EIGHT

"Children aren't coloring books. You don't get to fill them with your favorite colors."

—K Colemend Hosseini

EVELYN

I wasn't sure what to say to him. No, that was a lie. I knew what I wanted to say. I knew how I wanted to say it. Sadly, I couldn't. It wouldn't be right. I never once flinched at Lisa or Jennie's actions. My moral compass was shattered beyond repair, but that didn't bother me either. When I first married Marco, knowing what his life was going to be, I thought I could keep my head up above it all. But this life has away of sucking the good out of you…how can it not when you are surrounded by the worst of people. I've never physically killed a man, but twice in my life I've asked for retribution, and twice Marco had ensured that it was done it for me.

"What are you going to do?" I whispered as he lay on our bed. He stared up at the ceiling, not bothering to move like a fat cat after a feast. I knew this Marco. He was about to do something…something evil.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," he said, as I took off my heels.

They were originally Jennie's and the damned girl wanted to burn nine hundred dollar Jimmy Choos, just because they were white.

We were the same size, and like the shoe hoarder I was, I took them with pleasure. However, it seemed like they were molded for her feet alone and were going to kill me.

"You're a bad liar. Thank God I keep you locked away." I laughed, crawling on top of him.

"I'm a great liar. We're just born with a strong pair of bullshit detectors."

"Raising three kids—four if I count you—it was a required skill."

He chuckled, but didn't reply.

"Marco, what are you about to do?"

"Shh…" he whispered, just holding me.

I stopped struggling, allowing him to just hold me. It was what he did, what he always did. He held onto me as if he were worried I would never forgive him for whatever he was about to do, but I always did. No matter what, I always would.

We sat there, wrapped in each other's arms, and I felt sixteen again. I felt like that same loud mouth, know it all, rash, love-struck teenager who saw her prince charming and went weak at the knees the moment he looked my way.

"What?" he asked, as I smiled to myself.

"Nothing," I said, and in one swift motion, he flipped me onto my back and pinned me under him.

He glared into my eyes with a smirk on his lips. "Woman, what is so damn funny?"

"Man," I lifted my head up to him, "I said nothing."

"The hard way then…"

"Marco, don't…" before I could stop him, he ripped my shirt open. "Damn it all to hell, Marco, that shirt was a gift."

"My gift will be so much better." He kissed my neck and with one hand, he ripped my bra from my chest.

"Really?" I dared him, crossing my arms over my chest, but the moment they covered my breasts, he pried them away.

"Isn't it obvious?" he whispered, one of his hands wandering down the side of my arm, which were pinned over my head, until he reached my nipples. He played with them as he stared into my eyes.

"Marco…"

"What better way can I show my wife I care, than to give her pleasure?" he whispered again, kissing my lips before trailing the side of my jaw. "Give us both pleasure."

"Father, Lisa wants…" Bambam burst through the door before I could speak. "Jesus, mother fucking Christ of Nazareth, my eyes!"

I grabbed for a pillow, and Marco reached for his gun in a fit of rage.

"What have I told you about knocking?" he roared, before firing a round at Bambam's head.

Bambam ducked but it took off piece of the door. "SORRY…"

"Bambam, I swear, if you don't leave, I will skin you!" Marco shouted, getting off the bed once I was covered.

Bambam's head dropped, and I tried really hard not to laugh. He looked like he did when he was a child and caught us doing the same thing.

"Lisa said…"

"I don't care what your sister said. I don't care if the goddamn moon is falling out of the sky. Get out, boy!" he roared.

His throat was going to be sore in the morning.

"Father, I'd rather die at your hands than at Lisa's…or worse, Jen's. Give me one second to tell you and then I will run faster than Forrest Gump."

That did it, I couldn't hold back from laughing, and Marco glared at me, forcing me to place my hand over my mouth.

He stood in front of Bambam, not that he could see since he was forcing his eyelids shut, and put a gun to his skull.

"Marco…"

"You rather I kill you than Lisa or Jen?" he asked, and I wanted to smack him over the head.

Bambam smirked. "You would kill me quickly, and then mom will kick your ass. Lisa and Jen would take a page out of George Bugs Morgan's book, and hang me by my testicles with piano wire from a ceiling. Then burn my eyes out with cigarettes. Then maybe go after Mina too, just for the heck off it. So yes, I fear them much more than I fear you, because they are bat shit crazy."

Marco's jaw clenched.

"Bambam, what is it?" I asked, before Marco really did pull the trigger.

"Scarlet DeRosa is in Chicago, and Lisa thinks she's related to gramps somehow. Gramps isn't home yet, but we're on lockdown. Which means…"

"I taught you the damn rules, I know what it fucking means, you dumbass!" Marco snapped, pulling Bambam by the ear just as he used to. "Out." He pushed him out the door.

"Lisa wants a family meeting…"

"Tell your sister that your mother and I are having our own meeting. With the grace of God, maybe we can have another child to replace you three knuckleheads!" he said, slamming the door in his face.

Another child? Who were we, Abraham and Sarah?

"Urgh! Really? As if I haven't been scarred enough for one lifetime!" Bambam's muffled voice rang through the door.

