Chapter 59: Tripping Down Memory Lane

The Quinn Residence, Backwoods, Temperance, South Dakota...

Jarrett A. Quinn had been in his usual spot sitting in his favorite armchair in front of the television watching a wrestling program with a cooler of beer by his side and Brutus lying on his bed as if he had not a care in the world. Layla had been annoyed that he'd been home more so than usual as just getting a glimpse of the muscle-bound biker brute known as Brick Kenneally had been enough to make her want him again. She spent the majority of her time in her room, in bed recalling the events that lead to her and Brick finally consummating their relationship. She had no regrets about giving herself to him, in fact, the only thing she had dreaded was being away from him in the first place.

While the residual ache had been something she could do without, she had been riding high off her emotions. When Brick had been on her porch she had wished to see him and wondered if he'd come to be with her before taking note of the group he had brought along with him. She sighed as she closed her eyes reviving the intense moments with the handsome older man back at the mill before dosing off and getting some much-needed rest.

She hadn't thought about her mother in years, and here she was flooding her vision amid slumber after Brick had shown her a picture of her after all that time.

JJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJ

The Living Room, The Quinn Residence, Backwoods, Temperance, South Dakota...

Jarrett Quinn sat in his usual chair with a can of beer in his hand and a grim expression filed across his aged and bearded face. He had not had much interest in the program running along the screen as he'd been more or less stewing in the fact that Sherriff Tillman and a group of troublemakers had been on his front porch with a picture of his late wife who had turned her back on him and their daughter for the sole purpose of getting her kicks at their expense with other men.

He recalled when he'd been called down to the station to identify her beaten and battered body, the lack of clothing, and the rings around her throat along with the caked-on makeup and pale flesh that greeted him when he looked down at her. He'd been furious and grief-stricken all at once as he stared down at the lifeless corpse that had been his former wife.

He had bitterly written her death off as being her "own damn fault," and coming to the conclusion that it wouldn't have happened had she not left him.

Her name was Carla.

Carla Jones and at the time, she was quite infatuated with Jarrett when they first met. She was a lovely slender-shaped blonde with a bubbly personality and a keen interest in all things related to the gruff Jarrett Quinn. She gave him a daughter and a family and he gave her a home and security but it didn't seem to ever be enough for a girl like her.

Sadly, she ended up where most women like her did, at the bottom of a cold and lonely grave after turning her back on those that cared for her the most. Jarrett crushed the can that he held in his hand and glared at the television before tossing it against the nearby wall.

He climbed out of his seat and ventured toward the porch.

The sound of his movements had startled Burutus awake a bit but he noticed that Jarrett seemed to be in his own world and laid back down. The older Quinn stood on the porch as he glared out at the woods. His blue eyes narrowed in a kind of unspoken furry as he recalled the last time he'd seen his wife alive.

JJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJ

The door to the screen slammed as Carla rushed out the door angry with tears streaming down her face. She'd been crying ever since he had allowed his temper to get the better of him and smacked her across the face in the wake of her telling him that she was leaving him and their daughter. Half drunk after waiting up for her all night while she was supposed to be working and had been in fact laying with another man, Jarrett wasn't in the best of conditions for a life-changing discussion.

"YOU AIN'T GOIN' NO FUCKING WHERE!" shouted Jarrett drunk and enraged. "YOU GET YOUR PRETTY LITTLE PALE ASS BACK IN THIS GOTDAMN HOUSE AND CLEAN UP!"

"NO!" shouted Carla enraged in her own right. "I AM SICK AND TIRED OF YOU AND THIS SHACK YOU CALL A HOUSE!"

"SO YOU LEAVING YOUR DAUGHTER TO GO FUCK ON SOME SON OF A BITCH YOU MET AT THE CLUB?" asked Jarrett still upset. "YOU MAKE ME SICK AIN'T NOTHIN' MORE THAN A WHORE LIKE THE REST OF EM!"

"FUCK YOU JARRETT, I AIN'T NEVER SIGNED UP TO BE SOME KID'S MOTHER, WE HAD FUN WE FUCKED AROUND AND YOU NEVER REALLY GAVE A SHIT ABOUT ME OTHER THAN HOW MANY TIMES I SPREAD MY LEGS FOR YOU AND YOU KNOW WHAT I DIDN'T MISCARRY YOUR SON I GOT IT ABORTED!"

"The fuck you say?" asked Jarrett his blue eyes blazing with fury.

"You heard me," replied Carla glaring at him in her own right. "I didn't want your little bastard growing inside me so I had it cut out."

Jarrett couldn't control his fury after that and lunged at Carla grabbing her just as she reached the door and smacked her several times making her face swell and her mouth bleed.

He pulled her back inside and tossed her into their bedroom. There was a good deal of screams and struggling on her part before she'd been looking a bit worse for wear with her clothes torn and her face swollen amid tears and the blood from her busted lip.

The last thing he recalled was seeing the tears stream down her cheeks as she glared up at him with hatred in her eyes before he had managed to calm himself and rolled off her. He grabbed her by the throat and slammed her into the bedroom wall glaring at her rather murderously as he told her that she was to never come back to his home or mention his name or his daughter's name least he break her pretty little neck and she was terrified of him ever since.

He tossed her and her things out the door and pulled his shotgun aiming it at her new beau peppering this car as he took off with her screaming and shaken from the incident.

"YOU EVER COME HERE AGAIN BITCH AND I'LL KILL YA!" he shouted as his saliva fumed from his mouth and his eyes blazed with hatred. "I'LL FUCKIN' KILL YA!"

Jarrett turned his attention to venturing back to the house as the car kicked up dust and disappeared along the horizon. The next time he saw Carla, she'd been in the morgue after being gone for several months with her new man and she looked strung out and beaten worse than when he'd put his hands on her. Her once vibrant blonde locks split and wild as she lay cold on the slab every bone in her body broken and her neck snapped with two large black circles around both her eyes.

Her nose had also been broken and her dark eyes seemed to stare at him from beyond the grave.

He didn't care one way or the other about her after she'd left and her being dead was more or less the way things went. He had still been her husband when he collected her body and the evidence of another man having done her in was staggering.

He spit on her grave once she'd been lowered into it and washed his hands of any further obligation to her. It was why he'd been so angry that the sheriff had come to his home, a place that had gotten on well without her for years, and brought her back up.

"Rest in piss, Carla," growled Jarrett before venturing back into his house after urinating out front from the porch following his return from memory lane.