I loved Liam. He was my brother. He was one of the only two people on the planet that I trusted, and I felt like something irrevocable has changed between us. I knew he hadn’t been completely sold on what Emerson did, but if watching what happened to her bothered me and I fucking hated her, I can’t imagine what Liam was feeling.
I had my knees drawn up on the bench with my head in my hands when I heard screeching and cursing coming my way. I looked up and Deke had one hand on Bailey’s neck and the other on her arm, forcing her forwards with each step. Liam was walking behind them, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen Liam look so murderous, even when he was beating the shit out of Jamie, Roman and Ricky.
Deke was foaming at the mouth when they finally reached me. “Tell him!” he snarled.
“Let me go!” Bailey shrieked. “Get your hands off me, Deke!”
I could see Deke’s hand tighten around her neck. “Fucking tell him, you fucking cunt!”
I hopped off the bench and stood looking at the trio. “What’s going on?” There was only one thing Bailey, Deke, Liam and I had in common, and that was Emerson. I could already feel the pit of my stomach hollowing out before she had even uttered a word.
Bailey’s hands were desperately trying to dislodge Deke’s grip, but she was failing. “I’ve never hit a female before in my life, Bailey, but I swear to God, if you don’t tell him, I will fuck you up!”
Okay, now, my anxiety was skyrocketing. Deke would never hit a female. “What the fuck is going on?” I asked, again. “I won’t ask a third time.”
Bailey let out a sob and her eyes looked wild and terrified. “It was all a lie,” she cried.
I could feel ice forming in the marrow of my bones. Fear started creeping down my spine. “What was all a lie?”
“Ramsey, please-”
“What was all a fucking lie, Bailey!” I roared in her face.
She was openly sobbing now, but she was able to speak, and her confession almost brought me to my knees. “Emerson’s phone, all of it,” she began. “I found Emerson’s phone on the floor near the kitchen bar when it wouldn’t stop ringing. She didn’t have it locked, and I saw all the missed calls and texts from you and I…I…” Deke applied more pressure. “Ow, okay, okay,” she sobbed. “I called a friend of mine…th…the dealer I use for parties and told him I’d pay him a thousand dollars if he would help me play a prank. I…he…I told him what to text and I texted back to make it look like a legit exchange.” Her body was wracking with sobs so hard, she started hiccupping. “When you stormed out, I called him really quick and told him to answer and pretend he was waiting for Emerson.”
I could only stare at Bailey as Liam started destroying the bench with brutal, forceful kicks and punches to the wood.
It was all a lie.
The text messages, the guy, Emerson’s cheating…it was all a lie. A. Fucking. Lie
I could feel myself shaking and my knees threatening to give out. Bailey set Emerson up and I helped Bailey humiliate and brutalize her. Now, I was the one in danger of throwing up.
“Why?” Even though I had a good idea what the answer was, I still asked.
Bailey’s eyes went from dismal to defiant. “She’s a nobody!” she screamed. “She’s a filthy nobody from a trailer park! Did you really think I was going to let her waltz into Windsor and take the only guy I have ever wanted? She doesn’t deserve you! She’s trash, and she belongs with trash.” Bailey’s hate was palpable. “You belong with me, Ramsey! Me! How could you fall in love with her?! How could you want her?!”
“I heard this bitch telling Christa and Evelyn how she set Emerson up and was going to get you one way or another,” Deke spit out. He released her and I, honest to God, didn’t know what to do with her.
Oh, I knew what I wanted to do to her, but I wasn’t so egotistical that I believed I could kill her at school and get away with it. Besides, even though Bailey lied and set Emerson up, what happened on Wednesday was all me.
I could have waiting until I had spoken to Emerson before losing my shit. I could have found her and insisted on an explanation. I could have listened when she told me about her childhood and absorbed the kind of person she was, instead of focusing on being between her thighs. I could have trusted her. But, instead, I believed Bailey over an explanation Emerson never got to give.
“You’re going to regret every crossing me, Bailey,” I tell her, my voice ice. “By the time I’m done with you, you’ll be taking a razor to your wrists just to end your misery.”
I turned away from her and started walking across the school yard. Ten steps in, I started running. I ran through the school and to the parking lot. I jumped in my car and broke every speed limit posted on my way from the school to Emerson’s house.
Once I got there, I didn’t bother with niceties. I broke the down the door, splintering the frame and making the lock worthless. I ran up the stairs to Emerson room, yelling for her, “Emerson!” But when I got to her room, my heart stopped at the scene before me.
The room was void of a lot of personal stuff that decorated the room when I was here last weekend. Panic started to set in, and I ripped the place apart looking for any sign that this was still her room. When I couldn’t find anything, I went through the house, room by room, but found nothing.
