Read Forever We Fall: Broken #4 (The Broken Series) for Free Online

whispered. "As soon as his belly was full with whiskey he lashed out and I quickly learned I had to bend to his will in order to survive."
    "Why didn't you leave then?" Kyle demanded. "The first time he put his hands on you?"
    "I was pregnant with Lia," she said almost apologetically. "I telephoned Papa and told him, but…but my grandfather wouldn't hear a bad thing said about Jimmy. I was completely alone. Broke and pregnant and I…" her voice broke off and she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "I was trying to make the best of a bad situation. I hoped things would change…"
    "But they didn't," I whispered, understanding filling me to the point of pain. "He didn't."
    "No," Tracy agreed quietly. "He didn't, but as my pregnancy progressed he showed genuine signs of remorse."
    I raised my brow in surprise. I'd lived with my father for eighteen years and had never once seen an ounce of remorse in his gray eyes.
    "How fucking good of him," Kyle snarled, causing Tracy to flinch. Seeing her reaction to his outburst he paled and mumbled an apology.
    "When I was about four months gone, Jimmy beat me," she confessed. "I'd put onions in the gravy instead of…and he…It was bad. He lost his temper, used his belt, and I spent a week in the hospital." Tracy shuddered and used her free hand to wipe her brow. "The blood was the worst part," she admitted quietly. "He was very careful after that. He didn't want to lose the other baby. He was hoping for a boy…"
    "Hoping?"
    "You were a twin," Tracy confirmed in a small voice when she noticed my shocked expression. "Multiples run in our family. I was an only child, but my father was a twin and his sister had a set of triplets."
    "Do you see them now?" I croaked out, finding all of this incredibly hard to take in. It had been much easier to think of Tracy Gibbons, the mother who had abandoned me to a life of misery, instead of Tracy Gibbons, the woman who had endured so much pain and sadness… "Your dad's family? Your aunt and cousins?"
    Shaking her head, she sighed, "I lost all contact with my father's family when I went to live with Mimi and Papa. I haven't seen or heard from them in over twenty years, and my mother was their only child."
    "That sounds lonely," I whispered, feeling a strange kinship form in my heart for the woman in front of me.
    "After that Jimmy couldn't have been more different," Tracy said, carrying on quickly. "He stopped drinking and never raised a hand to me until…"
    "Until?" Kyle urged.
    "Until I gave birth and Jimmy realized I hadn't given him the boy he had hoped for," she choked out. "It all went to hell after that." Tucking her curls behind her ear, she said, "He took pleasure in beating me regularly, in forcing me sexually…in stripping me of every scrap of dignity and pride I had left…"
    "Jesus fucking Christ, stop," Kyle blurted out, his tone agitated. Jerking out of his chair, I rolled my eyes as Kyle paced the floor. "Where do Ted and Mora come into all of this?" Swinging around to face us, his blue eyes locked on my mother. "Having your address? Helping you leave him? Explain that to me."
    "I thought all my Christmases had come when Ted and Mora moved into the house next door to us shortly after Jimmy and I were married," Tracy said quietly as she fidgeted with a loose curl. "Although, I must admit I was surprised to see they were married with a child."
    "Surprised?" I shook my head. "Why were you surprised?"
    "Because I knew them," she replied with a smile. "They were from my hometown. Mora Jenkins lived on the same street as my parent's house. We were friends as children and I hadn't known she'd gotten engaged to Ted Frey…" Tracy's voice trailed off as she gazed off dreamily, a reluctant smile spreading across her face. "I'd always thought she would marry Freddy Skinner – varsity receiver and all round heartthrob." Shaking her head, Tracy sighed and added, "She informed me they married shortly after I moved away and…" Tracy exhaled