“That’s very clever, Connor.”
“I’m a clever guy.”
Silence again. This time, I give him a break, or maybe I want to talk to him about Ekatia. I have a feeling I could talk about her for days. She’s my favorite topic. My fixation.
“People who don’t check out don’t have access to my family.”
“Why do you keep her around?”
I tsk. “She’s Dina’s best friend and will be the maid of honor at my brother’s wedding.”
“That sounds like a reason not to keep her around even more. She’s in the innermost circle.”
“I can’t get rid of her.” I feel like ants are crawling over my skin. “She’s a good mother.” There. Dr. J can’t fight his satisfied smirk. He landed on what he wants to talk about with me.
When we first started our sessions, the Musketeers were given my file. They know my history. They know my father raped my mother and forced her to give birth to my brother and me. She called us her rape babies while also going out with him, doing drugs, drinking, and occasionally thinking up ways to get rid of me and Dec.
Dec found out that one time, our mom tried to drown us in the river under the Pointe Bridge, from which, at Declan’s order, our father hung our mother after he gutted her.
All of Selnoa witnessed her demise.
It’s one of the main reasons my father was feared. He killed the very person he loved most in the world. And make no mistake, he loved my mother fiercely. It was an obsession. A fixation.
“Do you want to tell me more about her?”
“I can do that. She gives a shit about her baby. She’s a hard worker too. Doesn’t whine about having to work. I respect that. She wants to get laid and doesn’t make excuses for her sexuality. She knows who she is. She pushes back when I’m being a dick, and you know what she did the other day?” I lean into the screen and stick my tongue out. “She came on my tongue in under a minute.” I lean back.
When I get no reaction from the Musketeer, I tilt my head. “You know my rules, Doc. If I feel like I’m talking to a brick wall, I’ll stop talking.”
“You have a relationship with this woman.”
“Is that what we’re calling it?”
“You are sexually active with her.”
“I haven’t fucked her. I just made her come. Do you like coming in someone’s mouth?”
Declan pays these people a fortune to sit here and chat with me, so I’d better get my money’s worth. “Come on, Doc. When you signed up for this job, you knew it wasn’t going to be easy. You accepted after you read my file. I stated my rules on day one. Answer me or fuck off.”
“Yes, I like coming in my husband’s mouth.”
“Does he?” I ask.
“Probably.”
“Did Declan force you to be here?”
“He sent each of us your file. We were all given an opportunity to study the file. We committed to a number of sessions.”
“You are evading. My question has a yes-or-no answer. “Did Declan force you to be here today?” People normally stay away from me. They find reasons to bail, run, die. I’m like a cockroach and can survive anything. Just ask my mother. She tried to kill us multiple times.
“Yes,” Dr. J says, “But…”
I disconnect. Stretch. Roll my shoulders, shake out my body as if I’m a book shaking off decades-old dust that’s stuck on the leather-bound cover.
“Connor!” Declan shouts from downstairs.
Uh-oh. He found out about the restaurant.
