I jerked up my chin. “That record I told you about. She served eight months. However, if it was up to me, after what she did to him, she’d still be in prison, rotting.”
Again several moments after I stopped, he asked, “And your brother?”
“He’s at Sunnydown. He has a TBI. Severe issues with recall. Deficits in attention and concentration. Problems reading and writing. Lack of motivation. He has episodes. Sometimes they’re seizures. Sometimes they’re aggressive. He also has regressive behaviors that the doctors think have nothing to do with the TBI and everything to do with the trauma of having our mother be a mother who was okay being shitfaced and picking up her fifteen-year-old son from a party in the rain. And that also explains the rain. He gets agitated and sometimes harms himself when it’s raining. It rained Friday night. He was spending the weekend with me. He had an episode. I tried to stop him from hurting himself, he caught me with an elbow.”
I pointed with my whole hand, fingers out straight and pressed together, to my eye and then offered my conclusion.
“That’s it. So we’re done. Finished. As you said . . . over. Thank you for listening and have a nice night. Don’t worry. I’ll lock the door after you leave.”
Again with the gentle when he replied, “There’s more to say.”
“You’re right, there is,” I agreed and then gave him exactly that. “Even if we were together, it would not be your right to pin me against shelves in a grocery store or anywhere. It would also not be your right to detain me in any way if I didn’t so wish, especially after I repeatedly asked you to step back.”
“I mentioned this the other night, but as I unfortunately conveyed, I wasn’t in a space to be as forthcoming as I should have been since I also unfortunately assumed incorrectly that you already knew. But Kavanagh Becker cooks meth. A lot of it. In this county. And he’s tight with your mother.”
I stared at him.
God.
God.
My mother.
“He’s a dangerous man,” Hixon carried on. “He cooks it and distributes it out of this county, but he doesn’t deal it in this county. Regardless, to do what he does and to get as wealthy as he is doing it, he’s good at it but doesn’t keep great company. After your mother and Becker had their fun with me, Becker paid a visit to me at my department the next day and shared your mother is not happy you’ve cut her out. It isn’t a leap, baby, with the games they played with me, the way they both were during that, to think that something broke with that and they came after you.”
Okay, well.
Damn.
That made sense.
And damn again.
Mom had a really bad guy in her corner.
I hadn’t thought of that at the time, what with losing Hixon taking precedence and all.
But I thought of it now.
I bit my lip and looked away, considering the many atrocities she could inflict on me with these new resources.
And Andy.
Shit.
“I’m sorry.”
When those words came from Hixon, I looked back at him.
He continued talking.
“I saw your eye and I’ve not been in a good way about what I said to you, how I left it between us, you blocking my calls, me worried that they might be affecting your life and how that might be, and I didn’t curb my reaction. I should have, in a grocery store, in your living room, it doesn’t matter. But you have a black eye, Greta, and I’ve had a coupla those. They don’t feel good and there’s never a good way to get one. I just jumped to what I hope you get now are valid, if erroneous, conclusions about how you got yours.”
Crap.
That made sense too.
And crap again.
If something like that was swirling around someone I cared about and I saw they had a black eye, I might pin them against some shelves too to demand their story, and I wasn’t even a six-foot-one, built, badge-wielding alpha-male.
I didn’t give him that.
I snapped, “Fine.”
“I still shouldn’t have pinned you in like that and forced a scene.”
“You’re right. Thank you for your apology. Now you’re free to leave.”
“Greta—” he started, his body moving like he was going to make a move to come to me.
“Don’t,” I whispered and he froze. “Not again, Hixon. Just don’t.”
“Corinne knows about us.”
And another time that night, my head twitched in confusion at his sudden, bewildering announcement.
“Sorry?”
“My daughter. Corinne. Hope told her about us. She’s . . . not pleased. She sees it as a betrayal of her mother. On the other hand, Shaw already knew, talk in school, his girlfriend filled him in so he wouldn’t get surprised if kids said something to him. He’s cool with it. But he wasn’t cool with his mother sharing news he knows I would have shared when the time came to share it. He’s been having issues with Hope for a while, with what she did to our family, those came to a head, and right after Corinne blasted me, he called and asked to live with me. All this happened on the way to Becker’s. I actually hung up with Shaw getting out of my truck at the foot of the stairs to his house. Then I walked in and got hit with your mom and Becker’s form of fun. I took that out on you—”
I interrupted him to confirm, “You did.”
“And it was wrong,” he carried on.
“It was,” I agreed.
“And I regretted it almost as soon as it happened.”
“And you show this by calling me the next morning and telling me what I should do when I run my mouth?”
“Then I was pissed at Lou.”
“I see.” I nodded. “And you took that out on me.”
He bent and leaned into both hands on the back of the couch, his head tipped back to keep hold on my eyes, and I lamented the fact he looked amazing doing that too.
“Right,” he started, “I get this doesn’t look good for me and I get why. I totally get that, sweetheart. But I’ll point out, I don’t usually have a nineteen-year marriage ending because my wife didn’t get a promise from me I’d buy her some fancy-assed ring for our twentieth . . .”
He trailed off and studied me, not moving from his position.
And I knew I gave it away.
“You knew,” he said quietly.
I pressed my lips together but they unpressed themselves to blurt, “I’m sorry, Hixon. Everyone knew.”
“Right,” he muttered, oddly not looking pissed out of his brain, as he should be. “Whatever,” he kept muttering.
Whoa.
Whatever?