Chapter 41 Haven
Haven
A silent scream echoes in my head, but my throat is too tight to let it escape. My lungs won’t fill. My vision narrows to a tunnel, and at the end of it stands the shriveled husk of a man I thought—I’d fucking hoped—I’d never see again.
My father.
Robert ‘Bobby’ Lee, poster boy for the government’s next ‘This is your brain on drugs’ campaign.
Tattered flannel shirt, holes burned through the fabric by cigarette embers.
Jeans crusted with God-knows-what. Grubby sneakers, one with a hole by the big toe.
Hair like oily straw stuck to his skull in sweaty clumps.
The stench of sour beer, unwashed skin, musty clothes hits me as hard as the memories do before a gust of wind whips it away. This was the smell of my childhood home—a dilapidated single-wide in the crummiest part of the trailer park.
The smell of poverty, addiction…of fear.
And beneath it all, the stench of rot—his teeth, his gums, his fucking soul.
I can’t breathe.
Can’t move.
Can’t fucking think.
Kai positions himself in front of me like a human shield, but it’s too late. I’m already drowning in shame so thick it coats my skin like tar.
Dad sidesteps to keep me in his sight. “Took me two goddamn buses and five miles of walking to find your squirrely ass, princess.”
The sound of his voice—that fucking nickname—makes my skin crawl. In my head, I’m already back in my car with the doors locked and the engine revving.
But my body is concrete, feet anchored to the ground by panic.
“Back off, Bobby,” Kai warns, squaring his shoulders.
Dad’s bloodshot eyes narrow as he peers up at Kai. “The hell you doing here?” His eyes become slits. “You part of this scam too? Always were thick as thieves.”
“Fuck right off,” Kai snaps.
His gaze slides off Kai and locks onto me with a clarity that makes my stomach turn. For a second—just a split second—I see a flash of the man he used to be.
Before the drugs and cheap liquor gnawed away at his conscience.
Before he started trading me to Uncle Lenny for meth.
“Ain’t going nowhere.” Dad scratches at the patchy stubble on his jaw, dirt-crusted fingernails leaving red marks on his skin. “Some uppity bitch calls me last week—”
He pauses to cough. I try not to evaporate in utter shame.
Oh my God, Nora.
I’m going to kill you.
“—bitch says I gotta come down to the school and sign something because my fucking runt of a daughter got herself enrolled here. Fucking genius, princess, thinking I got money for this kind of shit.”
“Now I’m on the hook for this bullshit?” He throws a hand toward the campus building looming in the distance. “How the fuck did you even get through those doors, huh? You take it up the ass?”
“You’re not on the hook for anything, Da—“ I cut off hurriedly, glancing at the sightseers around me.
Because people are staring. Nothing draws attention like someone else’s misery. I see them whispering, pulling out their phones, craning their heads to get a better look at the piece of Riverside trash polluting their pristine campus.
“This is none of your fucking business,” Kai barks at the onlookers.
One of Kai’s friends comes up to us. “Should I call security?”
Oh God.
Kai waves him away.
Guess it’s a little late to pretend we’re not related, though. Anyone within earshot knows the truth.
“Think I’m an idiot, princess? Bitch said I gotta sign something.” He stabs a finger into his own chest. “Means I’m on the fucking hook!”
“Jesus, Bobby, you don’t owe anything,” Kai says, trying to block me from my dad’s angry glare.
Shame hot enough to melt metal burns through me.
“Let’s talk someplace else, okay?” I grab Dad’s arm, feeling the sharp angles of bone beneath his paper-thin skin, and try to tug him to the fringes of the crowd.
He plants his feet, his wiry strength catching me off guard.
He used to be burly, but addiction melted his muscles and stooped his back.
“Ain’t getting rid of me that easy. You run off without a word, take my fucking car.
” He grabs my arm, giving me a violent jerk that rattles my teeth.
“That how you get in here? You sell my fucking car, you cunt?”
His breath is a toxic cloud that makes my eyes water. I try not to flinch, try not to show how much it makes my stomach turn, but it’s impossible. People closest to him draw back when they catch a whiff of the liquor oozing out of his pores.
“I’d have to pay someone to take that fucking junker, Dad.” I yank myself free, and, surprisingly, he lets go. Or maybe he’s used up all his strength for the day. He looks strung out—sweaty, pale, shaking. Cut off from his supply by now, I’m guessing.
Withdrawal’s a bitch.
A flutter of satisfaction somehow works its way past the panic.
He deserves every godawful second of it.
“She got a scholarship,” Kai says, and I swing to glare at him, because this has got fuck all to do with him.
