“I’m not infected with anything, Dad,” I tried to explain, my stomach so nauseated I thought I might vomit all over the photos at my knees.
“You sleep with filthy animals, Louise, you’re bound to pick something up. Now get up and get the hell out of my house. I will not have a wanton slut living under my roof, let alone one who associates with the likes of Zeus fucking Garro.”
The dry, malnourished part of my heart that I’d tried for years to nurture for my family kindled and went up in flames at the mention of Zeus. I surged to my feet, caught my balance with a hand on the table and stared down my dad.
“Fuck you, Benjamin. Maybe if you’d bothered to parent me at all the last seventeen years, things would have been different. But they aren’t because you’re a selfish fucking bastard who only cares about himself and his career. You want me gone, fine, I’m fucking out of here.”
“Don’t you dare fucking come back and you can kiss your education goodbye. There isn’t a chance in hell I’m sending you to university now. When that thug leaves you for someone younger don’t come crawling back to me for money.” He kicked at the photos and sent them flying through the air. “My daughter, a biker slut.”
“My father, a daughter abuser,” I retorted through the snot and tears that streamed down my face and into the hem of my ugly brocade dress.
Then with the limited dignity I could muster, I ran to my room to grab what I could before I left the Lafayette mansion for good.
I knew my face was already swelling and discolouring when Harleigh Rose opened the door for me and covered her dropped-open mouth with both hands.
She was a biker’s daughter so I figured she’d seen worse but maybe not on a woman.
“Hi,” I said.
There were three big Louis Vuitton suitcases at my feet and two more duffels slung over my shoulders. I had a lot of stuff I didn’t want to leave behind, including the wooden box in one of the duffels that contained my letters from Z.
“Ohmigawd,” Harleigh Rose breathed, stepping forward with a lifted hand to flutter her fingers along the goose egg forming on my cheekbone. “What happened to you?”
A second later a big shadow loomed behind H.R. and Zeus was in the doorway, pushing her gently aside even as his face darkened with fury.
“My dad knows about us,” I said calmly.
Then, because I’d finally made it to safety and a pair of arms that would close around me if I fell, I burst into tears.
Gently, Zeus hefted me into his arms so I could wrap my legs around his waist and bury my face in his hair. He walked me in the house straight to the left where the family room opened up into the kitchen and sat down with me in one of the big wooden chairs at the dining room table.
Cress and King sat at the table with their half-eaten dinners in front of them, frozen in the act of eating because they were both staring at me with horror.
Zeus’s hand stroked down my hair as he ordered King, “Get ’er bags and put ’em in my room. Then get your ass back down ’ere ’cause the second Lou stops cryin’ long enough to tell me why the motherfuckin’ fuck did this to her, we’re rollin’ out.”
King shoved back from his chair, already pulling his phone from his pocket. Cressida got up too and went to the stove to put on the kettle and grab a bottle of tequila from the freezer.
Zeus peeled my wet face out of his neck and held my head like I was breakable as an eggshell in his ham like hands. A low growl started up in his chest as two fingers gently brushed the aching skin of my cheek.
I placed my hand over his heart, dipping a finger into the divot of his gunshot scar. “Sorry I interrupted you in the middle of dinner.”
Zeus shook his head at me but I’d successfully broken the seal on his bottled-up fury and let a little air escape.
Cress and H.R. laughed at me. Then to my surprise, the latter came over to place a gentle hand on my shoulder and asked, “Want me to make you up a plate?”
“Smells good.”
H.R. grinned. “I made it, my famous chili. Dad’s a shit cook, which you probably know already, but I make some serious magic in the kitchen.”
“Looking forward to tasting it,” I said with a small smile as I wearily rested my head back on Z’s hard chest.
H.R. nodded then looked up at the rage in her father’s face and hers transformed into a mirror of that fury. Evidently, no Garro liked a man who hit women and Z’s girl wanted to see him ruin my dad nearly as much as he did.