Page 39 of Unresolved

Gemma had been right.If something happened to me she had no one to release her from the handcuffs I’d put on her.I slowed as self-loathing filled me.She had good reason to worry.I’d let my emotions rule my head.

Not that it excused her in any way, shape or form.She’d betrayed me so deeply I wondered if I’d ever heal.

My breath caught.Had she even named our son?

Hadshehealed from the ordeal of losing her newborn?

I couldn’t imagine the pain she’d gone through.I only hoped she hadn’t been alone.I’d met her mother and she’d seemed normal, an everyday, attractive older woman struggling with everyday issues.

So different to the women in my mafia family who never had to worry about finances or paying bills, who never had commonplace struggles.Their problems centered more on the possibility of losing their husbands or other family members to mobster enemies.

Anger resurfaced, then flooded over.Gemma had still deceived me, had intended raising our son alone, without my input or knowledge of his existence.It was the lowest of low act.That it had been Gemma, the sweetest woman I’d known, who’d done the dirty on me hit me harder than I’d believed possible.

I kept riding, but stuck to the speed limit.I wasn’t intent on a destination, not until I saw the lookout sign ahead, I pulled in and rode over a rough dirt track then braked in front of a safety fence, which kept visitors away from the edge of a drop-off that showcased red maples, white oak, black birch and dogwood trees.

I killed the Harley’s engine, flicked down its jiffy stand to keep it upright, then stretched my back as I stood and checked out the beautiful vista spread out before me.

I bet Gemma would love to be here to paint this magical landscape.

I snorted raggedly, the scent of pine and something vaguely lemon then filling my nose.I pushed a hand through my wind-whipped hair, then clasped the safety fence in front of me and closed my eyes.

Was it Karma that I’d lost a son even before I’d decided I didn’t really want children?I’d done a lot of bad things in my life, I’d had to just to survive in the world I’d grown up in.

My mind drifted to the past, to a time my father had still been alive, still been don.Still been an asshole of the highest order.A man who hadn’t deserved a son, let alone four of them along with a daughter.

I walked barefooted out of the wing of the house I shared with my mom, into the dark shadows of the corridor that would take me to the stairs of the ground floor.My fingers ached from clenching them into the fists I’d made after hearing my mother sobbing yet again in her bedroom across the hallway from mine.

Ihatedmy dad.He treated mom like shit, worse than shit.I hated even more that she was weak, too weak to stand up to him.Little wonder she used coke like it was her dearest friend.

Just because I was thirteen, it didn’t mean I was unaware when it came to drugs...and sex for that matter.

I’d snuck around enough parties to witness the drug use and orgies that happened afterward.I’d even partaken in some coke that had been lying around on a small mirror on a table.I’d loved the rush and decided if sex was half as good I wouldn’t say no to that either.

I only wished my brothers didn’t despise me so much because our dad had moved my mom into the house.That he’d done it just weeks after their mother had been sent away probably made them think my mom had replaced theirs.I huffed out a breath.It couldn’t have been farther from the truth.My mother would never replace my beautiful and caring stepmother.

If my brothers hated me for the presence of her in the house, I’d burned with envy wishing their mother was mine.Instead I had a coke-addicted, weak-minded mom who didn’t have a maternal cell in her body, and I shared a father whose power-crazed outlook saw him walk over anyone weaker, which was just about every one he knew.

Stepping past the corridor’s weakly-lit wall lamps that pushed back the worst of the shadows, I took the stairs that would take me to the ground floor and the kitchen of the house...just as familiar footsteps echoed from the steps below.

I heard them too late to avoid a confrontation, and my dad slowed as he saw me coming down.Even in the shadows I noticed his face tighten and his lips compress, his eyes flashing.“What are you doing up at this time of night, boy?”

I held his stare, though I secretly quivered in his presence.“I’m thirsty.”

“You’re thirsty?”He held out a decanter half-filled with amber-colored alcohol, most likely bourbon.“Then drink this.”

I gaped.“I want water.”

His eyes narrowed.“Are you a boy or a man?”

I pushed down anxiety.If I didn’t take his offering he’d take it out on me in some other, worse way.It was better I did what he asked now so I didn’t suffer later.

I took the crystal decanter without answering.Taking out its stopper, I lifted the decanter to my lips and chugged down the liquid that burned all the way from my throat to my stomach.

I drank every last drop before I handed the decanter back to him.I was already woozy when he took it back from me, one of his eyebrows cocked in amused satisfaction.“It looks like you’re a man, after all.Good thing you take after me and not your mother.”

My body was buzzing, the world tilting and twirling.Shit.If I wasn’t careful I’d fall down the stairs and break my neck.

“Speaking of whom,” my father continued, seemingly unaware of my growing intoxication as he drew me with him back up the stairs.“I’m going to have to do something about her.Put her in a treatment program or something.I can’t have her snorting half my coke supply while she pretends you need her.She’s becoming a liability.”

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