Blackwater 3 - Breaking Brodix by Anne Rainey Read Free Book Online Page A

had to live with once. It was while he was in foster care. He was abusive to River. It just so happens that the asshole was a reporter.”
    Ah, now it was all making more sense. “I remind River of that time in his life,” Sarah surmised. All these years later and River still carried the pain with him. “It must have been pretty awful.”
    Brodix nodded. “Yeah, and that’s not for public consumption, just so you know. The last thing my brother needs is to have those years splashed across the pages of the Gazette .”
    Sarah shook her head. “I would never do anything to hurt your family, Brodix.” She only hoped that was true. “I know there are some in my business who would do anything to snag a headline, but I don’t work that way.”
    “I know.” He winked. “I just felt a reminder was in order.”
    She propped her chin on her fist. “What about you? What were your days in foster care like?”
    “Nothing like what River went through.” Brodix shoved a hand through his hair. “Some neglect, I suppose, but nothing life-changing.”
    “Why do I get the feeling you’re oversimplifying?” she asked as she narrowed her eyes.
    He chuckled. “Maybe, but the fact remains that nothing newsworthy happened during those early years.”
    Sarah cocked her head to the side. “And here I thought we’d established a measure of trust,” she said, hoping to loosen his tongue a little. Brodix was holding something back; she could feel it in her bones.
    He was quiet for a minute as he stared across the table at her. Finally, he shrugged. “You’re right; it wasn’t all roses and sunshine.”
    There was raw pain in the tone of his voice, and Sarah immediately wanted to stop the interview. Quitting isn’t an option. Damn it, she knew that, but she didn’t have to like it. “What happened?” she asked, hating herself for forcing Brodix to dredge up bad memories.
    “I was seven at the time, and I’d been living with this couple, the Beattys. Mrs. Beatty was a nice lady, but sad. I remember her crying a lot. Her husband was a self-absorbed ass. He didn’t care that his wife was in pain. All he wanted to do was go out drinking with his buddies.”
    “Real hero material, huh?”
    Brodix rolled his eyes. “Not sure what she ever saw in him. Anyway, one day when I came home from school, I found Mrs. Beatty lying on the couch. I thought she was asleep at first, but when she wouldn’t wake up, I got scared and went to a neighbor’s house.” He exhaled deeply. “As it turns out, she was dead. An overdose.”
    Sarah gasped. “Oh my God, she killed herself?”
    “Yeah,” he said, his voice quiet, as if he’d mentally stepped back in time. “I guess she finally reached her breaking point.”
    “Brodix, I’m so sorry.” Sarah wished she could simply erase the last few minutes of conversation, for his sake. “How awful for you to see that.”
    He raked his hand through his hair, tousling the dark strands. “I got shipped off to another family pretty fast. It was years before I could get that image out of my head, though. Her lying there, eyes staring at nothing.” A muscle in his jaw flexed. “Gave me nightmares, let me tell ya.”
    Sarah cringed. “I can only imagine.” Something Brodix said earlier struck her as odd. “Before, when we were discussing River, you said River’s foster home but not yours? Are you saying the five of you were split up? Don’t siblings usually go to the same foster home, though?”
    “Yeah, but there aren’t a lot of foster parents willing to take on five rowdy boys.” He picked up his knife and twirled it around. “See, by the time the system got involved and took us away from our mother because of the drugs and neglect, we weren’t all together again until Wanda came in and swooped us up.”
    “That must’ve been quite an adjustment for you all. What was it like to finally be together again?” she asked, hoping to get Brodix past the awful memory of finding his foster