Page 25 of Hate So Deep (Hate #4)

NOW

Dirk

I knew being here would bring out the worst in me, but I swear, this place is a fucking powder keg about to go up and the burn in my throat only flames hotter when I enter through the front door and my father is waiting for me.

This is why I came back but that doesn’t mean I want to stand across from this asshole and have any sort of a conversation.

The sooner he’s in my rearview mirror, the fucking better but I can’t go until he makes this right and he will make it right or I’m ready to take him down even if I have to go with him.

Since I’ve spent my life studying his behavior, I know it will only rile him up if I pretend indifference to his scheming, so, once we’re in his office, I lean against the wall by the door and summon a bored expression.

My father thrives on creating chaos, I suspect because it gives him the power he so desperately craves.

In this, it took me years to ratchet back my rage, but it was worth it to see his own build with every careless shrug and blank fucking stare.

“So, you’re back,” he says, and I shrug. “Couldn’t handle the heat, Dirk? I told you, you’d come crawling back on your knees.”

Of course, he thinks I’m here to beg him for money, but I’d rather live out of my fucking truck and starve to death than ask him for anything.

This is all a game though and if I want to ruffle his feathers, I have to make the right moves.

It’s time to drop the first bomb and see how he takes it.

“I’m enlisting,” I say before stepping away from the wall. “Thought you should know since you’re my father and all.”

Although he raises his brows, he doesn’t comment.

Is he hoping that I haven’t found out about his little scheme? Or maybe he’s disappointed that he has nothing to hold over me.

“Enlisted,” he finally says. “You? How’s that going to go down, Dirk? You’ll be kicked out before the first day is through.”

“Nah,” I say with a shrug. “The only person I can’t stand listening to is you.”

When his jaw tightens, I pull up a smirk.

Bingo.

Your little empire is falling.

Dick.

After a moment, he rounds the desk to sit on it before grabbing the edges.

“It doesn’t have to be this way,” he says. “I’m willing to help you. You know how important it is for me to see my boys succeed.”

“Thanks,” I mutter. “I’m good.”

It sickens me to hear him spout this shit. He doesn’t care about me but now he can tell anyone who will listen that he offered to help but I shut him down.

As long as I’m the asshole, he can play the hero.

“Think about it, son,” he says. “This is your future. Don’t waste it because you blame me for things you can’t possibly understand.”

“I am who I am, and I will not change,” I say, and he whips around. It’s the same bullshit he used to say to our mother when he was beating on her.

Yeah, I remember dick. How could I forget?

I’ve been repeating the mantra in my head for years and when I need to remind myself that I’m doing the right fucking thing, I say it out loud.

It’s the only way to change this fucking cycle and I’m determined to do just that. I will not be my father…ever.

“Don’t waste your breath,” I continue when he doesn’t comment. “I was there, remember? You wanna blow smoke up Cory’s ass, fine. We both know what you did to Mom.”

He did this. He created us and this fucked up life and maybe I made my own choices, but it came out of pride, his pride and even still, he refuses to acknowledge what he’s done.

“Is this about the girl?” he says, throwing out a curveball.

When I don’t respond because if I do, I will end the game, he runs his hand through his graying blonde hair and says, “You were too young Dirk. It would have ruined your life.”

Where my brother gets his dark, delicate features from our mother to my eternal disgust, I look exactly like my dad, or so I’m told.

When I truly accept what I see, it’s like looking into a mirror of my future and it scares the shit out of me.

“I did what was best for you,” he says. “Someday you’ll understand.”

Of course, he only sees what he wants to, and this is where I break my silence, even knowing I’ll regret it later.

“Please enlighten me,” I grunt. “How did blackmail and fucking extortion help?”

I feel no victory when he looks away, his jaw tight. The only thing he did when he bulldozed through my world was to ruin what I thought was my future.

“You don’t understand,” he says.

“Oh? This wasn’t about me,” I say, slashing my hand through the air. “It was about money. It’s always about money with you.”

“Really? You couldn’t even pass a math test, and you thought you were going to support a wife…a family?”

“Fuck you!” I bark, pointing my finger at his face.

He doesn’t know shit. I was the one who made a pact in the dark of night. I was the scared stupid ass teenager with nothing but useless hope in my heart.

I thought I could change the world we were born into, and I did everything humanly possible to keep that promise, all for a girl who was never going to choose me.

My palms tingle in anticipation of wrapping my hands around his scrawny fucking neck and squeezing until he’s fucking blue in the face.

Instead, I say, “You gave up the right to make decisions about my future when you forced my mom out the door. You’re not a father. You’re a sack of shit. I know what you did, and you better drop this shit now, or you will fucking regret what I do next.”

When he locks his jaw, his nostrils flared, I brace for the onslaught, just like I have a million fucking times before.

However, he pauses, probably because the last time he tried to touch me, I showed him just how much of a weak ass little bitch he is.

“Don’t you want to know where she is?” he asks, and this is when I falter.

She?

What’s his game now?

“We could find her, Dirk. Don’t you want to know?”

Averting my gaze, I glare at the painting on the wall beyond his head. It’s the only item of worth in our home and Dad likes to parade his friends before it any chance he gets.

For him, it’s all about the success he so desperately wants people to see.

He doesn’t care about her, just as he doesn’t care about me.

“No,” I say, meeting his gaze once more. “If you don’t drop this and now, I’m going to expose every dirty secret you’ve ever collected from this town.”

“Like what?” he asks, raising a brow.

“I’ll start with the governor’s daughter, who’s health information you stole to blackmail the family. They, still lining your pockets?”

Although his brows flicker, he doesn’t respond to my accusation beyond asking, “What do you want?”

Yeah, it’s pretty fucking damning for the town physician to be using his power for the sole purpose of blackmailing his patients.

If I didn’t want him to drop his newest scheme, I’d have exposed him already.

However, this is more important. There are innocent lives on the line and it’s a small mercy, but I plan to keep their secrets safe.

“Stop looking for her. Drop it and never bring it up again,” I say.

After a moment in which he drills me with his stare, he says, “Fine. But you fucking leave and never come back.”

I expected nothing less from the man but for once it would be nice if he could accept his part in this sordid story. He thinks he has all the power but me leaving is my choice and moving forward, he will never have control over me again.

That fact must eat at the bastard, my only revenge in an otherwise fucked up situation.

“Gladly,” I mutter and relieved to be free of the cloying stench of his greed and misery, I blow through the door only to pause on the front porch.

As it tends to do when I’m home, Mom’s dark gaze rises in my vision.

It always comes back to this. Would our lives have been any different if she hadn’t walked?

Our father only descended further into his sickness but who’s to say it wouldn’t have happened anyway.

Father pushed her away just like he’s done me and that’s a fact none of us have any control over.

Inexplicably, Lauren’s glittering green gaze supersedes that of my mother’s the last time I saw her and although I try to push it away, it remains.

She’s not mine. She can’t be mine. What truly stings is knowing that I continue to push her away, pretending it’s for my brother, my best friend, the boy turned man who helped me through my darkest days.

Colt, for all intents and purposes, has moved on. He’s getting married. He’s created a new family.

He doesn’t need me and the fact that I fucked Lauren in the past shouldn’t matter.

I need her to stop trying to find something in me that doesn’t exist though. I’m not her savior. I’m not her friend. I sure as shit will never be anything but her enemy.

I do what has to be done. The sooner she understands, the sooner she sees, the better because I need for her to back away.