Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Fine,” Luna sighed, hoping she sounded resolved. “Stay up. I’m going back to bed.”
“Hold on now.” Cody leaned one hand on the counter, the other wrapped around his empty glass.
Does he know the glass is empty?
“What did your mama tell you about me?”
She looked at Karen, then back at Cody. “That you were her boyfriend.” Which was true.
He tapped the glass on the counter several times, his eyes dug into hers. Then turned to Karen. “If that’s all you said, why did you call me Ben? I don’t go by Ben.”
“I call you Ben,” Karen said.
Luna felt her pulse in her throat. She started moving toward her mother. “This is between the two of you. I have to work tomorrow.”
Karen’s eyes kept twitching.
Nystagmus.
A word Luna wouldn’t know if not for Miley.
Luna had seen it on her mother’s face more times than she could remember . . .
Luna tried to fake a smile and failed.
Seeing her mother this intoxicated, up in the middle of the night fighting with a man she said hit her, was the last straw.
I’m the bitch, Luna mused.
Karen told Benjamin Cody that Luna was a bitch.
Of all the things said so far that night, that was the one thing Luna believed.
None of it mattered. Luna needed to remove herself from the situation and throw her mother out later.
“Go to bed, honey.”
Luna couldn’t stomach it. “Don’t,” she said, shaking her head. “Just, don’t.”
“What did you say, Karen? Did you tell her what a mean and fucked up man I am and how you love it so much you keep begging me to come back?” Cody laughed, went to take another drink. “Fuck.” He glared at the empty glass, moved closer to Luna, and grabbed the bottle of vodka again.
Luna took his distraction and attempted to move around her mother.
One side step and Cody stood between Luna and the exit to the hallway.
She stopped short of running into him.
He was too close.
So close she smelled his breath and the odor of his skin. A mix of pure grain alcohol, bad teeth, and grease from a stale hamburger.
Her words felt strong, her back was shaking. “I’m going to bed.”
Cody looked her up and down.
Luna fought the urge to pull the ends of her robe closer together.
“You look like your mama.”
Luna swallowed back the bile. She stepped to the side to move around him.
Cody blocked her.
Behind her, Karen said nothing.
Dirty fingers reached toward her, touched the edge of her robe.
Luna looked at his hand, then back to his face and hoped she looked strong. “Back off.”
This was not going to happen. Not again.
Not in her house.
He didn’t move.
“Ohhh, there she is. Karen’s little bitch.” His words were slow, his eyes barely focused.
That was her advantage, she thought.
He was drunk.
Slow.
Luna took a calculated step back, never lowering her eyes.
“Don’t push him, Luna.”
“Get him out of my way, Mom.”
Cody smiled and set his glass down.
“Let her go to bed, sugar. It’s late,” Karen said from behind Luna.
“Why would I do that? The fun just started.”
Luna felt her feet falling into quicksand.
This was fun to him. This was fun to everyone like him.
Her breath started to come in short spurts.
Cody took a step closer.
Her body wanted to move, her brain said the minute she did he would give chase. As all predators did.
Retreat wasn’t an option. Maybe threats would work.
“We called the police,” Luna said in a volume just above a whisper.
“Excuse me?”
“The police are on their way,” Luna said louder. “If you leave now, you might be able to get away before they show up.”
Cody laughed. Slow at first and then so full he tipped his head back to suck in air. “And when did you call them? Between the sink and the stove?”
Luna moved beside her mother.
Karen was looking beyond Cody to the doorway. “Miley,” she whispered.
Cody stopped laughing.
“Let’s just go.” Karen stepped closer to Cody.
Cody swung to look in the empty doorway.
Luna shouted so he wouldn’t leave the kitchen in search of her friend. “I triggered the alarm. The police will respond. My brother will be called.”
“You’re lying.”
The lights in the kitchen flickered.
Luna stepped back.
It was a warning. Ethel was warning her.
“You’re not the first angry man my mother has brought around. I triggered the alarm before I walked into the kitchen.”
Karen rushed to Cody. “They’ll send you to jail—”
Cody shoved Karen aside.
Her mother stayed on her feet but only because she was close to the wall.
Luna expected the violence but found herself jolting anyway.
Cody turned and lunged toward Luna.
