Didn’t you say they’re from the same town?”
I nodded. “Fathers are in business together.”
“Maybe that’s why he targeted you,” Tori reasoned. “Maybe you had something he wanted, but couldn’t have.”
“Aivery?”
Tori nodded. “He’s older than her. She was probably underaged when he wanted her. Then you got her… When?”
“My second year here.”
“And that’s when you pledged. Right?”
My head bounced again, agreeing. “But that doesn’t make sense. He could have her here.”
Tori closed the pizza box and scooted back to leave the bed. “Not if it was you who she wanted when she got here instead.”
I watched her tight ass bounce, bursting through the cotton of my boxers as she left the room. I hoped she didn’t run into Stephan with those big ass cherry tits pushing through the thin fabric of my tank, and I’d have to make this awkward.
Shit…
I closed my laptop, realizing I’d exerted possession over this girl who wasn’t mine. I laughed to myself, placing the machine on my dresser and plugging in the charger. What would Tori look like as mine? Would she be adventurous? A freak? Aivery wasn’t a freak. She was good and fun, but brought the innocent girl act to bed, something I’d been putting off addressing. I didn’t know where Tori landed on the freak-odometer. She was new and…different.
“What’re you thinking about?” she asked, whisking through my room for the bed.
When she was settled in on her side, I turned to her. “How…normal were you before that pussy ass Paul…hurt you?”
“Hmmmm…” Her face folded as though she was thinking about it. “I don’t know. I was different, though.”
“How?”
“Free.” Her voice dropped several octaves and her sad eyes rolled up to me when she added, “Safe.”
“Safe…” I murmured without intent.
“I was like a real kid. Like one tucked in warm and safe. And then when Paul started coming around…” She swallowed, chocolate pools rolling away. “He made me feel like I did something to not deserve to be tucked in to be kept…warm and safe. Even before the first time, the way he’d look at me.” She turned back to me. “That’s when I knew my mother wasn’t like other mothers. She didn’t protect me even from a man I wasn’t related to. She had him over all the time and would leave us alone.”
My fucking heart ripped in my chest. “She knew?”
Tori shook her head. “No. But that was the problem, you protect so you do know. She was too comfortable with having him around me like he was a relative. They were sneaking around, so he came when he could, even if it was before she got home from work. And when she came in, she wasn’t checking for me. She was excited about him. Mothers like Ms. Wanda Lee wouldn’t do that.”
Ms. Wanda Lee damn sure wouldn’t do that. With all the flack I’d given my mother for being domineering and overprotective all my life, she still regulated my environments. She made sure I spent no time alone with any of my father’s friends. Before this very conversation, I thought it was because of her fear of me being around gay men. Now, I realize there were gay men in my family my mother loved and supported. But just as she didn’t want me around Jimmy alone, she never had any of her male companions around me alone either. She used to curse my aunt, Tabitha, out about letting her boyfriends babysit Brick and his sisters coming up. Wanda Lee hated that shit.
“I—” I cleared my throat. “I’m just glad she didn’t know.” That eliminated her as a monster in my head. A loser, yeah, still. But no monster.
Tori shook her head. “My Margaret was still angry. She should have known.”
“This is gonna sound fucked up, but I’m trying to find some positivity in all this fucked upness for my own sanity.” Her head rolled over and she gave me her full attention. “I hate that he ever laid eyes on you, much less forced you to do things with him. But I’m glad he didn’t do more to you. Like hurt you physically with intercourse.”
“He didn’t. He would threaten to, though. He’d told me if I didn’t do it right and make it quick, he would do it another way,” she breathed out the last few words.
That sick ass motherfucker…
“How did it stop?” I needed more good in this.
“The first time?” She took a deep breath. “One day…after we finished in my room, he walked out, and I dumped myself