Safe at Last (Slow Burn 3)

It defied all reason. His father was a psychopath in every clinical sense of the word.

In the distance, headlights shone and the faint sound of an engine registered, then shut off, followed by the headlights. Zack tensed, anger throbbing through his veins as he braced for the impending confrontation with his father.

He refused to go back to the house he was raised in. He’d give no physical evidence that he’d ever been there. Instead he’d called his father and told him to meet him here. He hadn’t responded to the questions, his father asking when he’d come back into town or why. He’d simply said he had something important to talk to him about and hung up, leaving him to make what he wanted of Zack’s cryptic statement. He hadn’t even known if his father would come.

Curiosity must have gotten the better of him. And as the old saying went, curiosity killed the cat.

A few moments later, his father shuffled up, a shadow in the darkness that blanketed the area above the lake.

“Zack?” he called.

“Here,” Zack said grimly.

The beam of a flashlight bounced erratically over the ground and then his father came into view. His appearance was shocking. He looked every bit his age, if not older. He had a beer belly that protruded well over his cinched belt, and he had the look of a longtime alcoholic. His hair had thinned considerably, a bald spot on top, and what was left was completely white.

The years hadn’t been good to him, a fact Zack took savage satisfaction in.

Harsh lines cut grooves in his father’s face and he had the haggard appearance of someone who didn’t sleep at night. Maybe his demons—and guilt—tormented his dreams. Zack could only hope that he endured half the hell that Gracie had suffered, though he doubted his father was capable of guilt or remorse.

“What the hell is going on, son? Why did you ask to meet here, for God’s sake? You should have come to the house. We could have had a beer and caught up. It’s been three years since I saw you. Not even a telephone call in that time. Christmas. Birthdays. Is that any way to treat your old man?”

Zack was seething. It took every ounce of effort he possessed not to lay his father out right then and there.

“I know what you did, you son of a bitch,” Zack bit out. “And don’t you dare fucking stand there, look me in the eye and deny it. Because swear to God, I’ll beat the truth out of you, you bastard. I’ll pull out every lie you ever told. Every law you broke and every sin you committed. And when I’m done, you’ll have nothing and you’ll be nothing.”

His father’s face flushed with anger. His cheeks mottled with rage, and his eyes bulged outward in clear agitation.

“Goddamn weak-ass pussies,” his father bellowed, spittle forming on his lips. “Which one was it? I bet it was Stuart. I should have known the spineless idiot didn’t have the stomach for it. It’s probably the reason his wife left him a while back. The dumb fuck probably couldn’t live with his conscience and told her everything. What a pathetic excuse for a man.”

Zack stared back at his father in shocked horror and complete incredulity. God, he wasn’t even going to deny it. There was no remorse whatsoever. No guilt. Just anger that he’d been ratted out. And he called Stuart a pathetic excuse for a man? What kind of man engineered the rape of a teenage girl? A girl young enough to be his daughter. The girl his own son was in love with and planned to marry.

Zack felt like he was stuck in some bizarre nightmare he couldn’t rouse from.

“You don’t even deny it?” he asked hoarsely. “What kind of a sick, twisted bastard are you? How could you do that to just a girl? She was a virgin, for God’s sake, and her initiation was a brutal gang rape that you instigated? A grown-ass adult man. A man sworn to uphold the law and protect the people of his town as their chief of police. Or did that protection only extend to those you deemed worthy?”

His father snorted in disbelief, ignoring Zack’s outrage and the issue at hand.

“You expect me to believe you hadn’t gotten in her pants already or that she wasn’t spreading her legs for anyone who looked twice her way? You’re a naïve fool if you believe that bullshit.”

Zack lost it. He laid his father out with one hard punch to his jaw. His father went down with a thump and just lay there rubbing his jaw with an expression of disbelief. As if he couldn’t believe that Zack would be furious or why. Was Zack supposed to thank him for single-handedly ruining the lives of an innocent girl and a boy, his son, whom he was supposed to love?

“You’d honestly defend the little slut? What is wrong with you? Isn’t it enough that she ruined your career? That even now you could still be playing ball? You could have won a Super Bowl, for God’s sake. You led a shitty-ass team to the playoffs the first two years you quarterbacked for them, and then you just walked away. And if you hadn’t been so fucked-up over her and had your head in the game you would have never gotten hurt to begin with.”

Zack’s fury exploded and he hauled his father up and rammed his fist into his gut and then sent him reeling with another blow, this time to his nose. The sickening crunch and the gush of blood indicated it was likely broken but at the moment Zack could kill him and suffer no remorse whatsoever.

He was out of his mind with rage. It boiled and erupted like a volcano and twelve years of worry, grief and anger were suddenly unleashed in a violent tornado of pure hatred for the man who’d fathered him. God, he’d do anything in the world to cleanse himself of his father’s blood and he wished with all his heart that they weren’t biologically related. Never would he be the kind of man his father was. He’d die first.

“I’ll have your ass for this,” his father wheezed as he took a wary, unsteady step away from Zack. “I’ll nail you for assault on a police officer. I don’t give a damn if you’re my son or not.”

“You do that,” Zack spit out. “Just realize that you stand to lose far more than I. I have nothing more to lose because I already lost everything that ever meant anything to me thanks to you. You took everything from me. But if I go down, so be it, because I’ll take you down with me and never suffer a single regret. I’ll make damn sure you spend the rest of your life behind bars. Not to mention the entire town will know what a complete sick fuck you are and you can kiss your reputation, your career and your pension goodbye.”