My eyes filled with tears.
My teeth chattered.
The vehicle that was following… stopped following.
The vehicle kept going straight and didn’t stop.
So it wasn’t following me.
I was paranoid.
Broken and paranoid.
I pulled to the side of the road.
I grabbed my phone.
There were texts from Talon waiting.
What the fuck are you talking about?
Hello?
Winter?
Who knows what?
My phone stated to ring.
Talon.
“Talon,” I said.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing,” he said.
“Talon…”
“Why the fuck would I lie to you?” Talon snapped.
“You didn’t do anything today?” I asked.
“No,” Talon said.
I thought about the knives sticking out of the tires.
“You know what, Talon? I want a refund.”
“Excuse me?” Talon asked with a laugh.
“You heard me. I want a refund. Someone is stepping up and you’re slacking.”
I hung up the call and started to drive again.
I couldn’t believe I just said that to Talon.
That might end up pissing him off and making him do something crazy like tell Noah, Easton, and Xavier the truth about me.
But you know what?
He was a Troc.
I was a Bump.
I was better than him all around. Financially. Socially. Everything.
He could tell anyone he wanted.
It was up to me to keep the lie going.
That should have made me feel better, but it didn’t.
I still kept checking my mirrors the entire time as I drove way too fast back to my mother’s beach house.
When I got there, Gia was waiting for me.
Sitting in her bright yellow car, music blasting. Her left hand stuck out of the window, waving to the rhythm of the song.
I parked Tank Two and ran toward her car, waving my hands.
She turned off her music and got out of her car.
She smiled ear to ear.
“Why are you smiling?” I yelled.
“Just having a good day,” she said. “What’s up?”
“Someone went after them,” I said.
“Who?”
“Noah, Easton, and Xavier,” I said. “And it wasn’t Talon. I asked him. He said no.”
“Walk with me, Winter,” she said. “Just for a second.”
Gia hooked her arm into mine.
I looked at Gia.
She was way too happy.
She was… sex happy.
Like she got some.
Which if she did, good for her.
But I was thinking about some more serious stuff at the moment.
“I want you to see something,” she said.
“Gia, this is important,” I said. “Someone stabbed a tire on each of their rides. They left the knives in the tires. Each knife matched. Like it came out of a… set…”
Gia smiled bigger.
She walked me to the kitchen of my mother’s beach house.
She snapped her fingers and pointed to the counter.
The knife block on the counter…
… it was missing three knives.
I grabbed the knife block and picked it up.
I shook it.
“No,” I said.
“Told you we could do this together,” she said.
I looked back at her. “You did this?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Nobody would suspect me either.”
“How? They have cameras…”
“I know how to cover myself,” she said. “And look how tiny I am. I can sneak around easily. What are you worried about?”
I had to plenty to be worried about.
But I didn’t need to list all the reasons.
I looked around the kitchen and quickly took the knife block to the trash.
I dropped the whole thing into the trash can and then took the bag outside to the side of the house and put it in the bigger can that would be put out on garbage night.
As I rushed around, I felt myself unable to catch my breath.
When I came running back up the deck steps, Gia blocked my way.
“Winter…”
“What?” I asked.
“Are you okay?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“This is fucking crazy, Gia. I didn’t ask you to be in this. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I don’t care,” she said. “I want what you want. To see them all suffer.”
I shook my head. “Gia, no. They’re smart. They think they know who it is. What if they know my mother had those knives?”
“Do you think your mother is the only person with that knife set?”
“Okay, fine, that makes sense,” I said. “But…”
“No buts,” she said. “I wanted to do this.”
I let out a long breath. “Well… thank you. I guess. I mean… why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you’re a good friend,” Gia said. “And you would try to talk me out of it. You told me they tried to kill you. Right?”
I swallowed hard.
“Y-yeah,” I said. “But…”
“Holy shit, Winter,” she said. “You like them. You really like them. You’re getting too close. That’s why you asked if they were happy. You’re trying to justify it.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are,” Gia said. “You’re trying to convince yourself what they did was… I don’t know… okay to do. You want them. You think it’s sexy in a way what they did.”
“I never said that,” I said.
“You asked if they were happy…”
“Because I see their lives!” I yelled. “Everything is forced. Fake. They have no way of being themselves. Seriously. All they have is their image.”
“And you don’t want to shatter that?” Gia asked.
“This is my thing, Gia. I’m making it up as I go along.”
“I know you are,” she said. “And now you have help. And I don’t even want money.”
I laughed. “Do you realize how screwed up this entire thing is?”
“Do you realize how screwed up it is that they are trying to get close to you so they could manipulate your memory?”
I walked by Gia and went to the opposite end of the deck.
