everyone else is a kid.”
“Are you talking about the kid downstairs or yourself?” Kane asked.
“What difference does it make?” she snapped.
Braden’s jaw set tight. “Peyton, I want this room clean, and I want it tidy before the weekend. I want you to pick up your things downstairs in the living room and start taking some pride in yourself again. Half the time you smell like cigarettes and booze.”
She stuck her lip out and pouted, something she often did whenever Braden scolded her. “I’m too old for you to tell me what to do.”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass if you’re forty nine and holding. I want you to call your softball coach and ask her to consider letting you try out late for the team. One C on your report card, and you’re grounded. Ditch school again, and you’re spanked.”
“Fine.”
“Then-”
“Oh fuck you, Braden! You aren’t my father.”
He stared at her dumbfounded. “No, you’re right. I’m not your father but I am still a man who cares about you. We all care about you, Peyton. Hell, Kane even saved your life. Maybe someday when you drag yourself out of self pity, you’ll let me show you a clip from the video footage I have. He’s lucky he didn’t die trying to save you.”
Peyton didn’t look up. She couldn’t look up. She slipped deeper into her own misery and couldn’t save herself from the freefall.
“She’s drinking in her room too.” Kane handed the glass to Braden.
“You’re tattling on me?” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I have a right to do what I want in this room. Braden, you said so yourself. It’s my room. I have the right to bring whatever I want into my own room.”
“If it’s legal,” Evan pointed out as soon as he appeared there too.
“Alcohol is legal!”
“If you’re twenty-one.” Evan continued to stick his nose where she didn’t think it belonged, “And you’re not twenty-one.”
“Gang up on me all you want but it’s not going to change anything.”
“It might,” Evan said.
“Young lady, I’m just getting started too after what your friend told us downstairs.” Braden tilted her chin, and she knew he wanted to see her squirm.
Kane sat down in the rocking chair. He looked like he planned to stay awhile.
“First of all, I want your keys,” Braden deadpanned.
“My keys?” she wailed.
“Yes, now.” Braden stood his ground.
“You can’t take my keys. You made me sell my car and without the one you gave me, I’ll have to bum rides.”
“You have three bums ready to sign on as your personal chauffeurs.” Evan smirked and added, “Then we can get a good look at that pervert who thinks he’s going to make you his mistress.”
She swallowed stiffly. She should’ve known they’d find out. The rumors were all over school.
“I’m eighteen years old. I can do what I want when I want.”
“Not while you’re living here,” Braden said. “You’re seeing a married man, Peyton.”
Kane’s jaw muscles tensed and he clenched his fist. “She’s what?”
“Tell him, Peyton,” Braden encouraged. “It’s out all over town. You’ll hear about it Kane, trust me. Everybody but the man’s wife knows it.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Peyton said. And they really didn’t. She’d decided not to sleep with that guy anyway, because he did have a wife. In fact, in recent days, she’d decided she might die a virgin.
“Oh I think we do,” Evan said.
“That boy down there doesn’t know anything about me,” she informed.
“He knew enough to have your little pointed teeth bite him right above the belt. I’m willing to bet he knows what it feels like to have your lips on his, your bare breasts against his chest…” Kane shifted in the chair and she saw the raw hunger, almost heard it in his voice before he allowed her to see the bulge in between his legs, and he let her see. He splayed his legs and they fell right open encouraging her to look, never mind want.
“I’m not worried about a kid. I’m more worried about the family she’s setting out to destroy,” Braden said.
For a second Peyton wondered if he was talking about the married guy again-David Taylor’s family-or the family she disrupted when she moved in with them.
“The man has a wife, Peyton.” Braden said. She didn’t want to look at him. She felt his gaze burning through her. “A wife and two kids.”
She shrugged. “Maybe he’s tired of her.”
“Shit, I’m not going to listen to this,” Evan said, “Peyton, if you want to whore yourself out to a married man then you go right at it, but the sad thing is David Taylor is…was a good man. He’s never had the first bit of trouble making his ends meet, raising his family, and taking care of his pretty little wife. You’re starting trouble with a married man who doesn’t need it. Walk the fuck away. Be decent for a change. You used to have some decency in you before the…”
“Say it,” she mumbled.
“I don’t need to say it. You were there. You know…”
“I want you to say it! I want you to say it so I can hear it! I want to know I made it out of there. I want someone to tell me how lucky I was to make it out alive but only after I remember everything I can remember about that day. I’m tired of everyone tiptoeing around it, afraid to tell me how horrible and awful it was. I know how horrific it was but I…want…you…to…say…it!”
By the time she’d screamed her head off, she stood in front of Evan with her hands nothing more than tight fists. She stretched up on her tiptoes and for a minute, she thought she might swing at him, fight out her anger regardless of where she displaced it.
“You wanna know?” Braden’s shock made her feel pathetic. “Then I’ll let you see. I’ll show it to you. My camera captured it all.”
“No,” Kane warned.
“Yeah, it’s time. She’s right. We’ve tried to protect her and instead of helping her, we drove her away, into her own world and the guilt-the package you shouldn’t even think about carrying, Peyton- is tearing her apart. I’ll be right back.” Braden disappeared into the hallway after he agreed to show her the footage.
“And don’t you ever call me a whore.” She glared at Evan and then at Kane. “I would’ve gladly been your whore or yours,” she looked back to Evan again, “but I wasn’t woman enough for a Cartwell man.”
Evan’s voice softened but Kane shook his head and looked down at his hands. “Peyton, that’s not true.”
“What a sorry bastard,” she said turning to Kane. “You’re not going to admit it or deny it.” She wasn’t good enough. His actions spoke louder than words anyway. At one time, she thought he wanted her, but now everything she thought they shared seemed like a distant dream.
Braden came back with the DVD in hand. He turned on the DVD player and her television and then settled on the bed next to her. He tossed the remote to Evan who hit play.
Peyton took a deep breath and watched as the events Braden captured on camera told several tales of one blood spilling afternoon.
“I hope you’re happy.” Kane’s accusatory tone of superiority often pissed them off. He hoped it made them fighting mad. He was pissed now and they caused it.
“She wanted it over, behind her.” Braden grabbed a beer from the fridge.
“So you had to show her the way it all happened?” Kane’s face tensed as he relived the memory of watching her glance over at him throughout the recorded footage. His voice rang out over everyone else’s that day. It wasn’t until then, until he watched everything Braden’s camera captured, that he realized he carried something deep for
