“Why you crying, baby?” I looked up into his deep dark gaze. His eyes said that he will take care of me. That he will protect me. That he will comfort me. But—
“The new you frightens me.” I whispered, deciding to tell him the truth.
“Why?”
I shook my head, not able to put my thoughts into words. Maybe it’s because he was so close. His nearness was a major distraction. Turning, I walked a short distance to the fence, looking out over the expanse of my land.
He didn’t let me put the space between us. He walked up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist, pulling me close.
“Gabe.”
“Hmmm.”
“I can’t have any more children, something went wrong during the birth of our twins and they had to give me a hysterectomy to stop the bleeding.” I waited to feel him stiffen, or anything that would indicate that my words had affected him in any way.
He put his hands on my waist and turned me so that I faced him. I exhaled when I saw the care, and comfort that was still there in his eyes, but there was something else. He didn’t speak right away, he just took me in. His gaze raked over my hair, my face, my neck.
“I never told you what happened the night my father died did I?”
I blinked up at him shocked. This was a no no topic around these parts. Biting my lip, I shook my head. He continued to study me. I could tell he really didn’t want to speak on it, but somehow, he felt as if he had to.
I touched his arm.
“You don’t have to tell me.” He shook his head.
“No, I do. I want you to know why the new me is necessary.” He looked off into the distance and then he began to speak.
“I tried to keep my strength a secret from my father. I knew if he found out he would go out of his way to prove he was more of a man than me. He felt the need to do that because he was beginning to see that his men had more respect for me than him. And I guess he had feelings about that. But trying to keep something from a man like him was impossible. He was too aware, too smart and too swift. He made it to where he was in life by always being several steps ahead of the next man.”
“When I turned eighteen, Mac and Kenny had thrown me this big birthday bash. The three of us was at my house getting ready when my pops walked in my room. He started calling us punks and saying all kinds of bogus stuff to us.” He shrugged his shoulder. I could see that this was starting to bother him.
“But you know, we was use to it, so we just ignored him. But he didn’t stop. He started going in on Kenny, calling him a fag, and a pretty boy. So, I told him just bounce out my room. And I can see in his eyes when he made up his mind that he was going to try me. Kenny jumped in the way and my pops hit him in the face with his pistol, knocked him out cold.” He shook his head staring off into the distance, lost in the past.
“I—” His words faltered, I rubbed his arm, letting him know that I was here. “It was the first time I blacked out and just reacted. When I came through Mac and Kenny was staring at me as if I was a monster. My father’s blood was on my hands.”
“They say I threw him into my closet door that was made out of mirrors, shattering it.” As he spoke he lifted his hands.
“They say I had lifted him high in the air, and then brought him down on a shard of the mirror that was sticking up.” He shook his head. “When I came to, I went to him and tried to pull him up off the glass. But it was embedded in his back, nearly slicing him in half.”
For a moment the only thing I could do was stare at him. My goodness, that was quite vicious. But then I thought of all the horror stories Gabrielle had told me. I thought about all the nights I listened to her grieve her son who she thought died hating her, all because of a very wicked man who was not happy and didn’t want to see anybody else happy.
And instead of saying what I felt, which was, I’m sure he deserved every bit of it. I just hugged Gabe close and mumbled.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” He brought up his thumb and traced my bottom lip.
“Don’t be sorry that he’s dead. Killing him was not the reason why I needed redemption. It was how I felt after I did it.”
My heart broke for him. I could only imagine how horrible he must have felt. That would have been tough for anybody. I rubbed my hand up and down his arm.
“How did you feel?” I asked in a soothing voice, wanting to give him as much comfort as I could. He studied me a little longer before he responded.
“I felt… I felt, great! Ecstatic, slept like a baby after lying to the police about how he died. I told them he tripped and fell backwards into the mirror. Of course, like most people, they hated the bastard and was more than happy he was dead.Assuring me that they looked forward to working with me, knowing I would be easier to work with than my father. Their only real concern was pleasing who was next in line to grease their pockets. They went out their way to assure me that they would handle everything. Kenny had a hard time getting over what happened, and so did Mac.” He shook his head.
“Not me. After the police left and they cleaned up
