Page 53 of Lethal Weakness

“What can I do to make this more bearable for you? Can I make you something to eat? Do you need a punching bag? Anything.”

“Nothing will make this easier,” I utter brokenly.

“I know,” he admits, looking more unsure than I’ve ever seen him. He really doesn’t know how to handle emotions from someone like me.

“I want you to tell me something.”

He stiffens. “About what?”

“Something about you.”

He rubs at the crease between his brows as if my question has truly stumped him.

“You’re a closed book… And it’s not my place to demand answers. But I just want to know something about the man who keeps rescuing me,” I whisper against his chest, and his arms tighten around me.

“I played baseball in school.”

Surprisingly, despite my sour mood, a smile pulls at my lips as I look up at him. “I bet you were good.”

The corner of his mouth curls upward slightly. “I was alright.”

“Did you want to play in college?”

“No. No college.” He takes my hand and pulls me over to my porch steps, forcing me to sit, and leaving just enough room for him to sit beside me. “After my parents died, I lost a lot of my optimism for life. Playing baseball seemed ridiculous when there was no one left in the stands to support me.”

“It was just you and your parents? No siblings?” I ask hesitantly. It seems if I keep with questions far in his past, I might keep getting answers.

“No siblings. My parents met at a conference in D.C., and nine months later, I was born. Luckily, it worked out, because they were soulmates. They were never apart after that. They even left this world together.” He shakes his head at the thought.

“Jack O’Connor, that almost sounds romantic.”

A small dimple forms in his cheek that’s facing me, and my lips part in surprise. I’ve known him all this time and didn’t know he had dimples.

“They were romantic people. I grew up with a lot of love in my house, just like you’re doing for Avery.”

“We don’t have much, but I know I can give her a good life.”

“You are. All of this bullshit will be over soon.”

There it is again. Those cryptic promises he keeps making.

“Can I tell you something that might make you angry?”

He tips his head to look at me with curiosity brewing.

“It’ll only make you angry for me, not at me.”

“I could never be angry at you, Linden. You could never do anything to warrant that.”

Grief stirs in my gut for the girl that endured so much of a man’s anger. Turner was angry at me for everything, even the things that I had no control over.

I never deserved it, but it rewired my brain. It will take me a long time to be brave enough to stand up for myself, and not to cower.

I wrap my hand around Jack’s bicep and rest my head against his shoulder. “I was four weeks postpartum the first time that Turner yelled at me. Like true, uncontrollable screaming. I couldn’t believe it because he had never treated me that way, but my hormones were going wild, and I assumed he was stressed. He dropped Avery into her bassinet so hard, I cried, and that made it worse. She was okay, but it infuriated him that I reacted that way.” Jack’s muscle is tense beneath my hand, but I keep going.

“He admitted that he was never meant to be a dad, and that it was my fault that we got pregnant. When I asked him how, because it was an accident, the condom broke… He admitted that he lied. He took it off without telling me because he was drunk, and I should have been on birth control like ‘every other college whore’,” I quote.

Jack launches up from his seat and starts pacing in front of me, swiping his hand through his hair roughly before righting his hat. “That isn’t right. He took advantage of you.”