Page 157 of Property of Stone
Holy shit, she did.
Chapter Thirty-Three
“Gonna say somethin’?”
“I’m processing it,” she murmured.
Stone closed his eyes and shook his head. “Not a lot of processin’ required. Just gotta answer yes or no.”
“It wasn’t a question but a statement.”
He released a little growl. “Woman, want you to stay and be my ol’ lady. But what I ain’t gonna do is fuckin’ beg. Want you to want it.”
“I mean, can I get a minute to think about it? This would be a major change to my life.”
His dark eyes flicked to the house before landing back on her. “Before you decide, need you to know somethin’ else. Somethin’ I don’t wanna talk about in fronta the kids.”
With him, it could be anything. But with his grim expression, whatever it was couldn’t be good. She forced herself to swallow. “Okay.”
“Told you about my brother, but there’s other shit you need to know before you decide to become my ol’ lady.”
Why did she feel the need to brace herself?
He pulled a cigarette from inside his cut, plugged it between his lips, then dug around again until he pulled out a lighter. After lighting it, he blew the smoke up and away from them.
She hated that he smoked but that was minor compared to everything else the man did.
“Killed my own father.”
With fingers pressed to her lips, she whispered, “What?”Holy shit.She didn’t know what to expect but it certainly hadn’t been that.
He frowned. “Ain’t repeatin’ it.”
A rock dropped into her gut. “So then, why even bring it up?” She could’ve easily gone her whole life without knowing that.
“Want you to be one fuckin’ hundred percent sure ‘bout bein’ my ol’ lady. Don’t want you sayin’ yes, then realize you made a mistake down the fuckin’ road and can no longer stand to even look at me.”
Someone who murdered others without any remorse certainly didn’t make the perfect significant other. Despite that, she was willing to hear him out. It wasn’t like he was going out killing people because he was a psychopath and enjoyed it. He had a good reason. Or at least a reason he thought was good.
Whether others would see it that way was a different story.
She agreed that Vic reaped what he’d sown after taking Stone’s daughter. She would’ve wanted to kill Vic herself if he had done the same thing with Wren.
But unlike Stone, could she go through with it?
How was any of this real life?
“Are you just going to drop that bomb and not explain?”
“Gonna tell you this once and once only. Fucker hadbeen drinkin’ all night, his favorite hobby. Problem was, he was a nasty fuckin’ drunk. Got pissed easily and even over shit that never happened. Broke my arm twice. Fucked up my older brother too many times to fuckin’ count. My mother constantly lived in fear. For us and for herself. But she was trapped. She couldn’t stay. She also couldn’t leave. Fuckin’ trapped,” he repeated, his jaw working. “He told her if she left him, he’d track her down, kill my brother and me as punishment while makin’ her watch. So, she stayed and took the brunt of his anger. To protect her own sons, she continued to be his punchin’ bag.”
After taking another long drag on his cigarette, Stone blew the smoke away from Taryn and continued. “Grew up thinkin’ that kinda shit was normal. All fathers, husbands, were like that. A man was supposed to be the head of the household. Rule the roost. As I got older, I realized my mother had no friends, wasn’t allowed to communicate with her family. He kept her isolated and under his fuckin’ thumb.” He took another pull on his cigarette. His head jerked to the right before saying, “Got home after school one day to find her unconscious, naked from the waist down, blood smeared on her inner thighs, face unrecognizable. He done a fuckin’ number on her. Worst I ever saw.”
She struggled to breathe as the memory of what Vic had done flooded her. It was bad enough for her to be hospitalized, and he was saying what happened to his mother was worse than that.
His Adam’s apple rose, stuck there for a second, then dropped like a rock. “Found the fucker passed out in his recliner with a vodka bottle in one hand and a baseball game on the tube.” He paused to take another pull on his cigarette, but once he exhaled a long stream of smoke, he simply stopped talking.
She waited anxiously to hear the rest. When it didn’t come, she prodded, “And?” That couldn’t be it.
