Chapter 38

“No.” Mark shook his head. “A man, Jake, offered to put me up for the night. He loaned me some money and said he’d help me get a job. I moved into some lodgings, but a couple of days after I was mugged in the street. I had all the money that Jake had loaned me in my pocket.”

“Oh, no,” Roy gasped and resumed his hand wringing.

Mark turned to me. “The more I think about it, the more I think the whole thing was arranged by Jake—the mugging, I mean.” He looked at the floor. “It was then Jake reverted to the total bastard he really was.”

Roy opened his mouth to speak, but Mark carried on.

“Dad, there’s no way I can soften the blow, and if we’re to have any future relationship, I have to tell you everything that happened to me after you…you threw me away.” Mark’s voice began to rise in volume.

I put my other hand over the top of his, sandwiching his hand between mine.

“Jake became my pimp. For six months your son was a male prostitute, a whore, a rent boy.”