Aftermath
Eliot sat alone in his truck and patiently waited until he saw the young boy appear with the police officer. He expelled the breath he'd been holding and smiled to himself. Randy was finally safe and his father wouldn't be able to touch him anymore.
He waited until the unmarked car had passed and then slowly pulled into traffic to follow at a safe distance, always keeping the car in sight. Even though he knew where they were headed, he still felt an obligation to follow through. Several thoughts ran through his mind as he drove, but none of them were as important as the young life that sat terrified in the back of the police car.
Randy was too young to understand what went on inside his father's perverted mind when he used him as his own punching bag. He only understood the pain and shame he felt afterwards. The humiliation he felt the next day at school when he half jokingly explained away another bruise to his cheek, or another broken bone.
Eliot had sensed the boy's deep rooted fear when he'd talked to him at the hospital. He'd seen it many, many times in his travels. He thought he'd be used to it by now, but the images of the violence were seared into his brain permanently, and it made his stomach roil. No one should have to endure that kind of living hell, especially innocent children. Children, whose only sin was being born into a family that barely tolerated their existence.
There wasn't any excuse for that kind of behavior. Simply put, a child was not a punching bag. And the sorry excuse who called himself a parent deserved to have his parental rights stripped from him permanently. And for good measure, Eliot would love to go a couple of rounds in the ring with the bastard. Bare-ass knuckle, get in your face, fighting. He'd wipe that smug smile off the idiot's face in a heartbeat.
That's what Eliot would love to do, but he knew that letting the law handle it would probably best the best thing for Randy. But, if that sonofabitch ever came near the boy, he'd wish he'd never been born. Because when he got through with him there wouldn't be enough body parts left to identify. It was a solemn promise Eliot made to himself as he drove on through the night. And Eliot always kept his promises.