Is it because I’m seeking revenge on her behalf? Ending the lives of the men who had a hand in ruining hers?
Or is it more than that?
Worse than that?
An ache flares to life in my chest, and I rub absently at the spot, trying to massage it away. Scrubbing a hand over my face, I dismount from the vehicle and head up the front walk, noting that the curtains in the living room are drawn, and there are no lights on upstairs.
Either Lenny’s asleep, which seems unlikely given her history of waiting up for me, or she’s painting. My cock jerks to life at the thought, already hungry for her even though it’s been less than ten hours since I last had her naked and writhing beneath me.
Now that I’ve had one taste, though, I can’t seem to stop.
Insatiable is one word for it.
Completely and utterly deranged is more accurate.
Throwing open the front door as it unlocks, I peer down the hall, kicking my shoes off.
“Lenny?” My voice echoes off the walls, harsh against my eardrums, and I’m met with terse silence.
Frowning, I shuck out of my leather jacket and hang it on the hook on the wall. Maybe she’s absorbed in whatever she’s working on, and hasn’t heard me come in. Starting down the hall, I whistle lightly, fully expecting her to be on her knees near the sofa with her hands speckled in paint.
Instead, my floor is covered in popcorn, as if an entire field was cooked in the open comfort of my living room. Charcoal streaks across the hardwood, broken pieces littering Lenny’s workspace, while the pages in her sketchbook are torn and her easel is broken.
Paint splatter marks the floor, the sofa, the wall by the fireplace—a cacophony of color I try blinking away, but each time it gets louder and louder. The room is positively destroyed, glass shards from an overturned end table sprinkling through the kitchen, and all I can do is stare.
Confusion worms its way through me, and I step farther into the room, scanning with widened eyes.
As I reach the sofa, I freeze in place, immediately recognizing the waves of golden-brown hair spilling down a slender back. The ponytail she left earlier in is no more, the strands having been pulled out and yanked on, creating a frizzy texture.
My heart stutters inside my chest as I take her in, and my throat grows impossibly tight. Is it possible the crimson stains aren’t actually paint at all?
For a split second, there’s no movement, and all I can see is her, but then her head whips around and those green eyes meet mine. A disturbingly powerful wave of relief washes through me, and I slump slightly against the sofa back.
“Bloody fucking hell, love.” I breathe out a chuckle, running a shaky hand through my hair. “I thought you were in—”
She shifts again, confirming my previous immediate fear: she’s not alone. With her knees outstretched, Lenny straddles the narrow hips of a dark-haired woman, and as she sits back, I see she’s got one of her broken paintbrushes held to the base of the woman’s neck.
Sucking in a deep, steadying breath, I take a moment to appreciate her lithe form in action; just like the night we met weeks ago, she looks terribly comfortable holding a weapon to someone’s throat, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t stir arousal hot and fiery in my gut.
As I continue my perusal of her, simultaneously cataloging her triumph and seeking signs of harm, my chest feels like it caves in.
There are bright-pink scratches decorating Lenny’s bare arms, and blood collects at the corner of her mouth, but it’s not any of that I’m paying attention to anymore.
Not when I reach the other woman’s face.
My chest burns, like some omnipotent being has reached in, stolen the air directly from my lungs, and then set them on fire. I can scarcely catch my breath, my gaze boring into the wide, teardrop-shaped eyes I haven’t seen in over twenty years.
“Mum?”
35
I forgot how old I was when my mum left us.
Purposely put it out of my mind in order to avoid the grief.
Loss is difficult enough, and it becomes a thousand times more insufferable when it’s the kind that could have been avoided. The kind that could be remedied, if only someone cared enough to return.
Mine didn’t. So, I spent a lifetime pretending she didn’t exist at all.
Aside from the beach house itself, I’ve kept no connection to her—not a single photograph, or article of clothing, or note scribbled and stuffed into my lunch pail before school every morning.
Even my memories now are hazy at best. Try hard enough to convince yourself that something never happened, and eventually in your mind, it didn’t.
In order to get over my mum’s abandonment, I forced myself into the belief that she had never been around in the first place.
A tactic I found infallible, given the years that passed without a single point of contact.
Until now, apparently.
Her black hair is shorter than when I last saw her, cropped to her chin and fanning out beneath her head. Everything else looks the same, from her bronzed skin to the bright, yet hollow look in her dark eyes.
Lenny’s eyes bulge comically when I question the identity of the woman she has pinned to the floor. The hand wrapped around her brush wavers, but doesn’t move away, the sharpened end still pointing right at my mum’s neck.
“This woman broke in and claims she’s your mom,” Lenny explains as if I haven’t just outed the other woman. “But I know that can’t be true, because you told me your parents are dead.”
“Oh, sirts.” My mum has the audacity to sound pained, using my childhood nickname as if it might endear me to her.
Instead, the word grates over my skin like a jagged strip of metal, and nausea rolls through my internal organs. My jaw tightens until it numbs, sparks of tingly pain radiating up my cheek.
How dare she.
Crossing my arms over my chest, I focus on Lenny. “I also said the house was haunted.”
“No,” she corrects, narrowing her gaze at me. “You said it wasn’t. Specifically. God, did you lie about that, too? Are there ghosts living in the attic?”
“We don’t have an attic.”
“That’s not—” Huffing, she cuts herself off, beginning to dismount. “Look, I’m really sorry—”
“Don’t move,” I snap, interrupting her apology.
Her brows knit together, suspicion drawing them in. “What?”
I jab a finger in my mum’s direction. “We’re not letting her up until she explains what the bloody hell she’s doing here.”
“If you would just let me explain—”
“Absolutely not. The only way I’ll hear an explanation from you is if I’m rotting in the afterlife with that as my punishment.”
Lenny hesitates. “Maybe you should hear her out…”
Gripping the back of the sofa, I lean forward slightly, looking directly into her eyes. They don’t blink, that seafoam-green color of her irises slightly soothing my anger the longer I stare.
Unwilling to let it slip away entirely, I glance back at my mum on the floor. It floods back like a tidal wave, invading the shore with no regard for anything in its path.
“All right.” Raising an eyebrow, I nod for her to continue. Lenny starts to get up again, but I hold out my hand. “No. She’ll explain where she’s at, or I’ll let you stab her.”