“Get off me!” William growls.
This is it. I have to run.
Breathless and with a pounding heart, I climb out the window and use the growing vines of honeysuckle on the side of the house to make my way down to ground level. The plant is huge, each vine thick and sturdy enough to hold me for the few seconds I need to flee.
I’m barefoot, but the grass I land on is soft, and a little wet from the morning dew. I hear William shouting. His figure inundates the window frame, but he’s not brave enough to do what I just did.
“You fucking bastard!” he shouts. “You better run, Dressler!”
For the first time in my life, I obey his orders. I run, as fast as my legs can carry me. I can’t afford any physical confrontation with Malone—not while I’m paying people to investigate him for murder. The last thing I need is any kind of bias against him when I do present the conclusions to the police.
For now, I run.
26
Kira
“Have you lost your fucking mind?” I ask, shaking with an unprecedented magnitude. I can’t even think straight, fear and shock mangling my brain to the point where all I can do is balk at my father, trying to figure out what is happening.
“You’re fucking Elias Dressler?!” Dad replies. He’s offended. As if I’m fucking Grandma or something.
“I’m thoroughly confused here. I thought you two were buddy-buddies, doing charity galas together now,” I snap, well aware that his hatred of Elias would never fade away, and that he’s merely good at pretending to tolerate him. Even so, with everything that Elias just told me, I’m having trouble reconciling the father I know with the man standing in front of me.
“Don’t be stupid!” he snarls. “I’m not his friend! He’s a Dressler! A rat! A nuisance! A threat to my wellbeing and the wellbeing of my company, and now… clearly a threat to the wellbeing of my daughter, as well!”
“You’ve pitted us against each other for years! We’ve already had this conversation, Dad!” I shout. “Also, I’m an adult. I can fuck whomever I want.” He doesn’t react to that with words. Before I can blink an eye, his hand is moving forward, and white hot pain shoots across my entire face as he connects with my cheek.
I pull my hand to my cheek, shooting daggers at him with my eyes. Then, I look to the door, where his security guard stands, looking just as enraged by his actions as I am.
“How fucking dare you,” I hiss, not giving into the pain. “How dare YOU barge into my bedroom like this?! How dare you put your hands on me? Have you lost your fucking mind?!” I shoot back, unwilling to yield. Sure, there are father-daughter rules I’ve broken here. What he did, however, is a million times worse. He didn’t just break those rules, he obliterated them.
My father grits his teeth at me. “How long has this been going on?” he asks. “How long have you been sleeping with the fucking enemy, Kira? How long have you been betraying me in MY house?”
“How did you know Elias was here?” I spit back at him.
He didn’t come to my room with rationality, wanting to wish me a good morning. He came here, already pounding his chest, like he already knew Elias was here.
Janelle comes to mind, but I push the thought away. She wouldn’t have. She wouldn’t have… right? No, she promised! She was offended when I mentioned it. It couldn’t have been her. But no one else knew…
“This is my house, Kira. My door. Your room? Mine, too. As long as you’re under my roof, you will obey my rules!” He’s moving closer to me again, that murderous rage in his eyes. I want to respond, but I know better. Now is the time that I keep my mouth shut.
My father completely closes the distance between us. “You fucking slut,” he hisses. And then, without warning, his hand is on my throat, his other hand punching wherever his fist lands. Pain shoots through me, not just in the places he strikes, but in every corner of my heart.
I taste blood.
I taste anger.
I taste hate.
“Mr. Malone, Sir!” The security guards voice cuts through the air, bringing my father to a halt. It’s just one of them left standing here now. I assume the others went after Elias. My father’s hand is still on my neck, keeping me in place, but no longer squeezing my windpipe shut. I think about hitting him, about kicking him in the balls, but I know that that would just turn his rage all the way up.
