Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 68500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
I’d lost my parents. My childhood. The small fortune that my parents left me. I’d accrued massive debts to get through college and had sacrificed a lot of things to make Pops understand that he was wanted by me.
Then there was Val.
She left, and like always, that was just one other thing that broke me and continued to break me.
I could feel Val looking at me, but unable to look at her and acknowledge all that I felt, I turned to Pops and said, “You’ll be okay here while I go home and try to get all the issues figured out?”
There were no issues.
I just couldn’t be here.
And it was as if he understood that.
“I’ll be fine,” he said.
And he would.
Val would take care of him.
“Good,” I grumbled. “I think I’m gonna go then.”
“Don’t wreck my truck,” Pops ordered. “I’m gonna get three more good weeks out of it.”
That made my stomach sink further.
“Yes, Pops.” I was going to throw up.
I couldn’t be here any longer.
“Thanks, Val,” I said as I started for the door. “If you need me, call?”
Val was blank faced as she nodded once.
I fled.
I drove home, slipping and sliding on autopilot.
Then I crawled into bed under six blankets and shivered my way into sleep.
CHAPTER 9
This is Bob. Bob has no arms.
Knock knock? Who’s there. Not bob.
-text from Felix to Val with a stick figure drawing.
VAL
“What was that all about?” I asked quietly.
I felt like something had just happened right in front of me and I hadn’t been able to comprehend that shit was about to go down until Felix was already gone.
Like a trainwreck.
One that you saw happening yet couldn’t prevent.
Pops took a seat on the couch and extended his legs to rest out in front of him.
He eyed me for a long time before saying, “It’s good to see you again.”
I smiled. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
Pops smiled, though it didn’t reach his eyes.
“A long time,” he agreed. “I always thought you were it for him, you know?”
My stomach sank.
“Felix… he hasn’t ever gotten the easy end of the deal,” he said.
My insides seized. “I…”
“You don’t have to explain or come up with any excuses that you think won’t sting,” he said quietly. “But maybe I should give you more insight into Felix’s life.”
I took a seat on the other side of the couch, then turned my body so that I was facing Pops.
“Okay,” I said quietly.
It was like being told that you were about to be handed the sun.
So freakin’ eager, yet slightly terrified of what was about to happen at the same time.
“How much of Felix’s home life situation did he tell you?” he asked.
I told him what I knew about his aunt and uncle.
Pops nodded, then started to once again sift his fingers through Cyclone’s fur.
The sight made my belly hurt.
Because the only person I’d ever seen pet Cyclone like that had been Felix.
He liked to say that Cyclone was wild, but I still saw all those times where Cyclone and Felix would be cuddled up on the couch together when they thought no one was watching.
“Well, there’s a lot more to it than that,” Pops said.
I waited, and he flashed me a grin that was so much Felix that my heart jolted at the sight.
“My daughter, Linny, became a mother at sixteen.”
I blinked. “That’s news to me.”
Pops nodded. “Linny fell pregnant when she was fifteen because a boy she trusted decided to take what wasn’t freely given.”
Meaning, Linny was raped.
Felix was a product of rape.
Fuck.
“Oh,” I said softly.
“Sometimes, I think she died because she was tired of fighting,” he said. “Felix was the one to find Linny.”
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“Linny was driving home from work and drove off into the trees. There were no tire marks showing that she’d avoided something in the road. No obvious signs of any issues. Nothing that would’ve warranted her driving off the road where she did.” He ran his fingers over the length of Cyclone’s back. “It took us four days to find her. And the only reason we found her when we did was because Felix started to ride the length of Linny’s drive home on his bike. It took him about eight trips to notice the break in the woods.”
Hell.
That hadn’t been something he’d shared with me.
“And then we found out that Linny had a sizeable life insurance policy on herself,” he said. “Almost as if she planned for Felix to always be taken care of.”
But he wasn’t.
“But then my son found out about the life insurance policy, and all of a sudden he wanted something to do with his family again after being estranged from us for eleven years.” He paused. “We believe that Woody, my son, knows who was responsible for whomever took advantage of Linny. Yet, he wouldn’t share that information with us, and when we pushed back, he disappeared from our lives. Until there was money involved, and no way for him to feel guilt by seeing his sister’s devastated face with any regularity.”