Page 76 of The Hookup
“How old were you?”
“Fifteen.”
“And your brother and sister?”
“Travis is a few years older, and Amanda must have been eleven. I don’t think she knew what was going on.”
“And your mom?”
“She still lived there.”
“How old was the mistress?”
“Young.Veryyoung. Straight out of college almost.”
Kay recoiled in disgust. The age gap was as disgusting as the cruelty inflicted on Luke’s mother by his father. She stared at him, clutching his hand harder, watching his face twist and harden. ““But didn’t your mom object, or give him an ultimatum?”
“What could she say? She had no voice in that house. He was the big boss. The big man. The fucking oil billionaire. He was a tyrant, and he was a pig to her. It was obvious what was going on. His mistress had no shame.”
“Andnobodysaid anything?”
“Nobodycouldsay anything. He was the patriarch and we couldn’t question what he did.”
“Why didn’t your mom leave?”
“Because she believed he would change. Who knows? I’ll never know why she didn’t. She couldn’t say a thing. She still loved the bastard.”
“That must have been so awful for your mom.”
“It killed her.” He pulled his hand away and clasped his hands together.
Her insides filled with dread. “What do you mean?”
“She ended her life.”
Kay clasped a hand to her mouth. “What?”
He turned and stared at her with darkened eyes; eyes which often undressed her just by looking, without him even touching her. Now he looked lost, and unreachable, and she couldn't help but put her arm around his big, broad shoulders.
“Oh, Luke,” she cried, leaning into his body. He looked so defeated, and so broken. “How…how …” She couldn’t bring herself to ask.
“She lay down on their bed—the bed she had once shared with my father—and slit her wrists.”
“What?” She gasped, pulling away, horrified. “She killed herself?”
He stared at the floor, and gave the slightest nod. “I was the one who found her.”
The room spun around her as the shock of his confession hit. She couldn't imagine it, a teenage boy walking in on that. And now, as he opened up to her in a way he had never before, she felt suddenly protective over him, as if she couldn't bear for him to be hurt again in the re-telling of something that clearly still haunted him. A person never recovered from something like that.
Never.
He was living proof of that.
She had gained an insight into his pain, and an understanding she simply had never had before.
No wonder he hated his father so much. No wonder his relationship with Travis seemed so fractured. An event like this must have smashed through the entire family like a deadly hurricane, uprooting all their young lives and their world, and changing it forever.
“Take off your dress,” he ordered, issuing the command roughly. She had more questions, and needed more answers. She wanted him to talk it out, to let it all go because she could see he’d had it locked up inside him. But that could come later. Sex was his go-to, and if it helped him through his dark moments, who was she to withhold it?
