been able to put up, at least. After all, wire hangers were nothing to people like Annabeth Preston. Child’s play, really. To Nicholas and Timmy, they probably would’ve felt like feather pillows swung good-naturedly at each other’s heads, just a little lighthearted playtime before bed for two highly spirited boys who had their entire lives stretched out in front of them in a shimmering path that was paved with gold and led directly to superstardom.
Dreams, however – much like little brothers – had to die sometimes.
The oppressive atmosphere inside the car made it almost impossible for Nicholas to even breathe properly as Annabeth Preston weaved her way deftly through the busy city streets with all the windows rolled up, pausing occasionally only to honk her horn angrily at another driver whenever they had the temerity to get in her way. Nicholas shook his head at their stupidity. Fools. Didn’t they know that getting in Annabeth Preston’s way was always a bad idea?
Apparently not. But that particular lesson was coming for them. Soon. And in spades.
Just like it had come for Timmy. Just like it would come for Nicholas.
Maybe even today.
Twenty minutes seemed to crawl into eternity before Nicholas’s mother finally pulled their boat-like car into the small parking lot on the west side of the butcher’s shop on Bishop Elder Avenue. Not counting Nicholas himself (which his mother seldom did), the butcher’s shop marked the only thing Nicholas’s father had left behind following Timmy’s horrific death. And – as his mother was so fond of reminding him – just one of the two commodities possessed any real-world value, leaving it up to Nicholas to figure out the rest of it from there. Wasn’t a very difficult equation to solve, to say the least. Something one might lean during a second-year maths course.
Still not speaking to him, Nicholas’s mother put the car into park mode before exiting the vehicle and walking briskly around the side of the car. Flinging open the back door, she grabbed him roughly by the underside of his bony arm and extracted him from the car. Then she marched him directly up to the entrance of the butcher’s shop, digging in her sharp red fingernails once more and nearly tearing Nicholas’s right shoulder out of its socket in the process. Nicholas’s shoulder sang with high-pitched pain as his mother produced a small silver key from the left-hand side of her lacy black bra with her free hand before unlocking the front door and dragging him inside.
An intense scowl darkened Annabeth Preston’s pretty face as she led him solemnly into the back to where the walk-in freezer was located, each one of her steps punctuated by the staccato report of her high-heeled shoes clacking loudly against the freshly polished tiled floor. His mother had ordered the tiled floors installed a few years prior for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was to simplify the task of cleaning up any spilled blood. And why not? There was always a lot of spilled blood inside the butcher’s shop, wasn’t there? And not just from the cows and pigs, either. Especially when Nicholas and his mother were alone together inside.
His mother finally released his arm to open the freezer door. Nicholas rubbed at it gently as she placed her hands on her shapely hips and stepped to one side. Though he strained with all his might, but he wasn’t quite able to keep his gaze from drifting to the plunging neckline of her red Armani dress. A silver Tiffany heart necklace sat cushioned between her ample breasts. The lacy black bra from which she’d produced the key to the butcher’s shop a moment earlier supported perfect white globes. A small brown mole winked out at him from the left side of her chest.
Nicholas blinked rapidly in an effort to stop himself from staring but it didn’t work. Not even close. Even at eight years old, even he could see that his mother was a truly stunning woman. A real piece of ass, as he’d heard the grease monkeys whisper to one another at the gas station over on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Elm whenever they filled up her tank for her. A real fine piece of machinery they wouldn’t mind checking under the hood. To be fair, though, Annabeth Preston’s inviting cleavage could have caused even the most pious of the priests over at St Christopher’s to forget their vows for a moment and steal a