James hums, but there’s a note of disapproval in the sound, as if being in the hospital shows how weak I am. I stab the prime rib just to stop my hand from shaking. If I’m not careful, I’m going to cry, and I don’t think my ego will recover if I do. But I’m trapped. And I’m tired. And I thought I was tougher than this, but I guess my heart has proved just how mistaken I was.
“You really should eat,” he says. “Nutritional deficiencies tend to exacerbate mood swings in women.”
He says it so assuredly, so nonchalantly, that I wonder if he’s even aware of how fucked up that is to say. I have no doubt this man would have loved to have women committed in the late nineteenth century, would probably still like to.
Nix makes a sound to corroborate my thought—half snort, half snarl—since she has no qualms about creating a shit show. Caleb subtly nudges her under the table. She bristles but keeps her eyes trained on James, and I know that look. She’s about to open her big fat mouth.
“How in the hell did Caleb come from you?” she drops her fork onto her plate with a clatter.
The air gets sucked out of the room as a sweat breaks out on the back of my neck. Jesus, what iswrongwith her? Did I make her like this? Is this me in teenage form?
“Nix,” I whisper.
But it’s too late. James lowers his fork with exaggerated poise.
“I admire your tenacity,” he finally says after a beat, voice flat and frostbitten. “It’s the kind of reckless confidence that will get you very far in life. Or very dead.”
“Same can be said for tyrants,” she fires back before I can even gulp, her smile thin and bright. “But thank you.”
My heart all but pounds out of my chest. For fuck’s sake, I’m going to end up back in the hospital. And I’m putting Nix in there with me this time since I’m going to have to beat some sense into her.
“I do wonder, though,” James leans back in his chair and narrows his gaze on Caleb as if he’s the culprit, “what has you so hostile toward me?” His gaze slides back to Nix. “Unless this is your natural state, in which case, maybe you, too, have some deficiencies.”
Oh, no.
I look to Jax for help, but it’s in vain, because he still won’t meet my eyes. It’s like I haven’t even existed to him since I entered the room, and if the table wasn’t so big, I would kick him in the shin. I make a plan to do just that once we get out of here.Ifwe get out of here.
“You—” Nix starts before being cut off by Caleb.
“You mean, besides being a misogynist?” Caleb says with more scathe than I’ve ever heard from him. “That’s probably it. That might be why she’s hostile.”
James raises a single brow, like Caleb’s just sprouted a second head. “Excuse me?”
Caleb clears his throat but doesn’t back down. “You heard me.”
Oh god. I don’t need to have spent much time with Caleb to know that him talking back is unheard of. Even Nix looks surprised, if not a little proud, but it’s the slump of Jax’s shoulders in quiet defeat that makes me realize what a mistake it must be.
The searing crack that echoes in the room confirms it, and I clasp a hand over my mouth as Caleb’s head jerks from the blow. Nix’s chair topples over as she abruptly stands. Jax’s chair hits the ground not a second later, and Arnold pushes off the wall. It’s a chaos of motion, but I’m frozen in disbelief.
Did James really just slap Caleb?
Out of everything I had to endure growing up, being hit was never part of it. My father may have been a drunk and a deadbeat, but he never raised a hand to me or Nix during the few odd months he spent with her. This is… this is—
“You’re a disgusting, tiny-dicked piece of shit,” Nix’s seething cuts into my thoughts, the venom in her voice waking up a panic inside of me.
She grabs Caleb’s chin to make him face her. She twists his cheek in such a way that I get a glimpse of the angry red mark blooming on his skin. He looks dazed, a bit out of it, but I don’t get a second to feel bad before I notice Arnold has drawn his gun, eyes trained on Jax. Jax, who’s standing beside his toppled chair, chest pumping with a fury I’ve never seen. His fists are clenched so tightly that his knuckles are white. His eyes are locked on James like he’s trying to decide where he’d bury the body.
Arnold widens his stance, placing both hands on the gun now.
“You hit him again,” Jax says, his voice low and vibrating with rage, “and I swear to God, I will snap every brittle bone in your fucking hand.”
James, seemingly unperturbed, brushes imaginary lint from his shoulder. “I will discipline my son however I see fit.”
“How about I disciplineyou?” Nix growls, but she keeps her teary eyes on Caleb’s cheek.
“Caleb,” Jax grinds out. “Take your girlfriend and her sister to their rooms. Now.”
“But we haven’t even had dessert,” James deadpans as if bored.
