Liam

 

“I’m sorry to call you over here like this,” Mom said when I stepped in the door.

She was wrapped in a thick robe, dark circles shadowing her red eyes.

I shut the door, then hugged her. I was bigger, so she fit against me easily. “You don’t need to apologize.”

“This place is just so empty… I never realized how big it was until tonight.”

“Dad had a large presence,” I remarked, glancing around.

“Yes, he does.” She pressed her lips together. “Did.”

Tucking an arm around her shoulders, I led her upstairs.

“How about some tea?” she said, moving ahead into the kitchen.

I followed along, agreeing to the tea I didn’t want. “Have you slept at all?” I asked.

“I don’t think I could.”

“You need to try, Mom. You have to take care of yourself.”

She was good at redirecting the conversation. “How are you? How is your shoulder?”

“It’s just a few stitches.”

She rushed across the kitchen and wrapped her arms around me again. “Oh, if I’d have lost you, too…” Her voice quivered.

“You might have if Bellamy hadn’t been there.”

She stiffened and then jerked away, going back to the tea.

I didn’t know why I said that. It was a dick thing to bring up, and I should have known better. I was just so damn angry.

About everything.

I felt like a pot on high simmer, rapidly approaching full boil and about to spill over.

“Mom,” I said, remorse thick in my voice.

She sniffed. “You wouldn’t have been in that position at all if it weren’t for her.” She spun, a tea bag swinging between her fingertips. “Your father would still be alive!”

He was dying anyway.

I sucked in a breath at the thought. Thank Christ I had enough control left in me to not spew that. My God, what the fuck was I thinking?

“She didn’t want Dad to die. You have to know that. She was trying to push him out of the way, just like she had me.”

Her shoulders slumped, and she turned back to the tea kettle that was beginning to whistle. Silence filled the house as she poured the tea and added honey to both mugs.

“She killed the man who killed Dad, you know.” I went on after a few strained moments. “Bellamy picked up the gun and emptied and entire clip into that asshole.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Mom whispered.

I thought back to the shower, to the words Bells whispered to me. “Because I’m in love with her.”

She turned, eyes meeting mine. “You could love a woman who killed your own father?”

I flinched, feeling as if she’d smacked me. She saw it so black and white… Maybe I would too if this wasn’t Bellamy.

If this wasn’t the girl who’d gotten away and then come home.

“She loved Dad just like we do.”

Her voice was shrill when she snapped, “No one loves him like me!” Her anger dissolved into weeping, and I felt about two feet tall.

My footsteps ate up the kitchen tile, and I pulled her into a hug. She clung to me and cried, her wrenching sobs finding a piece of me that had yet to break and snapping it in two.

Talking about this right now was a shit idea. My mom couldn’t handle anything except the next moment in front of her. Convincing her that Bellamy wasn’t at fault was a waste of time because her feelings were her own. As were mine.

Who are you trying to convince, Liam? You or your mom?

The front of my shirt was damp as I led her out of the kitchen, away from the forgotten tea, and into the living area where I guided her to sit on the sofa. She tucked her legs beneath her and leaned her head on my shoulder. Her cries had quieted, but she fidgeted with a used tissue in her hands, occasionally dabbing her face.

“What am I going to do without him?”

I was wondering the same thing.

“It was too soon,” she murmured. “He wasn’t supposed to die this soon.”

“We could have had forever, and it still wouldn’t be enough.” I agreed, the lump in my throat threatening to choke me.

“I’m glad the man who shot him is dead,” she said a short while later, after some of the grief settled at our feet.

I squeezed her a little tighter, offering more comfort that I didn’t feel.

I supposed it was something she was willing to admit that Dad hadn’t died directly because of Bellamy.

But really…

Spidey might have shot my father, but was he the one ultimately responsible for his death?

Perry Crone claimed ownership of that nefarious deed, so in my eyes, the man who killed my father was still alive and breathing.