Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 46344 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 232(@200wpm)___ 185(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 46344 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 232(@200wpm)___ 185(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
Silence fell around the table for a few minutes. Dwayne didn’t have anything more to say.
“I wasn’t aware,” Caleb said.
“I don’t go out killing people for the fun of it. I grew out of that.” He turned his attention toward Beast. “I went back and checked. Where I buried bodies, none of the ground has been disturbed. Those killings are not mine.”
Before they could say anything else, kids began to run in. Beast’s and Caleb’s youngest girls came running toward them, squealing.
He laughed and hugged them close.
Hope, Faith, and Charity walked back into the room, carrying drinks.
Charity frowned at him, clearly confused by what was going on, but he simply smiled at her to let her know that everything was okay. It would be. He knew how to deal with his uncles.
Dinner went by without a hitch. The kids made it so easy to just sit and eat lunch. They talked constantly. It was kind of strange to see both Beast and Caleb relaxed, laughing, happy.
His own father had never allowed for such noise around the table.
Food had been just another form of punishment. If Dwayne did something to annoy him, he went to bed without food. His mother would try to feed him, but if she was ever caught disobeying his father, then there was always hell to pay. He hated his early years, and watching Beast and Caleb’s kids, he felt envious of them.
He knew he was never going to have kids. There was no way in hell that he’d ever risk turning into his father, and the only way to guarantee that was to never have kids. He watched Charity talk with Hope and Faith. The three women had clearly hit it off, and it was also confirmed when they exchanged numbers before heading out.
Faith and Hope both gave him a hug and told him not to be a stranger. Of course, his cousins rushed around him, hugging, or fist-bumping him before he headed out.
Charity was giving him strange looks.
“What?” he asked, staring at her across the hood of his car.
“Nothing. I just, your family is pretty awesome.”
“You really think so?”
“Yeah. I mean, come on, don’t you see that?”
He glanced back at the house. “Never really thought about it.”
“I don’t know what went on between you and your uncles, but that was pretty amazing. They care about you, and you can see that.”
He saw the envy in her eyes, and he didn’t like it.
“Your family cares about you. They paid a fortune for you to be rescued.”
“I always wanted a brother or a sister. My parents were too busy to let that happen.” She shrugged. “You’re lucky.”
“I don’t have any brothers or sisters, Charity. That’s all the family I’ll have.”
He opened his door, climbing inside.
“You’re not going to have a family of your own?”
“No.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I’m not going to have kids. There’s no way I’d ever hurt them,” he said.
“I’m starting to think you need a therapist more than I do.”
“Keep your thoughts to yourself.”
He started up the car, and Charity burst out laughing. “Wow, you have got one serious attitude. What is your problem?”
“I don’t have a problem.”
“It sounds to me like you do. You can talk to me about this. You’ve talked to me about killing people, so this should be a piece of cake.”
He glanced over at her and sighed. “You know who I am. I’ve got a reputation. Throughout high school I was known as a stud, but now, I’m known as The Nightmare. That when I come visit, everyone is going to end up dead.”
“Like the night you came for me.”
“Yes. Killing is what I’m good at. My dad, I don’t even remember what he looks like. I just remember that feeling that I always got whenever he was home. It’s fear, no doubt about it, fear of what is going to happen when he finds me. Hiding was never an option, nor was fighting it. I only had to wait, and he’d be there. My worst enemy, my own personal nightmare.”
“You’re afraid of being that way for another human being?”
“As far as I’m concerned, the Carson blood is tainted. I won’t ever run that risk of being something that my father was to me.”
“Dwayne, you’re not like that.”
“You don’t know me. Not the real me. You don’t know what it’s like.”
“I know you’re my friend,” she said. “When I’m with you, there’s no safer place to be than with you. I like being around you, Dwayne. No matter what your father was like, it doesn’t mean you’ll turn out like him. Your uncles haven’t, and they were his brothers.”
“Exactly. There’s no guarantee their mother was faithful. I’ve got his blood, and no matter what I’m not going to risk it.” She went to say something else, but he shook his head. “No more, please. I’m sorry for being a bastard to you. I shouldn’t have said those things.”