Chapter 35 Heath
HEATH
Monday morning, I park the car around the block.
“I can go,” Rose says, from beside me.
“No. I don’t want you inside that house.” I declare. Whenever she is there, she only gets hurt. And I don’t fucking want that. Last time was enough.
“But—”
Reaching over, I kiss her to shut her up. It works because she goes soft against me.
Leaving her breathless, I caress her chin. “I’ll be out of there in no time.”
Worry swims in those eyes. “You shouldn’t be going. If my parents see you… they’ll be mad”
My chest tightens, seeing her concern. But I’d rather I get hurt than her.
“They won’t know.”
With that, I’m out of the car. As I hurry towards her house, I notice how in this neighborhood, her home is different.
While the others have neatly trimmed lawns and blooming gardens, hers contain wild, long grass that needs to be mowed.
The porch looks old and rickety, its floorboards scraped raw and its stairs creaky.
And the inside is as broken as the outside.
The house is the perfect reflection of what goes on the inside.
I don’t want Rose here. She deserves better than this and them.
Anger builds up inside of me and I curl my fingers into fists.
I need to stay calm.
In and out.
That’s the plan.
Going around the back, I climb to her room like the previous times I’ve done. Yanking up the handle of the window, I pull it up and slip inside quietly. The second I land on my feet, I take in her room. Everything seems to be glued to its place. Meaning, no one’s been here.
Taking light steps, I walk to her bed and grab her phone and charger. Next is her school bag and some of her clothes. As I stand in her closet, my hand freezes over her bra.
Now that I know how she looks without it, I don’t want to take it with me. But I know her, she’ll get stressed and I don’t fucking want that.
With a grumble, I take a bunch of her clean undergarments and quickly zip the bag.
I’m about to toss in her converse, when the door knob jiggles.
An icy cold chill runs down my spine. Not a single muscle moves in my body.
“I know you’re in here.” I hear her mother speak as she steps inside and closes the door.
If I move, she’ll know.
Silence hangs so thick in the air that I’m afraid even my breathing might be too loud.
“It’s better if you come outside.” She warns, and her voice gets closer as she appears in my vision. She’s dressed in scrubs and sneakers. Her uniform is wrinkled and has a small tear and her shoes are dirty and worn.
“I don’t have time to play games, kid.” A slight turn to the left and she’ll see me.
Kid.
Is that what she calls Rose?
Before I can think further, her head turns. Our eyes meet.
Tension winds through my muscles, drawing them taut.
I can’t breathe with how tight my chest feels.
But I refuse to lower my guard in front of this woman.
She has the advantage of inflicting pain on me and getting away. I won’t do anything to hurt her because she’s a woman. But it doesn’t make me hate her any less.
Her eyes narrow to slits and her face becomes a mask of fury.
“What are you doing in my daughter’s room?”
I hike up her backpack. “Getting her stuff.”
“Why?”
I glare at her. “Because you kicked her out and all her stuff is here.”
Something flickers through her gaze for a very short moment. If I wasn’t studying her, I wouldn’t even have caught it. “So, she’s staying with you. A guy.”
A scowl plasters itself on my face. “She wouldn’t be if you hadn’t abandoned her.”
She takes a step back as if my words hit her hard. “I didn’t abandon her,” she whispers.
“You did. You kicked her out of her home.” I argue.
“I didn’t want to.”
“But you did,” my voice is tense. I can barely hide my fury.
She gulps and squares her shoulders. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
I scoff. “Trust me, I don’t want to.” Taking a step forward, I add, “You’re just like him and that’s all I need to know—”
“I’m not!’ Tears fill her gray eyes — the color so different than Hope’s. “I’m not like him.”
My lips press together to not aggravate her. She could call in that husband of hers and I don’t want to look at his face and not pummel it.
Besides, this time my anger is directed towards her more than him.
She is the reason why my girlfriend is heartbroken.
Her own mother abandoned her. If she hadn’t asked me to come, she’d be on the roads right now and dealing with what freaks.
The thought of it all lights a furious, burning heat within me. The fire is so fierce it can burn anything.
“I’m not like him,” she repeats as tears rush down her cheeks.
No, you’re much worse.
“I love my daughter,” she says.
Then why do you hurt her?
“I didn’t mean to do it.”
But you did.
I dump the blue converse into the bag, then face her.
All I want to do is walk away from this woman. But so many questions circle around my head. I can’t let them go even if I want to.
