Summers, sensing the hostility, cleared his throat with a fake chuckle and looked between us with a half-pained expression, “Let’s do this, then, boys. Grab your stuff, our caddies are Daisy and Lucas. They’re waiting on the green at the tee box.” He then said as an aside. “Jasper and I will meet you, boys, there. We’ll bring my golf buggy down. I call him The Mule.”
Interesting. I thought someone like Summers would have named his golf cart ‘The Golfinator,’ or something else that was as pretentious. But nope, the man continued to surprise me.
We all started to grab our bags. Phoenix easily carried our golf bag as we followed the other two men, watching them load the buggy. “What are you doing? Are you nuts?” he rasped, clearly annoyed that I’d called Jasper a dickhead in front of his dad.
I shrugged and readjusted my glove. “That’s the consensus.” I could just see the headlines:Football God, Commits Homicide on the Fairway.
“You’d better be as good as Hudson,” Phoenix grunted moodily. He had always hero-worshipped our oldest brother, the kiss ass.
“Don’t get your dick in a twist.”
“It’s not my dick I’m worried about.”
A wide smile erupted across my face. I was the most competitive motherfucker on the planet and excelled at most sports. I’d donate a kidney rather than allow Jasper the prick to beat me. “Keep your panties on, brother. We’ve got this.”
FIVE
STORM
Signs of neglect, physical and mental abuse: children chained to their beds,starved, not allowed to use the toilet or shower? Living in filth.
That was the part of Reed’s life he had left out?
My stomach continued to churn. I had read Reed’s notes, which he’d submitted to my question sheet earlier that week, detailing that portion of his life before being fostered by Ma Sawyer.
Those lost ten months!
I hadn’t messaged him, knowing that what I wanted to say needed to be delivered in person and under professional circumstances. I knew as soon as I read about that missing period of his life, which he’d rarelytalked about, that I wouldn’t be able to become his official therapist; I was much too close.
Learning that the boy you once loved, strike that still loved, had been through such an ordeal gave me physical pain. My entire chest plate was still aching: shock, rage, and confusion powered through me.
After the foster mother he had shared with Micah died, and the father figure couldn’t cope, the two boys who had been housed together since they were five were split up: thrown back into the care system.
I didn’t have the details about what had happened to Micah, but Reed had been temporarily rehomed with the Palmer family. He and five others. All of whom were mistreated: some over a period of months, others for years.
Hiding in plain sight.
I’d seen something in the news about The Horror House but hadn’t given it that much thought.
When I’d searched the internet, the case was all over the news. Reed had been one of their victims, but why had he never come forward? I had a million questions circling my head.
From the appearance of the large bungalow, Reed and the others had been kept in it was a standard, middle-class family home, but inside, it told a very different story. From the photographs, the conditions in that house were not even fit for an animal.
When I found out that Reed had taken Hudson’s place in the doubles match between my father and Jasper, my heart had shifted to my throat. How could I sit there, knowing what I knew, without showing it on my face? But I had to, I wasn’t Doctor Summers that day, I was Storm. I also knew that if I showed him pity, Reed would not appreciate that. And as a professional, that would be unhelpful and could be potentially disempowering. The two emotions you were allowed to show, empathy and compassion, didn’t seem enough under the circumstances.
I had reread his notes many times over the last few days; they outlined how the kids were starved for days and the beatings they had if they misbehaved. No wonder Reed’s relationship with food was so strong.
What I had read in those papers would haunt me, and I knew I needed to speak with him about it. It happened a long time ago, but that didn’t mean that he was in any way healed. That type of scarring came out in different ways. Suppressed emotions led to uncontainable anger. Hence, Reed’s issues on the field. He had been so calm and quiet in high school and college, and now things had come to a head. The story was all over the press, but there had been no mention of one of the NFL’s star quarterbacks having been a victim.
Because they didn’t know.
The chaos of my thoughts was interrupted by my mother. “Do you want another glass of champagne, darling?”
I straightened in my seat. We were sitting inside the club restaurant beside the large bi-folding doors that led out onto a terrace. There was a perfect view of the golfcourse. It was Daddy’s usual table, and the staff always fawned all over us. I wondered fleetingly who was winning.
“No, I’ll wait for the others. Surely, they shouldn’t be too long now.” I was so anxious, my spine should have snapped in half from how rigid my body was.
“I feel quite nervous,” my mother carried on, fluffing her hair. She wore a short navy golf dress, which was rich considering she never played. I was also wearing Tory Burch, but in white with a collar and no sleeves. At least I’d been on the driving range that morning with my golf coach, Robert, and so had a right to wear it. My long hair was pulled into a severe ponytail, and I wore minimal makeup. The only jewelry I had on was my engagement ring. Jasper would freak out if I came to the club without my rock. And I hated it; it was like carrying a huge weight, not that dissimilar to the one on my shoulders.
