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away and stood
up to walk over to the wall. But he followed, gently pressing her back against
the wall with his arms around her.
    “What happened?”
    “I was five and I was disobedient,” she said, and settled
into his protective embrace.
    “Your mother was living with her parents still?”
    Mouse nodded. Those years were awful. She didn’t know how
she remembered her first five years with such clarity, but she did.
    “How old was she?”
    “When I was five?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Nineteen.”
    “She had you at fourteen ?”
    Mouse lifted her gaze, glaring at him. “Yes. But it wasn’t
her fault. He raped her.”
    “Who? Your grandfather?”
    “No.” She shuddered. “The minister. Mama had gone to stay
overnight with her best friend. The minister’s daughter. When she got up in the
middle of the night, he was awake and took her to his bedroom. He raped her.”
    “Where was his wife?”
    “He was a widower.”
    Tor growled, brushing her cheek with his fingers. “Did the
bastard go to jail?”
    “No.” Mouse snorted. “No one believed my mother. At first
they thought she’d been with some boy. Until I looked so much like that
horrible man. Then they blamed her . Said nasty things. Said she must
have seduced him.” Her gaze met Tor’s. “A fourteen-year-old doesn’t seduce a
man in his late thirties. My mother was no Lolita.”
    “So when you were five, what happened?”
    “I’d been playing with my ball in the dining room and it got
away from me and broke Grandmother’s china cabinet.”
    “So why didn’t they spank you ?”
    “They should have. I wish they would have.”
    “But?” Again he stroked her cheek.
    Tor leaned forward and set his forehead against hers and she
sighed. “Grandfather said I was too young for a proper beating. So Mother would
take my punishment so I’d learn my lesson.”
    “Oh Mouse, honey. I’m sorry.”
    “She leaned over the dining room table and they planted me
right beside her so I’d have to watch her be beaten and know that I was the
reason she was being punished. I’d have to see that, but for me , she
would’ve been fine.”
    “That sucks.”
    “Yeah. He flipped up her dress and she took down her
panties. Then he pulled out a switch and began to whip her.” She shuddered. “It
was horrible. At first she was silent. She just took it. And that made him mad,
so he hit her harder.”
    “Where was your grandmother?”
    “She was holding me…forcing me to witness it because it was
Grandmother who had demanded that Mother be punished for my sin of
disobedience.”
    “God.”
    “God had very little to do with it, even if Grandfather was
a church deacon.”
    “Yeah.” He brushed a strand of hair off her forehead. “How
long did he beat her?”
    “Too long. Her buttocks were quivering and she started to
cry. But he didn’t stop. When the switch started to cut her and she was
bleeding, I added my apologies too. Screaming and hoping I could make it stop.”
    “But it didn’t.”
    “No. Finally I screamed at him and threw myself between the
switch and her. I still have the scar on my back.”
    “Jesus.” Tor shook his head and pulled her into his arms,
gently cradling her close.
    “It ended up being a good thing.”
    “Did the police arrest them?”
    “No, but seeing them abuse me the way they had her made
something click. Mama grabbed me and dragged me upstairs even though she could
barely walk. She packed some bags and we left her parents’ home and never went
back.”
    “Oh Mouse, honey. I’m sorry.” He kissed her forehead and she
sighed.
    “We lived on the streets for a while…until she got a job.
Later, when I was ten, she met someone special and they got married. My
step-father loves her and their kids. He’s a good man.”
    He tilted his head back to meet her gaze. “So when you saw
Drago working over that sub, you remembered your grandfather beating your
mother.”
    Mouse blinked then slowly nodded. “Yes, I guess so.”
    “No