Ravage nodded and left the kitchen. Maureen turned to me and asked, “Who is he?”
“That’s what I want to talk to you about. Can we go to my office?”
Maureen nodded, and I opened the door for her to waddle through. I was excited to have a nephew. And I couldn’t wait to see how Dec handled fatherhood.
The trek to my office took a little longer than normal, and once again I wished Maureen would stay home and rest. I knew pregnancy wasn’t easy at any age, but with Maureen being almost fifty, it had to be taking a bigger toll.
I helped her into the seat across from my desk, and then I walked around and dropped into my chair. I didn’t know how to start the conversation.Should I start slowly or just blurt it out?
“King, do you want to tell me why that young man has the Murphy eyes?”
“He’s my brother.”
“What? How?”
“After Darcy left me with my grandparents, she changed her name and moved on. She became Gretchen Foster and met someone. She had Ravage a little over a year after she had me.”
“Does he know?”
I shook my head. “He thinks his mother is a woman named Jane Craven. He knows who his father is and doesn’t want anything to do with him. Any more than I do Sal.”
“What happened to Darcy?”
“We don’t know. All we know is when she delivered, Jane took her son.”
“What aren’t you telling me? Darcy wouldn’t just let someone take her son.”
“She let my grandparents take me,” I shouted, slamming my hand on the desk.
“Don’t you raise your voice to me, you little shit. She didn’t let them take you. She gave you to them. To protect you.” Maureen sat forward in her chair. “Now tell me the rest.”
“Jane threatened me. It was why she let her take Ravage.”
Maureen looked up at the ceiling. “Poor Darcy.”
“Poor Darcy?”
She dropped her head and narrowed her eyes at me. “Yes, poor Darcy.” I scoffed at the notion that my mother deserved any sympathy. “You’re a man. You have no idea how hard it is to give up a child. Darcy was forced to give up both of hers.”
“No one forced her to give me up. She could have stayed. She could have raised me herself.”
“You didn’t know your grandfather. He never would have let that happen.” Maureen swiped at her tears. “What about his father?”
“I don’t know exactly what happened there, but he walked away too.”
“He knew about him?”
I nodded. “He was there when Ravage was born.”
“Asshole,” Maureen muttered. “If Sal had known about you, he never would have walked away. He might have killed hisfather a lot sooner than he did.” She wiped her hands up and down her legs. “When are you going to tell him?”
“I don’t know. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I don’t know what to say. How to say what I need to so he doesn’t feel what I felt when I learned the truth.”
“Oh, King, you can’t prevent that. He needs to know the truth. He needs to know he had one parent who loved him and wanted him.”
I snorted, and she cursed me out. “Knock it the fuck off with that poor-me bullshit. You need to forgive her. And you need to forgive him. Sal has his faults, many of them. But this isn’t one of them. He was a kid who had no idea he had become a father. At least he didn’t walk away from you like Jackson’s father did.”
Maureen was right. Sal hadn’t known anything about me, but he was the only person I had to take my anger out on. Him and Declan. But Dec had always been there for me. He kept my mother’s secret, but he never let me down.
