Chapter Twenty-Six – Diesel
Hours later, Diesel found himself back in Brookings, his hometown, at the same diner he’d met Digger, Bunny, and a two-year-old CJ. He didn’t go in. Sometimes, when he came to reflect over the years, he did. He’d pick up a random girl to fuck. Either a waitress or a patron that he charmed.
But Jana was at home. Even so far away, he didn’t want to stick his cock in another woman. Whether she cared, in his mind, she deserved better.
He glanced at his watch. It was almost seven. He hadn’t eaten in hours. He wasn’t hungry, though.
He just wanted…he wanted his mom. Not the woman who gave birth to him. Fuck her. It was Aunt Meggie. The woman he always deserted to stand at Uncle Christopher’s side. The woman who loved him as her own anyway.
Maybe he’d kept his anger at bay when he discovered what Uncle Christopher did because he didn’t want to lose complete control.
Realizing he’d driven her away left him so fucking furious.
And, yet, he buried it. He took CJ’s route and seethed with resentment and indignation.
The one time Diesel needed to open his fucking mouth and confront a motherfucker on behalf of a woman who deserved his loyalty, he clammed up.
Did he even deserve Aunt Meggie?
He’d find no answers in the nearly empty diner, so he rode away.
Brookings was called the Wild Rivers Coast because of the area’s many rivers and the rugged Pacific coastline.
The day Digger ran across Diesel had been a fluke.
He preferred the untamed beauty of the shoreline.
With nothing to do and no one to care, he’d walk hours, rummaging for food and a safe place to rest. Generally, he was smelly, hungry, and ready to end it all.
Three weeks before that fateful meeting, he’d met a college girl and she’d given him a place to stay, fed him, and bought him two changes of clothes.
She was pretty, so her demand that he fuck her in exchange for her help hadn’t been an issue.
Then, she offered him stability only if he followed every instruction she gave.
Sleep with her friends? Check. In his fifteen-year-old-mind, it was more free pussy.
Clean her house? If it kept him fed and off the streets?
A very small price to pay. Walk her annoying ass motherfucking dog when that little bastard hated anyone other than his owner?
Fine. Whatever. Diesel hadn’t liked it, but he’d done it.
The one thing he’d asked of her, the only thing that still mattered to him, was that she help him get back in school. She’d declined and gave him an ultimatum. Forget school and focus on what she wanted, or leave.
The next day, she dropped him off at the diner. He’d been too down to make it back to a beach and hadn’t known what he’d do. So many people looked at him with derision or sympathy, but none offered assistance. Twenty-four hours later, his life changed forever.
Hating those memories, Diesel headed to Lone Ranch Beach.
In the gravel parking area, he killed his engine, but didn’t dismount, restlessness still plaguing him.
The crashing waves once lulled him to sleep.
He’d comb the beach for unique shells, realize he had no place for them, and move on.
Now, he had more than enough space. He also had someone who would find them fascinating simply because he did—Axel.
What the fuck was Diesel doing? He was hours away from his family. The ride from Hortensia to here took nearly seven hours. Traveling down I-5 was easy enough, until Grant’s Pass, where he had to veer off to 199 that took him into California and finally Hwy 101.
Yet, for the first time ever, he didn’t look forward to going home. Aunt Meggie wasn’t there—and Jana was.
What the fuck had he done?
Knowing he’d find no peace, Diesel started his bike and roared away. His destination? The other side of town with overgrowth and rundown homes. The one he sought had a yard filled with all types of junk.
He’d never knocked on the door. Just then, he wasn’t even sure if his father still lived at that address. He’d found him through property records three years ago. And hadn’t been able to bring himself to see him and hear…what?
He deserved to hear something. Diesel could finally understand why his father left him, too. Because he’d had a responsibility to his underaged son as well.
Just like Uncle Christopher had with Rule.
Still, he was there for a completely selfish reason. After all these years, if his father really was behind that door, he wanted to ask him how he’d coped after Theresa left. What had he done to find her, win her back if he had? How had he finally accepted that she’d left and would never return?
