“You’re loveable… when you’re playing well with others. They both love you.”
“Doesn’t matter. Love isn’t always enough.” I say.
“And why isn’t it?”
I sigh, pondering his question having no solid answer. “Did you love Jessica?”
“I did.”
“How come you never told me?” I ask.
“It wasn’t about keeping it from you. Jessica knows the dark all too well, and she lets it consume her more than she should. She’s never been good at balancing it with the light. She’s been through a lot in her life, and sometimes the past seeps into the present and makes everything cloudy. It’s tough to see through it and get to the other side. She’s always struggled with who she is, her identity means a lot to her. There’s nothing wrong with that, but I don’t think I ever really had a place within all that. I chased her every time, begging her to just let me love her, but I came to the wrong conclusion. I thought love wasn’t enough.”
“How do you know it was the wrong conclusion?”
“Love is always enough,” he says and the damn bee returns making me swat more.
“Not always. Jag and I’ve been through a lot of dark shit together. And now Ian is trying to keep me as his mistress or some other fucked up arrangement.”
“There are very few occasions when love doesn’t overcome all the other bullshit in life. You and Jag both concentrate entirely too much on the dark. You may have been through hell together, but you have to focus on the light. There is so much light between you two. The thing you both forget is you’re both passionate individuals, and the passion is only intensified between you two. Shit goes awry quick when passion is involved. Makes you think even more irrationally than love does. Of course love drives passion. Ian, well, the man has loved you since the day he met you. I bet you didn’t know that.”
“Not in that way. I thought we had an understanding. What we had was never based on feelings and love and emotions and all the shit that complicates relationships,” I say.
“Shit changes, especially feelings of fondness and love.”
“Jagger’s with someone else,” I advise.
“Is he?” he questions with that inflection in his voice that annoys the shit out of me.
I sigh, and sit back in my chair to take in the warm, salty air.
“Do you know why I chose to die?” he asks.
“What? You chose to die?”
“In a sense, yes. If I’d lived two things would’ve happened. I would’ve been severely injured. I never would’ve played again. I wouldn’t be the same person I was, but I also wouldn’t have you. If I lived, you died. My mom and every person who’s crossed your path since my death can judge you for the choices you made to cope with my loss and all the other bullshit you’ve dealt with in addition to it… but, I would’ve been dead in less than two years anyhow. I couldn’t have lived without you. Where you think you stopped living for years and then made bad decisions… I would’ve been self-destructive and hurt a great deal of people in the process. I don’t mean emotionally hurt people either, I would’ve slaughtered the people I loved and anyone who was unlucky enough to get in my way. What’s the point in living if I can’t play and you’re not there? This way was better. You’ve lived. Even when you didn’t feel like you were living, you did. I wouldn’t have been able to, Hen. I know it’s been hard without me, but you’re doing so much better than you think you are. The Ian and Jagger shit will work itself out. Work on you. Love you. Be the best version of yourself you can be, and fuck the rest of it.”
“Caleb.”
“Awww, now we will not rehash shit that don’t matter. I see you everyday girl. I sleep next to you, and I get to see you play. I play right along with you. Don’t waste this, ok? Do it for me?”
“So Plato, you would like me to be the shit at all times and way more bad ass than any other person in the world?” I ask with a smile.
“That’s what I’m telling you,” he smiles.
The bee buzzes all around again. Persistent little fucker.
“Do you have a guide book for that? I prefer the all-knowing universal guide.”
“You already have the guide, it’s in your chest.”
I open my mouth to make a smart ass comment when the buzz flies straight down my throat. I cough in attempt to expel it, but to no avail. I wrap my hands around my throat and attempt to get air into my lungs.
Caleb jumps from his seat screaming, “Hen, wake up! Wake up and fight!”
I shake my head, not understanding. I can’t breathe and tears fill my eyes as my throat constricts. I continue to cough hoping the fucking thing will dislodge.
“You have to wake up! Fight dammit! This is when you fight!”
