Underestimated Too(59)

“And I was once again the cause of all your problems,” I stated, looking to Drew. “I don’t want to hear the rest. I know the rest. I know what happened that night, every last detail, and I don’t think we need to discuss it,” I assured him.

“How about we just talk about how you were feeling that night, Drew, leave out the specifics?” Deidra offered.

“Okay, well, you remember what happened in the—”

“Clearly,” I assured Drew.

But Drew, again, kept on talking. “I ordered Morgan to go to her room as soon as we were in the door. ‘Retire for the night,’ I said, seeing Rebecca. She scurried off to her quarters behind the kitchen. I noticed the look of encouragement she transmitted to Morgan as they dashed in different directions. I went up the stairs and headed down the cold, dim lit hall. Glancing up, I reminded myself to get rid of the ugly paintings lining the wall to Michael’s room. Paintings of dead safari animals that the two Callaway men had shot over the years. That was one thing I never did want from either of them. I hated the thought of shooting an innocent animal for pleasure. The air was heavy and thicker than smoke before I ever reached his door.”

Door? Whose door.

“I felt a surge of nervous energy when I placed my hand on the handle of his bedroom door, another room I wanted to burn to the ground. I hadn’t been in that room in years, never felt the need to ever go back in there until now. I wouldn’t even go in there when Michael was dying and my mother begged me to come and say hi. I wanted him dead, I was only there to console my mother, not him. I knew Michael had a toy box. I’d seen it and I wanted to find it. His daughter was going to play and entertain me.”

I sucked in an unnoticeable long breath of air. That was a bad night, a really bad night, and hearing Drew describe things I knew nothing about, left me feeling helpless. He blamed me.

“I pushed open the door to the dark room, feeling death linger from Michael’s absence. Nobody had touched it since he’d passed. Pill bottles aplenty, a half bottle of water, and needles decorated the night stand. The hospital bed had been stripped and flattened. The chill in that room left my skin feeling like ice, and I shuddered from the unwanted sensation. Strolling over to the adjacent door, I peaked in but didn’t walk all the way through. The empty mirrored room was just as I remembered. Michael’s grandfather had built the room for his daughter, Randal Callaway’s sister. It had one of those stationary dance bars running across the mirror, a small bath, and an apartment sized refrigerator. I wouldn’t wish that torture on anyone. You can’t even begin to know what spending days in a locked room with nothing but darkness does to your sanity. I eventually learned, or tried to anyway, to do what Michael wanted me to do. Some things still landed me in that room and I’d end up doing them anyway.”

“Drew? You were locked in the gym?” I asked shocked.

“I was, and you want to know what I thought about as I stood there?”

“What?”

“I thought about you. I wondered if you were always so wet because you secretly liked the things that I did to you.”

“Drew,” I warned with a look. Why the hell did he freely say whatever was on his mind in front of this woman? Was he right? Had I always liked it? “I didn’t like that night,” I assured him thinking about it. Well, not all of it anyway.

“Let’s stop here,” Deidra requested, looking at the ticking clock over our heads. She probably had the next screwed up couple to get to. I wondered if there was anyway another couple could be as screwed up as we were. Nah, not likely.





Chapter 20





I spent the next couple weeks with Alicia, trying to get them ready to move into Callaway’s estate. Celeste had men working in the kitchen, redoing the ugly tile, having new carpet laid in the baby’s and Vincent’s room, new carpet in the master and living room, and having a wall knocked out to open up the dining room to the living room. Alicia wasn’t happy about any of it. She was fine with it the way it was, but like me, she did what Celeste wanted.

“Alicia, how can I get a copy of Michael’s death certificate?” I asked, holding the tiny baby while she painted pink trees. Nicholas played with an unused paintbrush, banging it on the paint pan Alicia had given him. He could care less about the diaper-bag full of toys. He had something new.

“What do you mean? Doesn’t Drew have that someplace?” she asked, not turning to look at me while meticulously outlining the pink with a darker pink on a branch.

“I can’t ask him. You should know that by now.”