Tainted Love: contemporary womens fiction love story and family saga (Behind Closed Doors Book 1) by Erin Cawood Read Free Book Online Page B

things worse. But he was at the hospital for hours and I’d been prowling the house the entire time. By the time he’d come to face me, I was too wound up to be forgiving.
    “I was there! I was in the garden. She was being overzealous and I shouted to her, not two seconds before to be careful and then she fell. I saw it happen. And there were no pruning shears in sight! How dare you accuse me of being an unfit mother?”
    I went to walk out of the room and something stopped me. The blasted promise I made on that goddamn beach nine years ago. “What do you want me to do, Cal?” I asked as I turned to face him. “Should I turn to drink? Or drugs maybe? I’m going stir crazy, and everything I try, you find a reason why I can’t do it. Why don’t you try staying in this house all day every day and see if you can manage it?”
    The following day, he came home with flowers, chocolates, and a membership and coaching sessions at the local tennis club. “Make friends, have a hobby, get out of the house, drink at social events. No drugs permitted, though.” He smiled at me. “They say it looks bad for the sport.”
     

 
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Twelve
     
    Spring 1989
     
    You and Cal spent so much time in the garden playing football when you were little. I'm not surprised you were one of the star quarterbacks from the moment you went to high school. I even had Coach Brown telling me we needed to get you focused academically, to get your grades up high right from the outset. He could see your name in stadium lights but you weren't interested in college. You just wanted to play ball.
    It didn't quite sink in for you just how good you were until the college scouts came around that first year and talked to me about you. We sat down with the school guidance counselor, and I asked you if there was anything you could be in the world, what would it be? You said you'd be a doctor like Cal. But what was the point thinking about it when Cal had already told you we didn't have the money for you to go to college?
    We didn't? Why didn't I know about this? What happened to the money Mom and Dad had put aside for your education? What about the money they'd left to me? I was sure we hadn't gone through that in ten years. We couldn't have. What about the practice? Wasn’t it doing as well as Cal claimed?
    The guidance counselor told you not to worry about the money. These colleges offered students with exceptional talent like yours full scholarships if they can also prove themselves academically. As I said, D, you're incredibly intelligent. All you had to do was apply yourself. The guidance counselor told you what you had to do to become the perfect candidate for medical school, and I set about asking Cal about our money troubles.
    Of course he denied it. He told me you were lying and he'd never said anything of the sort…but you'd never lied to me. Why would you lie to me now? He started calling you names, saying you were a delinquent, not interested in your education, and you would live off of us for the rest of your life.
    I defended you. Of course, I defended you. You did your chores, you remembered your manners. We'd brought you up to be a fine young man.
    He grabbed me by the fleshy part of my upper arm and pulled me into your room. "Tell me, Faith." He opened your bottom drawer and took out the box with your “comic book” collection and asked, "Is this the fine young man you're talking about?" His grip tightened as he tipped the box upside down on the floor. Now... you're wondering why I never cancelled your subscription, aren't you?
    So there I was, wondering how on earth a boy who’d just turned sixteen would get such interesting reading material with such fascinating photography . I was trying one, not to blush, and two, to get out of Cal's death grip to pick them up, so you wouldn't know we'd been in your room. This was not a conversation I wanted to deal with. You're my brother. As your guardian, I was supposed to deal