Freefall

Prologue

Riiing-riiing-riiing.

I lashed out at the alarm clock, which resulted in knocking it off the nightstand with a loud thunk. When the ringing didn't stop, my brain resurfaced enough to realise that it was my phone that was the guilty party, not the poor, abused alarm clock.

"Yes?" I snarled into the receiver once I clicked to answer it. It was dark in my room, so it was still night. Whoever would ring me up in the middle of the night?

"David? Is that you?"

There was something vaguely familiar about that feminine voice. "Who else would it be?" I replied crankily, because it was late, or early, depending, but also because I couldn't place the voice. This was an ungodly hour to be up and all I wanted was to go back to sleep.

"I'm really sorry for calling you this early, but I thought you'd like to know that your father—well—that he passed away tonight."

My brain snapped to attention and suddenly I didn't have a hard time keeping my eyes open. "Wha—Who is this?" It better not be some prank call.

"It's Eva. Your aunt."

Of course, that was why the voice was familiar. I hadn't heard it in twelve years now, so no wonder I hadn't been able to place it. Now, after she'd reminded me, I had no trouble hearing exactly who it was. It wasn't hard to picture her either. She was probably sitting up straight, dressed just perfect and clutching the phone a little tighter than usual—the only hint she would ever give that something upsetting had happened.

"Father's dead?" I propped myself up on one elbow, turned on the light on the nigh stand, then bent down to retrieve my alarm clock. It told me, with bright red letters, that it was five in the morning.

"It was the liver. Liver failure. That's what the doctors said. I've just come home from the hospital now, but they say he was dead long before he was found. I'm so sorry, David." She did have an apologetic tone to her voice.

"Don't be." I lay down on my back again to stare up at the ceiling.

"David, don't say that," she berated me. That was certainly a tone I could remember vividly. "He's your dad and now he's dead. He was your dad no matter what he put you through. The funeral's in a few days, will you come back for it?"

Go back to my hometown? I hadn't been back there in twelve years, ever since I left. My fingers ran over my chest and I circled one of the more prominent scars I wore as a reminder of just what I had been through at my father's hands. The man had made life a living hell for me for as long as I could remember, before I finally had enough and escaped it all. Why should I go back for his funeral?

"David?" Eva prodded gently. "Are you still there?"

"Yeah." Feelings warred inside me. I had no lingering love for the man who called himself my father. That had been beaten out of me long ago. Still, there were people back there I'd used to care about. People I hadn't contacted at all the past twelve years, because I'd wanted to put the whole town and everything that had happened there behind me.

"Will you come back?"

"I don't know." What did I have to go back to? My dad had never cared, at least not for as long as I could remember. Neither did anyone else in that bloody town.

"He was your dad, David," Eva said softly. "I know you didn't have an easy time of it with him, but can't you do this one last thing for him?"

"Don't you think I've done enough for him already?" I snapped, unable to hold myself back. "I've taken care of him since I was eleven years old. And I got nothing but abuse in return for it."

"You'll regret it later if you don't attend the funeral," Eva continued to push, ignoring my outburst like she had ignored my situation when I was younger. "Do this one last thing for him and you'll never have to do anything for him ever again. David, think of this as closure."

Well, at least it wouldn't involve empty beer bottles. But on the other hand, it might. If Dad was dead, the house was mine. Who knew what I'd find there, when I hadn't been around to clean up my dad's mess for the past twelve years?

Maybe she was right, though. Maybe it would be good for me to go to the funeral. I could finally see the old bastard get what he deserved; a coffin in the ground. "Fine. I can be up there the day after tomorrow."

"Good." She sounded relieved. She was probably happy she didn't have to deal with her late brother's house anymore. "Will you bring Kevin with you?"

So she remembered my son's name, what a shocker. "No, I won't." And with that said, I hung up. Rage bubbled up inside me, fast and out of the blue, and I threw my phone across the room. It hit the wall and fell to the floor, where it lay silently with the screen facing down.

I lay back down in bed and covered my face with my hands. Going back there... I didn't want to. I was done with that town. I had been done with it since I'd packed my bags, taken my son and left. I had never looked back. I'd burned all bridges.

Now I was all but forced back there, because even in death the old sod came back to haunt me, to ruin the good life I'd made for myself by forcing me to remember what had once been.

Anger rose again, not as quickly or as all-consuming as it had been only moments before, but it was still there. Anger and resentment battling each other inside me. I sat up again and pounded my fist into the wall repeatedly. "Bloody hell!" I swore both from the intense pain shooting from my knuckles and up my arm and from the thought of having to go back to face the town I'd escaped from twelve years earlier.

A movement in my wide-open doorway caught my attention. I turned to see my son standing there. "Did I wake you?"

Kevin was wide-eyed. He nodded and stepped further into the room. He'd just turned thirteen soon, my son, and though he should've been a reminder of the worst part of my life, he wasn't. He had inherited my looks. There wasn't much of his biological mother in him, for which I would always be eternally grateful. If I had to look at Kevin and see Melissa Holt every time, I didn't know how I could've ever moved on.

But from being the result of the most horrible night in history, Kevin had turned out to be the best thing in my entire life. I loved my son like I loved no one else and I would do anything for him to have a normal childhood, without any sort of abuse to darken it.

"Are you okay, Dad?" Kevin sat down on the edge of my bed. He twisted his fingers together, like he tended to do when he was nervous.

"I'm fine." I reached out to circle his shoulders and pull him in close. I would do anything for Kevin, and though I wanted nothing more than to have him close, I was going to spare him for what I had ahead of me.

"Why'd you hit the wall if you're fine?" Kevin turned his blue eyes, the exact duplicate of my own, on me.

I sighed. "I just got a call from a relative. She told me my dad passed away." Kevin had never met his grandfather—except for the first year of his life, but he thankfully couldn't remember that. "I have to go back to take care of the house and his personal belongings, and take part in the funeral."

Kevin was a smart kid and he caught on immediately. "You have to go back? What about me?"

"I was thinking you could stay with Ida while I'm gone. You've got school and practice, you know. I won't be long, I promise. A week tops. If it turns out I have to stay longer, I'll come get you. Okay?"

Kevin nodded silently after sitting still for several long second.

I'd never told my kid about my own childhood. I'd never even mentioned my own father to him. The old sod wasn't worth a mention, and Kevin was too young and innocent for me to ruin that with the tale of my own crappy childhood. So Kevin didn't have any thoughts or opinions of the man, and that was how I'd always wanted it to be.

My father had been dead to me for so long. Now he was literally dead too. I couldn't even be sad about it.

I had to go back and face my past, but Kevin would be spared for what was in store. I knew it couldn't possibly be anything good. There never was in my hometown.