slammed it down into the trash can so hard that the plate popped up before falling down.

  “Nathaniel, what are you doing?” Mama Beth asked in her most concerned voice.

  “You know what happened to me because of chocolate cake?”

  Mama Beth shook her head. “You’re out-of-your-head drunk and not making any sense. Please eat something. I made all of your favorites.”

  “Always trying to make things right with food, aren’t you, Mama?” I snapped.

  “Nathaniel, I do not like your tone or your attitude. I know things have been strained between us since Annabel left, so I came down here to try to make things right.”

  “So you brought me some good ol’ chocolate cake.” I laughed a little maniacally. “One baked cake never cost me so much . . . or us so much.” I staggered toward her. “Do you remember years and years ago when you asked me to take a cake down to Miss Mae’s?”

  “Yes,” she murmured, her forehead creasing in confusion.

  “Miss Mae wasn’t home. Instead, a vagrant named Kurt was there. He drugged me and dragged me into her bedroom, where he raped me!”

  Mama Beth gasped in horror, her eyes widening to the size of dinner plates.

  “The reason Preacher Man left his church and left us? It’s because he blew Kurt’s head off after seeing him violating me.”

  As long as I live, I will never forget the look on her face. It was an agonizing expression of shock, disbelief, and pain. Her hand flew to her mouth as she swayed on her feet. “Why didn’t you ever tell me? Why didn’t he tell me?”

  “I don’t know. We thought it was best to keep it a secret.”

  As she stared at me almost like I was a stranger, I felt like the biggest bastard to have ever walked the earth. “Mama Beth, I’m sorry,” I murmured. I wanted her to scream at me. To slap my face for telling her in such a horrible way. To hate me for ruining her marriage and, in a way, her life.

  Instead, tears streamed down her cheeks. “No, I’m the one who is sorry, Nathaniel. I’m so, so sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize to me. I’m an asshole for telling you like that.”

  She brought her hand up to cup my cheek. “You’ve been under a tremendous strain these last three months. While I should be angry at you for the way you told me, I can’t be. You’re my son, and I love you. More than anything, my heart breaks for you. How I wish I could turn back time to be there for you when you were suffering.”

  “You were. You just didn’t know the why.”

  Shaking her head, she said, “I wish your father was alive, so I could give him a good talking-to for keeping it from me.”

  I laughed. “Knowing him, it probably wouldn’t have done any good.”

  “It would have made me feel better.” She wiped her eyes. “He should have known keeping secrets never does any good. Maybe things could have been different if he had only been honest.” She glanced up at me. “Maybe you’ll learn from his mistakes.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “With Annabel.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “I’m not asking you to. I’m just telling you that keeping the truth from me hurt me far worse in the long run.” She then opened her arms. “Now come let your mother hug you and try to make it better.”

  Although I was a grown man, I allowed my mother to comfort me like the scared eleven-year-old boy wished he had been comforted.

  That had been a month ago, and while I wished I could say that her talk had made me see the light, I once again was too stubborn. I retreated back into drinking, although I did manage to make it to church meetings with the club and returned to my job at the pawnshop. Of course, I wasn’t sober for any of it, but at least I was physically present.

  The next afternoon found me walking home from the pawnshop. The December chill had me reaching inside my cut for my flask. After sucking back some liquid warmth, I put the flask back. Just as I started up the stairs, I remembered I needed to feed Poe. It had been two months since he had been released into the wild. Even though he was doing fine on his own, I still gave him his favorite treat of dried corn. It helped to bring him back around. Even though he was a constant reminder of Annabel, I still wanted to see him.

  As I lurched around the side of the house, I heard Willow talking in a singsong voice to Poe. She giggled at the loud way he crunched on the corn she was feeding him.

  “Whatcha doin’, rug rat?” I asked.

  After glancing at me over her shoulder, she gave me a disapproving look. It had a greater effect than she could have ever imagined. I had never felt so cut down to size by anyone, not even after Mama Beth’s talk. “Feeding Poe,” she finally replied.

  “That’s nice of you, but I’m the one who does that.”

  “You don’t do much of anything but drink lately,” she murmured softly.

  Fuck me. She might as well have knifed me in the chest. I didn’t know what to say to her. Finally, I settled on, “I’m sorry, rug rat.”

  After tossing the rest of Poe’s corn to the ground, she turned to face me. “My first mommy used to tell me she was sorry. But then she would go right back to drinking.” She stomped her pink-sneakered foot dramatically, and then swept her hands to her hips. “I don’t want you to be like her, Uncle Rev. I don’t want you to hurt people like she did. . . I don’t want you to hurt me.”

  While I had expected her to be the one crying, I was the one whose eyes became moist. Christ, where had I gone so wrong? I had once been a hero in Willow’s eyes. Now she was disgusted and disappointed by me. She was just another woman whom I had loved and had alienated myself from.

  “Do you want to know why Poe comes back for the corn?”

  Swiping my eyes with the back of my hands, I muttered, “Because he’s a spoiled brat.”

  W
illow shook her head. “He comes back because he knows we want to take care of him. He could survive out there with his deer friends, and maybe he would be better off, but he still wants to see us. We show him we still love him by leaving him the corn.”

  I blinked at her. I wasn’t sure, but I suspected that she was trying to make some strange correlation between Annabel and Poe. She didn’t give me a knowing look like Mama Beth might, or Alexandra. She just appeared to be talking from her heart.

  And it was time for me to start talking from mine.

  SEVENTEEN

  ANNABEL

  Four months, three days, and nineteen hours. That’s how long it had been since I had seen or even spoken to Rev Malloy. While he had tried to reach me by phone, I had refused his calls. He had wounded me too deeply at a time when I was at my most vulnerable. After what I had been through with Mendoza, I couldn’t have imagined ever going through something worse. But I was wrong. Having the man you care deeply for question your feelings for him and allude to your being crazy was just as bad. Maybe it was even worse because of the additional element of being kicked when you were already down.

  The rational part of me understood why Rev had done what he did. Deep down, I had questioned the root of my feelings for him. Did I want to be with him because of who he truly was or because he was my savior? Was he just the safe choice after what I had been through? Was it some weird reversal of Stockholm syndrome? Of course, Rev could never be compared to a monster like Mendoza. He might’ve been a tough biker who had made some choices I might not understand, but I knew that at his core he had a heart of gold.

  But regardless of the time, distance, personal reflection, and therapy I allowed myself, the answer remained the same. While it defied all reason and made no sense, I had fallen in love with Nathaniel “Reverend” Malloy.

  “Annabel? Are you up here?” My mother’s voice broke through my clouded thoughts.

  “Yes. I am.”