Total pages in book: 168
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
I can hear someone else crash through the door, and when I look up, I’m staring back at eyes the exact same as my own. Her hair’s pulled back in a low bun, her face fresh of makeup and her usual edgy attire replaced by sweats and Ugg boots.
“Jesus, son…” Mom steps inside, shaking her head at Moose and closing the front door when he leaves.
“Mother, I’m not up for one of your lectures. Maybe I made a mistake building this so close to your house.”
I stumble into the living room, leaving the lights above set to warm. Falling into the leather sofa farthest from the entrance, Mom makes her way to the floor-to-ceiling windows, tapping buttons on the dial. Shutters slide closed behind me. I don’t bother reminding her that they’re one-way.
“Are you going to make yourself useful or are you going to school me on my bad decisions lately?”
She falls silent. I follow her as she makes her way to the bar that’s tucked away in the far corner behind the floating fireplace. Soft yellow lights illuminate the bottom structure, and it’s not until she takes the spot beside me that she finally answers.
“Which one? The one where you stopped taking our calls or the one where you killed someone who meant something to you?”
“Psh.” I roll my eyes, waving her off. “Neither.”
“Priest.” The simplicity of my name leaving her has me hesitate. “This…” She taps at the tattoo that crawls over my shoulder. “Remember when you had me do this one?” I swallow, but it doesn’t leave. My throat swells. Why the fuck won’t the pain leave?
“No.”
“Priest…” she tries again, and her fingers crawl over the fine line ending of the ribbon that stops at the edge of my neck, enough to never be able to hide it. “I remember. It was the night of the charity gala—”
“Mother,” I deadpan, zoning off in the distance. “Are you going to help or not?”
Her touch is gone as quickly as it arrives, and she places her glass on the concrete coffee table in front of us, unzipping a bag.
“You know, you could do this yourself.”
I choke on my laugh. “You’re encouraging that shit?”
She doesn’t join my drunken stupor, but I see the smile on the corner of her mouth. “No, shithead. I’m not. What I mean is your art, P—
“—Mother,” I warn again.
She rolls her eyes, taking out the utensils. “Fine. But one day, you should. You need to share it with people.”
“What part?” I joke, resting my head against the couch and closing my eyes. “You and I both know no one wants to see that side of me.” I swallow the harsh words as they leave me for the first time. “They barely tolerate the small side I allow them to see.”
Mom’s silent a moment and I hate that I said what I did. With anyone else, it’d fly over their head, but not Mom. Not Madison fucking Montgomery. She should have used some of this intuition when she first started dating Dad. Heard he ran circles around her for years.
Until she shot him.
Kinda think he still got the last laugh after hearing what he did with her after that though.
The sting from the needle stops. I don’t even realize we’d been going at it for two hours until I glance up at the clock.
“I like this one.” With a brush of the wet wipe, her voice cuts through my trance.
“Mmm…”
She doesn’t answer, and I push up from the couch, reaching for my cigarette pack and tapping it on my thigh. She busies herself with packing up. I don’t need to be able to see the new one on my back since I trust her every time.
“I need to know if you think what you did was wrong?”
I hate that she wants me to answer this differently. That every single person wants a different answer, when truthfully, “No.”
The smile she’d clearly worked so hard to force there slips from her face. She looks back down to the tattoo gun.
“Mom, I’m not Dad. I don’t have compassion. I don’t do things on a whim or out of emotion. If I do it, I’ve thought about every single scenario surrounding it before going through. I don’t have regrets, and I sure as fuck don’t care about killing someone. There’s no redemption for me, and that’s final.”
“You loved her, Priest.” It’s a whisper, but she meant it to be louder.
I don’t correct her. “Even if that were true, I’m not him. Love won’t save me.”
She sighs, closing her case and placing it on her thigh. Her knuckles graze my cheek when she stands directly in front of me. There’s a part of me that wishes I could be the son she wanted me to be. The son she deserves to have.