Dominic heard a noise, one that made his heart jump and had him out of his bed in record time. He hastened to the door but stopped instantly, his hand outstretched towards the knob. He knew he shouldn’t. He was told to stay in his room; she hated when he disobeyed, and the last time he’d failed to do as he was told, she’d gotten incredibly angry and had locked him in that dark place. He’d been good since then, doing everything she asked without complaint. But the noise…he heard it again. Louder this time. Was someone in the house? Was she in trouble? Pressing his ear to the door, he listened carefully. There it was again! The loud thud had him blowing caution to the wind and yanking the door open. The hallway that led from his bedroom to hers was a long one, blanketed by darkness.
He hesitated again, this time standing at the threshold and staring into the gaping nothingness in front of him that frightened him like nothing else. It reminded him of that place. Dominic shuddered at the thought of having to walk through the darkness. But what if she needed him? What if she was in trouble again? The man from last time had hurt her very badly because Dominic had been too much of a coward to do anything about it. He’d hated seeing her in pain days after, even when she’d taken her anger out on him. The innate need to see that she was alright jostled him forward and before he knew it he was running down the stretch of foyer that seemed so infinite, but couldn’t have ended soon enough.
“Mom…” He was at her door, hand on the doorknob, turning it even as he heard the muffled voices inside. “Mom,” he called again, with his heart racing he heard the pained moans and entered her bedroom. “Mom, are you okay?”
“Fuck.” He heard the expletive in his search for her and found movement coming from her bed. There was some rustling of sheets before Dominic was faced with her scowling visage and that of a man he did not recognize. The man had been the one who’d whispered the obscenity. “You didn’t tell me you had a kid.” He stumbled out of the bed, nude except for the chain he wore around his neck as he frantically searched for his clothes. He found his jeans strewn on the floor a few feet away from where Dominic was currently standing. While he slipped them on, giving a small hop to get them over his hips, he looked at Dominic, who bemusedly retuned his stare.
“No, baby, don’t worry about him…” his mother tried to soothe, and with little regards to her own nudity, she chased after him.
“Jesus, Sheila, I’m not fucking you while you’re kid’s in the next room. Look, I’ll hook you up with this stash, but have my money by next week.” Having found his shirt seconds prior, he rustled a hand through Dominic’s hair on his way out.
“Come on, Randy, don’t leave. He’s a stupid little kid; he doesn’t even know what’s going on. He’s a little slow. Let me just put him in his room and we’ll party.”
“I think you’ve partied enough for the night, and I’m getting pretty tired of fucking you as payment. Free ride ends tonight. Don’t call me unless you have money to pay for it.” Dominic jumped again as the front door slammed shut behind the man who’d been in his mother’s bed.
It wasn’t too long before he felt the repercussion of his actions. She came at him with an open palm across his face. “You stupid little boy!” she screamed, anchoring a hand through his hair and tugging his head back to look into her sneering face. “God, I knew I should’ve killed you when I had the chance!” She dragged him behind her by his hair and Dominic raised his hand to hers to lessen the pain.
“Mom, I’m sorry…” Panic began to settle in when he saw exactly where they were headed. This was worse than the closet. “Mommy…Mommy, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it,” he pleaded with raw desperation as she thrust open the basement door, and tugged him down the stairs. “Mommy…Mommy, please!”
“You’re just like him!” she screeched, battling to pick him up as he struggled to free himself. But as much as he tried, his seven-year-old body was only capable of so much. “You’re horrible, just like your father!” She shoved him in the crawl space and yanked the metal door shut just before he could run out. “You ruined everything. You ruined my life!”
“Mommy, I’m sorry! I’m sorry, I won’t do it again! Mom! Mom, it’s dark! It’s too dark!” Dominic sobbed, banging futilely against the metal door. He couldn’t breathe. He was suffocating. He banged and scrapped his nails raw, bleeding and crying into the enveloping, stifling darkness until finally he succumbed to the darkness itself.
