I didn’t step backward.
I didn’t scream.
Nothing seemed to work properly anymore.
I stood there and stared at Kade’s right-hand man.
I blinked, the tears running down my face an afterthought while I made eye contact with the man who killed my best friend.
22
Sage
There are moments in life that make you question all the ones that came before it. Moments that force you to take a step back and reevaluate your life. Reevaluate how you got to where you are, and how the hell you can get yourself back to where you were before. As I walked through a metal detector and stood with my arms stretched outward while a prison guard used a wand to double check I wasn’t hiding any metal objects in the crevices of my body, I began to severely question each moment that played out in the last twelve hours of my life.
In one of those moments, I was standing in a doorway that was not mine, vomit drying on my shoes while attempting to remind my lungs how to breathe. In the moment after that, I was on the ground, hands over my head while I sobbed into Julie’s carpet. I became useless in a nanosecond. It took the familiar clicking noise of him cocking his gun and the barrel between my eyes to take me from functioning human being to sack of sobs. I don’t remember anything that came after those moments. I stayed on the ground, shaking and wailing and waiting for the bag to be tossed over my head.
It never came.
And I truly don’t know how long I stayed on the ground, but when my mind decided to give me a break and the memories of Trish’s lifeless body fled me, Julie was gone. I sat back on my heels and peered around her home. The front door was still wide open. There was a bullet hole in the wall next to a framed photo of a daisy, and glass from a broken lightbulb a few feet away from me. The place reeked of sweat and vomit and fear. I stood on shaking legs and grasped the nearest wall for support while I drug myself towards the front door.
It was quiet outside. I didn’t hear any animals or cars driving by. The wind wasn’t blowing, horns weren’t honking. Everything was still. I could’ve closed Julie’s front door and nobody would’ve known of the catastrophe that had happened inside of it.
Everything was calm.
Quiet.
Still.
Everything, except for me.
I was not still. Not in that moment. In that moment, I was a grenade whose pin was just pulled. I’d reached the end. The last button had been pushed. The last string had snapped. Any sense of reason or sanity I had left, fled my body. I collapsed on my knees right on Julie’s porch and threw my head back, screaming loud enough to wake the town that hadn’t paid any attention when it mattered. Nobody heard Julie screaming for help. Nobody heard the gunshot that turned me to stone. Nobody heard the struggles or the cries of desperation.
But they heard the crazy girl covered in vomit screaming on their neighbor’s porch.
And if I hadn’t already lost it, I would’ve right then.
Because there are moments. Moments that define you. Moments that make you or break you. And up until that moment, there were too many moments that broke me and not enough that made me. In the twenty years I had lived, there was suffering after suffering. Trauma after trauma. Pain after pain. Heartbreak after heartbreak. Self-loathing after self-loathing, and the end of my rope had been reached. I’d spent years feeling sorry for myself, asking the universe why it chose me and what the hell I did to deserve the shit hand I got dealt.
But then I sat there, on a porch in the middle of the night, screaming until my throat went raw and decided I needed a wakeup call. I was alive, and that was so much more than what I could say for Trish or Julie’s husband or possibly Julie herself. I was alive and it was high time to stop punishing myself for my lack of fighting back then and start fighting now.
I contemplated many things in that moment on the porch. I could’ve called the police. Actually, I probably should’ve called the police. But I didn’t. I didn’t call my parents. I didn’t call Brett. I didn’t even call Wren. Because he’d saved me once and that ended up with him in a situation so horrendous, he had a target on his back. Out of all the scenarios I’d contemplated when I came to, there was one that made the most sense.
I should’ve done something to save Trish that day.
I should’ve done something to save myself.
I should’ve done something to save Julie instead of having a panic attack on vomit infested carpet.
It was too late for Trish. But it wasn’t too late for Julie. Or Wren. Or even me. And after relying on people to save me for so long, I stepped off that porch with legs that were struggling to work properly and came to my conclusion. With sanity no longer an issue, I decided it was time for me not only to save Wren, but it was time for me to save myself.
So that’s how I ended up in this moment, halfway across the country getting clearance from a maximum security prison in a new pair of jeans and some clean sneakers I’d bought at a supermarket. After presenting my ID and forcing down bile after hearing I was listed as "fiancée" on an approved list of visitors, I was flanked by two officers and led down a hallway that appeared to be made of concrete and steel. There were no windows, and I started to contemplate the moment on the porch that led me here.
My skin felt patchy. My shirt felt too tight. I was sweating something fierce, and air was hard to come by.
The officers stopped outside a steel door. I avoided glancing at the guns secured to their hips and waited for one of them to scan their keycard. With a click, the steel door opened. I slipped through them as soon as there was enough space for my body.
“Take a seat, miss. The inmate will be led in shortly.”
I followed a finger to a row of chairs. It was exactly like I’d seen in the movies. Exactly the way I’d pictured it. There were six chairs lined up, privacy barriers on either side. A single phone was secured on the right side of the barrier, hanging there while it waited for a visitor to pick it up. I swayed on my feet, a waft of dizziness falling over me. I fought with my body, begging for it to cooperate just once. My feet began to move as I sat down in a seat in the center of the row. The dizziness hit me again. I fought it, resting my arms on the small table in front of me. There was a sheen of tears in my eyes as I opened them fully and gazed at the empty chair behind a wall of glass I knew would be occupied shortly.
