Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 128356 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128356 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
When I woke up the following morning, it was silent.
There was no coughing or shouting or slamming doors shut.
And my mama was motionless, frothing at the mouth, her dead eyes staring at nothing.
Overdose, they said.
I was ten years old, but I could tell it was because of the white stuff she sniffed on the regular.
“She was already dying anyway,” the cops whispered to each other.
“Poor girl,” the neighbor who gave me food told her scum husband. “Savannah wasn’t much, but she was Violet’s only family. Now, the girl will be abused in the system.”
“That slut shouldn’t have had kids,” another neighbor said. “Now, her daughter will be the same. With a face like that, there’s no doubt.”
“Drug overdose. Tsk. That’s what you get for sleeping with other women’s men. Karma, I’m telling you. Poor girl, though.”
“Poor girl.”
“Poor girl.”
Poor. Goddamn. Girl.
Another statistic.
Another name.
Another ‘single-mom tragedy’ as they called it.
No one asked me if I was okay after I lost my only family at ten years old. No one stopped to wonder why I wasn’t crying and was in complete shock for days, sneaking into our house and calling Mama’s name, only to be greeted by silence.
I wanted my mama. I wanted the only person I had.
Maybe it was Stockholm syndrome. Maybe I was too attached to my abuser, but she was the only person who was forced by biology to be there for me.
And the ten-year-old version of myself felt the world crumble around her.
I read once that ‘abuse can sometimes feel like love’ and it stuck with me. That maybe that’s what I felt toward my mother.
Over ten years later, I still revisit this box and wonder why Mama hated me so much. I tried my best at school, despite having little to no support, and got good grades. I learned to cook and clean early on to help her out, and I always stayed quiet because my voice annoyed her.
I hid in the closet whenever she had customers over, because we had one room, and I disturbed them. The older I got and the weirder they looked at me, the more she demanded I stay out of sight.
She often said she became a prostitute because of me, so is that why she hated me?
Shouldn’t she have given me up for adoption or something? Sure, I might have had a horrible life as well or ended up in the broken system I was eventually shoved into, but at least, I wouldn’t have felt worthless because my mother and only family disliked me.
I don’t know why I’m thinking about this now or pulling out the box. Maybe because I was so rattled this afternoon, and that triggered the memory of another trauma.
A deeper, bigger one I don’t think I’ll ever be able to face or the way it shaped my life.
I put the box back beneath the tote bags and stand up.
The moment I do, I feel a presence behind me.
My heart leaps into my throat as I attempt to turn around, but a gloved hand covers my mouth.
The smell of leather and wood fills my senses, and my body tenses up.
Jude?
His deep and velvety voice whispers in my ear, “Shh, not a word.”
12
VIOLET
It’s Jude.
Why is Jude inside my home?
I mean, he was here before, considering the note and that he read my journal and messed with my stuff, but he’s never stepped foot inside while I was here.
It’s that escalation again, isn’t it? Like when Mario started to watch me twenty-four seven or when Jude came into the bar and started a fight, then forced me to go with him and made me watch the recording of his mom’s murder.
Before he murdered someone in front of me.
I had to literally block that from my memory and shove it in with the skeletons in my closet so I wouldn’t break down.
After he left me alone, I thought he might have lost interest.
Hoped so, even.
But he’s here.
In the flesh.
Of course he’s here when I chose to go braless after the shower. And now, I feel self-conscious.
My body, which usually locks up when facing danger, is disturbingly pliant as he pulls me against him with the hand on my mouth and the other around my stomach. His large, gloved hand flexes on my belly over the apron covering my shirt as my back presses against his rock-hard chest.
He feels like a wall behind me, towering, impenetrable.
I tilt my head slightly, catching a glimpse of his handsome face that, as usual, is set in a disapproving scowl.
A sheen of darkness.
An overload of violence.
And it’s all directed at me now. As if I’ve offended him in some way.
I try to pull his hand away, but he tightens his grip. So I let my arm hang at my side, losing all will to fight—not that I have that.