Soul Enslaved (Sons of Wrath Book 3) (29 page)

“Hey! Hey!” her mother called. “You can’t just come in here. Get the fuck out.”

Sabelle spun around in time to see her rise to a stand and catch sight of Gavin, still waiting by the door.

“Who’re you?”

“A friend.” Gavin’s voice carried something intimidating that clashed with the surroundings.

“Hello, friend.” She pushed the strap of her top down her shoulder again. “My, you are the
finest
piece of ass I ever seen. Wanna be my friend, too?”

Gavin didn’t answer. The expression on his face had a sort of smug pity, if that were possible. Like he was glad no man would ever take such a ridiculous proposal seriously.

“Fuck you, then.” She turned back around and stumbled toward Sabelle. “So how’s my snobby, stuck up bitch of a daughter? Too good to come ‘round these parts.”

Sabelle kept on toward her old bedroom. “Shut up, Laura. I’m not interested in getting into it with you.” Sabelle pushed the door open, grimacing at a bucket filled with black, putrid water. Clothes littered the floor, and a greasy car engine sat atop greasy towels on her old bed. Some of her old posters of bands and France still hung from the walls, but Sabelle went straight for her closet where she’d left the letter in a cigar box on the top shelf.

The scent reminded her of her father, and she rubbed the rich wood before opening the box.

Empty.

“I told ya. I ain’t got nothin’ belonging to you.”

“It was here. I left it right here, in this box.”

Laura’s smile broke into cruel laughter. “I burned it. After you left, I burned everything. Your awards. Your art. Pictures. And that fucking letter.”

Nostrils flaring, Sabelle’s lip twisted. “You had no right. No right at all! That letter was for me and Denya!”

“Then, why’d you leave it?”

A snarl remained trapped in Sabelle’s throat. “Is it too much to ask you to do one too many hits tonight?
Laura
.” As much as she hated her, Sabelle regretted the words as soon as she’d spoken them.

Laura’s eyes glassed over. “The day you were born, when you came out of me all fire and screaming, I knew you’d be the one to destroy this home.”

“You destroyed it, Mother. You!”

Sabelle straightened as the half-baked, peen-peeping male staggered toward them.

He tugged on her mother’s arm. “Laura, come on.” His drug-addled brain must’ve somehow made Sabelle completely invisible, as he fondled her mother’s breast in front of her, crimping Sabelle’s lip. “I’m ready to breast feed again, Momma.” He chuckled.

Repulsion burned in the pit of Sabelle’s gut, as she watched her mother make out with a boy half her age. In all the slurping, his gaze landed on Sabelle, and he pulled away.

“Hey, you brought me a friend to play with.”

“She ain’t no friend, baby.”

“Ain’t no thang.” His yellow teeth shone through in his smile. “Let’s all get high and fuck.”

The very thought brought bile to the back of Sabelle’s throat. She pushed through them, but the male gripped her arm.

Though her first attempt to wrench herself free failed, the male’s eyes widened, and Sabelle pulled back, knocking into the hardness of Gavin’s body behind her.

“What d’you want, asshole?” The stare-down the hood rat attempted with Gavin was almost amusing.

“I want you to let go of my lady friend.”

“Lady friend? What kind of pussy calls his bitch a
lady friend
? You a fudge packer, huh? Like a little dick on the side? Or maybe you prefer big dicks?” Half-baked snickered. “I got one for ya.”

One punch from Gavin to his face left him cross-eyed, as he fell backward in a heap.

Laura gasped and dropped to her knees beside him, the sight damn near laughable. “Oh, baby! Sweet baby!” She cradled his head and turned to cast a glare up at Gavin. “Get out of my house. Both of you! Get out!”

“Gladly,” Sabelle gritted, stepping over her mother’s back. Goddamn, she had the urge to plow her foot through the old woman’s spine.

Throwing open the door, Sabelle stormed out toward the SUV. “Do you mind driving? She has me so rattled right now, I’m afraid I’ll put us right into a tree.”

“Not at all.”

She climbed inside the passenger seat. Gavin shut the door for her, circled to the driver’s side, fired up the vehicle, and backed out of the drive. “I’m sorry for that. I have a problem with disrespectful little pricks.”

