Page 92 of Fueled Hate

“Shut up, Dylan,” Sadie cries, shoving me back. “How do you even know? How do you know all of this and I don’t have a fuckin’ clue?”

“Because you won’t see what’s right in front of your face. You want to believe the nice, easy version instead of seeing them for what they truly are. These people are using you for their own pleasure or needs, and then they just toss you aside.”

“Get out,” she lunges, ramming her fist against my chest as she forces me back.

Me. She’s hiding from me and running to them and it’s gutting me, the agony spilling out in my words. “It’s still them. It’ll always be them because they’ve been around you forever.”

“Do you know why I can’t let you hurt me again? Why it’s easier for me to forgive them, only for them to do it again? Reveal some sick fucking secret that drags my heart further into a nightmare?” She steps in front of me, red-rimmed eyes cutting me to the quick. “Because it hurts worse when you do it. And you always do. Just like right now. You couldn’t just let it be. You have to plunge the knife deeper. And it fucking hurts because you also make me feel safe, protected. When I was defenseless, being swallowed up by the darkness, realizing that I was unable to protect myself, all I wanted was you. You to protect me, you to shield me, you to keep me safe. Only you can’t protect me from you.”

She’s right. I protect her from everyone else only to turn around and hurt her myself. Reaching up, I go to touch her face but stop. Lowering my hand, I take a step back and walk out of the room, leaving a wake of destruction. Exactly as I’d planned to do. Only I thought it would bring me some satisfaction, but it doesn’t. They haven’t been the ones that suffered the most—Sadie has. Instead of destroying Kyle’s life, burning his and Frank’s treacherous partnership to the ground, I incinerated Sadie’s world.

52

Sadie

How can a person that hasn’t taken a breath in years cause so much destruction?

“Pregnant,” I say aloud. It doesn’t make it feel any realer, it’s all too much. “Why would you push me to stay with Kyle?”

My hands grip my stomach, pressing as I try to suppress the nausea flowing through me. Between the drugs Jett gave me and the latest revelation of all things fucked up, I can’t handle much more. “I want to know why. Why she did it. How she could do that to you. And how you could be okay with all of it.”

“I was never okay with it,” Dad says, looking past me down the hallway. “I should’ve done so many things differently, but I wasn’t good with any of it, I’m still not.”

Jumping up from the table, I slam my fist against the hard surface. “Why? Why did she do it? Why did you tell me to give him another chance?”

“We’ll never understand. I’ve accepted that and you need to also,” Dad says nonchalantly, like nothing about this is a big deal. I stare at him in disbelief.

The door opens as Levi steps into the kitchen, his wrinkled clothes evidence that he hadn’t been home and had been out all night.

Levi gives me a smug look. “Pretty princess gracing us with her presence.”

I’m so fucking sick of his attitude. I lost my mother too. But not once, over and over again as I discover who she actually was. “Shut the fuck up, Levi.”

He stops, looking at me with shock because I don’t feel like being his punching bag for a change. “What’s this? Sweet, innocent Sadie finally decided to grow a pair.”

“Shove it up your ass, Levi.” I stomp over to him, getting in his face. I need to unleash my anger on someone, and he needs a wake-up call. We’re all hurting. All because of her. Not me. “I’m so sick of you being a selfish asshole. You’re not the only one who lost her.”

“That’s enough, you two.” Dad darts our way, wedging between us as he shoves Levi down the hallway.

Levi doesn’t follow directions, as usual, and keeps his malicious stare on me. “It’s your fault. It’ll always be your fault. So go find your rich little fuckboys—you shoulda been fucking them in the first place so they wouldn’t have fucked our mother.”

No. Levi knows. He knew all along. That’s why he blames me. “She made the choice. She did it. She probably fucked your friends too.”

Levi charges forward, hurling slurs at me as I stand and watch. It doesn’t hurt anymore. This is the destruction a mother left for her children. She’s to blame.

“I said that’s enough.” Dad shoves Levi back, continuing to yell for him to shut up.

“I should’ve put a bullet through your fucking skull instead of hers.”

All the air is sucked out of my lungs. It can’t be. He wouldn’t. Why is Dad still forcing him back, shoving him towards his room, telling him to keep his mouth shut. Protecting him. Dad is protecting Levi.

“You killed her?” The words don’t feel real leaving my mouth as I stare at my brother.

Levi looks at me through hooded eyes and a sickening look stretches across his face. “Yes. I did.”

“I told you to shut your mouth,” Dad yells.

“No. Pretty princess wants to know what happened. Guess what … she wasn’t fucking my friends, just your boyfriend. Oh, and they weren’t just fucking, she loved him. At least that’s what she said when I confronted her about it and asked why she would pick him over us, all of us. She was abandoning me either way. She used me as an excuse. All those times she said she was at practice watching me play or driving to a game. She was with him. She didn’t give a fuck about anyone but herself.”