Outlaw Xmas by Chiah Wilder

Author:Chiah Wilder [Wilder, Chiah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance, MC, Fiction
Publisher: Chiah Wilder
Published: 2017-12-14T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

The Crazed Grinch

Laughing as he checked off the names of three more families, he leaned back against the car’s leather seat and turned the heater up. An eerie stillness sheathed the world outside as the falling snow choked the land, covering trees, lawns, roofs, and cars. It was like he was in a cocoon, safe and protected, all the windows covered by white making his world inside the vehicle charcoal gray.

As he stared ahead, a small boy appeared in the theater of his mind. The image was in full color and the boy sat on the soft cushion of a brocade chair, the fire’s glow highlighting wet tracks on his face. His father, bent over, stuffed brightly wrapped presents into a large black bag. Standing in the corner of the room was his mother, her hands covering her mouth as she looked at the scene unfolding before her.

Gripping the steering wheel, memories from his younger days flooded his mind. He’d come from a wealthy family, lived in a mansion, took equestrian lessons, and had a lifestyle a lot of children would’ve killed for, but they didn’t know what was hidden behind the columned porch and hand-carved front door. Inside, a monster ruled them—all of them. The mother he’d clung to before he went to school had betrayed him and his sister. She’d stood by and watched as the puppet master yanked their silvery strings, manipulating, humiliating, and punishing them without mercy. And all she’d done afterward was offer them cookies and lemonade.

Scrubbing his face with his fist, he glanced at the illuminated blue numbers in the car—midnight. Darkness without a glow. Closing his eyes, he tried to remember when there was a life without misery, but he couldn’t. Blackness crept in when he hadn’t been looking, and it never left.

His father had been a cruel and controlling man. There’d never been any physical signs of abuse on his wife and children—his dad was too clever for that. All the scars he’d given them were internal, and they never healed.

“You’re a loser. You’ll never amount to anything, you stupid, worthless brat. The day you were born was the worst day of my life.” His father’s words resonated through him, making him wince and shudder even all these years later.

All the commercialism in the world couldn’t ruin Christmas the way his father had—he’d been an expert at it. From the age of four, he remembered the puppet master taking away their gifts to give to needy children. In the beginning, his mother had sneaked a gift to them, but somehow their father had always found out; the gift was taken away from them, and then he’d berate their mother for days. Then one year, she stopped trying: no secret gifts, no Christmas tree, no lights in the window, no cheer of any kind. The fight had seeped out of her, and she let the puppet master reinvent the holiday for their household.

After that, he’d outdone himself: forcing them to go to

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