“Don’t apologize. I’m sorry for subjecting you to this. It’s just …” Sabelle fought the sting of tears and the tugging in her throat that warned the old woman had penetrated her defenses. She cleared her throat. “When my father left, he left behind a letter for Denya and me.” She licked the dryness of her lips—the same dryness that itched her throat. “We never opened it. Promised we wouldn’t, just to spite him for leaving. I wanted to see if he mentioned Griffin at all. I just wanted to make sense of what happened.” Her eyebrow twitched. “I can’t believe she burned it. She had no right. No right at all.” She stared out the window at the destruction of the shit trailer park slipping by. “It’s just as well. I never should’ve come back here.”

CHAPTER 11

As Gavin reached the bathroom, Thomas walked out, and taking a step inside, he recoiled at the stench. Though, when he reached to flush, a high-pitched squeal stopped him short.

Just outside the door, Thomas stood with both hands covering his ears, eyes clamped shut and nose scrunched, as if in pain. “D—don’t flush it.”

“Buddy, no offense, but I’m about to puke. I have to flush it.”

“No! Don’t. D-d-don’t flush it!” The kid’s voice sounded thick with panic and tears.

Gavin flipped the toilet seat down for a moment. “Hey, Thomas, come here a sec.”

Thomas’ breathing hastened. “No, I don’t want you to flush it.”

“I won’t. Not while you’re in here. Promise. Just come on in.”

Thomas stepped inside the bathroom, hands still covering his ears.

“C’mon, buddy, I promised. I just want to talk to you for a minute.”

The boy dropped his hands to his side.

“You just sat on this thing and owned it. What’s the big deal with flushing?”

Thomas’s hand flinched like he considered putting them back to his ears.

“I’m not going to flush it. Just tell me what you’re afraid of.”

“It’s a m-m-monster. A loud monster. And it e-e-eats the poop and pee. It’ll eat me.”

Gavin bit his inner cheek to keep from laughing. A lesson was buried somewhere in the conversation, he just had to reach deep to find it. Clearing his throat, he leveled his gaze. “You know, when I was a boy, there was a bear in the woods that all the villagers feared. They called it a man-eater, because it’d attacked some folks passing through. My brother and I were very good hunters. So we decided to hunt this bear, and get rid of it once and for all.” The widening of Thomas’ eyes told Gavin he was on to something with the story, so he continued. “One morning, we set out early for the woods, both of us packed with our food rations and our bow and arrows. We must’ve walked the woods for hours, looking for that bear. It wasn’t until we took a break by a stream that we saw it off in the distance. Slowly, my brother and I crept through the brush, doing our best not to make a sound. But bears, they have a sense about them. She knew we were coming long before we got there and she rose up on her hind legs, roaring and showing her teeth.” Gavin stifled a smile watching Thomas cover his gaping mouth. He also stifled a gag, catching another whiff from the toilet. “I was so scared that I froze. Her roar was so loud, it echoed through the forest and chilled me to the bone. I backed up a step, and she came down on all fours. From the brush beside her, two cubs bounded toward the stream, and that momma bear sent another roar in my direction. I realized, right then, I couldn’t kill her. That loud, vicious roar was never meant to hurt me. She was just doing her job.”

The boy’s brows knitted together. “S—so the toilet is … just doing her job, too?”

“Yep. Trust me on that.”

Thomas cast his gaze toward the silver handle, and his lip tightened. He reached out and flushed it quickly, covering his ears for a second before he let them fall to his side.

“You see? Nothing happened.”

A smile crept across the boy’s face but quickly faded. “Uh-oh. It’s o-o-overflowded!”

Gavin’s gaze shot to the water pouring out of the small gap between the lid and the bowl and splashing onto the floor. “Ah, shit!” He jumped back. “Shit!” He raised a hand and glanced around until he spotted a plunger beside the toilet.

“You h-h-have to kill it with the sword!” Thomas yelled beside him.

Christ
. No sense letting the kid down with the fact he’d never actually performed the ritual on a toilet before. Toilets at the mansion were so state of the art and powerful, they probably
could
swallow the boy like a monster. Gavin spared a quick glance and flipped the lid, plunging the tool inside the cloudy liquid. The smell overwhelmed him, taunting the sensitive spot at the back of the throat that warned of bad things to come, as he plunged away, until the water finally receded. Straightening up from the sopping mess at his feet, he tossed the plunger to the floor.

Vengeance-dealing casino boss plunging shit.
Perfect.

“I … I think she quitted her job.”

Gavin set his hands on his hips and cracked a grin. “Yeah. It would seem so.”

