TRENT

There is no way in hell I heard what I think I did. The woman I’m in love with has a daughter. The mockery of this stumbles me backward. It robs me blind. Cracks my skull and bleeds me dry.

“Trent.” For the first time since she’s been here, I don’t want to hear my name coming out of her mouth. She knows. Knows that I can’t have kids of my own. I had a Goddamn vasectomy years ago, and here she gave her child up? I need longer than a fucking minute to process this before I do something stupid. Like shake the fuck out of her for not being strong enough to leave that motherfucker when I asked her to.

Goddamn, this stings. The irony of this is a sick, fucked-up joke. I’ve done everything I can to change, and the one thing I can’t change is giving the woman I love a child.

“Trent, you don’t get to be angry at me over this. I kept it from you because my daughter is not something you write about to the man you love who is serving time in prison. I was feeling guilty enough while she was growing inside of me that he was going to make me give her up. Do you have any idea how that makes me feel? I’m a coward. A sinister, selfish woman who allowed a man to bring me down. It hurt me every time you asked me if he hit me. There was no way I was going to have you in there feeling this kind of pain, too. Knowing there wasn’t a damn thing you could do to save me.” She has no idea how wrong that statement is. I would have found a way.

She is wrong. So incredibly fucking wrong.

“That’s bullshit, Tara, and you know it. My mother would have taken you in when you first told me about him hitting you; she would have helped you. You claim Lucian has power. Well, so did my mother. It’s called money, and let me tell you, sweetheart, money means power, and she would have spent every last dime she had to keep you safe.” I’m seething. However, when I look deep into her watery eyes, I see she doesn’t believe what I’m saying is true. How could she when she’s been shackled to a man who beat her? Abused her and choked her beautiful self-esteem right out of her veins.

“If I had left, I wouldn’t have had her.” Those words puncture something inside of me. The mere fact she had someone else’s child guts me to the inner depth of my bones. It’s something I will never be able to give her. Doesn’t mean shit when what she’s saying is true. She’s that little girl's mother, and no matter who fathered her, it’s obvious Tara loves her and wants her.

“Christ. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be angry with you. Truthfully, I’m not. This sudden surge of emotions is more directed at me. It’s another reminder of me letting my own greed take over. Me listening to a woman who was obsessed with a plan that I allowed her to talk me into having that vasectomy so I wouldn’t get Clove pregnant.”

“I couldn’t have you beating yourself up more than you already were. He took her, do you hear what I’m saying? I don’t have a clue where she is. He doesn’t deserve to be a parent. I do. He could never be a good father to her, not like you could. I’ve said I’m sorry. I won’t feel guilty about my decision to not tell you.” Fuck me. She shouldn’t feel guilty about anything. Jesus Christ, that man has done nothing but steal from her since she met him.

I hoist her off the bed, sit down, and lay her in my lap and hold her. Her body starts shaking. Her lips start to quiver, and she breaks down sobbing in my arms. “It’s okay. We’ll get through this. Together. Remember?” I say, inhaling deeply, not even coming close to comprehending how Luciano could do this at all.

Before I got to know Tara, I thought the world would be a better place without having a child of my own. Genes are inherited. Sickness and diseases are passed down from one generation to the next. This was the reason I agreed to make sure that would never happen with me. It was hard enough living with what I had done; it would have been harder with always wondering if someday, my son or daughter would turn into a man like me. I had turned into my father, after all, and he was the root of all things evil.

The way I see things now is, the evil my father claimed I had inside me, the evil things he bore into my brain to do are what’s going to guide me help her get her daughter back.

“I’d love nothing more than to raise her with you and to be her father. Do you trust me?” I ask, staring into those watery eyes, feeling more like a dick for attacking her with every tear I swipe away.

I see clearly the dark void of a mother lost without her child. A never-ending dark hole that consumes everything inside of you until you’re left feeling nothing at all.

It’s no wonder she stayed with him for as long as she did. Trapped in an illusion of getting her daughter back.

“Yes.”

“Then you need to let me help you. We will find her, but it has to be done my way. Whatever we do has to be planned perfectly; one flaw, and we may never find out what happened to her. I have as much power on my side as he does; it comes in the form of manpower, of men who will help me bring him down if only to get him to confess where she is. You need to put all of your trust in our love. I’m going to get her back for you if it’s the last thing I do.”