My knees bounced as I waited. I chewed on my finger and ate the ends of my hair. I gripped the edges of the desk to keep from collapsing three times and was seconds away from running full speed out the door when a buzzer sounded and a flash of orange caught my eye. My lungs seized, my heart went wild in my chest before it stopped completely and the orange blob sat directly in front of me. My hand shook with fear and adrenaline as it reached towards the phone.
Again, my instincts had failed me. There was not a single warning sign sounding loud and telling me to put down the damn phone. No flashing lights that told me to get up and walk out while I still could.
All I felt was hard pressed determination behind a thick layer of fear. I wrapped my bony fingers around the phone and pressed it to my ear, keeping my head down.
The first thing I heard was deep breathing. It went on for a few breaths before I heard words that sent a chill down my spine. I shivered in my seat, tears racing down my face when the voice that haunted my dreams became a reality once again.
“Hi, Cookie. I missed you.”
Just the sound of his voice sent me into a downward spiral. It was enough to get me to crawl right back into the hole I’d spent months and months clawing my way out of. It was too much. Too overwhelming. It brought back a flood of memories and nightmares I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to relive.
I’d barely made it out alive the first time.
“Aren’t you gonna say you missed me too?”
I choked, refusing to meet his gaze. My hand slid across the back of the phone, coating the hard plastic in sweat. My teeth ground together as I fought with myself on whe
ther to run back to my safe place or get what I came here for. I thought about Julie and what that crazy fucker was doing to her and lifted my gaze.
The moment I met his eyes, he grinned. That smug grin had such an effect on me. I wanted to hide under the table and throw my fist through the glass that separated us all at the same time. Seeing the handcuffs snapped around his wrists, and the security guards keeping post at the door stopped me from doing the former. It was the idea of my hand staying intact that stopped me from doing the latter.
He looked disgusting.
Kade never looked good, but now he just looked gross. The horrific storm that normally brewed in his eyes had gone calm. There were deep rings of red around his pupils and purple bags under his eyes. The gold tooth that was normally on full display was gone. In its place was nothing. It was just a hole in his mouth. Maybe some people thought it made him look tougher. More intimidating. Me? I just saw it as weakness. Somebody took that tooth from him, and though it was just a small victory, I felt a little better knowing after all he took from me something was finally taken from him.
“I did not miss you, you psychotic bastard.”
His lips quirked. He used the edge of the phone to scratch the side of his scruffy face. He didn’t always have facial hair, but now it was grown out and scraggly looking. Just like the hair on his head was. The dark locks were tied in a knot at the base of his neck. It looked as though he slicked his hair back with a glob of grease. I wondered what would happen if he ever wanted a haircut and prayed nobody would give this man a pair of scissors. I’d seen what he could do with sharp objects. There was a scar on the top of my right thigh to prove it.
“The first time you come and visit me I get sass? You know how I feel about sass.”
“I don’t give a shit how you feel.” His lips quirked again. My “sass” was no surprise to him. It came a lot in the early days when I was hoping he’d just kill me. And then I found out he made a sport out of not doing it.
“That’s one, Cookie.”
One strike, he meant. One slap. Kick. Punch. Pinch. Tumble down the stairs. It didn’t matter, really. Just one strike of his choosing to come in no certain form, at no certain time. It’s what happened every time I “acted up.” It was his fucked up way of finding validation for the abuse. Back then, I cursed myself. I’d considered walking up the wooden staircase and throwing my body down it all on my own accord for being so stupid even after I’d learned his triggers and came to the conclusion he wouldn’t kill me.
But in this moment, I knew better. And maybe it was my time with Julie. Or all the sun I’ve gotten from Wren. Or maybe my brain just decided to stop being a jackass. No matter the reason, I knew what happened to Trish wasn’t my fault. I knew all the bruises that marred my body weren’t deserved. What’s more, I knew he couldn’t follow through with the strike he so easily threatened.
He kept scratching at his face and it dawned on me he wasn’t scratching his skin off simply because he was itchy. He was scratching as a side effect of the drugs he took daily being yanked away. The days I was locked up and going through withdrawals, I’d practically scratched a hole in the back of my neck.
After spending over a year forced to be at his side, I still didn’t know what his drug of choice was. Kade didn’t discriminate. He took whatever was hot that day. Kade was a million times more abusive when he was doped up on whatever the hell the drug of the hour was. And though he didn’t have that shit running through his blood anymore, I knew he didn’t need drugs to be in cahoots with the devil. It was whatever he was made of that made him pure evil.
“Stop calling me cookie. I’m not your cookie. I’m not your anything.”
“Oh but you are, baby.” He leaned toward me, propping his elbows on the desk in front of him. There was glass separating us, but I didn’t necessarily trust its strength, so I scooted my chair back as far as it would go without yanking the phone out of the wall. “You’re whatever the hell I want you to be.”