“You wanna prance around like a fucking whore, Kira? Huh?” His hand grips my shirt and it takes nothing for him to rip the cloth from my body. I didn’t have time to put my bra back on and so my breasts are on full display. I’ve never felt more hopeless and helpless in my life. My pants are next. He doesn’t manage to pull it all the way off. Still, he lowers it enough for my pride and my dignity to slip out of place.
“You want a piece of this, Stuart?” His gaze switches to his guard, who looks nothing short of petrified.
“Sir?” is all Stuart manages. He’s shaking his head in both disappointment and as an answer to my father’s question. I don’t know who I’m more embarrassed for right now. Me, for having Malone as my father. Or Malone for being the way he is.
“It’s not virgin pussy,” my father hisses, “but it’s free and apparently open for anyone who cares to get their dick wet.”
I won’t cry.
I won’t fucking cry.
Not now.
Not with him watching.
Stuart turns, not just to look away, but to walk away from my father. “Get the fuck back here,” my father yells. The icing on the cake would come if his stupidity allowed him to put his hands on Stuart. Lucky for him – as unfortunate as it is – he’s not that stupid.
When Stuart is no longer in his line of sight, my father lends his attention to me once again. I stare at him long enough to see his foot jerk back, but I don’t watch as he rams it into my side. “Fucking slut,” he spits and storms out of the room like a man on a mission.
I don’t immediately leave my spot on the floor, afraid that the pain will multiply if I do. Hands over my chest, I guard myself from the world. My pants are still halfway down, my ass still on display. I’m shaking, anger vibrating through me without an end. He’s reached a whole new height of disgusting with this one.
As if summoned, the pain in my ankle returns, spreading like wildfire. It’s stronger than ever, making my calf muscles sting. Coupled with the pain in my ribs from where my father kicked me, I’m not sure how I’m surviving this. I suffocate my sobs in my chest. Not for the sake of not giving in to my weakness, but because it fucking hurts. Everything fucking hurts. Especially my heart. The burning sensation intensifies, followed by sharp cuts—as if someone is hacking my leg with a machete, trying to get to the bone. I can’t even stand anymore, so I slump into a chair by the open window. The window through which Elias jumped.
A million thoughts pummel through my mind. A million emotions all mixed into one clump of all the right ingredients to race someone into a never-ending depression.
Janelle. I’d messaged her. I’d told her Elias was here.
She wouldn’t do that to me, would she?
But how else would my father have found out? He doesn’t have cameras in my room. I’ve been checking ever since I was sixteen years old.
Another round of pain threatens to cripple me. In the corner of my eye, I spot the bottle of Oxy. It’s begging me to reach out to it. To allow it to help me. And Jesus Christ do I want to. My mind spins again and my head takes the trip right along with it. I have the bottle of Oxy pressed against my palm. I’m not sure what my plans are with it, I just know that I’m hurting from the inside out.
In the distance, I hear the engine of a car. Likely my father. He’s gone. That’s a good thing. Right? I think so. But what do I do now? Do I stay, knowing that his wrath probably hasn’t found a definitive end? Do I leave, knowing that no matter where I go, he will find me?
The house is quiet. Darkness reigns supreme.
My phone has been ringing. I’ve ignored every call, trying to focus on
what I can do against my father. I have considered every possible scenario so far, and I only have two options.
The pain in my leg is impossible to overcome. It’s more persistent than ever. Perhaps more persistent than the pain in my ribs from where he kicked me. And also the pain in my head from where he pounded his fists against my temples.
I thought I was strong, but I only feel strong when things are good. As soon as something goes sideways, I lose myself… That’s not exactly the definition of a strong woman, is it? I’m pretty sure it’s not. So here I am, wandering around the house, hugged by darkness and despair, trying to make my choice, the Oxy gripped firm in my hand.
I can do as my father says, and leave everything I know and love behind, or I can find something that incriminates him regarding Joe Fowler—or any other crime, for that matter. The only way I’m going to get any peace is if he’s in jail. Does that make me a terrible daughter, or just a terrible person in general? Who’s to say he isn’t right about Elias? Who’s to say that he isn’t just trying to protect me? I taste the blood in my mouth and the answer to that last question comes very easily. I feel the scratch marks from where his nails scraped along my skin as he demanded his guard to fuck me and I know for certain what I need to do.