Caleb is no longer in front of me and my eyes see nothing in my dark room. I assess my surroundings when I realize someone is straddling me. My hands are not around my throat, but around the wrists of whoever is choking the shit out of me. I try to scream but nothing comes out. I can’t fucking breathe. I draw one leg from between my attacker’s legs and use my knee for a groin shot. The attacker shouts an expletive and releases his hold on my neck, falling off the bed. I scurry from the bed, but only make it as far as the other side as I gasp for air.
Sweet air. I’ll never take breathing you for granted again.
“You fucking bitch!” he screams.
I can barely see his form huddled on the side of my bed, but in the moonlight that filters through my window, I make no mistake when he stands. He lunges at me on the bed, but I kick my foot into his stomach. He bends over again and curses me. I crawl to the side of the bed he’s closest to in search of my cell phone, but my shoulder feels as though it is ripped almost completely off. I’m able to grab a pen from the bedside table before he pulls me away from it.
I scream out in agony at the pain in my shoulder, and then a foot kicks into my ribs. All the air feels as though it is knocked right out of my lungs. I gasp for oxygen to fill my lungs, but have no time to recover when his hand picks me up by the hair on the top of my head. A shrill sound comes out of my throat, so shrill it surprises even me.
“You just couldn’t fucking listen!” he screams. “I told you to get rid of Jagger and Ian. There is no room in your life for anyone other than me.”
“Fuck you!” I spit out.
“Oh I plan on it darlin’.”
Over my dead body. That’s exactly how you’ll get that.
He pushes me against a wall using my hair as a guide, my body forced to extend to full length. Sharp pains shoot through my ribs and shoulder.
“Why couldn’t you just listen?” he asks and as my eyes adjust I get my first real look at the bastard.
I’ve never seen him before. He has to be my psycho stalker who lives in some alternate reality where he thinks he knows me… where we are destined to be lovers and live happily ever fucking after with 2.5 kids and a white picket fence. Not in this world, buddy. He studies my face, taking me at this close angle, probably comparing me to every picture he’s ever seen of me. While he takes his time visually analyzing my physical features, I take a moment to remember the notes, flowers, and then the gunshots ring through my ears. I remember the panic I felt only hours earlier as my body instinctively dropped to the ground and covered my head. When the ignition turned over in the seconds after the last gunshot, I called out for my bodyguard, my friend, my confidant. The blood, god the blood pouring out of his body. The video he released of me and Ian only seals his fate in this moment. The anger anchors somewhere deep in me and I sink the pen into the side of his cheek and pull it towards his lip.
His own pain comes out in a scream.
He wastes no time backhanding me, and the blood gushes from my lip. I spit in his face, and he lets go of my hair and uses every ounce of his body weight to land a punch to my eye, sending me crumpling to the ground.
“Memphis!” I scream.
“Shut th
e fuck up!” he screams at me.
He climbs over my body and the fight in me comes out, I kick and scream at the top of my lungs, attempting to throw him off me. The cold metal feeling under my chin halts my fight immediately.
“I’ll kill you, you crazy bitch! Shut the fuck up and be still.”
I hear my door knob turn, and then Memphis shouting my name, only followed by Koi shouting out as well. Cash is barking incessantly and sounds like he wants to eat the door. He was beside me when I went to sleep. Then I hear a sound no one could ever mistake for a grown man throwing himself at the door in attempt to come through it. Between those two it is only a matter of seconds before this fucker’s time is up.
“Look what you did!” he bites out and throws his fist into my face.
He looks towards the door, and I exploit his moment of weakness. I turn my head so that the gun is no longer under my chin, and I pull my knees as much as I can towards my chest diving right into his balls.
