Page 94 of Z For Butterfly Man
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
The universe quiets to the point that I can hear my blood flowing through my veins. Everything is silent except for the slowing echo of my heartbeat and a scream I’ve heard before but didn’t listen to.
“No. Mom! Please!”
In the hotel, when I was drowning in the tub, that scream wasn’t a memory or my own. It was his. Brandon’s.
I hit the floor. Blood is oozing out of more places on my body. My breath snags in my chest. Tristan’s gun clatters down in front of me.
Brandon is on the floor, too, behind me, holding me and placing my head on his thigh. He applies pressure to my wounds, tears frozen in his eyes. “Mom, no. Why did you do that? I’ve only just found you.”
“It’s you. You found me.” A smile shakes on my lips. “I should have known. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” That face… He looks exactly like his dad. I should have connected the dots much earlier. The one time Brandon lied to me, the story about the client who had a brother in prison… There was no client. Brandon lied because he knew about prisons from Shane. Brandon must have found his father. He visited Shane, and my brother told him about me. “I wish you’d told me sooner, my sweet boy.”
“Don’t talk, Mom. Please. Save your strength. Just stay with me. MORRA, HELP ME!”
Tristan sinks to his knees. “What have you done, Reagan? What have you done?”
“I had to. You’re the Simo Hayha of your time. You don’t miss.” I force the words out, the metallic taste of blood on my tongue. “I needed to save Brandon. I needed to save my son.”
Understanding hits Tristan in the face. “That friend of yours who got pregnant at fifteen. It was you.”
I touch Brandon’s cheek with quivering fingers. I touch my son for the first time. “I didn’t abandon you. I loved you more than anything. I begged them to let me keep you.” Tears burst from my eyes. “But they took you from me. They wouldn’t even let me hold you.” They tore him out of me. Then they tied my tubes and made me barren forever. They took my only baby.
“It’s okay. Mom, please, just don’t talk. Just stay with me. I called for help. All I need is for you to stay with me.” Brandon sobs. “I love you, too.”
He loves me. My baby boy loves me.
A wild cough takes over me, and blood fills my mouth. I don’t have much time. He needs to know everything. He needs to understand. “I was fifteen. I couldn’t do much, but when they were gone, I tried to find you… Nineteen years of searching databases and adoption records, of chasing false leads and dead ends. I never stopped trying.”
“I found you. I’m here. All you have to do is keep your eyes open just for a little while. Hold on for me, Mom. I’m begging you. MORRA, FUCKING HELP ME!”
“I made them pay,” I say through shallow breaths. “All of them. Mother, Shane, even Mason.”
Mason Bloom was never acting out of the goodness of his heart. He knew about the baby right from the start, from the day Shane asked me to lie to the MC and tell them Mason wasthe father. Shane had asked Mason to take the blame but make it look realistic. It was all a charade, an act they’d agreed on. Mason said yes for a price. His colors.
He watched them rip pieces of me, took their shame and guilted me for a patch he didn’t even get.
Shane never came through, so Mason kept me close as leverage, to have his revenge. When he had it, and there was no hope of getting back in the MC, he married me to pay his bills, to keep me docile with his secret.
I didn’t know about the deal. For years, I’d thought Mason was a victim just like me. Until I discovered he was the one who took my baby away. When I confronted him, he told me he gave my son to a nice family in New Mexico. I asked to see my boy, even from afar. Mason stalled. Then I learned it was just another lie. Mason dumped my baby in front of a church like trash.
Mason might have never laid a hand on me, although I made it look like he’d smashed my bones, but he smashed what was left of my soul. He dumped my baby on the street and then shared my bed for ten years.
My vision grays at the edges. “Everyone who took you from me. I made them all pay.”
“Stop talking.” Brandon’s voice cracks. “Please stop talking. You need to save your energy. TRISTAN! I’M LOSING HER!”
The gray closes in, swallows the light, swallows everything. But I’m not afraid because the last thing I see is my baby’s face.
My hand drops. I reach out for my boy again, but my fingers don’t obey. “You’re alive. I got to see you. I got to feel you. That’s all that matters.” Blood bubbles up with my smile. “You found me, and I saved you. It’s not a tragedy anymore. I couldn’t have written it any better.” I get to die in my son’s arms. “You are my happy ending.”
“MOM!”
“I love you,” I say my last words and surrender to the darkness I’ve always belonged to.