I listened to the ocean for a few seconds.
Then I slowly shook my head.
“It’s all screwed up,” I said.
“For me, that’s my normal.”
“Mine too,” I said.
Gia stepped up next to me.
I looked at her.
“So… how did it feel to stab their tires?”
Gia didn’t hesitate to tell me the truth.
“It felt fucking good.”
Chapter 7
it’s yours now
“Ohmygod…. breathe!”
I stopped running and turned around. I put my hands to my hips.
“I am breathing!” I yelled at Gia.
“No, you’re not,” Gia said. “At least not the right way.”
“I’m sorry. I’m not you. Obviously.”
“Oh, are you getting snippy with me?”
“What if I am?” I asked.
Gia walked toward me. “You wanted me to teach you how to run, right?”
“I was half joking. I didn’t know it was going to become so serious here…”
I glanced back and looked at the orange cones Gia had put on the beach.
Then I looked down at what I was wearing.
Gia’s clothes.
No lie.
She gave me running shorts, which were super short. I was in some kind of special tank top that she said would help to absorb
sweat and allow me to move.
Then came the shoes.
Some fancy running shoes.
I wasn’t sure what these shoes were going to do on the beach.
They were made for pavement.
Right?
Wrong.
Gia showed me the bottoms of the shoes and had an entire explanation of what kinds of shoes were used for which type of terrain.
Terrain.
She used the name terrain.
“Hey, you almost died because you tried to catch up to me,” Gia said.
I laughed. “Yeah… because you’re fast.”
“I wasn’t always fast. You have to start somewhere.”
“You’re crazy, Gia,” I said. “Like, seriously crazy.”
She pointed at me. “Don’t ever call me crazy again, got it?”
She opened her eyes wide.
I did the same back to her.
“Winter, just listen,” she said. “You have to get the breathing down. Let it sync up with the rest of your body. If you run too fast and breathe too little, you’re screwed. If you breathe too fast and run too little, you’re screwed. And it’s okay to start out slow. You work your way up to becoming faster. You feel yourself out.”
“You want me to feel myself in front of you?” I asked.
“Oh, that’s just so funny,” Gia said. “You know what, take those clothes off. And the shoes. I’m not helping you anymore.”
“If I do that, I’ll be naked on the beach.”
“And maybe Easton will be secretly watching you,” she said. “Or Noah. Or Xavier. Isn’t that what you secretly want?”
“Shut up.”
Gia backed up. “You love it. You love that they are giving you all the attention in the world. You secretly want them, right? I bet you’ve wanted them all along too. And now you have a chance… maybe…”
I lunged at Gia.
She turned and took off.
I knew what she was doing.
Getting me to run.
What a bitch.
I wasn’t sure how I did it but I managed to catch up to her. Maybe she let me catch up to her. Who knows… but I did it. I got close enough that I was able to reach out and grab her hair.
When I did, I pulled and she dug her heels into the sand and stopped.
My momentum had me running by her, so I let her hair go and started to do the whole running with my arms pinwheeling so I don’t fall thing.
I stopped and turned and Gia was laughing at me.
I moved for her again and she took off.
Growling under my breath, I ran after her a second time.
This time she wasn’t going to let me get her.
She even went as far as starting to dance while running. Jumping into the air and kicking her legs out. Making left to right patterns in the sand, just messing with me.
My arms, legs and lungs didn’t stop moving.
Each time I got within a few feet of her, Gia would look back and then speed up.
Finally, I called it quits.
I stopped running and I collapsed to my knees.
I made fists and hit the sand.
By the time I looked up, Gia had turned around to come back to me.
She waved her arms.
“Winter!” she cried out.
Gia fell to the sand right in front of me.
“Winter… are you okay?”
“Fine,” I said. “Just out of breath.”
“No head pain or anything?”
“What? No. Oh, wait, you thought…”
“Yeah,” she said. “Remember last time?”
“Oops,” I said.
“It’s not funny,” she said. She slapped my shoulder. “You scared me.”
“You deserved it.”
“Oh, come on, Winter, I’m just messing around. I got you to run.”
“True,” I said. “Just… don’t say things like that… okay?”
“Can I ask you a really honest question?”
“Sure, Gia.”
“Are you mad because it might be true?”
I swallowed hard. I shook my head.
If I could lie to almost everyone about not having my memory, I could serve up a small lie to Gia. I shouldn’t have wanted to lie to the person I considered to be my best friend, but…
How could I talk about Noah, Easton, and Xavier with her?
It was impossible.
Because I had no idea what I was thinking.
All three were gorgeous, in their own ways.