“That why you disappeared on me, you ungrateful little bitch?” He lets out a laugh wetter and more ragged than his smoker’s cough. “Here I thought you gone and offed yourself like Ginny.”
Coldness crashes over me, like I’ve been dunked in ice water.
“When did you ever give a shit about me?” I spit out.
His face hardens. “Don’t you talk to me like that. I’m your fucking father.”
“Yeah?” I laugh bitterly. “Could’ve fooled me.”
A flash of anger crosses his weathered face. “Now listen here—”
“Back the fuck off.” Kai shoves him before he can finish, sending him stumbling back a step. The crowd parts even more, until there’s an empty swathe around the three of us.
Dad’s eyes narrow, his gaze flicking between me and Kai. “You’re the one that put all these fancy ideas in her head, aren’t ya?”
His voice is getting louder. Or maybe it’s because everyone around us has fallen silent. My eyes prick with tears of humiliation as I feel their stares boring into me.
“Please, Dad, let’s just go talk somewhere else.”
But he’s too far gone, too caught up in his rage. “Think you’re too good for Riverside, don’t ya? Too good for your own family!”
“Shut up,” Kai hisses, stepping forward like he’s ready to throw a punch.
“Or what, son?” Dad sneers. “You wanna try your luck with me again? Promise you’ll eat dirt just like you did last time.”
Kai shows him his teeth, hands curling into fists.
I press my palms against my eyes, wishing I could disappear. Wishing I’d never come back to this fucking town. Wishing I’d stepped off that cliff when I had the chance. Wishing I’d taken that gun and turned it on myself after—
“Excuse me. Is there a problem here?”
A smooth voice slices through the chaos, and my blood turns to ice in my veins. I don’t need to look to know who it is. My body already knows, already reacting—skin tightening, pulse skyrocketing, core clenching like the treacherous fucking thing it is.
Bastian.
He moves to stand beside me, his presence a dark, solid weight. Impeccable, despite the gusting wind ruffling his hair. The crisp scent of his cologne cuts through the stench of my father’s unwashed body, and for the tiniest second, I’m so fucking grateful I could lick his fucking shoes.
“Who the fuck are you?” Dad demands.
“Professor Bastian Rooke.” His voice is calm, controlled. He offers a leather-gloved hand, which my father ignores. “I believe there’s been a misunderstanding, Mr. Lee.”
“Gee, ya think?”
“To reiterate, Miss Lee received a scholarship. That means you don’t owe us anything,” Bastian explains with the charm of a snake oil salesman. “And you never will. Your daughter scored a full ride.”
Dad’s eyes narrow with suspicion. “Her? She can’t even fucking cook.”
Kai turns on Bastian, his face flushed with anger. “I’ve got this.”
Bastian ignores him, addressing the people surrounding us, mostly students, but some parents and faculty members too. “None of this concerns you.”
When only a handful of the crowd moves away, he claps his hands. “Fuck around and find out, folks.”
The threat in his voice is unmistakable. Students scatter like he pointed a rifle at them. The older people in the crowd should have taken offense, and probably some did, but they’re right behind the rest.
In seconds, we’re suddenly at the edge of the crowd.
When Bastian looks back at Bobby, my dad actually flinches a little.
“Tell you what, Mr. Lee. You seem like a reasonable man.”
And he says it with a straight fucking face and everything.
My disgust for Bastian and what he did to me is still there, still filling me with rage and shame, but I’d do anything to get out of this situation…even if that means allowing him to take charge.
“Why don’t I address your concerns over lunch?” Bastian suggests, as if they’re just two men hashing out some paperwork. “Unless you’ve already eaten?”
Dad grimaces. “Don’t want your fucking handouts, cocksucker. I came here for her.” He lunges forward, grabbing my wrist with surprising strength. His too-long nails dig into my skin, breaking the surface. “We gotta talk, princess.”
“Okay, okay,” I whisper, rummaging in my tote bag to find my phone. “Let me give you my new number, then you can call me—”
As soon as my phone is out of the bag, my dad swipes it out of my hand and hurls it onto the ground. Between Dad’s fury and the hard paving, the phone doesn’t stand a chance. It shatters, glass and fragments of plastic scattering.
RIP, you cheap piece of shit.
I’m still staring down at the carnage when my dad gives my wrist a violent twist.
“Look at me when I’m talkin’ t’you!”
The pain yanks a cry from my throat, and then everything happens at once.
Kai grabs my father’s arm, wrenching his fingers off me. Bastian seizes his other arm. Together, they drag him toward one of the paths leading to the parking lot.
Away from the crowds.
Away from me.
“Let go of me, you fuckers!” Dad yells, his voice echoing across the quad as he thrashes with them.
I stand frozen as they haul my screaming father away.