Shaking his head, Diesel laughed softly. The motherfucker left. That’s how he’d coped. Because he’d been devastated. Broken. Unable to face life without his wife.
That decided him. Killing his engine, Diesel dismounted and forced himself to wade through the beer bottles, old stove, overgrowth, broken dishes, and rocks.
He stared at the screen door with the torn screen and loose handle. Swallowing, he forced himself to knock, praying Skylar Rivers no longer resided there.
Then the outside light flickered own, bathing him in a single spotlight, the main character in his own tragedy. The thin door scraped open and a man in boxers stood there.
Gaunt except for his beer belly, unshaven, and reeking of smoke and alcohol. The smell of an unwashed body hit Diesel’s nostrils.
“Diesel?”
He swallowed, an anticlimactic moment that left him hollow inside. “Hello, Dad.”
He swept his gaze over Diesel, then hocked a wad of spit, finally stepping aside and indicating the inside of the place with a wave of his hand. “Come in.”
Walking into the living room was like déjà vu.
It was filthy, cramped, just as their place had been after his mother left them.
The air was stale and musty. This would’ve been his destiny if luck hadn’t shone on Diesel and made his father turn his back on him.
He would’ve stayed at his father’s side out of guilt and loyalty.
“Have a seat.”
“I, uh, I can’t stay. I was in the area.”
The floor creaked as Skylar walked to the torn leather recliner and sat, scratching his balls. Diesel frowned.
“You must be here for a fucking reason, boy.”
He no longer knew what that was. Looking back was never a good idea. It wouldn’t change what had happened. It wouldn’t change how miserable he was because his entire foundation had been shaken up again.
Diesel started to turn. “This was a mistake, Skylar.”
“Hey, you little shit. Respect me. I’m still your old man.”
“Biologically,” Diesel snapped. “Any other way? You were a fucking failure.”
Skylar jumped up. “Watch your fucking mouth.”
“Fuck you! You fucking left me, motherfucker.” It was true. Despite empathizing with his father’s predicament, he left Diesel, too. “You deserted me just like she did. I was fifteen. I didn’t know what the fuck to do. The first three days, I didn’t even know where the fuck to get food.”
“You fucking survived, so stop whining. That’s all that cunt ever fucking did. Whine and complain. She should’ve kissed my fucking cock every fucking day for even keeping her after she refused to get rid of you. I didn’t want no fucking kid. I had enough problems with that bitch.”
“She was your fucking wife!”
“She was a fucking cock tease! Switching her ass around me, tempting me with her young pussy.”
“So it was true? She was what? Sixteen? Seventeen?”
“She was fourteen when we met, fifteen when I knocked her up.”
Rebel crossed his mind. Suddenly, Diesel wanted to throw up.
“And you were how old?”
Skylar shrugged. “About forty. That don’t matter. The cunts rule our cocks.”
“She was a fucking child, fuckhead!”
Skylar glared at him. “I told you once, I’m not taking your lip.”
Before he completely fell apart, Diesel needed to leave. But he knew so little about his parents and Skylar seemed to be in a talkative mood. “How’d you meet her?”
“Lived next door to her and her folks,” he said around a rancid belch. “Always saw her skipping around in those short little uniforms, pretending she didn’t want me to see her pussy.”
“She was a waitress?”
“A JV cheerleader. Flaunting her ass at me when she practiced with her friends. Gave me her pussy the first night we went out on a date. Wasn’t even no virgin.
Her momma and daddy thought she was the bees knees.
Threw her the fuck out when she ended up knocked up.
Church fearing people didn’t countenance a whore. ”
“So she turned to you,” Diesel guessed raggedly.
“Those bible-quoting fuckers threatened me with jail. Unless I made an honest woman out of her. I married her. Regretted that shit every day of my fucking life. She was a smart-mouthed cunt. Couldn’t fucking stand her. That’s why I had to slap that bitch around almost every day.”
“No wonder she fucking left,” Diesel screamed, visions of pulling his piece and shooting the fuck out of Skylar dancing in his head.
