Page 87 of Darkness of Mine

My blood runs cold. I thought I’d want to hurt him if it was true, hit him like he hit her, but I don’t want to touch this broken, pitiful man. I was scared of him for so many years but he’s not a monster. He’s nothing.

Eventually, he wipes at his cheeks and leans forward, bracing his elbows on his spread knees. “The drinking didn’t start after your mother was taken.”

“Oh.” His admission is an arrowhead buried in my stomach. I’m not sure I want to know.

Freya twines our fingers together and I stay quiet and listen.

“I lost my job about two months before. That’s when I started drinking.” My dad’s eyes cut to mine, an iron will strong in their clarity. “I never laid a hand on your mother, Eli. I promise. But one night…” He grimaces, then breathes in, pulling himself together. “One night, she was telling me I needed to stop drinking, and I got angry. I threw a bottle, not at her, just at the wall.” He closes his eyes. “But it smashed, and the glass cut her cheek.”

My brow knits together. “I don’t remember that.” I was fourteen, I would have noticed a cut on her face.

My father opens his eyes and now they’re clouded like I’m used to seeing but this time with tears not booze. “You never saw. The next day she was taken.”

Fuck.

My dad stares at the floorboards, his hands linked behind his head. “You’re telling me that it was my fault.”

“You didn’t kill her,” Freya says.

“But I’m the reason he chose her. That he hurt her.”

I don’t say anything. I can’t. He didn’t kill my mother. He didn’t abuse her. But he’s not wrong and part of me hates him for it.

Freya sits forward. “If you let this destroy you, if you start drinking again, you’ll be hurting your son. And I think you’ve done enough of that, don’t you?”

He drags his head up and shifts his tortured gaze from Freya to me. “I got a lot to apologize for.”

I stay quiet.

“Eli—”

“Not now. Not yet.” I’m not ready to hear him out. I’m not sure I’ll ever be.

My heart is twisted and mangled from what I’ve learned but the pit in my stomach is gone. The worry that’s been haunting the corners of my mind has disappeared. He hadn’t been abusing my mother behind closed doors. My memories of her, smiling and laughing, spinning around and leaving notes for me to find, can rest untarnished.

Maybe that’s enough.

My father leaves after that but I have a feeling it won’t be too long before I see him again. Alcoholism is a disease, and a sober Eddison March is the closest I’ve ever come to seeing the father my dad was before we lost my mom. I wouldn’t mind seeing him again.

I’m still lost in my thoughts when Freya’s phone pings.

“It’s Carmen,” she says. “She’s got Zach’s bank details.”

37

JUDE

The bell above the shop door rings as I hold it open for Freya. My other arm is still in a sling and it’s bugging the hell out of me. My hand itches to flip the stones in my pocket. It’s hard to move them from one pocket to the other with only one good arm and I keep forgetting things I’d usually use the stones to remember.

Freya trails her fingers across my abs as she passes and my annoyance scatters. She’s slept in my bed practically every night since I came back from the hospital. I may be forgetful but the memory of her telling me she loves me, that she’s loved me since the day I saw her scars, is permanently etched into my mind. She’s made a habit of saying those three words to me of late and each and every time lives rent free in my head.

She looks back and smiles up at me and I wonder if she knows that I’m thinking of my mouth buried between her legs while she screams ‘I love you’ over and over. Maybe I can do that later, after our plans for this evening. Freya doesn’t know we have plans yet but I’ve been plotting this night for weeks now.

The glint in her eye has me wanting to play but her smile is tired. This is the fourth shop we’ve visited, all of them scatteredaround the county. We didn’t shut Zach’s access down because we want to use his bank card to draw him out. The next time he spends any money on it we’ll get alerted but until then we’ve been tracking down his past purchases to try and find a lead on his location.

He's been smart so far, choosing stores seemingly at random and far from each other. We’ve been to a paint shop, a grocery store, a hardware store and now a place that sells furniture and homeware.

I follow Freya past a set of wicker chairs and shelves filled with cushions. River, Eli, and Oz join us as we head to the counter at the end of the large store.