Page 44 of Property of Baffle
“I get it,” I cut him off to say.My sister smirked at me, knowing I was talking about Nell.
My dad tipped his head toward my left hand and smiled.“I see that.Would love to know more about your woman and maybe get to meet her one day, if you’re willing once we’re done here.”
I didn’t think that would happen, but I wanted him to finish telling us the history that led to one parent dead, one in prison, and one a shitty fucking human still breathing free air who shouldn’t be.
“Anyway, thanks to Lila being the one in my wife’s ear, things were worse the next time I came home.Started begging Crutch to send me off because I couldn’t handle being around the woman Stace was becoming.She blamed me for the loss of the baby, my dad, and all kinds of other nonsense.Then she started blaming me for sending a woman who I used to fuck to come into her home to care for her.That was when I put a stop to Lila going there.Only Crutch knew why and I don’t think he ever filled Tilly in on the details.He also wouldn’t let her help care for you.You started shadowing him and hanging out more with Travis back then.”
I caught Angel’s questioning look and explained.“Travis is Bigfoot, the club president.”
“Oh, okay.That makes sense.”
Dad nodded and carried on.“During one of the runs I went on, I met Gianna Whitmore.She was this up-tight, rich bitch.”He glanced at Angel and gave her an apologetic look.“Sorry, honey, but it’s true.”
“I have no love for my mother, so I don’t really care what you say about her.”
That took my father aback.“What the hell happened since I’ve been in here?She was always a good mom and took really good care of you.”
“I doubt that.She just pretended when you were around to see it.”
“Son of a bitch,” Sticky grunted.“We’ll come back to that.”He shook off whatever else he wanted to say about his daughter’s claims and got back to where he left off.“I slept with her.Fucking hated myself for it.It felt so fucking wrong.She wasn’t my woman, my love.At that point, Stace didn’t feel like it either, though.I was so fucking lost.I knew what I did was wrong.Knew it would change everything, but then I kept thinking everything is already changed.I hadn’t been able to touch my wife in more than a year.She acted like she hated me every time I came home.The more I went out on runs, the more I met up with Gianna.The less I was home, the better your mom started to get.”
None of us said anything for a while and finally Dad spoke again.
“The guilt over what I was doing to cope never left.I felt like a piece of shit.I was a fucking failure to myself, my family, and most especially my wife.I was a piece of shit for stepping out on your mom when she was having a hard time.Without that bitch, Lila, in her ear all the time, Stace finally started to come to terms with the loss of the baby, any future babies, and my dad, too.Eventually, she started to miss me and wanted me to come home again.I was still coming home, but I was gone sometimes one to two weeks out of each month, sometimes just a couple weekends.I was in Colorado for some of that but the rest I was usually at the clubhouse trying to give Stace the time she needed to heal.It really depended on what the club needed at the time and what I needed.As fucked as it was, as guilty as I felt about it, Gianna made me feel needed when the love of my life had washed her hands of me.
“The guilt was part of my downward spiral, though.I loved feeling needed and wanted by someone again, but that someone wasn’t my wife.I started to drink to numb those feelings and when that didn’t work, I moved on to harder stuff.It was the only way to cope with what I was doing.And then, things got better at home with Stace and I thought we might just make it.I’ll quit everything.We’ll be a real fucking family again.”He stopped there and didn’t seem to want to say more.I didn’t pick up on why at first, but my sister did.
“That’s when you found out my mom was pregnant with me.”
He nodded.“I hadn’t been around in a few months.She finally got word to one of my club brothers in Colorado.He called and had me come back.By the time I listened, Gianna told me that she was pregnant with a little girl and I didn’t know how to handle that.I’d lost my baby girl with the love my of life and here was my chance at another one, but it was with the wrong woman.I knew.In that moment, I knew that I could have one or the other but not both.I could have my wife back and healthy or I could leave my old family behind and have my daughter.There was no way Stace would have accepted another woman’s child.An affair baby.No fucking way, especially after she lost her own daughter.But I couldn’t leave any of you.I was caught in the middle of the two women who were tugging me in different directions.Gianna wouldn’t have had any hold on me except that she used my daughter to get her way.”Something clicked for him then and his eyes met Angel’s.“I guess I see what you mean.If she couldn’t get anything from me after I went away, she didn’t have a reason to… Fuck, baby girl, I’m so sorry.I fucked it all up.Should have taken you home with me, raised you there on my own in the same town with my wife and boy.Could have at least still had both of my kids with me even if my wife would never forgive what I’d done.”
He stopped talking then and shook his head.“I should have listened to my gut,” he finally said.
“You really should have because my mother played you.She played you so hard you ended up killing the woman you claimed to love.”
Well, I guess little sis didn’t feel like cutting the old man any slack.
“What do you mean?”
Angel explained how her mother had never been to Violence, New Mexico.She’d never seen Stace with another man or at all.She certainly hadn’t seen her intimate with another club brother.
“No, she had proof,” Dad said.
“What proof?”I asked.
“She had pictures of your mother with a man.”
“Having sex?”I asked.
“Hugging,” he huffed.“Fucking hugging.It could have been any of my brothers just supporting her.Fuck, I was so damn lost in the drug haze because I was living two fucking lives and doing it poorly at that point.”
Dad turned his attention back to me.“That day, I confronted her and all I remember was that she wouldn’t admit to an affair.”
“Funny that you were holding her at gunpoint over an affair when you had a whole family with another woman,” I spat.
“Yeah, not denying that.I had no fucking right to flip the script on her.In another situation, on any other day, I would have just come clean and begged her to do the same so we could start over.When I left Colorado, Gianna sent me off with a parting gift.The drugs I took.I thought they were her Xanax.Figured they would calm me down before I got back home but that wasn’t what she gave me.The bitch gave me Klonopin.That shit fucks me up, especially when I drink with it.I was out of my fucking mind.I don’t think I even registered that I had the gun in my hand until it went off and then…” His head sunk low along with his shoulders even as they began to shake.“I got sick.Maybe it was because on some level, I knew what I’d just done, even if I wasn’t able to effectively process it at the time.That was the last thing I remembered until I woke up to you screaming at me and the cops kicking in the door.”
“Well, Mom never had an affair.She wanted to have a vow renewal ceremony with you.I remember her telling me that she had made it really hard for you to love her for a while.I didn’t understand what she meant then, but I do now, so thanks for that.”