***

Sabelle stepped away from the bathroom, smiling. What should’ve had her cringing in embarrassment, left her choking back laughter—not so much at the thought of Gavin plunging a toilet, more so at the idea that never in a million years did she envision a lesson coming out of something so ridiculous. Yet, she’d just witnessed both.

Had she attempted the same pot-side lecture, Thomas probably would’ve run off, confused and undoubtedly convinced that his mother was crazy. She’d tried to help him overcome the fear before and failed miserably.

His willingness to entertain Gavin told her one thing—her own son respected the man as much as everyone else, even with a plunger in his hand.

Another laugh tickled her chest, and she ambled down the staircase before blowing her cover. Back in the kitchen, she finished preparing the lunches she’d started before Thomas’s squeal had her racing up the stairs.

Thomas scurried into the kitchen, Janie in tow carrying a doll.

“M-M-M-Momma, guess what I did!”

Sabelle cleared the tug of laughter from her throat. “What, sweets?”

“I flushted the toilet! I was
not
scared.” Thomas pointed a finger to emphasize his point. “N-n-not even of the m-m-monster.”

Sabelle allowed her mouth to gape, arching her brows in mock surprise. “You didn’t!”

“G … G … Mister Gavin killed it. And it just blowed up!”

Clutching her mouth did nothing to hold back the laughter that burst from her chest, especially when Gavin appeared in the doorway. She dropped her hands away from her face. “I’m making lunch. Would you like some peanut butter?” Laughter tore free again at the grimace on his face. “I’m sorry. But think of all the things you can add to your resume now. Counselor. Crap plunger. Superhero.”

“Funny.” His lip curved into a grin that dimpled his cheeks. “Hey.” He nodded toward Thomas. “Little man, I want to show you something.”

“What is it?” Thomas slid from the kitchen chair and crossed the room to stand beside him.

Gavin opened his palm, revealing a small golden whistle attached to a golden chain. Tiny, perhaps the diameter of a toothpick, yet so intricate, with leaves and branches etched into its surface, it rested in his hand. “It was given to my brother.” Gavin glanced up, sadness in his eyes. “When he was not much older than you.”

The sight hitched Sabelle’s breath. Never had her young son been given something that clearly meant so much.

“Can I have it?” Thomas bent forward, brows drawn.

“Thomas, don’t be rude,” Sabelle chided.

“No, it’s alright.” Gavin handed him the chain. “He died long ago. Memories won’t bring him back. Perhaps the whistle will bring some joy for once.”

Thomas placed his lips to the gold and blew what sounded like a bird’s chirp. A smile stretched across his face. “Cool! I blewed it! It’s like a birdie! D-d-did you hear that, Mommy?”

“I did.” The corner of Sabelle’s mouth tugged to a smile. “What do you say, Tommy?”

“Thank you, Mister Gavin.”

“Call me Gavin. Or Gav. No need to be formal.”

“Let me hold on to that, Thomas. It’s very special to …
Gav
. We don’t want to break it, right?”

“Will you wear it, Mommy? Then I can take it everywhere. And, at the park, we can talk to the birdies!”

“I, uh …” She glanced toward Gavin. “Sure. I’ll wear it.”

His wide blue eyes landed back on Gavin. “W-w-will you teach me to hunt?”

“You’ll need a bow and arrow.”

His eyes lit with excitement. “I have one! W-w-wanna see?”

“Yeah, let’s see it!” Gavin chuckled as Thomas skipped up the staircase toward his bedroom.

“Thank you …” Sabelle glanced away. Somehow, the gesture meant more that he’d done it for her son. “You didn’t have to give that to him. It means so much to you and—”

“I want him to have it.”

Sabelle nodded. “Thank you.”

“Look!” Thomas flew down the stairs so fast, he lost his footing and tripped forward.

Muscles tense, Sabelle jerked to catch him, but Gavin beat her to it.

The demon caught the small boy in his arms, sucking in a deep breath as he set him back down. “Careful down the steps, okay, buddy?”

As if nothing had happened, Thomas lifted the small plastic toy. A small red bow and suction cup arrows. “S-s-see? We can catch a b-b-birdie and I’ll shoot him down, like, pew!” He demonstrated with his toy, and sent the arrow flying into the air about a foot before it fell.

A grin stretched Gavin’s lips, and, goddamn it, like the sun appearing after days of darkness, it filled Sabelle with warmth.

“That’s a fine bow. Very fine.” Gavin examined it as though he examined a rare and expensive relic. “I think we’re well-equipped for the hunt.”