Page 102 of Shattered Souls
Every ounce of pent-up aggression pours out of Riley and hits her mother square in the face. Not that Lydia so much as flinches. If anything, a spark of malice ignites in her muddy brown eyes, and she lifts her chin in a show of defiance. Of silence.
Seeing it, Riley sneers. “Ihateyou,” she spits in her mother’s face. “What the fuck did I ever do to you?” Smacking a hand over her heart, her voice cracks with fury and despair. “I’m your daughter.All I wanted was for you to love me.”
Unmoved by Riley’s words, Lydia’s lip curls in disgust. “You wanted to suck me dry!Mommythis.Mommythat. Always needing something. Even when I ensured you had everything you could ever want, it wasn’t enough. You just had to keep taking. Taking what wasn’t yours.”
“Oh my god.” Riley paces away before marching forward, pointing a finger into Lydia’s chest. “For the last fucking time,” she snarls, “I did nottakeyour husband. Your sick slimeball of a husbandrapedme, but of course, you’re too self-involved to see it that way.” It’s Riley’s turn to curl her lip as she glares down at her mother in disgust. “You werenevera mother.”
In a move so shocking I don’t see it coming, Riley’s hand whips out and slaps her mother across the face. Lydia’s head whips to the side, a bright red palm print crawling across her cheek.
“Youmight not be a mother, but I am,” she hisses. Bending down, she gets right in Lydia’s face. Fisting her hair, Lydia screeches and writhes in the chair. Logan steps up, keeping her in place as Riley snarls in her face, spittle hitting the woman’s cheek. “A mother goes to the ends of the earth for their child. They’ll doanythingfor them. They never give up. Theyneverstop looking.” A slow and truly malicious grin spreads across Riley’s face. “I found her.” Lydia goes stock still, eyes wide as she stops fighting Logan’s hold, and stares wide-eyed at herdaughter. “Yeah,” Riley smirks. “Bet you didn’t expect that. You lose, Lydia.”
“No,” the bitch whimpers.
“It’s over. You’re done. I’m going to walk out of here, and my daughter and I will be living our best lives. We’ll never speak your name again. You’re dead to us.”
I’m not sure if Riley realizes her mother willliterallybe dead by the end of this night, but I don’t think she’s too bothered either way. Like she said, once she leaves this room, it will be like her mom no longer exists. That’s as much permission as I need to finish the job.
Sensing that she’s done, I step forward. Aware of the sudden threat, Lydia’s eyes snap to me, her body trembling. Flexing my muscles, I crack my knuckles. As eachcrackwhips through the air, she flinches, her trembling growing stronger until the entire chair rattles. I take great pleasure in her terror. While I’m usually anti-violence against women, and I’m sure Grayson and Logan would agree, for this bitch, I’m more than willing to set that aside. Given that I haven’t been to The Depot for an actual fight in weeks, and I’m a pent-up ball of aggression ready to unleash.
Lucky for Lydia, she’s going to face the full ferocity of my wrath.
She begins to thrash furiously in the chair, and Logan’s firm grip on her is the only thing keeping her from flopping onto the floor. “No! Please!” She screams bloody murder, the sound a waste of energy since it does nothing but vibrate around the room before swirling meaninglessly down the drain. “I-I’ll talk. I-I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”
My chuckle is sharp and deadly. “Lydia, Lydia,” I tut. “Don’t you see by now that you have nothing of use to us?”
“I-it wasn’t just me.” She practically shrieks the words, pressing herself so deep into the chair she’s practically rubbing up on Logan.
“Oh, you mean your little fuck buddy, David?” Even her lips drain of color. “Don’t worry, we already had a chat with him. He was very informative. Told us all about how the two of you concocted this plan to sell Aurora to make a quick buck and get back at your daughter and husband.”
“I-I can tell you about the buyer.”
I shake my head. “No, you can’t. You don’t know shit about the buyer. Your buddy filled us in on that, too. How, the night you were supposed to hand Aurora over to me, you abandoned her in a fucking playpark while she wassleeping.”
Riley stiffens. She wasn’t aware of any of this. When I’d told her David had given us all the sordid details, she said she’d prefer not to know—all that mattered was that Aurora was safe and home.
I smirk down at the snot-nosed bitch. Crouching in front of her, I reach up to push a strand of bleach-blonde hair out of her face. “There’s something David didn’t tell you, though. Something I’m going to take great pleasure in informing you before we—” I point to Grayson and Logan—“take our pound of flesh.”
She looks pathetic. Nothing like the pretentious bitch who walked into that speakeasy all those months ago and tried to get me to sleep with her in exchange for selling her granddaughter.
“Shit.” Grayson curses, and I whip toward him. His face has lost its color, and when he glances at me, alarm has darkened his already dark irises. He twists his phone toward me, showing me the numerous missed calls from the nursing home.Shit.
He marches out of the room to call them back, but after sharing a look with the others, we know we need to leave now.
None of us bother to spare Lydia a glance—she’s not worth our time—as we follow Grayson out of the room. “What’s wrong?” Logan demands.
“It’s Gran,” Grayson chokes. “She’s taken a turn. The home says I need to get therenow.”
“Then let’s go.” I’m already messaging Dax to let him know we’ll be back and not to take out the trash just yet. I wasn’t speaking metaphorically when I told Lydia I wanted her pound of flesh. I’m going to take it—all of it. For Riley. For Aurora. For our family.
28
RILEY
We arrive at Sunnyside Nursing Home in record time. “Go,” Logan urges as he pulls up to the curb. “I’ll stay with Aurora.”
I only hesitate for a second, but I trust him with her—I trust all of them with her. When he gives me his reassured, confident smile, I chase after Grayson. Rushing through the sterile hallways, the fluorescent lights flicker overhead as if sensing our urgency. The scent of antiseptic and faintly wilted flowers fills the air, clashing with the adrenaline coursing through my veins from tonight’s activities. I pick up my pace, practically jogging to meet the guys’ long strides as we hurry toward Gran’s room.
Grayson’s face is a mask of devastation, his eyes hollow and haunted. He hasn’t spoken a word since we jumped in the car, and I can tell he’s barely holding it together. We all can. The weight of his grief is visible in the set of his jaw and the tightness of his shoulders. It shatters my heart to see him like this.
