″I spent a lot of time just trying to breathe. I would be sitting in school and my chest would just cave in with heaviness, and I’d be gasping for air, just trying to stay alive.”
″Sounds like panic attacks,” Callum whispers.
″Yes. But my dad was so wrapped up in dealing with my mom and raising Luke, that I was neglected. Sometimes I wondered if he wished I was the one who died. Which never helped, because I felt like that every day.”
Callum’s arm wraps around me, pulling me in close.
″Mom remarried. I was pushing twelve at that point. Jason was very attentive when she wasn’t. At first, I enjoyed the love I was getting. He let me stay up and eat ice cream with him. But then, as I got closer to being a teenager, it got weird. He’d even get jealous of me spending time with Luke.
″He said it wasn’t nice to give all of my love to my brother. He needed it, too. And it felt… well, in the mind of my thirteen-year-old self, icky. But I didn’t want to upset or disappoint him. He was the only one that loved me, so I would do whatever he asked.”
Callum’s body is tight as he processes what I’m saying. It’s the all too familiar way he fills with rage, and I know he is trying to remain calm.
Still, I push through. “When he got mad, he would hit me, and he had a twisted way of trying to make me feel like I was supposed to like it because it meant I loved him. The hitting turned to other things.”
″What other things, Haley?”
I shake my head, picking at my nails. ”Sexual things. When Mom had a baby when I was sixteen, I was terrified he’d hurt her, so I tried to come forward about Jason’s abuse.
″I went to the police, but everything was brushed off because he was the chief of police. Probably a dumb thing to do now, looking back. But I didn’t know what else to do.”
″What did they do?” Callum asks.
″He and Mom made me out to be a liar. For years I’d been acting out because of the things he did and they used that against me. Everyone just assumed it was the stress of losing Sarah and going through a divorce, so they believed him.
″After that, I moved in with Dad. His new wife and stepdaughter were nasty and because of it, I wound up on the streets. Andi brought me in and let me live with her after a few months. She’s the only other person who knows the truth.”
I swallow, my mouth dry after all my confessions. The heaviness in my chest slowly lifts and the warmth of his hand steers me away from slipping into the urge to drink, or cry.
Callum brushes the hair from my face, his hands in my lap. “Is he still alive?” He asks.
″As far as I know. But I don’t keep track of them.”
He removes his hands from my lap, drifting off into space, and I’m sure he is debating on ways to kill my tormentor.
Six hours ago, that would have disturbed me. In just one evening, we’ve pushed this relationship so much further than where we were yesterday. He confided in me earlier, and now I’ve done the same. I rest my elbows on my knees, rubbing my mouth with a hand. The pressure in my chest is gone.
Callum knows now. There’s nothing left to hide and he’s not running for the hills. I glance over, eyes trained on the clenching of his fists in his lap. He’s still off in the distance.
I say, “You can’t kill a retired chief of police, even if you are a mob boss.”
″I can. And I most certainly fucking will.”
″Believe me, I’ve thought about it.” I stand and head for the kitchen to pour us some wine. From the island, I call over to him, trying some humor. “Death by a thousand dicks shoved up his asshole was a top contender for a while.”
I catch the sound of a snort as Callum shifts back against the couch.
His amusement has me continuing my list of murder options. “Arsenic in his food. Suffocation. A thousand bee stings.”
When I walk back over to him, a bottle of wine in one hand and two glasses in the other, he takes them from me and sets them on the coffee table to pour.
″You know what happens if I kill him? He becomes a dead hero. Retired police chief murdered. No one ever knows the monster he really is. No. I have to expose him.
″My father let me live on the streets because he thought I was an uncontrollable teen that made up lies. I’ve never met my half-sister, aside from the day she was born. She’s eighteen now. And Luke only maintains a relationship with me because I help him out with tuition.
″I have no family, Cal. It’s all his fault. And when he dies, he doesn’t get to take that with him. Does that make sense?”
″It does.” Callum gulps down his glass of wine quickly and doesn’t bother to pour more. Instead, he drinks from the bottle. After a moment of silence, he turns to me. “You’re right. But this is hard for me. This is what I do.”