REMI HOOD

Chapter 19

Remi

"No... Stop messing with me!" I say loudly, my heart racing fast as I get out of the hospital bed to face him.

It can't be.

"I'm not! Your mom is the only person with guts enough to set fire to my house." He rolls his eyes.

My throat tightens as tears escape me, gut-wrenching sobs tears through my chest.

"STOP LYING TO ME!" I scream at him.

"I'm not." He simply says.

The urge to punch his face is so strong that I couldn't help but do so. My non-broken fist meets his nose. Blood immediately flows out of his nostrils.

"I WANT THE TRUTH! TELL ME THE TRUTH, YOU BITCH!" I yell at him as he glares at me.

He pauses for a moment and hastily wipes the blood from his nose. "You want to know what happened that night?" He advances me. "Are you sure?!" I nod my head furiously. He stares at me with a look of uncertainty and opens his mouth to speak.

He is finally telling me.

A little sob escapes him as he blinks rapidly.

Is he... Is he crying?

I stare in disbelief, watching a tear racing down my dad's cheek. He looks at me and for the first time in my whole life, I see emotions in his eyes; full of hurt and pain...

I see a broken man.

"A day before that night, I caught your mom. I caught Anaya with..." An ugly foreign sound escapes him.

"Another man."

I mutter in shock, "W-What?"

He sits against the wall.

"That man was your uncle... My own twin brother. I caught Anaya with him on our bed."

A great tremor overtakes me, my lips trembling as I try to process what he is telling me.

He continues, "I confronted them, I caught them red-handed and they couldn't deny it. But what I didn't expect was what Anaya said to me. I remember her words.."

"'Hey Richard, I love Tom more than you and he has tons of money.' She said that and continued to-" He croaks. "...Do what she was doing right in front of me."

I shake my head in disbelief. "Th-That doesn't sound like mom at all. She... She would never say and do such a thing."

"But Remi, she did. I didn't know what to do. My whole world was crumbling before me. She was my whole world..."

"I just stood there, watching the love of my life fuck my own brother."

There is silence as I am dumbfounded as my dad finds his words.

"She ignored me from then... Until the next night. We were decorating the room for your birthday, when my boss called and I had to go to work." He gulps.

"I got back late that night. Police cars were everywhere. I saw you first. You were on a stretcher and was being pulled into an ambulance. I thought you were dead. I ran towards you but the police officers grabbed me and stopped me. I tried to get to you but they wouldn't let me. I watched as the ambulance took you away. My little princess." He gives me a sad look.

"And then I saw her on a stretcher, just like you... But she was dead. The policemen led me towards the body. I looked closely. It was someone else who looked exactly like her, but it was not Anaya. I panicked. The police were asking me to verify if it was her, so I opened my mouth to say it's not her but I couldn't."

His lips tremble. "I realized she had faked her death... So she wouldn't want me to tell the police about her, so I... Uh, I lied. I told them it was her, the body was Anaya's. I soon found out it was the fucking wrong thing to do."

He rubs his eyes which were red and swollen from crying too much. "That night I couldn't sleep, my wife had left me, my daughter was hospitalized and I couldn't even see you because the police had to make sure I didn't kill Anaya or something. An unknown number called me.. and without thinking I picked up the phone. Your mom's sweet voice echoed through the phone. I was so surprised. She told me that she had left for America with Tom and that she is never going to come back. Then.. she threatened me, she said that she'll find a way to tell the police that I was involved in her fake death. She threatened... To kill you. I couldn't bear losing you.. so I did what she told me to do."

He wipes the dried blood from his nose. "She told me to get money for her and Tom, she told me to steal from people and give the money to her. She also told me to kill women, she sent a list of names I should take out. I refused but she threatened to kill you again." Worry fills his voice. "So I... I killed them. She then told me to treat you badly... So I did, I was always very good at acting."

I am speechless.

"Every single time I hit you... It kills me. And one day, you had to come to me with a deal, I was laying on the bed smirking at the ceiling as I was thinking about the funny things you used to do as a baby. You probably thought I was being creepy. You also probably didn't notice but my phone was near to my ear, it was on speaker and Anaya was on the phone. When you rattled on about the deal, she was listening and it was too late to hang up, I had no choice but to repeat what she told me to say. She told me to agree on the deal. I trained you the way Anaya wanted."

What is he saying?!

He rubs his eyes once more. "She somehow found out about the FBI agents. She also found out that you were interested in that Will boy... I never told her, he seems to make you happy.... You deserve to be happy. Anaya has eyes everywhere, she hires people to spy on us. So she knows if I don't follow her instructions and she knows if I hit you or not. She is the one who told me to do what I did in the alley. She was the one who told me to make the second deal with you. I didn't want to take away the only happiness in the world you had, but I can't lose my little princess."

He stares at me, his eyes going soft with affection and sadness. "Anaya never told me not to tell you what really happened. I chose not to. You were too little to understand. if I've had told you, you would have gone to the police, and Anaya would have killed you. So I didn't tell you. I'm telling you now because you're a strong grown woman and because you have every right to know the truth. I don't expect anything from you. I don't expect you to forgive me and I don't expect you to immediately believe me either. But I want you to know, I have always loved you... I never stopped. I love you, Remi."