Counterfeit Son Read Online Free PDF Page A

got you all checked out, Neil," he said, and picked up the blue nylon bag and tossed it gently at him, grinning broadly. "Don't want to go home in your designer gown, I guess."
    Cameron smiled back and unzipped the bag. Inside he found new underwear, still in the plastic wrap, and white socks with the paper band still around them. There was a stiff new pair of jeans, and a new Dallas Cowboys T-shirt. He looked at it a moment before remembering they were a football team. Had Neil been a big football fan? Pop mostly watched wrestling, and so Cameron stared at the TV with him, but he didn't like it much.
    His mother went out while he dressed, fumbling a little with the new clothes, and with the effort of keeping his back turned away from his father without being obvious about it. The last thing in the bag was a pair of green-and-white running shoes, so new that fresh rubber and leather smells filled the bag.
Expensive, like the other stuff,
Cameron thought. He'd been right about the money. He wasn't greedy, but he still thought he'd be safer if the family had money.

    He finished tying the laces and looked up. "Thanks," he said, meaning it. "Dad," he added quickly.
    His father blinked his eyes rapidly. "Oh, Neil," he said huskily. "A few clothes—it should have been years of clothes—" He turned away, interrupting himself.
    "Dad…" Cameron started.
    "Neil—I've got to say this—you've got to know—" He broke off again and stood, leaning against the wall with his fists pressing against the clean white paint, the tendons stiff and knotted beneath the sleeves of his striped golf shirt. "That man—what he did to you—"
    Cameron's hand clenched on the handle of the blue nylon bag as his stomach lurched. He'd been stupid to try to hide his back. Of course they knew—about the scars, and about the rest. The doctor had said he could see what had happened. For all Cameron knew, they could figure out from the bodies of the other boys what had happened to them, too. Pop always told him not to tell.
They llknow you've been bad,
Pop's memory reminded him. This man, his father now, was going to punish him, just as Pop had said.
    "I'm so sorry—" his father was saying, his voice thin and strained. "I wish the police hadn't killed him. I'm so furious I want to take him in my own hands and kill him myself for what he did to you. Neil—" His father suddenly turned and gripped his arms, and Cameron was shocked to see tears running silently down his cheeks. He hadn't realized the man was crying. He couldn't hear it in his voice.

    "Whatever he said to you, Neil, don't believe it. It wasn't your fault. He was an animal, Neil, and you survived, and I'm so proud of you, son."
    Cameron stared into the hazel eyes that mirrored his own so uncannily and realized that this man wasn't blaming him. He wasn't going to punish him. Pop had lied.
    Something cracked inside of him. His eyes blurred, and Cameron felt salty warmth on his cheeks and discovered that he was crying. He caught his breath, and then knew it was all right. If Neil's father was crying, it must be all right for Cameron to cry, too.
    His father loosened his grip on his arms and pulled him close in a rough embrace. Cameron should have been frightened by being held so close, but all he could do was cry. He couldn't remember ever crying like this. He had even been afraid to cry down in the cellar, in case Pop came looking for him before he was finished with the other boy. He'd done that a few times. Cameron cried once in a while in a corner of the school yard, but he didn't dare cry much. He was afraid Pop would find out.
All those years of held-back tears,
he thought.
That's a lot to make up.
    "What's this?" It was his mother, and he could hear she was frightened. His father hugged him tightly, then released him and gave him a watery smile. "Just a man-to-man talk," he said, wiping his eyes without any sign of embarrassment.
    Cameron ducked his own head and grabbed a corner of the