She jumped back, felt her feet tangle beneath her. She caught herself from falling by grasping at the counter she knew was behind her.
Something sharp pierced her skin.
Cody’s fingertips grabbed her robe and started to pull her closer to his putrid breath.
One of the empty wine bottles was a foot away, she reached for it.
For a drunk man, Cody moved fast. Those hands on her robe pulled her back and slammed her against the counter.
The wine bottle was forgotten.
“Get off me.” She slammed her fists against his chest, but he was too close to do any harm. She thrust her knee, aiming for his groin.
He shifted, laughed, and brought his booted foot on top of her bare one.
Someone was screaming.
Luna was pretty sure it was her. Only just like the dream she was pulled from, this didn’t feel real. If she could just wake up, everything would be okay.
Cody’s body pinned her to the counter, one of his hands held one of hers down, the other fisted and hit her jaw.
She clawed at his face, drew blood.
“Bitch!”
Cody captured her neck and started to squeeze.
“Let her go!”
The sound of a shotgun being cocked echoed in the room.
The lights flickered again.
Cody’s grip on her neck loosened enough for Luna to scrape at his fingers.
He looked behind him.
Out of the corner of Luna’s eye, she saw Miley, the shotgun in her hand.
“Let her go!”
His fingers slid from Luna’s neck.
She sucked in a full breath.
Cody was laughing. His body pressed so close to Luna she felt every move his laughter created in his body. “You’re going to shoot me? And hit her?”
Karen moved in front of Miley. “Put the gun down.”
Lights flashed again.
And there were sirens.
Sirens coming closer.
“Get out of the way, Karen,” Miley yelled.
Karen waved her hands in front of her.
Luna felt the moment Cody’s attention moved from her and onto the noise coming from outside.
He crawled over her to push the kitchen curtains aside to look out the window.
“Fucking bitches.”
Luna looked for a weapon.
Anything.
She saw a scented jar candle and grasped it.
Without hesitation, she swung it with as much force as she could toward Cody’s head.
She grazed the side of his temple enough to hear a crack.
Cody stumbled as the back door of the house burst open.
That’s when she heard him.
Nate.
In a deadly voice she’d never heard before and hoped she’d never hear again.
“Body bag or jail, motherfucker.”
Cody must have been holding on to her, because when Nate’s words registered, Luna fell to the floor and was free to get away.
Sirens and flashing lights screamed into the driveway.
Cody slowly put his hands in the air.
Miley dropped the gun and ran to Luna’s side.
Three squad cars, an ambulance, and a paramedic truck were skewed all over Luna’s driveway.
Nate glared at Benjamin Cody while one of the officers finished taking Nate’s statement.
“He’s on probation for armed robbery and aggravated assault. He’s already spent five years in the state penitentiary.”
“How long will he go away for this?” Nate asked.
“Not long enough,” the officer admitted.
Nate’s finger itched. He should have taken the shot.
“He could have killed her,” Nate said, his voice low. “His hand was around her neck.”
“It’s a good thing you showed up when you did, then.”
Nate looked the officer in the eye. “Luna’s brother is Portland PD.”
“Good to know,” the officer said. “Most of us know Miley. She makes our job easier when we roll into the ER. We’ll keep an eye on this place. Make sure this asshole knows we’re watching.”
Nate stuck out his hand. “Thank you.”
The squad car carrying Cody away backed out of the driveway.
Luna sat on a gurney, her eyes tracking the police car as it left.
Nate walked over and stepped in front of her view.
She looked up slowly and tried to smile.
The light from the ambulance was enough to show the red blotch where she’d been hit. Miley was cleaning a cut on Luna’s hand while the medic was wrapping her foot in gauze.
Nate hadn’t been able to talk to her yet.
He’d kept his gun on Cody, and after a short, tense moment when the police arrived and weren’t sure who Nate was, the officers took Cody into custody and rushed him out of the house.
Miley held Luna while Karen sat in the corner and cried.
When the paramedics arrived, Nate and Miley walked her out to the ambulance where she hadn’t moved since.
Nate saw the cut on her hand. “That’s going to need stitches,” he said.
“I’m not going to the hospital,” Luna told him.
Miley looked up at Nate with a shrug. “It’s a straight cut, it needs glue. I can do it. But you should have that foot x-rayed.”