A selfish man has done this to her, and if I don’t find a way to get her little girl back, she’ll drown. Guilt will eat her to death. It will show no mercy as it twines around her lungs, spreads across her heart, and squeezes until it suffocates. Guilt does not care. It strives off the pain. Leeches a hold of the weak and never lets go.

While I was living in my own hell, Tara has been living in one much worse. God, how I wish my mother were here. She would know the right things to say because she lived something similar herself once.

She told me once how her instincts of knowing I was alive kept her going. She knew I was out there somewhere crying out for her, too. The difference between my family’s situation and Tara’s didn’t have a thing to do with money. It was the power of love my father hung over her head. She could have drained every dollar she had in finding me, but she risked my father following through with his threat of killing me and coming after my brother if she were to try and find me. My mother loved me, and in the end, she won the bloody war she created. We were reunited, but before all the shit went down, when she was threatened by the forces of evil, she did what she thought was right in order to protect the only man she could save. My mother had to protect my brother from my father. And that right there is an unforgivable shame.

“Listen to me. I’m going to do whatever it takes to find your daughter. But first, we need to talk about how we can get to him without either one of us getting into trouble. I can’t leave the state, but I have friends who can. You also have to dig deep and remember everything I told you about the strong woman you are. You cannot crumble. I need you to be tough, Tara.”

I’d love nothing more than to hop on a plane and slice that motherfucker’s hands off. Stuff them up his ass and set him on fire. But I’ll be damned if I allow him or anyone else the satisfaction of fucking up my parole.

I used to envision many times the different ways I would love to kill Lucian. When you have nothing but time to waste while locked behind a cell twenty-three hours of the day, your mind tends to wander. You wish for things that may or may not come true. I spent half those hours thinking about Tara, and the other half wanting to drain all the blood from his veins.

“Where are all my letters?” I ask when she doesn’t acknowledge me. She’s lost in her head. More than likely remembering the little time she had with her, which was none. If I can get her to remember some of the things I said in every letter I wrote, then maybe she’ll acknowledge just how strong she really is.

I can’t even begin to imagine the pain this must have brought to her. God, it was hard hearing her tell me; it’s harder watching her suffer.

Seeing her this way gnaws at my soul, plunging me deep into the darkness of my past. I need to think of myself as the man I once was. One with the power to use my brain and hands as my most valuable weapons. Tara is the light that pulled me out of the dark, and I’ll do what needs to be done to make her life shine for once.

She peers up at me through her red-rimmed eyes, a slight smile lifting the corners of her mouth. Christ, she’s stunning even when she’s sad.

This wasn’t how I wanted our first day of meeting each other to go. Regardless, I’m glad she told me; this kind of talking has to be done. May as well rip the Goddamn cord off the blinds and welcome the light, since we’re about to be submerged into a black cavity that will soon be filled with death.

“In my suitcase,” she breathes out. Lips still trembling as she tries to gather strength.

“That’s good. I kept all of yours, too. If you need to read a few of them to remind you of the woman I know, the woman I see when I look at you, then maybe you should while I grab us something to eat. I’ll show you around, and then we can talk about a plan if you're up to it.”

“Alright. Thank you for understanding why I didn’t tell you,” she says in a tone filled with regret. Not sure if I’ll understand, but I know what it’s like to love someone enough that you’ll do what you have to in order to protect them.

She reaches up and runs her hands down my beard. I have no words to describe how good she feels pressed up against me or how the simple gesture of her fingers combing through the thick mass on my face feels. If I didn’t know her the way I do, I would clean it up, trim it down, and cut my hair. Tara doesn’t give a shit about any of that. She doesn’t give a fuck what I look like or what I do as long as I stay true to loving her. Never hurting her and putting all of my strength into helping her heal.

I place her down on her feet. Her scar is in my line of sight. She’s so damn beautiful it hurts to look at her. I vow right there that even if I have to fuck with my parole, I’ll do whatever it takes to get her child back to her. I just need to figure out how.

“I’m going to take that shower, after all,” he says. I nod in agreement. It will do her some good to relieve the tension she has to be feeling. I want it all out of her, so she pays attention to the plan I have building up in my head.