Devil You Know(Lost Boys Book 1)(16)

“You need to come over here immediately.”

“No.”

“Listen to me you little shit. You either get your ass over here or I’ll just show up at the Aherns. I’m sure my invitation got lost in the mail.”

I went numb. She would crash the party; she’d ruin the day for everyone just to fuck with me.

“I’m on my way.”

She was in the kitchen, digging through the trash looking for any bottle that still had a sip or two of vodka. The Aherns were throwing a party for their children to celebrate their accomplishments and my mother was fucking picking through her trash for a fix.

“I heard through the grapevine you were fucking that Ahern girl.” She looked at me from over her shoulder, her bloodshot eyes rimmed with dark circles. “Got that apartment just so you could fuck her, didn’t you? I wonder what her father would say.”

My hands balled into fists, but I refused to take the bait. “Why are you such a vile bitch?”

She turned and laughed, but the sound wasn’t pleasant. “I loved a man and he left me. He was everything to me, I worshipped him, and he fell in love with someone else.”

“That’s not love. Love lifts you up, you were obsessed with him, clung to him, demanded everything from him, even feeling jealous of your own child and the attention Dad gave to me.”

“He was mine! Mine not yours. And he loved you, you who did nothing but shit in your diapers and cry and want attention. He lavished that on you, took his love from me and gave it to you. You didn’t hold his interest very long though, did you? Out of sight and out of mind. And don’t you act like you are any better than me. You’re just the same. Tell me I’m wrong. You are willing to give up everything for that girl, to follow wherever she leads. She consumes your thoughts. A lowlife daring to believe you’re good enough for her. She’ll realize it, just like your father realized it, and she’ll leave you. And it will be you sitting in your shit apartment, drinking yourself to death because you can’t live in a world without her.”

Ice moved through my veins because as much as I wanted to deny it, there was truth in her words. Thea had become the center of my world, the air I breathed…my own obsession. Would I become jealous of my own child if Thea and I ever had one? Did a scene like the one I had witnessed between my mother and father lurk in my future? I would rather never see Thea again than ever see her look at me the way my dad had looked at my mother. My legs went weak at the thought.

“You belong here with me. We are just alike, you and I.”

“Why did you call me here?”

“I’m out of vodka and the electric company is going to shut off my power. You need to take care of it. It is the least you can do considering what you cost me.”

Looking at where I came from, the evidence of the darkness in my blood, I wouldn’t pull the Aherns into hell with me, and if I stayed that is exactly what would happen. She would make all of our lives hell. But I didn’t intend to spend another second with the twisted and pathetic creature whose only legacy was hate. I walked out while she screamed at me to stay and I never looked back.



I had never seen Thea looking as happy as she did during the party. Her face was radiant from the smile that went from ear to ear. She had put herself near me for most of it, but at the moment she stood with her dad—arm in arm. He was toasting her, the pride on his face so clear to see. I would remember how she looked in that moment so I could carry it with me. I loved her, but I had to let her go. I wanted to be better for her and me and to do that I had to leave, even when everything in me wanted to stay.



“What happened?” Anton was a good friend but sometimes he was too fucking observant. I had been to the army recruiter and was getting my shit together. I was leaving. Now that the decision was made I had to just do it, because unlike my thoughts at the beginning of the school year, I didn’t want to go.

“Your fucking mom, wasn’t it?”

“She’s a bitch, but it isn’t because of her I’m leaving…not entirely because of her. I need this.”

“And Thea?”

And Thea, the ache in my chest just wouldn’t fade, but this was the right decision for her too.

“I love her, but she’s got NYU in the fall. Our timing sucks.”

“I like her for you.”

“I like her for me too.”

“I think you’re doing the right thing.”

That surprised me. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’ll look out for your girl.”

Cam was heading to Massachusetts. Thea would be alone in the city. “Don’t look too close.”