Hexed (Never After #6)

24. Venesa

TWENTY-FOUR

VENESA

In my entire life, I’ve never felt the level of rage that I do right now. It’s coursing through my body like hot black sludge so thick, my limbs are shaking from the weight.

There have been many times in my life when I’ve imagined hurting Aria.

When she kicked me while I was down on my first day of school.

When she instigated the rape that I still haven’t fully processed emotionally.

The list goes on and on.

But none of that, none of it compares to how I feel right now, staring at my father—the man I still have nightmares about—while he stands across from me in the living room of the Aquata .

I need to go back outside and hurt her.

Beat her like my dad used to beat my mom, just so she can experience a fraction of hardship in her life.

She can play an innocent all she wants, but there’s no way she doesn’t realize how this affects me. She might not know the gritty details of my past, but she knows enough, and she did this on purpose. To be cruel, the same as she’s always been.

But I’m not the same girl.

Staring at my father on my birthday is like being in a time vortex, snapped up and spun around until I’m thrown back into my past.

“Come out, come out wherever you are.” My momma’s voice is a singsong from the living room. I cover my mouth, stifling the giggle wanting to burst free.

I’m cramped in a cupboard to the right of the kitchen sink, and it’s so hot and stuffy, the strands of my brown hair stick to the sides of my face.

“Er-sahhhh,” Momma hums. “Where’s my Yrsa, baby?”

My foot cramps and I jerk, my toes hitting the wooden siding.

Dang it, I just know that means she’s gonna hear me.

Sure enough, a few seconds later, the door swings open, my momma’s beautiful white grin spreading across her face as she leans back on her heels, her hands already shooting forward to tickle my sides. “Gotcha!”

“Momma!” I screech. “You’re gonna make me hit my head!”

A car door slams out front, and suddenly the mood changes, Momma’s eyes growing wary as she looks to the side door off the long and narrow kitchen.

“Who’s that?” I whisper , but the sinking in my heart gives me the answer before she does.

It’s my daddy…at least, that’s what I’m supposed to call him. He’s never really around enough to make it feel like the real thing. I barely recognize the man because of how often he’s missing, and even when he is here, the way he likes to hurt Momma makes me not want to know him at all.

I just wish she’d feel the same.

Momma pops up from where she was crouching in front of me and peers out of the small square window over the sink, a sharp inhale of breath following whatever she sees.

That sinking feeling in my chest drops to my feet.

If he’s back, then that means I’m about to lose these moments with her. Again.

She never really loves me out loud for long, even though she promises each time will be different.

It never is.

If my daddy is a drug, then my momma is the addict, and she’ll bleed for him until her veins run dry, even if it leaves me all alone.

Her lips thin, her face draining of color. That’s a weird reaction. No matter how much he hurts her, she’s always happy to see him.

“Is it Daddy?” I ask, unsure now.

She glances at me, chewing on her lip, and then she gives a sharp nod and crouches back down until she’s looking me in the eye. “I want you to do something for me, okay? I want you to hide in here again, in this very spot, until I come and get you. No matter how long it takes. Can you do that?”

I scrunch my brows. “But you already know where I am.”

“I do, but…” She leans in close. “Your daddy doesn’t, and I just know he’s gonna want to find you. It’s your birthday, after all.”

She’s always doing things like that, trying to make him seem like a better person, a better parent, than he is. But just because I’m a kid doesn’t mean that I’m dumb. I don’t believe her for a second.

You can’t erase memories from a brain by whispering sweet words, and even the heaviest of makeup washes away eventually, leaving nothing behind but the ugly truth.

I learned that the first time my daddy came home, then pulled me from my bed in the middle of the night while he beat my momma black and blue in front of me.

Punishment for her, he said. If she’d just behave more, then he wouldn’t have to teach her lessons.

I cried and ran toward them, banging my little fists on his thick arm and begging him to leave her alone.

He stopped. For a second.

But only to throw me on our worn plaid couch and tell me to get myself together. That crying was for the weak, and Andersens were strong.

I learned quickly that if I didn’t cry out, he’d stop sooner.

So I try to stay quiet when I hear them argue in the next room now. At least I think it’s him.

He’s drunk, I just know it. He’s always drunk. Maybe that’s why his voice sounds different.

I count backward in my head, trying to figure out the last time he actually came home instead of staying out all night gambling and drinking away Momma’s tips, but it’s been so long, I’ve lost track.

Fear for Momma makes my heart pound wildly in my chest. And fear for me because I don’t want him to come grab me and make me watch the way he always does.

They scream for a few more minutes, and then I hear it.

The sound of flesh hitting flesh.

I squeeze my eyes shut, bringing my legs to my chest and wrapping my arms around them. I bury my head in my lap until my knees press against my ears, trying to muffle the noise.

He never found me.

And she never found me again either because that was the night she died.

When I finally crawled out of that cramped cupboard, I saw her on the living room floor, bled out, her eyes wide-open and lifeless. I remember trying to cry. Walking slowly to her bloody body and curling underneath her limp, lifeless arm, staring blankly at our blue wallpaper with white flowers that was stained yellow from years of cigarette smoke, willing the tears to fall and feeling guilty when they wouldn’t.

I moved in with Uncle T three days later.

Everyone asked me what happened, but I never told a soul.

Hours in police rooms, them trying to ply me with sweets and ice-cold soda pop. But I didn’t say a thing.

Except…I told Aria.

Not about everything, but that it was him who killed her.

And maybe over the years, despite what she’s done to me, despite how cruel and awful she’s been, I’ve held back and given her some grace.

Because at least she respected my boundaries for this one singular thing.

This dark thing she held for me like a personal secret keeper. As long as she did that, she was still family. My family.

But that’s all dead and gone now.

And despite everything, I can’t find it in me to hate Uncle T for arranging the trip and hunting him down because he doesn’t know, and I have to believe he’s only doing something he thinks will make me happy.

I have to believe it. Otherwise, what is there for me to believe in?

But even as I think the words, a dubious feeling slithers around me, latching on like tentacles, shaky and unsure.

I don’t like it.

Being around Uncle T, being his sidekick—the one he turns to when he needs things done—has always grounded me. Given me purpose. I’m not sure what to do if that goes away.

It’s all I’ve ever known, really.

Having Harald here, knowing Aria set this up even though it must have taken an elaborate amount of planning…it makes me feel like I’ve lost control.

But there is one thing I still have control over, and that’s staying here with him .

I don’t have to do it.

So I don’t.

Without another word, I spin around, slide open the glass door, and leave.