Page 34 of Ebbing Tides (The Lighthouse Duology #2)

Dad's hand reached down to grapple with the blanket at his waist. A groan tore through his lips, and in a frustrated tone, he said, “I think … I think I might have soil—”

“I don't fucking care,” I spit out, swinging my gaze to his as I emphasized every word. “You're going to sit in your fucking shit until you tell me the goddamn truth.”

His pruned lips twisted with a protest, his eyes darkening with rage.

But he was helpless. He couldn't do a damn thing about the control I now held over him; oh, it was satisfying in the cruelest of ways, and for perhaps the very first time in my life, I understood his incessant need to treat me like the lowest scum of the earth.

It was a rush to fight against those who could never ever fight back.

But the only difference was, he deserved it.

I never did.

“She was … a pretty little thing,” he whispered.

Slowly, I turned to face him, only to find his gaze had fallen to stare off toward nothing I could see. Maybe he was looking at her, the woman he had impregnated, the woman who had given birth to me.

I swayed on the spot, and I reached behind me, grabbing for the arms of the chair kept at his bedside. I found it and pulled it closer, allowing my ass to drop into the seat as I brought my hand to lay over my forehead.

“Young,” he muttered, nodding to himself. “Eighteen, maybe nineteen, and so beautiful. She was … oh, she was so beautiful. Too bad you look nothing like her.”

“Who was she?” I managed to ask.

“My secretary,” he answered without hesitation.

“I had just started working at my first law firm.

I was a newlywed, married to a woman who had insisted I marry her.

It was the times, you see. It was our parents …

our religion. A woman couldn't lay with a man if she wasn't wed, and so Margaret demanded we get married.”

She wanted to marry him ? I furrowed my brow at the thought. Is he honestly blaming this all on his dead wife?

“There was never a spark,” he went on. “People talked about that, about love , and I thought it was all bullshit. A fairy tale. And then Lilly walked through the door—”

“Lilly?”

“The most fitting name for a woman who looked so lovely ,” he replied, his voice wistful, and my heart stuttered at the softness in his tone.

Had I ever heard him speak of anyone in that way?

And then, just like that, his face crumpled with disgust. “But something you must understand … something you never seem to understand … is that beautiful women prey upon men. We are weak in their presence, helpless against their beguiling qualities. They hold us by the prick, control us with the sweetness kept between their thighs, and use their womb for blackmail.”

I tipped my head, trying to make sense of what he was saying. “So, wait. What? She …”

“She begged me to fuck her,” he continued, his lips lifting into a smile, as if the memory brought him joy.

“And I did. Oh Lord, I felt guilty for it at first, but …” His eyes fluttered closed as he sighed.

“Fucking Margaret was like sleeping with a cold, dead fish after fucking Lilly. And suddenly, the faithfulness of a man to his wife lost its meaning. Because why should I sacrifice the joy and pleasure of good and glorious sex for the sanctity of marriage?”

“It's called divorce,” I muttered, stuck somewhere between shock and disgust at the story I was hearing.

“Divorce was unheard of in either of our families,” he explained.

“So, I had it all. I came home to Margaret after fucking Lilly. And it was fine—it could have been fine—but then Lilly told me she was pregnant. Pregnant !” His hand lifted, only to drop back down on the blanket, a weak attempt at slapping his leg.

“I demanded she get rid of it, to get an abortion, to do something to destroy it, and she demanded I leave my wife.

When I told her I couldn't do that, she threatened to ruin my life.”

He hung his head, sighing. “We fought. I beat her. I hadn't wanted to—I never liked to beat a woman, you know that—but I was blind with rage and desperation. All I could think about was getting rid of that fucking baby because I knew … I knew … it would ruin everything .”

Oh God . I leaned forward, resting my elbows against my knees as I laid my face in my palms, shaking my head.

“She disappeared after that. I thought she was gone for good. Months— months —went by, and I heard nothing . What a relief , I told myself, and I progressed in my career, progressed in my marriage, and everything felt good, as it should be. Until that bitch came up to me at my place of business and forced me to make a choice.”

I swallowed and asked, “What choice was that?”

“Give her money or take my son.”

“I would've had a better life if—”

He cackled, and I lifted my head at the sound, surprised by the sudden surge of strength. “Oh, Maxwell. She didn't want you . She never wanted you.”

“You don't know that,” I fired back angrily. “She wanted to marry you, she wanted—”

“She wanted control . She wanted whatever I would give her. Marriage, money—”

“But not your child ?” I barked with a laugh. “That doesn't make sense. This … none of this makes sense!”

“She was going to throw you off a bridge.”

I couldn't help it; I gasped at the full-circle, fated admission. And although I wanted it to be bullshit, I knew he was telling me the truth.

“She was going to get rid of you. Do you not understand?

When I told her I wouldn't leave my wife, she was out for revenge. She had a bargaining chip— you , boy—and she was going to use it in any way she could. She squeezed you out of her tight little cunt and held you over my head. If I refused to give her money or take you off her hands, she was going to get rid of you herself and find some other way to ruin me.”

“And why? Why the hell would she do that?”

“Because she was crazy! She was obsessed with me! She couldn't stand the thought that I could fuck her and go home to my wife!”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “You're lying to me again.”

He sighed, his body slumping further into the bed.

“I don't know what to tell you, Maxwell.

You wanted the truth; I gave it to you. Now you're accusing me of lying again.

You're impossible. Always have been. Defiant, determined …

you get that from me. But, oh, you're vengeful and insane, and that … you get from her .”

It was laughable, the things he was saying. He didn't see himself as vengeful? The man had spent nearly fifty years of his life tormenting his only son for his own goddamn mistakes.

I slowly rose from the chair and faced the door, my back to him.

My palm covered my mouth as I tried to make sense of it all in my head.

I didn't want his confession to be the truth, but it felt far from a lie, and that knowledge crept deep inside my chest, inside my gut, and burrowed down until I felt it heavy against my soul.

It crushed against me, like a prisoner sentenced to death by pressing.

Every year of my life, another weight added to the tremendous load.

Could I ask Lilly? I wondered, grasping for any shred of hope I could find. Is there a chance I could talk to her?

I turned on my heel, taking a step closer to my father's bedside. “Where is she?”

“Who?” His voice was quieter now, as if he'd used the last bit of his life's strength to tell me the truth of my beginning.

“My … my m-mother,” I stammered, hardly able to believe those words were being said about any woman but the one who had raised me.

She truly hated me , I realized. Oh God, she truly hated me. I always thought she did. I thought …

Oh my God, I really was the reason she killed herself.

It was me.

“She's gone,” he answered matter-of-factly, a frown settling in the lines around his mouth.

“Wha-what do you mean, she's gone?”

“Dead.”

He was fading faster, slipping again into slumber, but that one horrible, hopeless word left his lips, as clear as the sky outside his window.

I rolled my lips between my teeth, biting back the need to cry out and scream and wrap my hands around his brittle fucking throat.

Then I said, “You don't know that.”

He slowly nodded, his eyes closing heavily, and quietly murmured, “Lilly Meyer.”

Then he slept and said nothing more.