"Pull up a chair at Nickhun's therapy lessons and cry to them," Marco yelled back before falling onto our bed. "I knew that boy would forever cock-block me. I knew it from the first month he was home."

Laughing, I kissed his back before lying next to him. He was right. Between all of our children, Bambam was the only one who had ever caught us in the act. The others might have heard, but only Bambam ever came in and killed our moment. He did it as an infant, he did it as a young boy, and even as a teen. And now, he did it as an adult.

"Remember, he is also the one who makes you laugh harder than the rest. Bambam is the laugher. Nickhun, the quiet observer. Lisa is…"

"A smart ass, controlling prick, with a God complex to rival my father's," he added, turning to look up at me and pushing the pillow away in order to see me.

I shook my head. "No, Lisa is the thinker, the master chess player. It's why you love her so much. It's always a back and forth between you. But each one of them is like you. Bambam radiates joy, the way you used to before this life; Nickhun reads like you, studies like you, listens like you. He enjoys the peace…"

"And then Lisa, oh wise mother?" He smirked, kissing my hand.

I smacked his arm. "Lisa is the tiny part of you that wishes to achieve greatness at all costs. Yes, she is a smart-ass, and yes, she is controlling. She may even have a God complex. But you see her and you see what you could never have become and you respect her for it. You and I both know if Lisa were first born and never ill, Shamus would have tried to adopt her."

"I knew it even when she was sick," he whispered. For some reason, his voice was stuck at this level with me tonight. "She had so much fight. She used to tell me while in bed that once she was better, she was going to buy the damn hospital, just so they could stock it with better food. When I asked why she didn't just suggest it to them, she said, 'that's too much talking and I want it done.' She was seven. I took her and the boys fishing when she was thirteen. Bambam caught five fish, Nickhun three, and I seven."

"Lisa didn't catch anything? Are you sure?" I frowned, trying my best to remember those days, but he and I both knew that time for me was like the dark ages.

"She caught one. She was just getting over her trip from the hospital and still a bit weak. I was surprised she caught anything. I just wanted her to get fresh air and relax. We camped out by the lake, but when I woke up in the morning, Lisa was gone…"

"Marco!" I slapped his arm.

"Ouch. Damn it, woman!" he yelled, holding onto me tighter. "I found her, didn't I? The little brat took the boat, went out on the water and fished until she caught eighteen fish. Kid was half frozen, her fingers were cut from the wires. I never wanted to kick her ass so much!"

I could see how now, years later, he couldn't stop himself from smiling at the memory of it.

"She was so determined to out-do us all. She could have stopped at ten, but no, the damn kid had to double it. She was so proud of herself, even though she reeked to high heaven," he added.

"That sounds like our Lisa. She has to be number one, and everyone has to know it." I laughed.

"Yeah." He kissed my head. "It's how I knew she was the one who was going to take over. Lisa could barely stand to bow down to me. If it were Bambam or Nickhun, I know she would have broken away or killed them. Never in my life was I more grateful to Bambam than when he accepted it without question."

"That's because he's like you and never wanted to be in charge. He hates working under pressure." I would never admit it, but Bambam's fun craziness came from me.

"Your biggest success was finding Jen, you know that, right? Lisa would not be half the woman she is now if it weren't for her," I added.

"Both a good and bad thing. Good for the family and the company. The world may just hate me for it. Lisa feeds off of her, and she her. They both like to out-do the other and it's scary. Lisa would have killed Shamus, but Jennie pulled her back."

I could see it in his eyes. Pride. They were finally growing.

"What are you going to do?" I asked for the third and final time.

He kissed me before sitting up. "I'm going to have a talk with my father."

MARCO

There comes a time in every child's life where they have to look their parents in the eye and say enough.

I always wondered when that time would come. Or how I could look my demon of a father in the eye, whilst standing with my head held high with no fear. We are all afraid of something or someone. Shamus had always been that person. Yet, as we walked through the back woods behind our home, I felt nothing…and nothing was a familiar feeling.

It was how I spent almost thirty years running the family. There were brief moments of relief; the moment I met Evelyn, the moment each of my children were born, and the moment Evelyn came back to me. But that nothingness was always there eating away at me.

"I didn't seek company," Shamus spoke in the darkness, as the wind blew the leaves above us.

"I didn't seek your presence," I said to him, moving to stand beside the tree. I hated coming this far back in our property, but I still made the trip once a year with Evelyn, just to see the tombstones that rested right under the tress. One for my mother and one for the daughter we never got to raise.

"I told you that kid of yours was going to cock-up everything I've built."

I didn't reply for a moment, enjoying the chill of the wind as we stood.

"Why are you back here, Shamus?"

"Because death is coming," he replied. Turning to me, I noticed for the first time he held a gun in his hand. "You have no idea what you did when you arranged for their marriage. There are rules even we have to follow."

"Any rules I broke was because you failed to teach," I replied. "Are you truly going to kill me out here, in the woods, in front of my own mother and daughter?"

"Not you," he said before turning the gun onto himself.

Before I could blink, the shot echoed through the night. His body fell onto the leaves, and I couldn't bring myself to care. Not even a little bit.

Kneeling down, I stared at him. "You should have done that a long time go."

Sighing, I pulled out my phone. Lisa was going to be pissed.