You’re driving in circles, Liam.”
God, I just wish she would shut up. No matter what I do, she just keeps going. Keeps digging. Keeps using her words like a scalpel—careful, efficient cuts. I see why she is so good at her job. Why Drew uses her. She is the kind of weapon he loves. Subtle and deadly. Unlike me.
“Why don’t you just run away? Let me out and just go. I won’t tell them anything.”
Her words slip into me. They gnaw at my resolve. Not just these, but everything she’s piled atop me since I took the tape off. I know what she’s doing. I can see right through it. She is spinning my reality into her story. But there is an allure to it, a kind of dangerous beauty. Like honey dripping from a bee’s nest. No matter how much it’s going to hurt, I want to grab hold of her tale. Taste its sweetness. And let it be real, for just a second. Let my life be something that it never was.
“Are you okay?” she asks softly.
Could she mean it? Could she care? I hold my breath, trying to shut her out. Keep myself focused.
“I get it, Liam. All this back-and-forth. You’re just scared. But it’ll be okay. I’ve got your back. It’ll be okay.”
Her hand reaches out. She touches my forearm. My tattoo. Every nerve in my body fires. My eyes shoot down.
“Don’t touch me!”
Her eyes widen. And she recoils. Driving down the road, I turn on her, my words pouring over her like fire.
“He told me what he does to you.”
She stiffens. “What?”
“He brags about it to me. Maybe to other people, too.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I think you know what I’m talking about,” I say. “There’s a fine line between hurt and pain, right? Fun and danger? Excitement and fear?”
She looks at me, incredulous. “Really? This is where you’re—”
“Love and shame,” I finish.
She has no answer to that. I don’t know the truth. He never told me anything. But I can guess. I can always guess.
“Patsy knows, too, Lauren,” I say, staring at the road ahead.
Her response is silence, so much so that I can hear her breathing just audible over the sound of the car’s tires on the pavement. This news shouldn’t surprise her. In his arrogance, my brother did nothing to hide the affair. But from her response, I know already that it is enough. That no matter how much she knows it is the truth, that it was always going to be the truth, my brother’s web has her snared. His words hold her down as much as the strength in his hard, crushing hands. His promises lay heavier on her chest. His lies surround her as visibly as the heat rising from my anger.
“And you let him do that to you,” I add.
I see the nod. It is a wisp, but I see it whether she wants me to or not. And I guess that’s enough. My brother has her as deeply as he’s had me for so many years. I never expected anything else. At some point, she will betray me. Strange how little that seems to matter now.