Live to Tell (Detective D.D. Warren, #4)(90)

“Whiskey,” I replied.

Sadly, she thought I was joking. She poured us both glasses of water. I didn’t think that was strong enough for what I needed to do next.

She carried the glasses to another small but beautifully decorated room. The sitting area featured gleaming hardwood floors, a white-painted fireplace mantel, and a vaulted ceiling. Off the family room was a screened-in porch that overlooked a stretch of wetlands. Earlier in the summer, we’d sat on that porch and watched for herons. This late in August, however, it was too hot and sticky.

We perched on the L-shaped sofa. I sipped my water and felt the ceiling fan brush freshly chilled air across my cheeks. Aunt Helen didn’t speak right away. Her hands were trembling on her glass. She wouldn’t meet my eyes, but gazed at the floor.

This time of year always hit her harder than it did me. Maybe because she gave herself the permission to grieve, to release the floodgates one week out of every year. She cried, raged, blew off steam. Then she picked up the pieces and returned to the business of living.

I couldn’t do it. Never could. I didn’t want to release the floodgates; I was afraid I’d never get them closed again. Plus, all these years later, I remained mostly angry. Deeply, deeply enraged. Which was why I rarely visited my aunt around the anniversary. It was too hard for me to watch her weep, when I wanted to shatter everything in her house.

My visit today had probably surprised her. She twisted her water glass between her fingers, waiting for me to speak.

“Doing okay?” I asked at last. Stupid question.

“You know,” she replied with a small shrug. Better answer. I did know.

I cleared my throat, looked out the sunny bank of windows. Unexpectedly, my eyes stung and I fought through the choke hold of strangling emotion.

“Something’s happened,” I managed at last.

She stopped fiddling with her water glass and studied me. And suddenly, I was staring at my mother’s blue eyes. I was standing in the doorway of my mother’s bedroom, holding my father’s gun behind my back, while I tried to muster the courage for what I needed to say next.

“He hurt me,” I heard myself whisper.

“Danielle?” My aunt’s voice, my mother’s voice. They ran together, two women, both who’d claimed to love me.

I licked my lips, forced myself to keep talking. “My father. On the nights when he drank a lot … sometimes he came to my room in the middle of the night.”

“Oh Danielle.”

“He said if I did what he wanted, he wouldn’t have to drink so much. He’d be happy. Our family would be happy.”

“Oh Danielle.”

“I tried, in the beginning. I thought, if I just made him happy, I wouldn’t have to hear my mom cry at night. Things would get better. Everything would be all right.”

My aunt didn’t speak, just regarded me with my mother’s sorrowful blue eyes.

“But it got worse. And he drank more, came in more often. I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t take it. I went to Mom’s room that night. To tell her what he was doing. And I brought his gun with me.”

“You threatened Jenny?” my aunt asked in confusion. “You were going to shoot your mother?”

“No, I threatened my father. I told my mom that if she didn’t make him stop, I was going to shoot him. That was my plan. Not bad for a kid, huh?”

“Oh Danielle. What happened?”

“He came home while we were talking. He was drunk, calling our names. We listened to him come up the stairs. Mom demanded that I give her the gun. She said she’d take care of everything. She’d help me. She promised. I just had to give her the gun.”

“What did you do?”

“I handed her his gun. Then I bolted down the hall and hid under the covers in my bedroom. I didn’t come out until … afterward.”

My aunt took a shaky breath, released it. She set her water glass on the coffee table, then stood, walking a few steps toward the window. My aunt wasn’t a restless person. Her actions now distracted me, made me study her intently. She wouldn’t look at me. She stared out at the sun-bleached wetlands, where the birds had to be more comforting than our current conversation.

“You think it’s your fault, what your father did,” she said, softly.

“I was a kid. Can’t be my fault.”

She turned, smiling wanly at me. The first tear trickled down her cheek. She wiped it away, crossing her arms over her chest. “Dr. Frank taught you well.”

“He should’ve; you paid him enough.”

“Do you hate me, too, Danielle? Are my sister’s failings my own?”

“Did you know? You’ve been so adamant about therapy all these years. Did my Mom tell you what he was doing?”

Slowly, Aunt Helen shook her head. Then she caught herself, a second tear trickling down, a second tear wiped away. “I didn’t know about the abuse. I suspected. Dr. Frank suspected. But, Danielle, not everything going on in your family had something to do with you.”

“I told on him. I tried to make it stop and everyone died. My mom, Johnny, Natalie. If I hadn’t said anything … if I’d just kept trying to make him happy…”

“Your father was a self-centered son of a bitch. No one could make him happy. Not Jenny, not his kids, not all the second chances Sheriff Wayne gave him. Don’t pin this on yourself.”