Blackthorn Elite: The Entire Series

by Beck, J. L.

  For a long time, there is nothing but silence. Only me and my friend, the darkness.

  “Yes, she is stable now…” A voice suddenly breaks through to me. It seems far away as if I’m standing in one corner of a large room, and someone is in the other, across from me. Something draws me to that voice. I try to move, but my body and mind don’t seem to be connected at the moment.

  “No, I won’t leave her side, I promise…” The same voice speaks again, a little bit louder now as if he took a few steps toward me. I strain to hear him again, hoping he comes a little bit closer still. His voice is a beacon of light in the dark.

  “Okay, I’ll see you soon…” He stops talking after that, but the sound of heavy footsteps echo in my ears. I think he’s coming closer. When a large warm hand covers mine a moment later, that thought is confirmed.

  Part of me wants to pull away from his touch, while some other part of me craves it. I’m confused by the notion until I hear him say his next words.

  “Junebug, please, wake up. Please, be okay… I just need you to be okay.”

  There is only one person in the world who calls me Junebug… Jackson.

  Why is he here? I drag myself out of the heavy fog, fighting with all my might to open my eyes. Cinder blocks weigh them down, but somehow, I blink my lids open. Light blinds me, and I release a groan at the burning of my retinas.

  Like paint seeping into paper and spreading in large splotches, the events that got me here unfold in my mind. The cutting. All the blood.

  I flinch when Jackson squeezes my hand gently, reminding me that he’s here now.

  Cut yourself a little deeper next time…

  My entire body is one big ache, and my head is heavy, swimming with thoughts.

  “Thank fuck you’re okay!” Jackson says, sighing as if he’s been sitting here watching me for hours.

  Tugging my hand from his, I scowl at him. “Don’t touch me!” The words come out so raspy and distorted, I’m not sure if he even understood them.

  Anguish contorts his features.

  Why is he here?

  “I’m sorry, Kennedy. I’m so fucking sorry. This is all my fault. I’ll do whatever it takes to make this better. Whatever you want. Tell me, and I’ll do it.”

  “Leave,” I croak, trying to scoot away, but my limbs are still too heavy.

  “Anything but that. I won’t leave you and not only because I promised your mom. I’m not leaving because I love you.”

  Love? Is he serious?

  All I can do is shake my head at him. How can he be talking about love right now? After what he did to me… what he said? I can’t wrap my head around it all. It’s too much. Too many emotions and thoughts rushing to the surface all at once.

  “Please, go…”

  “I can’t, bug. I can’t leave you. Not after I almost lost you forever.”

  Closing my eyes, I turn my head away from him. I don’t want to see him right now, because every time I look at his face, I see him yelling at me. Telling me to cut myself while Tylor is standing next to him, grabbing his crotch. This is worse than my worst nightmare because it’s my reality.

  “I won’t touch you or even talk to you if that’s what you want, but I’ll be staying here so I can watch over you.” I hear him retreating from me and taking a seat in the corner of the room. The tension eases from my body only slightly.

  I try to go back to sleep, but my head hurts, and the skin on my legs burns too much to find any rest. When I attempt to move again to get comfortable in another position, I yelp out in pain as I tug on something connected to my arm.

  “Hold on, don’t move. Let me get the nurse.” Jackson jumps up and rushes to my side. He grabs something behind me, and a moment later, a female voice comes through a speaker.

  “Nurses station.”

  “She’s awake and needs some more pain meds.”

  “I’ll be right there.” The line goes dead, and Jackson takes a step back.

  I can only manage to look at him briefly before I turn my head away from him again. Seeing his face hurts too much right now. It’s nothing but a reminder of what he said to me. How he treated me. I trusted him, and he betrayed that fragile trust. He believed Tylor’s lie about me without even asking my side of the story. How could he believe what he told him? Does he think so little of me? I thought we were getting somewhere, letting go of the past. My chest aches at the thoughts rushing through my brain.

  Thankfully, the nurse comes in, pulling a small cart behind her, sidetracking my thoughts.