The gun goes off right beside my ear, causing a sharp pain to erupt through the canal and down to my temple. The ringing makes it impossible to hear a fucking thing. Realization that this mother fucker is here to kill me sets in, and as he sags over the side of my body, I reach up and grab his nipple and hold on for dear life. Through the ringing in my ears, I hear his screams. Nothing like bringing a man to his knees by his dick and nipples. I capitalize on him being off kilter and climb out from under him, never releasing his nipple. Before I rise to my feet, I notice he’s dropped the gun, so I quickly retrieve it. I release the skin between my fingers for only a moment before I smash the butt of the gun across his nose.
He goes down, and I jump on top of him unleashing every bit of fury my tiny body can muster. I pummel him with my fists until he’s no longer moving, but I don’t stop. I want him dead. In this moment, I don’t consider the repercussions of taking another’s life. I just need all of this stop, to be over. I cannot function like this anymore. He has to die.
Arms go around my waist, and I hear voices, but the gunshot has fucked my hearing completely. As I’m pulled off the douche bag, I kick my feet out landing as many blows to his torso as possible. I finally twist out of the hold on me and pick up the shotgun that has stayed by my bed since this asshole started stalking me. Holding it by the barrel, I commence to beating the fuck out of him with it. I start at his face and make my way to his ribs. If he’s not dead, he’ll wish he was.
“Stop, Hen!” Memphis screams.
I finally make eye contact with my brothers and when I turn to the door I see the dresser in front of it. The man that lies beneath me moved one of my massive dressers in front of the door, making it difficult for my brothers to reach me. I heard nothing in my exhaustive state of unconsciousness. He’s thorough, I’ll give it him that. Visions of Cory bleeding out in front of me take over, and I lift the shotgun by the barrel one last time, and push all 120 pounds of my body weight through my last blow that lands directly between his legs.
I spit one last time on his body, “You hit like a bitch.”
Memphis and Koi wince as I drop the shotgun. I grab his gun from the floor again and call Cash off since he’s decided he’s hungry
“Fuck, he’s going to eat his ass!” Koi says, but I do not try to stop my furry, white protector.
I call out one last time to Cash, and he lets go of my attacker. I level the gun down at him and empty the clip center mass. I drop the gun, and walk down the long hallway that leads to my kitchen, pull out a bottle of Crown Royal from the freezer, and down two shots. My body throbs and screams at me. I pour whiskey and Dr. Pepper into a glass so I can continue to nurse the warmth that spreads through me. Exiting my patio door, I all but collapse into a chair, and light up a cigarette. My left arm is useless at this point. I briefly wonder how I used the damn thing at all in the moments after he nearly detached it from my body.
I register the sounds of sirens in the distance and wonder if I’m destined to hear those sounds for the rest of my life. I’ve heard the damn blaring too many times since the night Caleb was taken from me. I could live the rest of my life and never hear another emergency vehicle.
A flurry of activity descends upon me, but I space out trying to get as far away from here as I can get in my head. My mother’s worried eyes meet mine, so I take another swallow from my glass, and hope it all just goes away.
Chapter 14
Jagger
I’ve been playing sick for days, avoiding Rosario, and the fact that I’ve accepted I’ll never get over Henley. I tried, and my attempt will only hurt Rosario. I’ve avoided everyone’s phone calls and texts, choosing rather to sit here and sulk over my sad little life.
Kip barging in my room scares the shit out of me.
“What the fuck?” I yell.
“Get your ass up and stop moping. The mother fucker who’s stalking Hen shot at Henley and Cory yesterday, and if you’d bother to get out of bed you’d already know Cory took two bullets for her. Koi just called and said the ass hat got into her house tonight and beat the fuck out of her. Cops aren’t even there yet.” Kip seethes.
“Let’s go!” I say as I throw on jeans, a shirt, and shoes in a hurry.
We jump into my SUV and haul ass over to Henley’s, which is only five minutes away, but seems like an eternity. When I throw the car into park, I throw my door open, and realize Kip hasn’t moved.
“Come on!” I prod him.
