Page 213 of Broken Bonds
Mom lovingly strokes him. “Maybe now I can get a horse.”
“I was thinking about that day,” I admit. “When you took me to the carnival.”
She looks shocked. “You remember that? You were so little.”
“Of course I remember it, Mom. It was one of the best days of my life. Until Dad got home. You lied to protect me, didn’t you?”
She blinks back tears. “I should’ve stripped outside and dunked myself in the pool, too.”
“Why did he react like that?”
Her hand stills on the gelding’s velvety nose. “Because he made me give up my horse when he took me,” she softly says. “He knew how much I loved riding, and how much I loved Ferris. My horse,” she adds. “I didn’t compete but I loved jumping. The stable where I boarded him had a lot of acreage. I could ride for hours, natural jumps, and had so much fun.”
“And he couldn’t stand you having something you loved, especially that took your attention.”
She nods. “He threatened to rip out Ferris’ throat if I didn’t stop.”
“Fuuuuuck. Is that why we couldn’t have pets?”
“Of course. His excuse was that they were dirty and smelly. The truth, I realized, was he didn’t want something that could bring us joy, or that we’d pay more attention to than him.”
“I’m sorry, Mom.”
I’m not expecting the anger in her tone. “Don’t you dare apologize.” She turns to me. “You are the best thing that ever happened to me. If it wasn’t for you, I would have been tempted to kill myself. I knew even when you arrived that your brothers were already lost to him. I had absolutely no power to save them unless I killed your father. And then I’d lose them to the state.”
She cups my face. “You are beautiful. You’re perfect. And having you and seeing the wonderful person you developed into, bucking your father at every turn, gave me hope that maybe one day we could escape him.”
She pulls me in for a hug. Just like that, I’m in fifth grade and she’s hugging me for my perfect report card, telling me how proud of me she is.
My father never acknowledged my achievements. Probably because I smoked my brothers at every turn.
“What happened when I left?” I ask when we end the hug. “How crazy did he go?”
“I’m glad you called Lana. When he got home late that night and you weren’t there, he asked me where you were, and I said camping, and told him what you said about planning the wedding. He immediately called Lana, and when she told him the same thing, he looked up the car’s location, saw it was at the nature preserve, and that calmed him down. Then he got busy with campaign bullshit, and it wasn’t until the third day he started asking questions again.
“I drove out to the preserve, found your car, and I walked along your scent trail for a little way, then turned and walked more into the depths of the park. Returned to the car and called him and said I found you, and you asked for another couple of days.”
I’m…shocked. “Really?”
She smiles. “Really. Because I might have also lied and told him you agreed to go back to college to get a law degree, but you wanted it to be the same place Lana went once she decided where, and you just wanted an extra couple of days to make peace with it.”
“And he bought it?”
“Of course he did. Especially when I showed him the college brochures.”
“Um, what college brochures?”
“The ones I’d ordered once you got back. I don’t know why I did, but I thought maybe I could talk him into letting you go to school somewhere away from Atlanta, giving you space and buying you more time.”
I throw my arms around her again. “Thank you, Mom.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you better, honey. I will always hate myself for that.” She sighs. “I was kind of hoping you would do that, then I could go out there and be with you on the pretext of keeping an eye on you while we tried to figure out how to escape him. And Lana, too.”
“Is she stuck marrying someone else now?”
She tucks a strand of my hair behind my ear. It’s really shaggy now, and two-toned from where I’d bleached it. But now that I’m pregnant, I didn’t want to risk dyeing it again. “When it became obvious you had run, she disappeared.”
Horror fills me. “Disappeared?”