  “How are you feeling?” she asks, walking up to my side. She doesn’t smile, but her demeanor isn’t mean, just serious.

  “Okay.” The lie rolls off my tongue so easily.

  “On a scale from one to ten, what’s your pain at right now?”

  One million. But that’s just the ache in my chest over the betrayal.

  “Eight,” I tell her. “Maybe a nine. My head hurts.”

  “You lost a lot of blood. And the doctor found a bump on the back of your head, you must have hit it on the bathtub.”

  Or on a brick wall. I should say it out loud. Tell her that I want Jackson gone, that he is the reason I’m hurting, but some small part of me won’t let the words escape.

  “I’m going to check your vitals and then give you some more pain meds through your IV.” She starts wrapping the blood pressure cuff around my arm and takes my pulse while the machine is working, squeezing my arm tightly almost to the point of pain.

  “Blood pressure is good,” she tells me after she is done. Then she gets a syringe from her cart and injects something into my IV. It only takes a few seconds before I feel the effects. A warm fuzzy feeling spreads through my veins, covering me like a soft heavy blanket.

  Exhaustion takes hold of me once more, and with the pain disappearing, I can finally close my eyes and escape the world again.

  * * *

  The next time I wake up, someone is holding my hand. I know instantly it’s not Jackson. These hands are smaller, softer, and less warm. Prying my eyes open, I come face to face with my mother.

  “Hey, honey,” she coos, a sad smile on her lips.

  “Hey, Mom. What are you doing here? You didn’t have to come all this way. I’m fine.”

  “Oh, Kennedy, of course, I came. You’re my child. Why didn’t you call me? Why didn’t you tell me…” She doesn’t finish the sentence, but I know what she is thinking. Why didn’t you tell me that you were hurting yourself… that you wanted to end your life?

  The real question is, what would she have done? I’m pretty sure the answer to that is nothing. She would have brushed it off, told me to get out more, make friends, and be normal.

  “I’m sorry.” I don’t even know what I’m apologizing for, but I feel the need to say the words. “It won’t happen again.”

  “It better not,” I hear my father’s gruff voice from the other side of the room. Only then do I register the other two people in the room. My father is sitting in a chair in the corner, looking down at a newspaper. He doesn’t even look at me.

  My gaze swings to Jackson, who is leaning against the wall with his arms crossed in front of his chest, staring daggers at my father.

  “Travis, now is not the time,” my mother warns, but there is not much conviction behind her statement, which eggs my father on even more.

  “When is a good time, Claudia? After she kills herself? After she makes a mockery out of this family yet again?”

  Instead of saying anything else, my mom just lowers her head and squeezes my hand.

  “Get out,” Jackson’s voice booms through the room. Both mine and my mom’s head snaps up to find Jackson looking furious.

  “What?” My father looks up from his paper like he can’t believe Jackson is brave enough to say something.

  “You heard me, old man. Get the fuck out,” Jackson growl.

  “How dare you––” My father starts but is cut off by Jackson’s hand, grabbing a fist full of his shi
rt to drag him from his chair.

  “How dare I? How dare you talk to her like that? You’re her father. You’re supposed to care for her, not make her feel worse. You’re part of the problem, and I’m not standing by and letting her be hurt anymore.”

  My father struggles, but Jackson is too strong. He easily shoves my father out of the room while my mother and I watch the scene unfold with our mouths hanging wide open. Jackson slams the door shut, and I jerk at the sound.

  Without saying another word, Jackson walks back to the corner and sits down on the chair my father was in just moments ago.

  “I’m going to check on your father,” Mom whispers, and I almost roll my eyes. Of course, she worries more about him than me. I nod, and her hand slips away. She steps outside, leaving me alone with Jackson.

  “It’s too late, Jackson. Standing up for me now doesn’t make up for what you did yesterday.”

  “I know, but I won’t leave you. Even if you don’t want me right now. I know you need me. Your parents just proved that.”