Luna glanced at her friend. “If something is broken, it can wait until tomorrow, right?”
“Yeah but . . . he was choking you,” Miley argued.
“Good thing my roommate is an ER nurse. I have faith in you.”
Nate placed a hand on Luna’s shoulder.
“Hey, Miley?” one of the officers called out. “We need your statement.”
Miley looked at Nate. “Talk some sense into her?”
Miley walked away.
“Can you give us a minute?” Nate asked the medic.
Once they were alone, Nate took Luna’s uninjured hand in his.
She rested her head on his shoulder.
“Talk to me. Why don’t you want to go?” he asked softly.
Luna nodded toward her mother.
Karen was already loaded in the back of the ambulance.
“I need to be as far from her as possible.”
“Did he hurt her?” Nate hadn’t seen any evidence of injury on Karen.
“I don’t know. I heard the medics talking to Miley. Between the alcohol and hysteria, they want to take her in for a psych eval.”
“That sounds reasonable.”
Luna shook her head. “I can’t do this again with her.
I don’t have it in me. She’ll play the victim.
Get everyone to feel sorry for her.” Luna stared up at him, wetness pulled behind her eyes.
“Then a year from now look at a picture of her and Cody and tell me how good-looking he was. How tonight wasn’t that bad.
” Luna started to cry. “I can’t . . . I can’t. ”
Nate gathered her in his arms.
Luna buried her head into his shoulder and cried.
“Shhh, it’s okay. You don’t have to go. I’ll take you to the doctor in the morning.”
Luna nodded and kept crying.
His heart was breaking for her. There was so much more here than physical pain. Injury deeper than any blade could cut.
Nate coaxed Luna off the gurney and helped her back into the house.
Later, Nate lay beside Luna long after she’d fallen asleep. She’d stopped crying once her mother was taken away. Gave her statement to the police like a seasoned pro and let Miley glue the laceration on her hand.
He heard a motorcycle in the drive and slipped out of Luna’s bed to talk to Ash.
When he stepped into the kitchen, he saw Ash holding Miley.
Nate hung back.
In all the chaos, Nate hadn’t thought about how Miley was holding up. This had to have been hard on her, too.
Ash noticed Nate and slowly pulled away. “He won’t be back,” Ash told her. “I’ll make sure of it.”
Miley followed Ash’s gaze and centered on Nate. “How is she doing?” she asked.
“Sleeping.”
“Why don’t you go to bed?” Ash asked her. “I’ll finish this in here.”
Miley had been cleaning the mess in the kitchen. Or maybe just looking at it since most of it was still there.
Broken glass, blood on the counter, empty wine bottles.
Miley nodded and turned to Nate. “You’re staying, right?”
“Of course.”
“Watch her. If she has trouble breathing, we have to take her to the hospital.”
Miley had already told him this. Her biggest concern was swelling from Cody choking her.
“I will.”
Nate watched as Miley left.
Ash was studying the wreckage of the fight, running both hands over his head.
“I should have shot him,” Nate said.
“It would have been hard for them to live in this house if you had,” Ash replied. “How is she really?”
“Sleeping but shook up.”
Ash nodded. “Where’s my mother?”
“In the hospital.”
Ash looked up.
“She’s not hurt. Psych eval . . . maybe alcohol poisoning, but from what Luna tells me, that would be hard for her to achieve considering her tolerance.”
Ash pinched the bridge of his nose.
“She’s not coming back here,” Nate said. “Her bag was packed. I’ll take it to her myself if I have to.”
“I’ll do it.”
“Good. You don’t want me to. I’d remind her who the victim was here, and how she’s not fit to call herself a mother. I protect the people I love, even if it’s against family. I’d crush her spirit so far down, she’d be on a 5150 as a danger to herself before I left.”
Ash kept nodding. “I understand.”
“I’m sure you do,” Nate said. “She’s also your mother, so . . .”
“I’ll make sure she gets back to Alabama, or wherever, far away from here. If Luna asks, tell her I dealt with it.” Ash’s shoulders slumped. “I thought maybe she’d changed.”
“Really?” Nate asked. He found that hard to believe.
Ash shook his head. “Hoped.”
Nate could live with that. “I’m going to get back to your sister.”
Once Nate left the kitchen, he heard Ash not so quietly explode.