Why do you let your husband her?
Why do you manipulate her?
Why do you stay with him?
Why do you love a monster?
Why do you do nothing?
Why. Why. WHY.
So many whys cluster in my head, but there’s one that keeps poking me.
Why did you kick her out?
The rational thing to do is leave in the middle of her mumbling, but for some strange reason, my feet stay glued to the floor.
Images of Rose crying and being utterly miserable flash in front of my eyes.
I look back at the weekend and all I remember is her sadness.
Despite the date that cheered her up, when we came home she cried in my arms and then fell asleep.
I held her the entire night, not moving at all because I didn’t want to wake her up.
My self-control starts to wither away at the thought of it.
Tension wraps around my body like a vine, tightening with every passing minute.
I can’t leave without knowing.
So I lift my head and study her face. Her eyes are red, with dark circles shadowing them, and sadness is written clearly across her features.
“Listen, I care a lot about your daughter, despite what you think.” My words capture her attention instantly, and I keep going. “I know you don’t particularly like me which is fine because I don’t fucking like you either.”
I narrow my eyes on her. “But I want to know one thing and I want the answer.”
She stares at me in waiting.
“Why did you kick her out of her own home?”
She closes her eyes, hiding away all her emotions from my sharp gaze. My jaw ticks at her tactic.
For fuck’s sake.
Her bottom lip trembles, and she slowly looks at me. “I did it… to protect her.”
“Protect her?” I ask, a little too aggressively,
“Yes.” She nods. “Alex was saying all these things, secrets that were supposed to stay hidden from Hope. She didn’t need to know that we were drunk when we…
she didn’t need to know that her father suggested that we get rid of her.
She didn’t need to know that for a week I hated that I was pregnant because all I felt was dread.
All I could think about was that my nursing career is over.
I can’t be a mother and a student. I needed to make a decision.
“Which I did. When I got my first ultrasound and saw her in the shape of a very small bean I knew I wanted her. That I would do anything for her. So I convinced Alex to keep her. But…”
A hiccup breaks out of her but she quickly recovers as if she needs to let these words out of her. “I knew he loved me and it took months for him to come around the idea of having a kid.”
Looking up at me, she says, “That night I recognized the hate and anger in him. I didn’t want Hope to get hurt by it so I asked her to leave.” A tiny, empty smile hangs on her lips. “And I knew you’d come for her. Since, I’ve noticed that you’re awfully fond of my daughter.”
That’s because I love her.
She continues, “Believe it or not, all I’ve ever done is to protect Hope. I made sure I was the target of his hits and victim of his anger. I’d get her to leave the room so she wouldn’t get in his way. I tried my best, but then he came back and started hurting her.”
“He’s been abusing her, for months,” I grit out.
She nods. “I know. I’ve seen the marks.”
“And what did you do about it?”
She stays silent and it pisses me off.
Her sob story doesn’t mean anything to me because the person I love is getting hurt because of her actions and choices.
What she needs to do is leave him.
“Maybe the person you should kick out is your husband,” I suggest.
She shakes her head. “He won’t leave me. He loves me.”
Surely, she is fucking joking.
“And the worst part is, I love him and hate him at the same time.”
She is on my shit list.
I scowl. “You need to make a choice. If you don’t leave him, your daughter will keep getting hurt.”
A few seconds pass and she doesn’t utter a word.
Anger floods through my veins seeing her like this.
Sidestepping her, I open the window and leave, not looking back at her at all. She pissed me off enough to not continue the conversation with her.
I jog back to my car and slip inside. The second Rose sees me, her face brightens up.
“You’re back,” she engulfs me in a hug. Her delicious warmth and sweet scent wraps me in entirely and my anger dissipates.
I run my palm down her back. “Of course, I’m back.”
She holds onto me for a while before letting go of me. Her eyes search mine for answers. “Did something happen?”
“No.”
Relief washes over her. Then she asks, “Did anyone see you?”
“No.”
The insightful conversation I had with her mother needs to stay under wraps. I will tell her about it, just not now.
She bites down on her lower lip, worrying it between her teeth. “Did you see anyone?”
“No. The house seemed empty.” The lie rolls off my tongue so easily. Because I don’t want her to get hurt.
She nods. “My parents must be at work.”
Your mother wasn’t. She looked like as if she knew I’d be there.
“Here’s your bag. I tossed in as many things as I could.”