Chapter 13
THIRTEEN
PHOENIX
I decided to stick with my initial strategy but toned it down slightly. I kept the focus of the discussion on my father. “So, you do remember who he was then?”
“Of course, I remember. What type of woman do you think I am?” she shot out, her color returning as she defended herself against my suggestion that she’d slept around.
I grunted my response to that one. Didn’t all women do that in those days, free love and all that shit?
And then it hit me: those days? I didn’t even know her age.
“That’s the problem. I don’t know you at all.”
“You don’t,” she agreed in a flat, emotionless voice. It pissed me off even more.
“And whose fault is that?”
Some of her anger subsided, and I asked her outright if the man who fathered me had been abusive. “Did he hit you? Is that why you really ran? If he did, tell me where he is, and I’ll beat the shit out of him.”
A hint of surprise twitched her features. “You’d do that for me? The woman who abandoned you?” I ignored her piss-poor attempt to throw my own words back at me.
Washing a hand down my face, I replied with a shrug, “I’d do that for any woman physically mistreated by a man. I have a moral compass, you see.”
“Well, at least you were raised as a decent person, even if I wasn’t the one to do that.”
“Oh, I am far from good. Ask any of my brothers.” I only just managed to keep the frog out of my throat, as I spoke about my family: those I considered my real family, anyway.
Luna’s head lifted as she curiously peered across at me. “You have brothers?”
“Stop changing the subject. Tell me about my father.”
Releasing an elongated sigh, she explained, “No, it was never anything like that. Your father was an important man, and I, I was a mistake.” That prickle of guilt vanished at the self-pity in her tone.
“So?” I couldn’t keep the bite out of my voice.
“Please, just let me finish.”
I did, but continued to watch her with an unimpressed expression. So far, the woman had done little to earn anything else.
As Luna lowered her hands to her lap, she glanced away. “When he found out about the pregnancy, he wanted me to get a termination.”
That revelation almost forced me to my feet, but I remained sitting. My legs were shaking, and I didn’t want to give my weakness away. “Motherfucker,” I swore under my breath, dragging her focus back. My pulse pounded in my eardrums.
Mommy not-so-dearest darted another look towards the room’s main entrance. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t cuss in here.”
I smirked unpleasantly. “Oh no, Luna, you don’t get to tell me to watch my mouth. Not now.” I hissed, my nostrils flaring with disdain.
Tapping my fingers against the cushions of the couch, I tipped my chin, glaring at her. “So, I was the dirty little secret, and the man who had sired me didn’t want to face the consequences of his actions. At least you had something in common with the douche.”
We both shifted in our seats, mirroring our shared discomfort.
“He was married, Phoenix. And his wife was already pregnant herself.” I could see how ashamed she felt by sharing that chestnut.
“His wife was in a poor emotional state at the time, and there was a chance she could have lost her baby.” Her voice cracked, backing up my theory that she was ashamed.
Ashamed for fucking a man whose wife needed him to be there for her.
At that point, my disgust for both my mother and my father intensified. “Fuck me. It keeps getting better and better. You should be on TV on one of those reality shows.” I suggested nastily.
My temper was hanging on by a thread. I only managed to calm down by reminding myself that Harper was in the next room. I didn’t want to bring her into any more unnecessary drama. “Who was he then?”
Smoothing her hair back, my mother replied in a surprisingly firm voice. “It doesn’t matter. It’s in the past. He doesn’t even know you exist.” Her words could have been considered cruel, but she said them in such a matter-of-fact way, like she was discussing someone else’s car crash of a life.
“So, you lied to him?”
Luna pursed her lips. That earlier shame had gone, and my mother now looked almost proud of her decision not to terminate her pregnancy. “Yes. He paid me off with several thousand dollars, but I didn’t get the abortion. I couldn’t go through with it.”
“You don’t say,” I snarled beneath my breath.
My mother swallowed, clearly upset by my outburst. “I knew it would have been wrong.”
“You knew it would have been wrong?” I echoed, annoyed that she attempted to play the martyr card.
“Yes. So, I disappeared for a while, went off the grid to stop him from forcing me to get rid of my baby, of you. I was scared, lost, and alone, and pregnant. I had no family or friends to turn to.”
