Jase froze. He wasn't entirely sure he'd heard her right.
"Your dad killed my dad?" he asked as calmly as possible. It clicked then and there what Greg had meant by this ordeal being bigger than Madison. He was talking about her dad. About the damage he'd done over however many years. "I was eighteen when my dad left-" he stopped. It made no difference what age he was. Madison wouldn't look at him. Instead, she cleared her throat and topped up their glasses.
"I didn't know while I was in the house. I didn't know until I got out and my dad figured out who you were." Jase still didn't move. Her words didn't sound real, there was an immense pressure in his head, thumping as she spoke. "I'm sorry." The apology came in like a voice travelling through a tunnel and Jase snapped back into the room.
"And Caspar knows. And you and your dad know he knows," he said. Madison nodded guiltily. "Which means you've also worked out that he likely pushed us together in the hopes that I would find out who your dad was. That's why you kept us separate." Jase said, thinking out loud more than searching for an answer. He knew he was right. He finally looked at Madison. She was staring at him. Tears tinted her eyes pink.
"I think his plan was to have one of you take the other out. To isolate me," she replied. Jase puffed his cheeks, let out a big sigh, and knocked back his brandy. "Jase, I'm sorry. I couldn't let you work with him, with everyone knowing what he did except you. It isn't fair."
She was sincere, but Jase was so numb with shock he was having a difficult time acknowledging it. There were a lot of conflicting feelings.
He tuned back into what Madison was saying. "-go after him Jase, he will kill you if he thinks you're some sort of threat, regardless of what I say-"
"I'm not going to go after your dad," he said suddenly. Madison jumped and Jase made an effort to relax his shoulders. "I don't care. I barely knew my dad and what I did know, I didn't like. Whether he's dead or just out there somewhere pretending I don't exist makes no odds to me."
Madison's mouth shut. She wiped her eyes quickly and Jase tossed her a packet of cigarettes, assuming she could use one.
"But... but you said at the house-" she stopped when Jase smirked sleepily.
"You're not the only one that can lie, Mads. Do you really think I'd be that vulnerable with a girl who's always scheming and giving me a headache? Don't you think that would fuck up the power dynamic a bit too much?"
Madison didn't know what to say as she took a cigarette from the pack. She was baffled.
"So all that stuff about your mum being a prostitute and your dad paying for your electricity was a lie?" she asked.
Jase grunted. "Half lies. You know as much as I do that lies are easier to keep track of if they're closer to the truth." She tossed the cigarettes back over, picking up the lighter. He stared at them for a moment before caving and taking one for himself. "My mum was a prostitute. And my dad did pay for our gas but only because he was my mum's pimp. He was never in a relationship with my mum. He'd been selling my mum all sorts of drugs since she was about fifteen, they slept together when she was sixteen and she fell pregnant. My Nan was super Catholic and kicked her out, she went and lived with my dad and he pimped her out. Turns out there's a big market for barely legal pregnant girls."
Madison's stomach swirled with bile and brandy. She had known Jase's dad solicited women but she didn't know Jase's mum was one of them. Jase carried on, totally detached from what he was describing.
"I was born, dad kept us around because of the government checks, still had my mum working corners. I was raised by random crackheads that shot up and fucked my mum on the sofa as I slept in my crib beside them. Growing up, Dad was there less and less, first, it was days, then it would be weeks and sometimes months before we saw him again. Mum was a washed-out mess with no desire to clean herself up and I was getting by doing what I could. One day, Dad stops coming back and I honestly never really thought much of it." He took a drag on his cigarette and poured another drink. When he put the bottle down, he paused. "I do have some questions though."
"Like what?" she asked.
"Why?"
Knowing what she knew now, Madison felt less nervous about telling him the whole story.
"He used to work for Mickey."
That's where Jase had seen Mickey before. He'd gone out with his dad to the docks, they were picking up a parcel. It was one of the very few decent things his dad did when he was around- taking Jase out when his mum was working. Mickey had been there, he was the one that gave Jase's dad the parcel. He'd only seen him from the passenger side his of Dad's car, his face illuminated by the car headlights.
"My dad's quite old-fashioned, he doesn't like the soliciting of women. He has a daughter and he tells your dad to pack it in. And to be fair to him, he did. At least, that's what he made it look like. Mickey found out, had your dad roughed up a bit, your dads ego was bruised and dad cut him off but as far as he was concerned, that was the end of it. Your dad had other plans and when Mickey got banged up, he went after Dylan."
Jase raised his eyebrows. He wasn't sure what was stranger, his lack of emotion around the whole thing or all the intertwining aspects of his and Madison's lives. He remembered reading up on human psychology when Madison had left, to try to understand how her mind worked, and coming across a study called The Six Degrees of Separation. It was along the lines of being connected to a total stranger through an average of six people.