  “What I need is space, from you, from them, from everybody. I just want to be left alone.”

  “I can’t do that. I’ll give you all the time in the world, I won’t expect anything from you, but I won’t leave your side.”

  If he had said those words to me twenty-four hours ago, I would have been happy, ecstatic even. Now, it just drives the knife deeper. Because right now, everything he does is just a reminder of what he didn’t do yesterday… protect me.

  92

  Jackson

  Every time I look at my hands, I see her blood on them. I see her pale face, her closed eyes, and pale pink lips. I almost lost her. Had I not got there when I did, she may not be here right now. Hell, what am I saying? She wouldn’t be in this hospital bed if it wasn’t for me.

  Cut yourself a little deeper next time.

  I want to rip my own tongue out for saying something so disgusting, so cruel, so horrendous. I knew she was suffering, but my own fragile state overshadowed that. I was selfish and believed someone else without stopping to ask her what really happened. She was the one hurting the most. Jillian died, and the loss of her crushed me, but Kennedy went through so much more than the loss of her best friend.

  Had I been at the party that night and not thinking with my dick, maybe none of this would’ve happened. Maybe Kennedy wouldn’t have been assaulted, maybe Jillian would still be here.

  I’ve been so busy piling the blame on Kennedy that I’ve never stopped to think about how I played into the situation.

  “Are you sure about this?” Kennedy’s mother asks for the third time.

  I nod. “Yes. I’ll stay with her and make sure nothing happens.”

  The apprehension on her face tells me she doesn’t want to believe me, but, truthfully, she doesn’t have a choice. Kennedy is old enough to make her own choices. She, however, can’t be trusted to stay alone. The doctor recommended someone stay with her for the next few weeks. The other option would be to put her into a mental hospital, which is only happening over my dead body. Her father, of course, was all for it, which almost earned him a fist in his face.

  “He said he’ll call us if there is a problem, Claudia, let’s go,” Travis, Kennedy’s father says, his eyes refusing to meet mine. He’s lucky he’s even allowed in the room after all the shit he pulled.

  “Okay, okay. I’m just worried. I don’t want to lose her,” Claudia says, her voice cracking. Kennedy hasn’t said but a handful of words to her parents. I haven’t dared tell her mother that I might be the worst person for this job, given Kennedy’s and my past, but I owe her this. I owe it to her to make things right, to protect her, to make sure she gets another chance at this. I can’t let her go, not knowing that I’m the cause.

  Claudia pats Kennedy on the leg, but she doesn’t even look up and acknowledge her mother. “The doctors are going to get you set up with a therapist. You need to go once a week. Please, don’t hurt yourself, please. If I lose you…”

  “Let’s go, honey,” Travis growls from the doorway.

  I want to tell the fucker that he should care more about his daughter, but you can’t make someone care. They either do, or they don’t.

  Claudia wipes some tears from her face and kisses Kennedy on the forehead before walking toward the doors, turning toward me before she reaches the threshold. “Please, take care of her, and call me if anything happens, day or night.”

  “Will do,” I tell her. She nods and walks out of the room without looking back. I hate how self-absorbed Kennedy’s parents are. They should’ve seen how much she was hurting.

  I should’ve seen how much she was hurting.

  “Are you ready to go?” I ask, keeping my voice gentle.

  She doesn’t look at me as she speaks, “Why are you still here?”

  Patience isn’t my strong suit, but I’ll do anything for Kennedy, so I bury my emotions and remind myself it’s going to take time. She is not going to accept me being here.

  “I promised your mom I would stay and take care of you so you can continue going to school. I didn’t think you wanted to go home.”

  “I don’t, but I also don’t want to be with the person that pushed me into this hospital bed.”

  Fuck that stings, but I deserve that. I deserve to feel her anger and pain. I’m ready to be battered by her because I fucking deserve it. I’ll be her whipping post, and the person she needs to hold her together.

  “I understand that, and I’m going to make this right. Fix everything that I did.”

  “I’m not a broken picture frame. You can’t fix me.”

