Страница 18 из 76
“You’re an obedient bitch, but you’re not as pretty as she is. And I’ll bet she’s a whole lot more fun in bed.”
“All I want to do is please you,” she said, dropping to her knees.
“Then shut up and suck. You talk too much.”
Chapter Thirteen
April 13, 4 p.m.
Port Orchard
Do
She divorced her husband, Zachary, after their adopted daughter, Marissa, put them through the wringer in ways that no parent could or should endure. Marissa had set a fire in the kitchen when she was six, run away from home at ten. By thirteen there was no more room for pretending that there was anything they could do to be the close family they had desired when they had brought her home in a private adoption from a Russian orphanage.
Do
What should have been a gift was turned into a sense of invincibility. Midnight had convinced herself that she was able to do whatever she wanted. She continued working the streets, the ferry, wherever she could score a john, partying the money away and doing whatever it was she wanted. It was the ultimate F-U to her mother, of course. Do
When Midnight was seven months pregnant, she showed up at the nurses’ station looking for her mother. It was the first time she’d been to the hospital since she was a teen and was determined, it had seemed, to make her mother’s life as miserable as possible. She had left with a physician’s bag of drug samples. No charges were pressed because Do
After Midnight’s return and the impending pregnancy, however, things started to change. It started with a few phone calls. Mother and daughter met for lunch a couple of times at a drive-through in Navy Yard City, on the edge of downtown Bremerton. By the time Tasha was born, her mother and grandmother had come to an understanding: if the little girl was to have any semblance of a home life, they’d have to work together.
Do
“I’ll call you when I need you, Mother. Don’t think about interfering with my life or my daughter’s. As long as you get that, we’ll be fine.”
Do
Not only for the baby but for her own broken heart.
It was Tuesday, and Do
After work, she parked her car in the lot behind the aptly named Pack Rat’s Hideaway and climbed the stairs to her daughter’s apartment and knocked.
No answer.
She pushed the bell.
Again, nothing.
She listened, and she could hear the sounds of a baby crying.
“Tasha?”
No answer.
“Marissa!”
A man wearing oil-soaked blue jeans and a red fla
“Can you tell that ho to keep her kid quiet?” he asked. “Jesus, some of us have real jobs and need to get some shuteye. The kid’s been crying all night. Day and night. I don’t give a shit about the day, but I don’t like putting up with some brat squawking when I need to get some sleep. I get up at four a.m. Kid’s going all night.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll tell her,” Do
“You better. That’s what I say.”
“I will. I said so.”
“Fine. That bitch is a piece of work, you know.”
Do
The man, slightly embarrassed, retreated into his apartment.
Do
“Marissa! Open up!”
She jiggled the doorknob. Locked.
The sound of the crying grew louder. With a surge of adrenaline-the type that turns a frightened mother or grandmother into Wonder Woman-Do
And she nearly dislocated her shoulder in the process.
“Marissa!”
Once inside, Do
“Marissa?” Do
Tasha was standing in her crib. She’d somehow shredded her diaper and her little body was smeared with feces and her bedding soaked in urine. Seeing her grandmother, the little girl let out an even louder wail.
“Oh, baby, it’s all right. Grandma’s here.” Do