"How did he go after Dylan?" he pushed, sipping his brandy.
"My brother and Mitch were buying from him separately. Rather than stopping them from racking up too much of a tab, your dad handed them ticks left, right, and centre. When they couldn't pay, Dylan refused to go to my dad for help, they didn't have a good relationship. Your dad said he'd wipe the debt if they ran some drugs for him."
"They?" Jase questioned.
"Dylan and Mitch." Madison stubbed her cigarette out and checked the baby monitor. "They agreed to run the drugs but they were robbed. By your dad so they ended up owing double. You up the stakes, young boys are going to get scared. You can make them do stupid things. Which is what Mitch and Dylan did. They promised me in exchange for a clean slate."
"How does your dad know all this?" Jase asked.
"Someone ratted him out. There aren't many people that are okay with being on the wrong side of my dad. Karl handled Dylan but Mitch never showed up. His brother was in prison with my dad and pre-warned him. Dad dealt with the brother in prison and we all know what ended up happening to Mitch." She drained the dregs of her brandy and jumped off the side, rinsing the glass and placing it on the draining board.
The wind had been knocked out of his gut. The apple really didn't fall too far from the tree. Though he was bad, awful at times, he'd never even thought of taking a child as a hostage or weapon. Even when Benny would suggest things that they should do to grow the business, knowing predators were more than happy to pay an arm and a leg for the right product, Jase had suffocated the ideas as soon as they arose. He wouldn't hear it. His head started spiralling, and when Mia popped into the forefront he lost his composure completely. Not many things could bring up the contents of his stomach but the idea of Mia... He ran the tap, washing away the brandy he'd drank and wiping at his mouth with a kitchen roll. He wished his dad was around so he could kill him himself.
"Fair enough," he muttered, his eyes pulsing from the pressure of throwing up. "So whoever Caspar really is might have known my dad, and this is payback for that?" Madison shrugged, her back to Jase as he leaned over the sink and splashed his face. He was clearly done with talking about that side of things and she was happy to leave it.
"Your guess is as good as mine," she replied.
Jase shook his head in disbelief at how deeply it all went. He felt way in over his head with all of this. He'd only started selling drugs in his teens to pay for the clothes on his back and the food in his fridge for fucks sake.
"Is there anything else I need to know? Does Mickey have someone in the house working for him? Is he waiting for the right time to pick me off? Because you're right, the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. My dad was a horrible bastard and I'm not far off. And I did exactly what he was planning on doing that got him killed."
"No Jase, you've changed-" He turned to her, his face pale.
"Have I?" he laughed, "because the other day I blowtorched Greg's lips together after taking off a couple of fingers."
"You did what you had to do," Madison replied sternly, she wouldn't let him feel bad about the things he'd done if it was to keep Mia safe. In her eyes, whilst he'd done shitty things, at least he felt bad. At least he felt, which is more than what she could say about half the sociopaths and psychos he and her dad affiliated themselves with. And everything he'd done whilst she had been in his life, well, most of it at least, was for a good cause. Jase groaned, tipping his head back.
"This is a fucking mess," he concluded. He looked back at her again.
"He doesn't have anyone in the house and if he wanted you dead, he'd have had it done a long time ago. You need to trust me-" He glared at her.
"Why should I? You kept that your dad is Mickey Kimber from me-"
"For a fucking good reason!" she snapped before quickly reeling it in, remembering Mia was asleep in the other room. "As far as I was concerned, you and my dad were never going to meet and you could go on blissfully unaware of what really happened to your dad. And only because I thought you cared and I didn't want to pile any more on your plate. If I'd have known this was the reaction it was going to get, everything would have been handled differently, but it wasn't so you're going to have to suck it up and move on from here. And as for trusting me, let's not forget that I kept my mouth shut about the house after I left. I kept my mouth shut about you letting me go down the alleyway and about you dragging me back to the house after I escaped. I have my dad's word that neither you, Sam, or the others, are to be touched. I'm the mother of your child and everything I do is what I deem best. I know this is a lot of information to take in, and I know how much it complicates things, but if you start doubting me now then Caspar has achieved exactly what he wanted." She left down the hallway into the bedroom. Had it not been for Mia sleeping, a slam of the door would have followed.
Initially, Jase felt inclined to trail her and make amends because realistically, she was right and none of this was her fault. She'd been drinking and there were too many emotions involved. He wanted them both to sleep on it but he wasn't ready to go to bed yet, the conversation had sobered and woke him. Instead, he drank his double, picked up his keys, and left for the club.