* * *
“I believe the last time you were here we came to the agreement that the sum of money we gave you would take care of the little issue, thereby permanently removing you from our lives.” Winston Virgil Armstrong stared his imperious nose down at the haggard woman standing unsteadily in front of him. She oozed of degradation; the stench of her addiction permeated the air in his office. She was someone he’d believed he’d dealt with years ago. One of his son’s proclivities having spun out of control, he’d written a substantial check to the woman who’d come crying rape because Gregory had gotten a littletoo physical. Winston had done so to keep their family name out of the papers, but mostly to preserve his son’s future. He and his father and his father’s father had toiled for far too long to build their enterprise.
The name Armstrong was synonymous with trust, respect, and upstanding family values to the thousands upon thousands of consumers who purchased their products. To have had such a scandal threaten to tarnish that good name would’ve been mayhem. Furthermore, with ’Gregory’s impending nuptials to Millicent Wentworth, heiress to one of the largest cosmetic lines in the country, the scandal would’ve shattered that possibility. The union presented a lucrative opportunity for a merger between their companies; it’d been quite imperative that nothing interfere with the wedding. Therefore, Winston had dealt with the problem in the manner befitting. Unfortunately, it appeared he’d been foolishly optimistic in believing the situation could’ve been so easily rectified.
“Well, I didn’t get rid of it.” She sniffed indignantly, folding her tattered cardigan over her emaciated form.
No, she certainly had not. Winston’s gaze drifted down to the gangly child at her side. He could no more deny the child’s paternity than he could ignore those unmistakable sharp, green eyes that were an inheritable trait in his family .Although he would have a definitive answer before the day was out. Then there was also the fact that the boy bore a startling resemblance to Gregory when he’d been that young. Much as he wanted to, Winston knew that the boy was his grandchild. His brow furrowed further as he carefully assessed the child. There were bruises covering his pale face, and the clothes he wore hung off his disturbingly slight figure. He looked malnourished, the gauntness of his features making him appear close to death.
“What will it take to get rid of you permanently?”
“How much is the child of a rapist worth?” she countered nastily, shrewd, despite the glassiness of her coal black eyes.
“You’re willing to part with him?”
“You can have him and my silence, for a price.”
“Name it.”
“Two million dollars.”
“Done. In turn, you will never step foot on this property again. If you return, make no mistake, I will have you shot for trespassing.”
He cut her the check and the instant she had it in her hand, she stepped away from the boy, who quickly reached out to grab her sweater. “Mommy…” he called softly.
“You’re not my problem anymore,” she said coldly, wrenching the little bit of her sweater he held in his small hand. She turned her back to him and walked out the door, leaving Dominic behind in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar faces.
* * *
He’d seen Sheila Swanson only once more after that when he’d been eighteen. She’d been a shell, more so than what he’d remembered her to be, and Dominic had been grateful for his upbringing in that his indifference had been able to help him cope with her perpetual contempt for him and the unforgettable way he’d been conceived. When he’d finally heard of her passing some months later, an overdose or some such, he’d already shut himself off from everything and had barely given her a thought until this evening. He raised a hand to the bartender for another shot, his fourth now, but Dominic had only just begun to drown the memories. God, he hadn’t gotten this drunk in quite some time now, but it seemed his demons were in quite the mood, gnawing away at Dominic’s soul with avaricious frenzy.
I hope you’re prepared to rape me, Dominic, because that’s the only way you’re going to touch me.
Ah yes, there it was again. He noticeably shuddered at the statement that continued to replay unendingly in his mind. Dominic closed his eyes, but there was no finding peace there as eidetic memory detailed the gravity of her solemn expression when she’d uttered those damning words. The irony of the situation was not loss on him he realized as he tipped another shot down the hatch. He couldn’t fault her for thinking he was capable of such a reprehensible act. But being a product of that act himself and being so unknowingly reminded of it sickened him. Dominic was many things, his vices were quite numerous, and he was the first to admit he was his own worst enemy, always toeing between that line of what was appropriate and what was not. But even he had limits. There weren’t many, but physically accosting a woman, using brute strength to force himself on her, was something he could not do.