I listen for movements in the house. It’s hard to hear anything over the pounding in my head, but I focus hard. Eyes closed. Breathing stilled.
I know better than to think that in a match between William Malone and Elias Dressler, Elias comes out the villain. We grew up knowing what hatred meant and that wasn’t because we were born that way, it’s because we were raised to hate. I’m no Juliet and Elias sure as shit is no Romeo and I’d be damned if I allow the war between our houses – between our last names – to end like some twisted Shakespeare tragedy.
My father does not deserve to win. No matter how long my mom stuck with him, I know that if she were here, she’d be on my side in all of this. If she could see that the scattering of good that existed in him when she was alive had been completely erased, she wouldn’t stand by him any longer. She wouldn’t want me to stand by him either.
But the truth remains, William Malone will not go down easily. He’s spent years building his reputation, making friends with the local police, tightening his connections and paying off the right people, in order to make his business flourish.
If he did kill Janelle’s father – a man he valued more than his own daughter – then who’s to say how far he’ll take things if I continue to disobey him.
I’m in his study now. He’s not home. I don’t know where he is, but I’m inclined to assume he’s at his favorite bar, laughing and drinking, pleased with everything he’s accomplished today—at the expense of his daughter’s happiness and sanity.
I keep the Oxy bottle in my pocket. I’ve been telling myself that I can do this, that I can resist the urge. But the more I live through this nightmare, the harder it gets. Checking my phone again, I see another missed call from Elias. He’s the one I need the most right now. But if I let him get close, Dad will hurt him… or worse. I made him run away this morning, but I regret that decision and I hate that he allowed me to make that decision for him. I resent him for running… it wasn’t his fault, but I resent him for it.
After all that ugliness, I wish he’d stayed. I wish we’d both stuck together and fought my father with everything we had. Instead, I let him tear us apart. I let him tear me apart.
There aren’t many books in Dad’s study, mostly technical and legal stuff with a focus on real estate development. He’s an avid reader of murder mysteries, though. He’s got about sixty titles from Patterson and the likes. Maybe that’s where he got his idea with faking Joe Fowler’s suicide, if he did do it.
He’s gathered some decorative pieces from his travels. A brass figurine, a few painted trinket boxes, a ceramic bowl glazed in turquoise… but his favorite stash of souvenirs is in a large fishbowl he keeps on a wide shelf, close to the window. My phone rings again. It’s Janelle, this time. I don’t have the energy to deal with her betrayal. I need to figure out what I’m going to do, and how I’m going to do it.
With every minute that goes by, it becomes increasingly clearer that giving into my father’s demands will eventually kill me. Maybe then it’ll all be over, but part of me doesn’t want to surrender yet.
Ignoring the call, I start digging through the fishbowl. This is where he keeps all of the matchboxes he’s collected from different bars in cities across the country. It’s sort of obsessive the way he adds to his collection. Once, when mom was alive, we’d driven at least a half an hour away from our hotel in Chicago before he realized he forgot to snipe the matchbox from the coffee table. He’d spun the car around and made the trip back – screw the fact that we’d missed our flight. At least he had his matchbox.
I don’t really expect to find anything here, but I’m sort of out of options. I pluck a few more out and spin them over in my hands. My head pounds harder and I close my eyes, pressing my fingers against my temples. One breath in. Another out. It feels like I’m trying to inhale a blade.
Focus Kira.
It might hurt now.
But it won’t hurt for good.
I focus on the matchboxes again. My father even has some European pieces here, from Amsterdam and Paris, amongst others. The boxes are varied in shape and size, but they’re each branded with the logo of the locales from where they were collected. Studio 54. Jamieson’s. Carluccio’s… Denver, Seattle, New Jersey…
I find a square one with a couple of matchsticks missing. It’s from the Red Herring Motel.
