“Don’t tell me you fell for her shit too, Dad.” Thom laughs, a maniacal edge to his tone. “You can’t see the kind of person she is? A person who’d go out and seduce my father just to get back at me for?—”
And then something else clicks into place in his head. His eyes widen, and he freezes to the spot.
“Don’t tell me this is the guy who fathered your babies,” he mutters. It’s a question, but it isn’t phrased like one. Maybe because he already knows the answer. Maybe because he senses that neither of us are jumping to tell him that he’s wrong, he’s crazy, that neither of us would ever have let something like that happen, and that he needs to get the hell out of here before he goes around throwing accusations that he can’t take back.
But we don’t. No, neither of us say a word, because neither of us have to. The answer is clear. And whatever attempts we might have made to keep these two worlds apart from each other come crashing down in a matter of seconds.
“Jesus fucking Christ!” Thom yells. “You’re kidding me, right? You did this to hurt me, Lila? You thought this would get under my skin? You ruined your life just to…just to fuck my father like some little whore?”
“Thomas,” Martin warns him, moving toward him, backing him toward the door.
Thom stands his ground, not giving an inch. “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” he sneers. “You fell for it, Dad! I thought you were meant to be smart, at least, but you fell for it too…”
He looks almost drunk with fury, and I know this isn’t going to end well. For the first time, he will feel like he has some right to be angry at me, and I’ve seen what he does even when he has no business at all being mad.
I don’t want Martin to get hurt, but I have to think of myself and the twins, keeping them safe from whatever rage he’s about to pile down on top of me?—
“You get out of here, Thomas,” Martin tells him once more, his voice even. “We can talk about this later?—”
“Talk?” he exclaims. “We’ve got nothing to talk about. You fucked my?—”
Finally, Martin pushes him toward the door, clearly not willing to listen to another word out of his mouth. My hand flies to my mouth, and I feel tears spring to my eyes. I don’t know how this has happened, don’t understand how the universe could haveconspired so cruelly against me to land me in the middle of this mess. I thought I was just starting to get my feet under me, only for something like this to explode across my entire life.
Thom swings for Martin, who ducks, sending his fist slamming into the wooden doorframe. Thom lets out a howl of pain and goes to launch a kick at his father, but Martin sweeps his leg underneath him, sending him dropping to the ground.
But Thom has never been one to take a hint, even when he really needs to. And as he scrambles to his feet once more, I see the glint of metal in his hand—and I let out a scream as he runs full-force at Martin once more.
20
MARTIN
Thomas swingsthe knife at me, tearing a chunk of my tee and drawing blood from my chest. I grimace, jerking backward, but I know there’s no way he can win this. He’s too shaken, too angry, and it’s throwing off his good sense.
Not that I can blame him, given the circumstances.
He tries to rush past me, and I slam the door before he can make it inside, sending him crashing into the wood full-force with a grunt. He spins around, brandishing the knife again, and I flex my hands at my sides. I never thought I would have to take on my own damn son in a fight like this, but right now, it doesn’t look like I have a choice.
He brandishes the knife at me, jabbing it toward me like he’s trying to keep me at arm’s length. “Why did you do it?” he demands. “Did you do it to hurt me? Did she come to you because she knew?—”
“I didn’t know anything,” I tell him. It’s the truth, but I doubt he’ll believe it.
Shit, I don’t know if I would believe it, if I was in his shoes. The coincidence is just too enormous, the hugeness of it more than either of us can take.
“Oh, yeah, like I’d believe that,” he grunts. He swings the knife wildly again, but it’s clear he doesn’t have a damn clue what he’s doing with that thing. I don’t know what he had intended to do with it if it had only been Lila in the apartment, but I’m relieved that I’m here to take him on.
Even if this whole mess has left me with more questions than answers.
“Just leave her alone,” I tell my son, pacing around him carefully, pushing him back wordlessly till he’s at the top of the stairs. It’s a short drop to the next landing, but enough to knock the wind out of him. If he won’t go on his own terms, I’m happy to help.
“And what, you’ll go in there and knock her up again?” he snaps. “Does Mom know about this? What would she think if she knew you had a little whore on the side?—”
“Don’t talk about her like that.”
I try to control my temper, but it’s difficult when he’s clearly going out of his way to aggravate me. He wants a response, wants me to react, wants to see me blow the fuck up with no warning. That way, he’ll feel as though he has won, and I know I can’t give him that satisfaction.
“Why, that’s what she is, isn’t she?” he mocks me. “A girl who’d sleep with a father and son—what else does that make her but a?—”
I lunge for him before I can stop myself, and he takes a step back to get away from me—but he’s so close to the edge of the stairs that he topples, sending himself sprawling to the ground before he realizes what’s happening. The knife flies from his hand and I dive down to grab it before he can pick it up again, watching as he lands with a heavy thud at the bottom of the staircase.