I leaned forward in my seat, not able to grasp what she was saying. “How the hell could he have forced you?”
“As I said, the man who fathered you was a powerful man, Phoenix. He was capable of anything.”
“Was?” I questioned. If she lied to me that he was dead, I’d smash something.
“Yes. Was, is.” And there it was, the fucker was still alive.
I laughed; it wasn’t a nice sound.
When she didn’t embellish her answer, I stated in a dark voice. “Well, maybe I should pay him a little visit too, surprise him? Considering he wanted you to murder me.”
I wasn’t sure whether I felt that abortion was murder; I only said it to be crude.
The woman I was ashamed to call my mother pushed to her feet and walked around the coffee table, planting herself on the spare seat next to me.
“No, Phoenix. It wouldn’t make any difference, as he wouldn’t accept you as his.
You’d only cause more pain—for all of us, especially for your brother and me.
” Her expression was of the begging variety, and I could see that her hands were shaking.
Who was my old man to give her that reaction?
She touched my arm, but I pulled away. “Pulling out the sympathy card isn’t going to work, I’m afraid.”
“What are you going to do?” she rasped unhappily.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
Letting her hands fall onto her jean-clad legs, my mother raised her chin and asked in a desperate voice. “Please, Phoenix. Just let me finish my explanation.”
I moved slightly to put some distance between our bodies. Her scent reminded me of better times, long before this woman left me to wander the house in my own shit. “OK then. You were saying you abandoned me because you thought I was better off with strangers. On what planet does that make sense?”
Swallowing, she nodded, her eyes assessing my stance.
“But by the time I found you, they weren’t strangers.
They were your parents. I saw you together, how good they were with you.
From the report I was allowed to see, they had you lined up for all the best schools.
I couldn’t bring myself to ruin that. It had been almost a year, and you were so settled.
You looked like the picture-perfect family.
I was working in a diner for God’s sake, on a low salary. I could only just feed myself.”
I wanted to believe her. Either way, the woman had still shit on me from a massive height. She must have known that I didn’t get to stay with the Fox family (after their own little bundle of joy was born). I was cast back out into the system, and yet she still left me there.
Unless she didn’t know?
I considered that thought and wasn’t sure how I felt about that. If she didn’t know, I couldn’t continue to blame her, or could I? “But it didn’t stay that way, did it?” I added and waited for her response.
She did know I was put back into care. I was right, and I savored the sight of guilt creeping into her cheeks.
“I know, and I’m sorry. Sorry, you were forced back into the foster system.
” She just saved herself by adding. “But I didn’t find out that you were no longer with Mr. and Mrs. Fox until years later.
If I had known, I would have come back for you then.
” A likely story. “After that, you had been transferred around for a while, and I couldn’t find you.
By the time I had, you were once again settled, or so I had been told. ”
Settled. Yeah, with the Jacksons?
“So, you didn’t keep an eye on me regularly. Check your son was, OK?”
She stiffened, and I could now see the pain in her face. It was raw and must have mirrored my own, and I knew I needed to get out of there. “No, it was too hard,” she croaked.
“So why did you move back to the area now? I assume it wasn’t to find me?”
“I won’t lie to you, Phoenix. No, it wasn’t. My husband's company is the only reason we moved back this way. It’s a work thing.”
Fuck, why did that hurt so much? I only just managed to deny that foolish urge to smash something: throw one of her vases across the room.
In one fluid motion, I stood from my position and glared down my nose at her. “I think we’re done here.”
Mrs. Leibrock followed me up. I could hear her behind me as I made my way around the sofas. “Phoenix, please. Don’t leave like this. Let’s talk about it.”
“Talk about what? You clearly don’t want me here.”
“I can prove I tried to find you.”
Turning on her, she backed up a step, raising her hands as if I would hit her or some shit like that.
“You don’t need to prove shit to me. Your lame ass story doesn’t make up for anything.
You have no idea what it was like for me.
You should have come back and fought for me, especially when I was put back into the system. ”
“I couldn’t find you.”
“You didn’t even try.”
“It was too late, Phoenix.”
“Bullshit.”
My mother placed a hand on my arm again. The way I glared at her fingers caused her to let go. “Please, wait. Stay a while.”
“Why? You want to get to know me?”