  “I’m not trying to fix you, bug. I’m fixing myself. I’m here because I want to be. Because I owe it to you.”

  “I don’t want you here.” She lifts her gaze, and there’s a haunting look in her eyes. I want to go to her, wrap my arms around her and tell her everything is going to be okay, but I wouldn’t dare. Not now. It’s too soon.

  “I know, but I’m here, and that’s not going to change.” Exhaling, I look down at my hands. Blood. So much blood. I’ll never be able to forget the way I found her. The fact that I caused her that much pain and pushed her to kill herself. I owe her this. “Are you ready to go?” I ask again.

  She doesn’t say anything, and I decide to take the initiative to get us going. Maybe she’ll feel better when we get back to her apartment. Calling for the nurse, I get her a wheelchair and wheel it into the room.

  Kennedy pretends as if I’m not there as she slowly pushes off the bed and into a standing position. Pain flicks across her features, and I feel it in my gut, like a dull knife blade digging into my skin. Out of reflex, I offer her my hand, but she smacks it away, hissing at the contact, almost as if I’ve burned her.

  “Let me help you,” I plead.

  “No,” she grits out through her teeth. “I’d rather feel every ounce of pain than let you touch me again.”

  Her words pelt me like blocks of ice, but I expect them. Expect her to lash out, to hate me, to curse me forever.

  The nurse returns a moment later with discharge papers.

  “Please, remember to inspect the wounds and make sure that they’re clean. We’ve sent over an antibiotic and pain reliever to the pharmacy. The doctor would like her to resume classes in a few days. If you have any problems, give us a call.”

  Kennedy grunts and takes the papers from the nurse, scribbling her name across the signature area.

  “Thank you,” I tell the nurse and start to wheel her out of the room. We make it to the front doors, and I park the wheelchair before turning to her.

  “I’m going to go get my SUV, I’ll be right back.” As expected, I get no response, and she turns her head away from me like a child. I go and get my car, driving up to the pick-up area as fast as I can. I almost sigh with relief when I find Kennedy still sitting there, her hands in her lap. God, she looks so fragile and broken.

  I did that to her. I broke her.

  Putting the SUV
in park, I get out to help her out of the wheelchair, but she’s already pushing out of it and hobbling toward me.

  “I’m here to help you,” I growl, unable to hide my anger. She’s going to end up ripping her stitches if she doesn’t let me help her.

  “I think you’ve done enough helping,” she sneers, forcing me to step out of the way as she reaches the door of the SUV. I’m planning to help her into the vehicle when she hops up all by herself, wincing only once her ass hits the leather.

  “If you don’t want to have to go home and live with your parents, then you’ll listen to me. I’m not going to do anything to hurt you.”

  Kennedy laughs, but it’s not humorous—if anything, it’s sad. “I don’t trust you, Jackson. I should have never trusted you. Thinking you would be there that night, thinking that you would help me, thinking that you would believe me. I trusted in you and look how that turned out.” She looks over at me, and I see nothing of the girl I had loved for years. “I hate you. I hate everything that you represent, and every time I see your face, I’m reminded of how you took his side. I’m reminded of what a horrible fucking person you are, and how I never want to look at your face again because that’s all you’ll ever be.”

  Tears fill her eyes, and for one brief moment, I can’t breathe, think, or even react. I knew she was angry and sad, going through the motions, but I never… I never thought she could truly hate me. Now, I’m not so sure.

  I shove my feelings down, stomping them into the earth as soon as they start to pop up. This isn’t about me. This is about her.

  “I get it,” I say and close the door once she’s tucked inside.

  The drive to her place–after stopping at the pharmacy–is painstakingly slow. When we pull up to her apartment complex, I’m more than thankful to get out of the car. That relief is short-lived when Kennedy gets out and starts wincing. We have an entire flight of stairs to walk up, and there isn’t any way I’m letting her walk them. Knowing this, I let her get to the complex door before I scoop her up gently and cradle her to my chest.