Page 68 of Someone to Hold

“You think you’re better than me?” Malcolm snarls as I slowly maneuver around the side of the truck. “I can see that woman is afraid of you.”

“You don’t know anything about herorme,” Chase seethes. “Get out of here, Dad.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that, son. It’s the way I raised you. Some women need a firm hand. Your mother?—”

“Keep her name out of your mouth.”

I place the scooter in the back seat and climb into the passenger side, but don’t let the door shut completely. I won’t leave Chase alone, not with his father standing there spewing verbal poison.

“Your sister put me on the restricted list for visiting. She’s my goddamn wife.”

“Yourex-wife.”

“I never agreed to a divorce.”

“Not much of a choice from jail.”

“I want to see her, and you need to help me.”

“I don’t need to do a goddamn thing for you.” Chase’s voice drops to a dangerous growl, low and gravelly with barely contained fury. “There’s nothing for you in Skylark anymore.”

“You thinkyou’vegot a chance at a life here? If you can’t get back on a bull?—”

“You don’t need to worry about me.” Chase huffs out a humorless laugh.

“Iknowwhat’s going on, Chase.”

“Goodbye, Dad. Don’t try to contact me or Mom or Ada.”

“It’s not your fucking leg or too many concussions,” Malcolm continues. “You’re scared.”

In the rearview mirror, I watch Chase go completely rigid, his jaw clenching so hard I can see the muscle tic beneath his skin. “Shut. Up.”

His father ignores the command. “I know weakness when I see it. It’s your mother’s fault, you know. She coddled you and your sister. If it were up to me?—”

“If it had been up to you,” Chase cuts in, “I’m not sure I would have survived childhood.”

“Let me tune my tiny violin,” Malcolm mutters. “You need to man up, Chase. Get back in the damn ring. Like I said, I didn’t raise you to be a pussy.”

Tension rolls off Chase in waves as he squares off with his father. “Stop using that word.”

“You going to stop me, boy? Let’s see what you got. I learned some tricks in the joint, and you’re not as tough and angry as you used to be.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure.”

Chase says something else under his breath that I can’t hear then shakes his head. Malcolm answers with an angry cackle that sends shivers through me.

“That’s right, run away. You can’t even find your own woman. Had to poach off a dead man.”

There’s a scuffling noise, and I turn to see Chase dragging his dad away from the truck by the collar of his shirt. I cringe as he shoves Malcolm back, the old man stumbling and then landing on his ass in the gravel parking lot.

“Stay down where you belong.” Chase’s tone is as searing as the blue flame at the center of a fire.

Then he’s heading back to the truck.

I close the passenger door and quickly fasten my seatbelt. He gets in, breathing hard like he’s just run five miles at full speed. He turns the key in the ignition and backs out of the parking space. Gravel spins up from the tires as he peels out, and in the side mirror, I see Malcolm waving his fist and still shouting insults as we pull away.

The air in the truck is thick and heavy with the weight of what just happened.