“She told me she was sorry that night you asked her for space. She said she was sorry, and I never made things right with her. I never told her I’d already forgiven it. I just pretended it never happened and kept her at arm’s length. I should’ve been here tonight. I should’ve been in her bed watching over her, and I was too fucking proud to sit down and have a talk that would’ve made that possible.”
“We both have some apologizing to do, so let’s go take care of our girl,” I say.
Kip wipes his eyes, and we trek through the fleet of cops, paramedics, and firefighters. I stop dead in my tracks when I see a large black van pull into the drive. The vans large lettering “Coroner” means someone is dead. I run into the house searching for my friends and girl. I run into Memphis and nearly throw us both down.
“Dude, I’m sorry. Are you okay? Jesus! Fuck!” I try to catch my breath.
“I’m not injured,” he says clearly indicating he is not fucking okay.
“Where’s Henley and Koi?” I ask holding my breath.
“On the patio.”
“Why in the fuck is the Coroner here?”
Memphis stares into space at something I can’t see. He looks like he’s somewhere else. He opens his mouth to say something and closes it.
“Memph, you okay?” Kip asks.
“She killed him with his own gun,” he manages.
“What?” Kip and I ask in unison.
“She beat him within an inch of his life and then turned his own gun on him. Unloaded the whole fucking clip into him,” Memphis says and rakes his hands through his hair.
Memphis nods his head towards the kitchen, so we follow him to Hen’s back patio. I see her back as I enter the space. A massive white Cash sits in Henley’s lap, facing her, her right arm is thrown tightly around his body, while her face is buried into his neck. Cash is growling at anyone who attempts to approach them, and his demeanor tells anyone he’ll rip them to shreds if they touch her.
We stand behind the paramedics who are attempting to coax Hen to let them assess her.
“We couldn’t get through the door, he placed a dresser in front of it. I had only let Cash out of her room half an hour before so he could make a round outside. He was lying on the couch with me. I thought he would eat the fucking door, man. He was just as desperate to get to her as we were. Jesus,” Memphis chokes on his words for a minute, and stops to compose himself. He places his thumb and index finger to the bridge of his nose and sniffs the tears back. “I’ve never felt so fucking helpless.”
Derek approaches us quietly, “Kip, do you think you can calm him down? I’m afraid he’ll hurt someone.”
“I’ll try,” Kip says.
Kip takes a deep breath and approaches the massive canine sitting on his estranged best friend. He takes a few steps towards them, but leaves enough space where Cash doesn’t feel threatened. He lowers himself onto his hinds and tries to soothe the pup.
“Cash, come here boy. Come to Uncle Kip.”
Cash gives a lower, throatier growl, almost like he’s in pain. He avoids eye contact with Kip.
“You did good, Cash. You’re a good boy. You protected mommy. You did so good buddy. I won’t hurt her.”
Cash whines at Kip.
“Come ‘ere Cash.”
Cash whines again but finally makes eye contact with Kip. He takes in the scene in front of him and all the people he may have to protect his master from.
“Memphis, I need treats,” Kip informs.
Memphis returns seconds later with treats, and Kip inches closer to the dog, and extends his hand as far as he can to him with a treat flat on his palm.
“You were a good boy, you want a snack?” he asks.
The word, snack, causes his ears to stand up. He whines again at Kip. He won’t sell out for a fucking snack, and as fucked up as this whole situation is, that makes me smile.
“Come get a snack!” Kip says taunting him with the treat.
Cash’s head goes straight up and he howls. His howl sounds like it is full of pain and there is no mistake the dog feels the heaviness of this situation and what happened to Henley. His howls bring tears to my eyes because part of me is jealous that he can so freely relate his hurt and pain without caring who sees or hears.
I swallow past that lump in my throat and take a few solid steps forward. Cash stops howling and takes me in, no doubt wondering what my intentions are. I’m preparing to fight him off as long as it means we can get to Hen and see how badly she’s hurt.
“Come here Cash,” I say authoritatively.
Guitar Face Series Box Set: Books 1-4 Page 68
