Impact (Suncoast Society #32)

Impact (Suncoast Society #32)

Tymber Dalton




Chapter One


Then…



Cristo Guerrero lay curled up in a ball on his bed in the basement of his uncle’s house on the outskirts of Los Angeles. He couldn’t exactly call it his room because it was a bed shoved in the corner and an old dresser. The washer and dryer were also down there, as well as years of accumulated stuff—boxes of Christmas ornaments, sports gear, things forgotten and broken.

Much like he felt at that moment.

He’d barely been able to stumble down the stairs to collapse onto his bed after the beating his uncle had just given him.

Life can’t be like this. There has to be more. This can’t be all there is. If it is, f*ck this noise.

He was only sixteen. If this was what he had to look forward to for the rest of his life, why f*cking bother?

He heard the basement door slowly open, then quickly close again. Even if he hadn’t heard the telltale creak of the fifth step down, he still would have known it was little Sofia. Only eight, and named after their paternal grandmother, Sofia had followed him like a shadow, adoration in her little brown eyes, ever since he’d been forced to move into his uncle Gonzalo’s house six months earlier.

His ribs hurt so badly from the punches he could barely breathe. That’s why he didn’t even respond when he felt her cool, tiny hand on his forehead.

“Are you okay, Cris?”

This time, he couldn’t lie. “No, Fi. I’m not.” That was his special nickname for her.

“Why does Daddy do that to you?”

He couldn’t protect her from the ugliness in the world, especially the one she lived with.

As the baby of his aunt and uncle’s brood of four, and the only girl, she was four years younger than her next older brother, and an accidental baby the doctors had told Gonzalo and Julieta Guerrero they’d never have.

Their little miracle.

With a lot of renewed pain that almost made him black out, he managed to roll over and stared up at his little cousin. He knew, in her eyes, he was an adult.

He couldn’t very well explain things to her in a way that she’d not only understand, but which wouldn’t earn him a heavier beating.

“I don’t know,” he finally settled on. It wasn’t exactly a lie.

The deeper truth was he didn’t know what drove someone to the level of visceral hatred his father and uncle felt toward him.

His family was convinced he was gay, a worse sin in their staunch Spanish Catholic eyes than being a criminal. No matter how he’d tried to explain it to them, they didn’t understand he liked men and women. He was, right now, guilty of nothing worse than his father walking in on him and catching him watching a gay porn clip on his laptop.

She knelt next to his bed. “I love you, Cris. I always will.”

He managed a smile for her sake. “I love you, too, Fi. And I always will.”

Her father never hit him in the face, marks that would draw the attention of any of his teachers. It was always in the gut, in the kidneys. His uncle insisted Cris needed to toughen up, to man up. That he was too weak, and that, by God, he’d beat the “sin” out of Cris until he renounced it to his uncle’s satisfaction.

Cris wasn’t even sure if there was a God at that point, but he damn sure wasn’t going to lie, even if it meant more beatings.

He knew when he turned eighteen he’d be out of there and in college. He’d already received word back from his early applications that he had a scholarship and grants waiting for him.

He’d have to work his ass off to support himself during school, because he knew he couldn’t count on his family.

But he’d be free.

If he survived his uncle’s “love.”

“Do you want me to bring you something to eat or drink?” she asked.

He didn’t want to get her in trouble. Despite how she was basically spoiled rotten by everyone, if her father thought she was giving Cris help or attention, he might turn on her, too.

Or turn her against him.

“No, sweetie. Did you finish your homework?”

She shook her head.

“Go upstairs and finish it. Then if you want, bring it down for me to look at. Okay?”

“Okay.” She leaned in and kissed his forehead before she turned and headed up the stairs.

He couldn’t see, but he could hear, how she carefully eased the door open just a crack, then slipped through it when the coast was clear before closing it behind her.

He carefully rolled onto his back and closed his eyes against the pain. It would fade, as it always did. He’d tough it out. Yes, there was more to life than this. He knew it.

There had to be.

The question was, was he strong enough to break free of his family’s hold on him and build the kind of life he wanted? To find happiness?





Cris was genuinely shocked when someone loudly stood up and cheered for him as he marched across the stage at graduation.

He realized after the fact that he shouldn’t have been.

Once the ceremony ended, he struggled his way through the crowd to find her before nearly getting tackled from behind. Now ten, Fi was growing like a weed.

“Did you hear me cheer for you, Cris?”

He turned and hugged her. “Hey, yes I did. How’d you get here?”