Chapter Twenty-Three
Mal
"I once looked up to you. Now look at you. I think less of you than the cum rag I keep in my goddamn nightstand."
My father's attention jerked up when I burst into his office. He was seated at his desk, doing what appeared to be paperwork. His pinched face and open mouth had me pausing.
He wasn't alone. Someone was under his desk. "Damn it, boy. Can't you see I'm busy?"
One of the nurses crawled out from his desk on her hands and knees. A vein jumped in my temple when my father bent down to slap her ass. "Hey, who said you were done?"
"Oh—" The nurse flicked her gaze to me, wetting her lips. "Will you be joining us, Dr. Rook? I have two holes. You can fuck my ass while your dad takes my pussy."
Her voice was all silk and honey in an attempt to lure me over. Couldn't blame her, fucking her old skin-sack of a boss had to get old.
"Get the fuck out." The nurse jumped at my barked command. Instead of leaving, she looked back at my father as if unsure of what to do, and I snarled louder, "Leave!"
He rolled his eyes at me, as if we'd slipped into a parallel dimension where I was the disappointment. "Do you fucking mind, Mal? I'll be getting blue balls now, thanks to you."
"I don't give two fucks." My knuckles cracked as I gripped the edge of his desk.
I held on for dear life. If I let go, I didn't trust myself not to wrap my hands around his throat and watch the light slowly leech from his eyes.
Getting put away for murder wasn't the ideal outcome, as much as I was considering it.
"You're lucky I don't have you neutered like the rabid dog you are. "
Satisfaction coiled through me at his taken aback expression, as if I'd struck him with an invisible force far heavier than a backhand. He recovered quickly and kicked back in his chair, glaring at me over his steepled fingers.
"What are you referring to, exactly, boy?"
"Call me Doctor or don't call me anything." Every syllable dripped with acid. "I'm twice the physician you'll ever be."
"You're wandering into dangerous territory, Son. You'd better tell me what has your nuts in a twist. I'd like to know the reason for firing my own boy before I make it official."
"Fire me, then! I never wanted to work in this hellhole to begin with. In fact, the only reason I agreed to go to Brown was so that I could get the fuck away from here.”
"You're wandering into dangerous territory—"
"What did you do to Barbara Reed?" I pressed, leaning over his desk to shove my sneer in his face. "Did you rape her?"
"Which one is Barbara Reed again?"
Bile scorched my throat. If that wasn't enough context to narrow the patient down for him, that meant she wasn't the only one. "Fucking nurses is one thing. But patients? And a sexual assault survivor at that? Jesus fucking Christ, she's barely eighteen!"
"She's legal. That's all that matters. Besides, whatever she told you is a lie. I was simply giving her a standard physical examination, as doctors do."
"Since when does a standard physical require you to put your fingers between her legs? And don't you dare use her miscarriage as an excuse. She's healthy. And if it had been a simple exam as you say, she wouldn't be up in my office shaking like a leaf."
"You're reading into the behaviors of a mentally ill murderer. And frankly, your attachment to this imbecilic child is embarrassing.”
Pain shot through my skull as my teeth ground together. Imbecilic was not only outdated, but just about all respectable mental health facilities had abandoned the derogatory term. Not my father.
"I thought better of you, and I'm in awe, really. Because the bar was so low before this, it's in Hell. And if you call her or any of my patients for that matter, imbecilic again—"
"Mal, my dear boy. You're blowing this out of proportion. Just like your mother used to. You're so much like her."
"Don't bring my mother into this."
"See? You're like a woman, without all the useful parts.
Doesn't matter how fancy an education I buy you, or that I raised you exactly as my father raised me.
Squandered effort on my part." He rose from his chair, buttoning his pants while holding my eye contact.
That patronizing grin he wore had me barreling dangerously close to my last nerve.
“You're a pussy, Mal. And I'm ashamed to call you my son. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if your whore of a mother cheated on me. You have the stink of a bastard to you."
Something inside me broke.
He strode past me, arrogant enough to turn his back on me. I lunged, hands wrapping around his throat. A strangled grunt of surprise caught in his throat, the vibrations against my palms practically goading me to squeeze harder.
He threw all his weight backward, sending me crashing into his desk.
He whipped around, faster than I'd ever seen him move before.
Reaching for me, his hand wrapped around my throat and hoisted me high into the air so that the tips of my shoes barely scraped the floor.
How—? It wasn't possible for a man of his age, with his lifestyle, to be this absurdly strong.
With his arm stretched over his head, his sleeve slid down his forearm to reveal veins that looked as though his blood had been replaced with a toxic sludge, so bright they were nearly incandescent.
"My experimental drug," he said, answering the silent question written on my reddened face. "The one you called a waste of time and money. Does it look like a waste now, Dr. Rook?"
I tried to fire off a curse, only for it to lodge in my blocked airway, coming out as a gurgle.
"You know what? I'm feeling magnanimous today.
Instead of killing you, because that would be a waste, I'm going to make you strong, like me. I'm not even going to fire you. That would be too easy.” His frame loomed over me, and peering into his hooded gaze, I saw no trace of the man who’d raised me.
He pressed his foot to my throat, making me wince at the pressure applied to the rapidly forming bruises his iron-grip left.
Dark pin pricks spotted my vision, spreading until the darkness was all I could see.
Despite the fact that I was seconds away from passing out, I could hear the click of the phone and my father’s voice a few beats later.
“Send two orderlies to fetch Barbara Reed. She’s in the Bell Tower.
Have her delivered to the surgery ward for an immediate operation. ”
He fell quiet, simmering in a brief silence. My heart lifted with hope. Was he reconsidering? Had he come to his senses?
“Oh, one more thing, Nurse. Confiscate that raggedy bunny rabbit from her, and throw it in the incinerator.”