Deadlier Than the Male: The Fiercest Heart / Lethal Lessons. Colleen Thompson

stare at Haley. Even her classmates were stunned by Lena Shore’s words.

      Haley froze. God … oh, God, oh, God. Stewart? Dead?

      Judd spun, and before anyone could stop him, he yanked Haley up by the arm and began beating her with his fists.

      “Daddy! No, Daddy, no!” she screamed, then doubled over, trying to block his blows by covering her face with her arms.

      When she dropped to the floor, he fell on top of her and began pummeling her with every ounce of strength he had in him.

      It took both deputies to pull him off.

      “Lena is right! If someone had to die, why wasn’t it you?” he roared.

      Haley crawled to her knees, then pulled herself up. Blood was pouring from her nose and mouth. She was too dazed by the assault to even answer.

      Judd Shore was still cursing and crying as the deputies dragged him out of the hospital.

      A nurse came to Haley’s aid and led her away, leaving Chief Bullard to see that Lena Shore was taken home. All the way out the door she kept screaming at God, angry that he’d let Haley live and taken her boy instead.

      Haley found herself back on a gurney. Her stitches had to be replaced, and another three added. By the time they took her to X-ray, one eye was nearly swollen shut, and it hurt to open her mouth. When they finally finished working on her, it was after midnight.

      The doctor who had been stitching her up stepped back to eye his work.

      “I think that takes care of it,” he said. “Where’s your family? I’ll have the nurse tell them you’re ready to go home.”

      Haley shook her head, slid off the gurney, paused a moment to steady herself, then headed toward the door.

      “No, Miss Shore. You need to wait for your family,” the doctor said.

      “I don’t have any,” she muttered, putting a hand to her rib cage as if to hold back the pain, and walked away. But she wasn’t leaving the hospital. Not until she’d seen Mack.

      There was no one in the intensive care waiting room except the Brolins, who were taking turns going in to see their son.

      When they looked up and saw Haley standing in the doorway, whatever anger they had left turned swiftly to shock. Her face was so swollen that, had she not still been wearing her graduation dress, they wouldn’t have recognized her.

      Still, she was the last person they wanted to talk to.

      “You have no business here,” Chloe Brolin said. “Go home, girl. Go home.”

      Even though it hurt to breathe, Haley wouldn’t let them know how deeply she’d been wounded. She lifted her chin, defying them to deny her when she said, “I want to see Mack. I have to see him.”

      “Well, you’re not going to, because he doesn’t want to see you. Ever,” Chloe snapped.

      Haley reeled, the words shredding her soul.

      “You’re lying,” she whispered.

      “No. I’m not,” Chloe said. “You need to go home where you belong.”

      Before Haley could stop them, tears suddenly welled and spilled down her cheeks.

      “I don’t have a home,” she said. “The only place I ever belonged was with Mack.”

      Haley stared at the Brolins, eyeing Tom and Chloe until, ashamed, they looked away, then her gaze slid to Mack’s sisters, Jenna and Carla.

      “You people … what’s wrong with you people?” Haley whispered, then she turned around and walked away.

      It took her an hour to walk home. By the time she got there, it was almost 2:00 a.m. She got the spare key from the birdhouse and let herself in the back door.

      She couldn’t believe how this night had ended. This morning she’d been on top of the world, and less than twelve hours later, that world had been permanently shattered.

      She paused in the kitchen, listening to the house. As she stood, she heard a slight pop as the water heater came on, followed by the hum of the refrigerator. There was a drip at the sink.

      She shuddered and sighed.

      Daddy never did turn the faucets far enough off.

      The ache in her belly deepened. Daddy. He’d tried to kill her tonight. If it hadn’t been for the police, he might never have stopped beating her.

      She took off her shoes and started through the house. There was a light on beneath her parents’ door as she passed it on her way down the hall. She didn’t bother to stop. There was nothing left to say to either of them. The fact that her brother was dead didn’t seem real, but she took no blame for it happening. He’d done it to himself, even after she’d begged him to stop.

      When she got to her room, she stripped out of her dress and underwear, leaving everything in a pile in the floor as she went into the bathroom. A short while later, after having showered and washed the blood and glass from her hair, she dressed in an old pair of jeans and her softest T-shirt, then pulled a suitcase from the back of her closet.

      Her face was expressionless as she began packing it with only the necessities, trying not to think of the things she was leaving behind: toys she’d saved from her childhood; her grandmother’s wedding dress, which had been bequeathed to her; all the things she’d been saving for her own home that were stored in her hope chest.

      She didn’t remember, until she was looking for ID, that her diploma was most likely lying somewhere along the highway, with her purse. She would stop by Chief Bullard’s office in the morning to see if anyone had found it when they’d towed in the cars.

      Finally there was no more room left in the bag or her small backpack. She sat down on the side of the bed, then stood again. She was in so much pain she knew she couldn’t sleep. She downed a couple of painkillers, got her checkbook and the passbook to her savings account and added them to the rest of the stuff in the backpack.

      Just before she started to close the bag, she remembered Mack’s photo. She kept it taped to the back of her dresser mirror. She took it down, then removed a family photo from a frame on the wall and put Mack’s photo in it instead.

      Her heart was broken. Mack might not want anything to do with her anymore, but that didn’t mean she didn’t love him. She put the newly framed photo inside her backpack and slung it over her shoulders, then wheeled the suitcase out of her room.

      It made no sound on the carpeted hallway floor, and once she got to the kitchen, she picked it up and carried it the rest of the way out of the house. The last thing she wanted was to look at her parents again. As far as she was concerned, her entire family—not just Stewart—had died tonight.

      Her car was still in the garage. It had been a present from her grandmother on her sixteenth birthday. The title was in her name, which was good, because she was taking it with her.

      She tossed her things into the trunk, then backed out of the garage and drove away without once looking back.

      When the bank opened at 9:00 a.m. the next morning, Haley was waiting at the door. She’d already been to the police department, and recovered her purse and diploma. Chief Bullard had been kind and gentle, asking if she wanted to press charges against her father, which she promptly refused.

      She’d walked out of the department with a hand to her midsection. The more time passed, the stiffer and sorer she became. She knew what she looked like: as if she’d been through a wreck, which she had, and beaten to a pulp, which she also had. She felt shattered in every way that mattered, but she still had her pride.

      She passed through the bank lobby without looking to her right or her left, and walked straight up to the first teller she saw.

      “I want to withdraw my savings,” she said, and put her passbook on the counter. “I’ll take fifteen