Page 60 of Broken By Silence
“I thought it was about me,” I go on, voice low. “That you were punishing me. I’d call you names, shove you around, do everything I could to get a rise out of you. But when your eyes went dead? When you went silent? That cut deeper than any punch he gave me. I hated you for it. Because even when I hurt you, you used to fight back. And when you didn’t… I thought I was nothing to you.”
The tires hum against the road. Her face stays forward, unreadable.
“But I get it now,” I whisper. “It wasn’t about me. It was about surviving. About what he did. What Elijah’s dad did. And I hated you anyway, because I was too fucking selfish to see past myself.”
Her grip on the wheel trembles just slightly. She doesn’t look at me, but her throat works like she’s swallowing words she’ll never let me hear.
I lean back, pressing my head against the seat. “I don’t hate you anymore, Lottie. I don’t think I could if I tried.”
The GPS pings softly,telling her to turn. She follows it without question, though I can feel her curiosity prickling under the surface.
Ten minutes later, the lights of the town flicker ahead. She slows as the map directs her down a narrow street, until finally the car rolls to a stop outside a squat brick building. The sign above it glows in bold letters.
Voodoo Tattoo
She stares. Then turns on me, eyes sharp. “You dragged me all the way out here for this?”
I don’t flinch. “Yeah.”
“Roman—”
“I need it,” I cut in. My chest tightens, but I force the words out. “I need something permanent. Something I can’t drink away, or fight away, or pretend never happened. Something that reminds me, every single day, of what I’ve done and what I owe.”
Her eyes widen slightly, then narrow. “And you think a tattoo’s going to fix that?”
“No.” My voice cracks. “But I think it’s the only way for me to show you that I’m not him…”
The silence between us is heavier now, but it’s different than before. Not just fear. Not just hate. Something else, sharp and fragile, waiting to snap.
I don’t move. I let her sit with it. Let her decide whether she’ll walk in there with me or leave me to do it alone.
Either way, I know this much… I’ll walk out with ink under my skin and a reminder carved into me that I’m no longer Lorenzo’s son.
Chapter 22
Lottie
Istare at the glowing sign like it’s mocking me. A fucking tattoo studio. Out of all the places Roman could have dragged me, he picks this.
“You’re serious?” I ask, half a laugh, half shock.
“Dead serious,” he says. His voice is steady, but his eyes are restless, darting around like shadows cling to him and won’t let go.
I should turn around. I should get back in the car and tell him to find another driver, tell him to deal with his own ghosts.
But I don’t.
My feet move anyway, carrying me after him.
Maybe it’s because I don’t trust him not to do something stupid if I leave him alone. Or maybe it’s because part of me wants to see what the hell this is about.
The studio smellslike disinfectant and ink, the kind of sterile-clean that makes the hairs on my arms rise. The buzz of a tattoo gun cuts through the air from behind a curtain where someone else is already under the needle.
Roman doesn’t hesitate. He strides up to the counter, pulls a folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket, and lays it down flat.
The artist—a tall guy with sleeves crawling up both arms—glances from Roman to me, then back down to the paper.
I step closer, curiosity gnawing at me even though I don’t want it to.