Noah with his white shirts and clean, sexy look. Easton with his gruff look. Always so messy and so wild. But it worked. And Xavier was just big and protective. I had no clue what he was thinking. Ever.
I chewed on the corner of my bottom lip for a few seconds.
“There’s too much happening at once, Gia. I didn’t want this many people to know.”
“Then you should have lied better,” she said. “You ended up with a conscience instead.”
“Yeah. I screwed up. I should have just stuck with Evie and Darcy.”
“Really?”
“I’m kidding,” I said. “What’s wrong? Can’t take a little joke?”
Gia fake laughed and rolled her eyes. “How did running feel?”
“Terrible,” I said.
“It’s not supposed to feel that bad.”
“Well, I had to chase you down,” I said.
“Next time just listen to me.”
“Next time?”
“Oh, these clothes and shoes are yours now, Winter. You’re my new running partner.”
“Excuse me?” I asked. “Running partner? No. You can run. I’ll gracefully jog the beach.”
“Without a bra?” Gia asked. “So you can bounce around and have the guys staring at you…”
Gia put her hands under her chest and bounced air boobs with a smile on her face.
“Goodnight, Gia,” I said.
“Goodnight?” she asked.
“I’m tired,” I said. “I’m going to shower and get some sleep. That a problem?”
“No.” She looked at her phone. “Oh, shit. I didn’t realize what time it was here. Fuck.”
“What’s wrong? Hot date?”
“I wish,” she said. “I have something to do with my mother. You know how she is.”
“No, I don’t.”
Gia looked at me. “Funny. She just wants to hang out. Talk.”
“She loves you.”
“No. She needs someone to give her attention. She can’t function alone and without attention. Shit. I better get going.”
“Are you sure about the clothes and shoes?” I asked. “This stuff can’t be cheap.”
“Then I guess it’s a good thing we’re rich,” Gia said.
Gia got to her feet and jogged away to get her orange cones and go home.
I sat back on my heels and my fingertips flirted with the sand.
I guess I was a runner now, huh?
I laughed.
My plan was to stick to what I said before… I was only going to run if someone was chasing after me.
Simple as that.
I curled my fingers into the sand and smiled.
At the same time I got that I’m being watched feeling again.
A tingling feeling on the back of my neck that pushed through my body to the front of my chest.
It was like when you watched a scary movie and then had to walk through your house and you were creeped out that something was going to happen.
A feeling of eerie dread.
I licked my lips.
My mouth started to go dry.
Very slowly, I looked to my left.
I squinted my eyes and looked as hard as I could.
There was nothing visible.
I looked the other way.
Nothing.
I carefully stood up, my legs were rubbery and burning.
I stepped back and turned to face my mother’s beach house.
That
’s where it was coming from.
Not the house… but somewhere around the house.
I felt watched.
I couldn’t see a thing but I felt… watched…
The horror movie feeling hit me again and hit me hard.
So I put my shoes to use and started to run.
The run to the deck of the beach house could have been ten miles with the way my nerves and heart were racing.
I ran up the steps and ran into the house.
I locked the door but didn’t feel safe at all.
My mother wasn’t coming home tonight, so the beach house was all mine.
I liked it that way… but I didn’t like this feeling.
I went up the steps and into my bedroom, shutting and locking that door too.
After taking a few deep breaths, I told myself to take a shower and relax.
Everything was fine.
I was home.
I was safe at home.
“Safe at home,” I whispered.
Except this wasn’t home.
And being near Noah, Easton, and Xavier… I wasn’t safe.
I took an extra-long hot shower.
It seemed kind of dumb to do, right?
Like if I thought I was being followed, why get into the shower?
Then again, that was just the kind of proof I needed to show myself that I was fine. I was being goofy and paranoid over everything happening.
It was Gia’s fault too.
For making me run.
For talking about my feelings for the guys.
And then taking off on me.
I had no clue how to address any feelings I may or may not have had.
All I needed to do was shut my eyes and remember the feeling of speeding down the road and Tank not being able to turn, or stop. The feeling of trying to get into the backseat, hoping that would save myself.
I didn’t shut my eyes and remember that.
I didn’t want to.
Instead, I shut off the water and climbed out of the shower.
The bathroom was steamed up pretty bad, but it was comforting.
I grabbed a towel and left the bathroom.
I shivered as I walked across the floor to my bed.
I threw on a pair of shorts and a hoodie.
After I dried my hair the best I could with the towel, I threw it into the bathroom and that was that.
I plopped down on my bed and grabbed my phone.
I couldn’t text Gia.
She was busy.
I really had nobody else to text.
It was a bit of a lonely feeling, but it had its purpose.
Damaged Love (Bay Falls High NEXT Book 2) Page 6