“Left?” Skylar guffawed. “I did tell you that, huh? I beat that cunt to within an inch of her fucking life, dumped her in front of the hospital, and left the rent money for her care. Shit got a little out of hand and I felt guilty.”
“Did she survive?”
His gray eyes twinkled. “She did. Didn’t know me from the next motherfucker.”
Diesel balled his hands into fists. “You left her brain-damaged?”
“Short term memory loss.” He sounded so fucking pleased with himself. “Last time I saw her with her fucking brats, she still didn’t remember me, so I know she didn’t remember pushing you out of her pussy.”
Diesel’s body shook, rage like he’d never known before coursing through his veins. His sperm donor—he refused to call that motherfucker his father from here on out—was responsible for so much misery and had the goddamn gall to be proud of himself for it.
“I was your biggest defender,” Diesel croaked, on the verge of a breakdown.
Pure spite prevented his tears from falling, as he refused to cry in front of that walking shit stain.
“I spent most of my fucking life feeling sorry for you and hating her, when you didn’t deserve an ounce of my fucking pity!
I couldn’t appreciate what I had, the luxury I’d been gifted, all because of the damage you caused.
Everyone around me tried to get me to understand what an asshole you were, but I refused to believe it.
I denied their words, fucking disregarding their advice, made a fool of myself for nothing. ”
Skylar snorted. “Never asked you to do that shit, boy. Never even wanted you.”
Despite everything, the words crushed him.
“You motherfucker,” he whispered, debating if he should give into the urge to pull out his piece, or circle back when he was in his vehicle to scoop him up and give him what he deserved.
Someone like Skylar Rivers didn’t deserve a quick death. Being a shitty father was the least of his crimes. He was a pedophilic woman abuser who didn’t give a damn that he was the scum of the Earth.
Diesel barely felt the blow to his jaw, but the action was enough to set him off.
Unable to take anymore, Diesel let out a roar of anger, interrupting whatever Skylar was about to say.
His fingers found his donor’s eye sockets, digging into the motherfuckers.
Skylar let out a pained holler, but Diesel didn’t care.
Not withdrawing his fingers, Diesel shoved his father against the dirty wall of the trailer, slamming his head against it three times in a row.
His screams had faded into pathetic sobs, and blood coated Diesel’s fingers.
He withdrew them, letting his father slump to the floor.
His rage hadn’t let up, though, so he kicked the motherfucker in his big beer belly and filthy fucking mouth, stomped on his damaging hands and vile cock.
Each hit was vindicating, payment for everything Skylar took from Diesel, and justice for all the torment he put Theresa through.
The beating was also an apology to his mother, a blood offering for a woman who likely didn’t remember him, but whom Diesel spent years blaming for his abandonment. When the true culprit was sniveling at his feet, the pained moans and shallow breathing his only indication of life.
He only stopped when his leg began to feel sore.
Chances were high that Skylar would die if Diesel walked out, but he was never one to leave loose ends.
He dropped to his knees, straddling his sperm donor as he wrapped his hands around Skylar’s throat, staring at his bloody face as he choked the fuck out of him.
He didn’t let up until Skylar pissed himself and went limp, his annoying whines finally ending.
Diesel released Skylar and stood. Breathing heavily, he stared at the corpse, his body still trembling with latent fury. Blood leaked from an eye and his nose, bruises covered his body, and he was positive his beating had broken a bone or two. Still, his death had been too fucking easy.
Thinking of his mother, who’d been thirty when Skylar ruined her fucking life, he kicked that motherfucker’s cock, his head, his ribs, hating him more than he’d ever hated anyone.
How many fucking years had his mother’s desertion tormented him? He’d blamed her. Despised her. Never finding peace, happiness, or gratefulness.
All because of the piece of shit laid out at his feet.
He stumbled outside and dropped onto the stoop, hanging his head in his hands and sobbing. For Theresa and for himself. For all the years he’d wasted on hate and misery.
For allowing himself to be fundamentally changed by the bitterness that had eroded everything good in him.
For that alone, Diesel would hate Skylar Rivers for the rest of his fucking life.