I looked down at my left hand and wiggled the fingers. Not a single one wore the monstrosity ring he’d forced on me the night he told me we were getting married. He told me if I ever took it off, he’d sew it into my skin. I’d spent every day with Kade living in fear, but that night, I thought fear might be what finally killed me.
“Ya know what I am, Kade? I’m your victim. I am not your girlfriend, your fiancée, your cookie, your baby, your sweet thang, your bitch, your hot piece of ass or whatever hell else term you used to degrade me. I am your victim and I’m so sick and tired of even being that.”
He chuckled. The sound sent shivers throughout my nervous system. “Sick of being my victim? You aren’t my victim. I didn’t kill you. I kept you alive! Ya know what your issue was, Cookie? Your issue was that you didn’t know how to show gratitude. I got you off drugs and what did I get in return? God damn sass mouth!”
“You were the reason I was on drugs in the first place, you monster!” It was a dead end arguing with him. His brain didn’t work like a normal brain did. In his mind, nothing he did was wrong. And he was the king. It should’ve been my absolute honor to bow down to the king and take his drugs without complaint.
He jolted in his seat and pressed his fingertip against the glass so hard, the tip of his finger went stark white. “Where the fuck is your ring?”
“Don’t know. Probably somewhere in evidence. I’d love to find it and shove it up your ass. I’m not your fiancée, Kade. I’m the girl you kidnapped.”
He’d never understand. I knew that. But I was saying it for me. Julie spent months trying to get me to say my thoughts out loud.
If you say it out loud, it’s easier to believe.
“That’s two.” He snarled.
“Two what? Kade, look at you! You’re in handcuffs inside a federal prison! This is done! You can’t get to me anymore.”
He shook his head, pressing the cheek that didn’t hold the phone to the glass. “That’s the thing, baby doll. I’ll spend my life in here but you still won’t get rid of me.” He lifted a finger and tapped the side of his head repeatedly. “This is where I’ll be, Cookie. In your head, your dreams, your thoughts. You hired a therapist to erase me and look at you. Look where you’re at. Sitting across from me thousands of miles away from your family. Why is that, Cookie? Why come all this way without telling a soul? Because you didn’t, did you? Nobody knows you’re here.” My limbs shook violently as he sat back and popped his neck. His eyes held me and no matter how badly I wanted to look away, I couldn’t. Once again, I’d been trapped by Kade Wilson. “You think I don’t know you, Sage. But I know you. I know you don’t have the balls to erase me from your brain because you don’t have the balls to do anything that requires an ounce of strength. Do you want a trophy, Sage? A medal? You aren’t a victim. You aren’t a survivor. People survive every God damn day. You. Are not. Special.”
People survive every day.
My body went limp as the words filled my ears. My bones dissolved into sand. Each breath in my lungs grabbed hold to something inside my chest, and I struggled not to spiral.
People survive every day. You are not special.
Those words had been playing inside my head over and over again, taking up any extra space and refusing to give me a moment to think about anything else. I’d beaten myself worse than Kade had ever beaten me with those few words.
You are not special.
Except, I was. It was true, people did survive every day. But there were so many people who didn’t. Especially not when they were faced with what I was. Here I sat, in front of the man who kidnapped me, abused me, manipulated me, and gaslighted me. In front of a man who’d spend his life behind steel bars and he was still trying to get inside my head. Still believing I was going to allow him to chip away all the best pieces of me.
I had a long way to go in the recovery department, but I was done letting Kade Wilson take any more pieces of me.
Tears ripped down my face. What felt like bricks of con
crete fell off my chest. I stood from my chair and walked back towards him. The phone bit into the side of my face and I slapped one hand down on the desk in front of me. I pressed my forehead against the glass and pierced him with my eyes.
I held his gaze and made sure he heard my words. “I do not belong to you, Kade Wilson. Not a single part of me is yours. Not my mind, not my body, and sure as hell not my heart.”
Not my heart. Hell no. That piece of me belonged to the man who taught it how to work again.
“I came here because you have something I want.”
He slumped in his seat and ran his tongue along his yellow teeth. “What could I possibly have, Cookie? I’ve been locked up for months.”
My hand hit the glass with the thud. The security guard stepped forward and gave me a look that told me to stand down or get out.
I did neither.
“Information.” I snarled.
“Information?” He said the word like he’d never heard it before. “I’m not sure what you mean, baby. What information?”
He smirked, which told me he had exactly the words I wanted to hear on the tip of his tongue. I could tell by the way his eyebrows rose he was also surprised I had the balls to ask. Truthfully, I was shaken down to my very core when Julie revealed the truth. I’d never felt so betrayed. Never been so positively livid, but the more I thought about it, the less angry I became. Julie was nothing but a victim. She was used and manipulated exactly like I was. The difference? Julie knew when to stop. Julie did not harbor darkness. She harbored the strength it took to say no.
Now she was God knows where with God knows what happening to her and there was one person who could tell me where to find her. Kade Wilson was a man who liked control. That gang belonged to him. It didn’t matter where he was and that he wasn’t ever going back. It was his, and I wasn’t dumb enough to believe somebody wasn’t feeding him information on the daily.
Specter: Circuit Series Book One Page 21
