"DAD!! – NOOOOOO!!!" Mikey screamed.

It was enough to draw Henry’s attention away from Tina and toward his son…But the look in his father’s eyes chilled Mikey to the bone…It terified the young boy…

Henry had a wild look in his eyes, like a wolf that was going in for the kill…There was a sheen of perspiration on his skin, and his hair was damp and wild…he was feral looking…

But the most frightening thing of all…..Was the smile on his face..The sick bastard was enjoying inflicting pain on his poor defensless wife…

Just then, Mikey heard the sirens…

"Dad, the cops are coming!!! – You have to get out of here!!" he pleaded.

Mikey felt so torn…He loved Tina, and didn’t want to see her get hurt anymore…But Henry was his dad, and when he wasn’t mad, he was the best dad in the world….

Only these days, he seemed to be angry all the time…And the beatings were getting more and more consistent…

"Dad, please?.." Mikey begged.

The sounds of the sirens became closer…This and his son’s voice pulled Henry back to reality… He looked down at Tina…Laying there unconcious on the floor…Then looked back at Mikey…He pointed his finger at his son…

"You had better not say a fucking word to anyone boy!!!" Henry snarled, then the coward took off out the back door…

The sirens were really close now…Mikey didn’t want to have to explain what happened here tonight…He always took his father’s warnings to heart…After all he knew what Henry was capable of when he felt ‘betrayed’…

He ran to the front door and opened it slightly so the cops could get in, then he followed in his fathers footsteps and ran out the back door…He couldn’t be here when the police got here…

THE PRESENT…

Mikey spent the next few hours just wandering aimlessly…Replaying the nights events over and over again in his head…

He kept seeing Tina’s body laying there on the floor…He kept hearing her cries…Her begging Henry to please stop….And poor little Angie curled up in the corner, silently sobbing as she saw her mother being beaten to a pulp…

Mikey couldn’t get the images out of his head…He just walked and walked…Not sure where he was going…Wandering aimlessly…Maybe if he walked far enough, he could just get away from all of this?… Maybe he could start over, and never have to think about the sorry excuse that was his life?…

But he couldn’t just leave Tina and Angie…Could he?

Mikey was pulled from his thoughts and back to the present as he registered someone calling his name…

He looked around at his surroundings and realized he was on the bridge…Overlooking the river.

He had absolutely no recollection at all of how he got there.

"Mikey" He heard his name again…It sounded like his friend Sam.

He looked around in the direction of the voice…He spotted the owner…It was Sam, and he had two people with him…

When they reached him, Mikey knew immediately that they were cops…

"Mikey Morgan?" The male cop enquired

"Yes sir..I-I’m Mikey"

"We have been looking for you for hours son…”

The young boys heart sank in his chest as he asked the question that was at the forefront of his mind…Although he was scared of the response he was going to get from these grim faced officers…

“H-How’s Tina?…”

“She’s in a bad way son…Now we’d like you to come down the station and answer a few questions for us…Would that be okay?

“Uhmm…S-Sure..” Mikey replied…

Inwardly the youngster was in pieces….He knew what he should do…He knew the right thing to do would be to make a statement telling the cops of his fathers brutality…

But he was also painfully aware of what his father would do to him if he ‘served him up on a plate’ so to speak…If he dared to inform on him…

The repercussions of doing that…Of being a ‘Judas’ in his father’s eyes, made the teenage boy’s blood run cold…

Henry could be one mean, vicious individual…And his temper was legendary….

But he could also be the sweetest, kindest person in the world…And regardless of everything…Henry was his father…So Mikey felt a misguided loyalty towards him…

The youngster’s mind was in turmoil…he was fighting an inner battle with himself…What should he do?

TBC?