The Monster (Boston Belles 3)

“Tell me why I’m here. Why I’m not in an orphanage. I’m old enough to know,” I demanded, balling my fists really hard, clenching my jaw. “And don’t talk to me about the Bible. The Lord may have heard Hannah, but He sure as shit ain’t been listening to me.”

“You’re here because we love you,” Sparrow said at the same time Troy answered, “You’re here because I killed your father.”

Silence descended. Sparrow shot up from my bed, her eyes really wide and really big, staring at her husband. Her mouth hung open like a fish. Troy carried on.

“He said he deserves to know. He’s not wrong, Red. The truth, Sam, is that shortly before your father died, he kidnapped Sparrow with every intention of killing her. I had to save my wife and did so without thinking twice. I wanted you to have a father figure. A person to look up to. The plan was to take you to basketball games every now and again. Provide guidance, advice, and a fat college fund to kick-start your life; getting attached was never in my plans, but it happened, anyway.” He looked me right in the eye. “Very early on I realized you were not a project. You were family.”

“You killed my father,” I echoed.

I knew Brock Greystone was dead, but Catalina and Grandma Maria always said it happened in an accident.

“Yes,” he said simply.

“Who knows?”

“You. Me. Cat. Aunt Sparrow. God.”

“Did God forgive you?”

Troy smirked. “He gave me you.”

Depending on who you asked, that could be seen as a punishment.

Now Brock was dead, and Cat was gone. The Brennans were my only shot at survival, whether I liked it or not.

“All right?” Troy asked. With his Southie accent, it came out as “Aight?”

I stared at him, not sure what to think or do.

“I’m going to go get some dunks now.” He leaned down to grab my shoulder bag, retrieving Cat’s pack of cigarettes from it. It was close to midnight. He was definitely going to one of his “businesses.”

“Donuts always make everything better,” Sparrow pointed out, carrying on with the lie. “Be safe, honey.”

He bent down to kiss the top of her head. “Always, Red. And you…” he tousled my hair with his massive palm “…no more cigarettes. This shit could send you to an early grave.”

That was the moment I decided I was going to smoke until my lungs collapsed. Not because I wanted to defy Uncle Troy, but because dying young didn’t seem like a bad idea.

When he left, I turned to Sparrow. My nerves were shot. I couldn’t trust myself not to vomit again, but this time in her lap. And I never vomited, never cried.

“He didn’t want to take me,” I said.

She ran her fingers through my hair, brushing it back to normal. “No, he didn’t. But only because he didn’t want your mother to walk out of your life.”

“But you didn’t give a shit about that. Why?”

“Because I know no mother is better than a bad mother, and every day you were with her made my heart hurt.”

“Grams left, too.”

“She didn’t leave, honey. She died. It wasn’t up to her.”

“I don’t care. I hate women. I hate them.”

“One day you’ll find someone who changes your mind.” Sparrow smiled privately, like she knew something I didn’t. She was wrong.

Grams died and left me with Cat.

Cat almost killed me multiple times.

Women weren’t reliable. Men weren’t either, but men I could at least punch in the nuts, and men never made any promises. I didn’t have a father or a grandfather to get mad at.

“I will never change my mind,” I muttered, fighting my heavy eyelids that demanded I pass out.

I crashed in Sparrow’s arms hours after Troy left.

When I woke up the next morning, I found a golden chain on my nightstand.

I scanned the Saint Anthony charm on it. My initials was engraved around the coin.

S.A.B.

Samuel Austin Brennan.

Years later, I’d learn Troy and Sparrow petitioned to legally changed my name from Greystone to Brennan the same hour they filed for full custody of me.

I knew who Saint Anthony was, the Patron Saint of all lost things.

I was lost, but now I’d been found.

Next to the necklace was a paper plate with a glazed donut and a hot cup of cocoa.

I was a Brennan now.

Boston underworld aristocracy.

Privileged, respected, and feared above all.

A legend in the making.

I intended to live up to my namesake at any price.

I would never be lost again.

My parents failed, but me? I’d prevail.

I would rise from the ashes and make them proud.

Would soar into the sky.

This was the first time I felt this way.

Certain.

Age 17.

The heart was a monster.

That’s why it was locked behind our ribs, in a cage.

I’d known this all along, from the moment I was born, but tonight I felt it, too.

Twenty minutes after taking the Mass Pike out of Boston, I finally came to terms with the fact that I was lost.