Good men do not harm.
Good men do not obsess over a woman to the extent that the idea of being abandoned by her leaves them an aching mass of flesh and rage.
I have never been a good man.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. Another message from Nolan to meet. He’s got information, but what information can fix the hollow void left in my chest now? I ignore the message in favor of fixing my attention on my target.
The front door to the house opens and Morpheus Calloway steps out, adjusting the front lapels of his suit as he moves towards the waiting sedan that pulled around just five minutes earlier. He doesn’t look up, he doesn’t look back. He simply gets into the back seat of the car when the skinny little nerd that dashes out with him hurriedly jerks forward to open and close the door behind him.
Juliet is in that house now. She left us for this place with its white walls and pristine windows and the landscape that hides it from the road’s view. The cavity where my heart thumps, slow and deadened, aches.
I was getting better with her. Now, I’m right back in the pit that formed thirteen years ago.
“Alexio! Where the fuck is that little shit?”
“S-Sancho?” Mom’s voice is much quieter than Dad’s, shaky and scared, but I hear her over his roaring.
“Where the fuck is he?” Dad demands. “Some little bitch in his class has been saying things about him.”
Jules. He has to mean Jules. Despite how much my limbs tremble as I scoot farther back into the small cupboard beneath the kitchen sink to hide from his rage, another part of me that feels more like him than anything else is viciously angry. How dare he call Jules a bitch? I don’t know exactly what that wordmeans, but I do know that when he calls Mom a bitch, she doesn’t like it. So that must mean it’s an insult.
My hands curl into fists and I press them into my legs to stop myself from jumping out of my hiding spot and attacking him as I hear both him and Mom get closer.
“I’m sure it’s nothing, honey,” Mom says. She always tries to calm him. It never works. I don’t even know why she tries, but then…it’s worse when she stops trying. She’s done that too before. When Dad stops responding and he just lays into her or me. His fists flying and our bones breaking and everything hurting.
Sometimes, her eyes get this faraway look and though her body remains, her mind isn’t there. She leaves me here with him. Juliet would never leave me. She was so angry when she saw the bruises the first time. Everyone else just acted confused and then changed the subject or found a reason to leave me by myself.
I pull my legs up harder to my chest, forming into a tight ball as far back into the cabinet as I can. The scent of bleach and dust invades my nose, making it twitch as I repress a sneeze.
“It’s just children being children,” Mom says, still trying to placate Dad. There’s no point when he’s already mad enough to yell. I’ve learned in my five years that the second he starts yelling, it’s already too late.
“It was Juliet fucking Donovan!” Dad snaps, and then there’s the sound of flesh on flesh and Mom’s sharp cry of pain.
My chest hurts. I squeeze my eyes shut and bury my head against my knees.
“People can’t ignore her,” Dad says. “Her father is too important!”
“Y-you’re important, honey,” Mom says, her voice tight and full of pain. I can picture her standing in front of him, her hand cupped to her cheek as she tries and fails to get him to calmdown. “Everyone knows how generous you are to the county, to Silverwood.”
“Not as generous as a Donovan,” Dad growls.
“W-well, it won’t matter for much longer,” Mom says. “They’re building that new school for the north side, and you know her parents will want her closer to them.”
Hot tears leak from my closed eyes. I know about that stupid new school. Jules was the one who told me about it and how much she doesn’t want to go. We’re kids, though, and kids don’t get to make choices. Our parents do.
“Not soon enough,” Dad replies. “The school called. They have no choice but to file a report. She’s been too noisy.”
“That’s all right, we can fight it,” Mom says. “We just have to— Ah!”
Mom’s words are cut off with a fresh scream and another slap. Lifting my hands, I push them over my ears. The slaps turn into thudding punches and cries and screams. I rock back and forth beneath the sink, one side of my leg tapping the curvy pipe thing each time I shift and move.
More tears rain down my cheeks, never stopping no matter how hard I squeeze my lids together. The sound of my mom’s cries doesn’t stop for a long time.
The old memory fades as the sedan in front of the Calloway mansion pulls away. Juliet left me before, when we were children—a forgivable offense when she hadn’t been given a choice. Now, though, she made the decision. She saw me, loved me, gave me all of her, and then… she took it all back.
I circle the bottom floor, avoiding the cameras out front that I spy and using my phone to hack and duplicate the feed on the ones that are unavoidable. If Morpheus has someone watchingthose cameras at all times, all they’ll see is a slight bit of static and then a replay of absolutely nothing to worry about.
My cell phone buzzes again with another call from Nolan just as I finish directing one of the final cameras away from where I’m located. With a nasty snarl, I send him straight to voicemail and lift my head just in time to spot the woman that’s been both my blessing and my curse for over a decade in one of the second-story windows.
