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“You could be so much happier if you came back to the family,” she counters, stomping after me to the glass doors. For a small woman she makes a lot of noise when she wants to. “You don’t know anything about her mother, figlio. Porscha is a nightmare incarnate.”
I stop at the doors, glaring down at her again. “Are you going to tell me something important about Porscha, or is this more bullshit?”
Mama hesitates, looking between me and the outdoors. I know without checking that she’s eyeing Jo. As though my wife can hear through the glass, Mama leans in closer. “Porscha got pregnant in high school.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, Mama.”
She starts to shake her head. “No one knows who the father was. She wouldn’t tell anyone. But she did love this boy, someone she was supposed to stay away from.”
I sigh, shaking my head. More nonsense. Turning to glare out the glass from a moment, I slide my hand into my pocket and tap a few spots on the screen. It was already pre-set, but Mama isn’t aware of that. “Is there a point to this?”
She hisses out a breath through her teeth, and I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Mama so mad. Even when she found out I was involved with a boy and a girl at the same time, her eyes didn’t burn with the levels of hatred that they do right now. “Porscha. She always complained about feeling cheated out of her youth.”
I scoff. “Mama, you never spent time with Porscha. How would you know anything about her? You’re older than her.”
Mama turns up her nose, looking offended that I called her old. “It doesn’t matter. Citrus Grove is a small town. Ayoung girl pregnant during her junior year? She was seventeen! Everyone in town shunned her.”
“Porscha was just a kid,” I say with a shrug.
“Did you ever ask your little wifey about her grandparents?” Mama hisses.
I frown. “Porscha was a loner. Estranged from her family.”
“And she just ended up in Citrus Grove?” Mama prompts.
“I don’t know anything about that.”
She hesitates, looking from me to the window and back again. She has no idea that I’m breaking her trust, but she hasn't given me any reason to be loyal to her. “I don’t know why Porscha came here. She showed up one summer with her brother and her parents, like they were all on a vacation. Then they left. A few months later Porscha returned to the house the family stayed in. She was pregnant. I heard she emancipated herself from her family to come live here alone.”
Jo’s never brought that up before, but it wouldn’t surprise me if her mother simply never told her. Then again, Jo’s Uncle Wayne never complained about any of that either. The few times I’ve had the displeasure of speaking with him he keeps things brief. “And you can prove that?”
Mama shrugs. “I don’t need to prove it. She’s not my problem. She’s yours,yourin-law. Don’t you care what demons hide in your wife’s side of the family?”
I pause, making a show of looking around the house for something. “Do you think she’s the only one?”
“Our demons are a product of the family’s work,” Mama insists, and there’s that oblivious behavior I’m familiar with. She always did turn a blind eye to what my father does, because it affords her the lifestyle she has. “Porscha’s are home grown. The day she got pregnant with thatgirl, her life was over.”
“Well, Mama, it's interesting that it took her sixteen years to start killing people.” But I hear it in my head, the pieces clicking together.Sixteen years later… maybe Porscha’s madness is a product of jealousy. She couldn’t find happiness as a teen, so why should her daughter?
It doesn’t completely make sense though. There were over a dozen victims before Jo. And now a half dozen since. Her hatred can’t be centered solely around her daughter with that many casualties.
I press a finger to my temple, fighting a headache. Jo told me once she remembered Alastair standing over her, that’s what’s in the reports…
“No one understands the madness inside without speaking to the person themselves,” Mama says, crossing her arms once more. “If the FBI did their job and caught Porscha, you could ask her yourself. Mental illness is hereditary, is it not? You should find out what you’re in for with Jo.”
That’s it. I tap the screen on my phone again, and if the app isn’t off fuck it. I step into my mother’s space until there’s nowhere for her to go. She frowns, stepping back as her eyebrows rise. “I shall say it once more,Mama.Enough with the threats to my wife. I made my choice. You can bitch about it when I’m gone, but you have to live with it. There’s no changing that.”
“Better a wife than two lovers,” she says beneath her breath, and I just shake my head with a sigh.
She’s only slightly better than Massimo. My parents are just never going to understand the way I am. Without another word I pivot and hit the front door. It bangs open, and part of me hopes the fucking thing breaks.
“You won’t get the book back from your Papa!” Mama yells, following me outside. Jo stops speaking with Xeno whenshe notices us, and I can see movement in the car. “Unless you apologize-”
I spin fast enough she almost crashes into me. “There’s only one person I will grovel on my knees for forgiveness from. And it’s neither of you.”
She’s cursing again behind me, and Jo’s eyes flash as I meet her gaze. Xeno nudges Jonathan who moves out of the way, and before she can protest I’ve snatched her up off the ground and into my arms.
“Say your word and I’ll stop,” I tell her, breathing against her lips before I kiss her. I want to feel her against me, reminding me every chance she has that, come what may, I’ve made the right choice every time I choose her.