“Since when do you stay at motels?” I murmur.
William Malone considers a four-star hotel to be his worst-case scenario. He wouldn’t be caught dead in a motel. That would be an insult to his wealth. The man likes his champagne and caviar and massage services too much. I turn the box over to find printed details of the motel, including an address and a phone number.
“Baltimore…”
Baltimore. So the bastard was in Baltimore. He told the police he never set foot in Baltimore. That it’s one of the least attractive cities in terms of real estate development, considering his high-end projects and reputation. That he wouldn’t be caught dead dealing in that city.
Flipping the top of the box over, I find three digits jotted down with a ballpoint pen. 601. It’s my father’s handwriting. I’d recognize it anywhere. Something is wrong here. There’s a connection I’m missing.
“I’ve seen this number before,” I say to myself, trying to remember where.
Despite the pounding in my head, it doesn’t take long for the memory to resurface. A newspaper article, I think. About Joe Fowler and the motel where he was found. The Red Herring. Room 601. Stars start to dot behind my eyes, the pounding in my head even more prominent than before. I pull myself to my full height and try stretch my way through the swirling in my head. When that doesn’t work, I shove the matchbox in my pocket and press my hands against the table in front of me.
What the hell is happening?
Why the hell does it feel like the world is spinning on its side.
An incontrollable tremor takes over. I’m shaking at every joint. My legs give out, and I fall. Hitting the floor hard, I yelp from the pain that seems to be attacking every single part of my body. Every muscle burns. Every bone feels like it’s being crushed with a hammer. And my head. Jesus Christ, my head.
My father lied. He was in Baltimore, and he kept a trophy of his visit there. I try to hold onto that memory. I try to pull the bottle of Oxy from my pocket. Anything to get rid of the pain. Or will this make it worse? Dull the physical pain and amplify the emotional one – that doesn’t exactly sound like an ideal tradeoff.
This is too much. My brain can’t cope. My soul is torn and shattered.
Fire rages through me. There is so much pain, I don’t know how much I can put up with…
I’m stuck in a haze, my back against the carpeted flooring and my b
ody moving without me.
Numbness begins to expand. It starts at the ankle and moves all the way up until it practically has me in a chokehold. I try to move, but my body doesn’t respond. I’m struggling to breathe, struggling to stay strong, struggling to keep the darkness away.
A thread pulls loose, and reality begins to slip further and further away from me.
I see pills on the floor. The bottle spilled. I see my hands. My fingers, trying to move.
Hours feel like seconds, seconds feel like hours, and I lose all sense of time.
Something cold covers me, followed by something hot. I can’t breathe. I’m shivering. I’m sweating.
I think I want to sleep.
I think I want to sleep forever…
27
Elias
Sheldon paces around the room, nervously waiting for me to finish perusing the photos he brought in. My blood is boiling. There isn’t anything useful here, just pixelated zoom prints of what looks like William Malone’s car, but we can’t make out the license plates. Those insane zooms they show on CSI, magnified to the point where you see the killer’s nametag on his shirt? Fiction. Pure fucking fiction.
“That was as much as we could get without a warrant,” Sheldon says. “I bet we can make out a plate number if we get the police involved.”
Okay, so maybe not pure fucking fiction, but still impossible since we’re civilians. I slam my fist on the desk, anger taking over, turning my vision red.
“We don’t have enough to get the police involved!” I shout. “All we have is circumstantial, at best, and the words of a mistress! It’s not enough!”
Sheldon isn’t letting go. Normally, I would admire him for it, but it’s been sixteen hours since I’ve seen Kira, and she hasn’t returned any of my calls. I briefly check through my messages again. William’s only words to me are clear, black on the white screen. If you go anywhere near Kira again, I will hurt you in ways you never imagined possible.
Trinity High: High School Bully Romance Page 47
