“I love you,” I said. He looked up from his dinner. Our eyes tangled and met.

“It’s mutual, and that’s why I need you to be well, Rosie. If there’s something I should know about your health…”

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Focus on your family stuff.” I smiled, patting his hand from across the table.

That night, he didn’t touch me, and I didn’t ask him to.

And when Friday came…so did our grand finale.

Eleven Years Ago

“DON’T LET OWL KILL ME, baby.”

Nina’s tears bled out of her eyes as she clutched the collar of my damp wife-beater, clinging onto me for dear life. I only wore wife-beaters when I came to visit her. It wasn’t like anyone there was going to appreciate my collection of flamboyant YSL men’s T-shirts or suede shoes. “You gotta do something about him. He’s hitting me real hard. See these marks? See ’em? He’s going to end me. Are you gonna just sit around and let it happen?”

“You should leave him.” I took off the sleeveless undershirt and tossed it over her bed. I was done weeding her huge-ass garden and was getting ready to make the three of us some dinner. “Come with me to California. Mom wouldn’t mind.”

“Helen is not your mother, Dean. I am.”

There was no point arguing, but that didn’t mean I agreed with that statement.

She always dragged me into her marital shit, every single summer without failure. I swear she thought of me as a hybrid between a bodyguard and personal assistant. Couldn’t blame her, though. I constantly tried to save her. To protect the person who compromised me.

That night, Owl came home drunk. Nothing out of the ordinary. He may not have been a junkie like Nina, but he sure as hell liked his bourbon on a hot summer night. He crawled into their bed, slurring and swearing. I heard everything from my room across the hall as I lay in bed with their neighbors’ daughter, Tiffany. She snuck into my room every night through the window. It was a one-story, barn-like house. I had bite marks all over my fists from stifling her moans to prove it, but no one asked what they were or where they came from, because no one gave a shit.

Come to think of it, no one gave a shit about anything under that roof.

Muffled shrieks and sobbing filled my ears, and I couldn’t concentrate on our make-out session, failing to elevate things from dry-hump territory.

“This crap is going to drive me nuts all night,” I groaned, brushing away some of the hair that fell on Tiff’s face so I could see her lust for me better. This time, the rusty springs on their mattress didn’t scream. Something was different. It was the first time my intuition was so strong, it burned me from the inside.

“Your aunt is a mess,” Tiffany retorted, climbing atop of me, straddling my hips with her thighs and grinding against my dick.

She didn’t know Nina was my mother. My parents made sure Nina kept her mouth shut.

I heard the smack of skin hitting skin. I heard Nina yelp in horror, and then her trying to get away, bumping into furniture, shit falling to the floor. Placing both hands on Tiffany’s waist, I moved her aside and got up.

“I’m going to check and see that everything is okay.”

“Nothing is ever okay in this place,” Tiff said, slumped on my bed. She wasn’t wrong. Everybody knew the Whittakers in this minuscule village. Knew that Nina was a drug addict with pupils like saucers and that Owl drank his own body weight every night and that they were both losing money trying to pay for the mortgage on this land every year. Guess most people prayed they’d finally have to call it quits on this little adventure, sell the property, and move the fuck away.

“Let me rephrase.” I clasped the door handle, half my body already in the hallway. “I don’t want Owl to kill Nina on my watch. Better?”

“He won’t kill her.” Tiff scooted up the bed until her back hit the wall and lit a cigarette, making herself comfortable.

“That’s right, because I’m about to make sure of it myself.” Thwack! Another hit and another yelp pierced the air from the far end of the hallway. I stalked toward their room.

“You don’t want to do that,” Tiffany called behind me, blowing clouds of smoke like she didn’t have a care in the world. “They’re insane. You’ll get yourself into trouble.”

She was right, of course, but I didn’t want to listen. Protect the strays, a voice inside my head recited. Even the person who made you one.

As soon as I walked in the room, Owl threw a vase at me. And missed. That was enough to turn my rage switch on and pull me into the situation without thinking of the consequences. I lunged at him with balled fists, punching his gut mercilessly as I crouched down, immobilizing him completely, not giving a fuck if an inner organ exploded.