Emerson was gone.
I raced back to my car and drove over to Roselyn’s. Emerson wasn’t friends with anyone else in town, so she could only be with Roselyn.
I barely hit the brakes before I was out of the car and running up the sidewalk to the Greene’s front door. The door was in danger of meeting the same fate as the one at Emerson’s when the door was finally wrenched open by a very pissed off, sick looking Roselyn. “What the fuck do you want?”
“I’m here for Emerson,” I said, getting straight to the point.
Roselyn let out a cackle so evil; it sent chills down my spine. “You’re a bigger egomaniac than I ever thought possible if you think I’d ever tell you where Emerson is after what you did to her, Ramsey.”
I knew Roselyn’s loyalty for Emerson ran deep and I didn’t have a chance if I wasn’t completely honest with her. “I fucked up, Roselyn, okay? Is that what you want to hear?”
She kept up her distain. “Saying you fucked up implies that there’s a way to fix it, Ramsey, and there isn’t,” she retorted, coldly.
I’ve never had a problem with Roselyn. Even when she started sleeping with Deke and Liam, I found her to be different, and I was curious about her, but I wasn’t curious enough to get to know her beyond a head nod here and there.
Deke and Liam trusted her, and as unconventional as their relationship was, they seemed to like her well enough and that was good enough for me.
But, right now, I was close to strangling her with my bare hands. “Look, Roselyn, you’ve managed to remain in my good graces because of your relationship with Liam and Deke. But don’t think for one second I won’t squash you if you don’t tell me where the fuck Emerson is!” I was yelling in her face by the time I was done.
Roselyn planted her hands on her hips, but she relented. She knew I was serious, and I suspected she was a little worried about how the fall out of her defiance would affect her sleeping arrangements with Deke and Liam. “She’s not here, Ramsey.”
“Then where in the fuck is she?”
I wanted to burn the world to ashes when I saw the answer playing across Roselyn’s face. She actually didn’t want to even say her next words. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “She turned 18 yesterday and was out of Sands Cove before the sun had even come up.”
I felt like my entire body was shutting down, but I managed to ask, “Did she ever replace her phone?”
Roselyn shook her head. “No,” she answered as her eyes watered. “She said she send me a message on her social media once she got settled, letting me know she was safe. But other than that, she wanted no reminders of Sands Cove and that included me.” Roselyn lifted her chin, even though her lips were quive
ring. “And I don’t blame her.”
I stood there feeling absolutely nothing and absolutely everything.
Emerson was fucking gone.
Chapter 30
Emerson
Being back in the small town where your father killed your mother was going to be like living in a fishbowl, but I didn’t care. I didn’t know where else to go and there were worse things than people staring at you and whispering about you.
You know, like almost being gang raped, being accused of wanting it and then being exposed to biological diseases. Yeah, like those things.
After I cried all night long in Roselyn’s arms, I had woken up in the morning determined to leave Sands Cove in my rearview mirror. I was 18 and my aunt had no say anymore. I hadn’t even bothered calling her to tell her I had left. Something told me she wouldn’t even notice. I mean, how could she notice if she never came home?
I was thankful my car had made the journey, but I suspected my car wasn’t long for this world, so I had to make some moves and soon.
One of the first things I did when I got to Roselyn’s was to call the café and quit my job. They hadn’t given me shit for not putting in the customary two week’s notice, but I knew it was because Jarod was still leery about my connection to Ramsey.
I had told him to mail my final check to Roselyn and I told Roselyn she could burn it for all I cared. I wasn’t going to stay or go back to Sands Cover for a couple of hundred dollars.
Roselyn, in turn, helped me by digging into her stepfather’s safe and giving me five stacks of one-hundred-dollar bills. We fought for 20 minutes as I tried to refuse the money, but she insisted. I finally conceded when she explained it was either take the money or she was coming with me. She wanted to make sure that wherever I ended up, I was safe.
It absolutely killed me to walk away from her.
When I got into Hantover, I went straight to what I knew. Straight to where I felt like myself. I drove over to the Hantover trailer park and walked into the office. Clifford Meeks smiled when he saw me and when I asked him if he had any open trailers for rent, he said, with what happened and all, the trailer I grew up in was still vacant.
I took it sight unseen.
I paid the deposit and first month’s rent with the money Roselyn gave me and made my way to the trailer. When I had walked it, it looked exactly the same as when I was hauled out of there by the police the night my father killed my mother.
Minus the blood, crime scene tape and whatnot.
I’m not sure what I had expected. I mean, I had only been gone a few months, but somehow Sands Cove had felt like a lifetime away. It felt like I’ve been gone much longer than a few months.
Sitting on the familiar furnished couch in the familiar surroundings, I still felt the crippling weight of what Ramsey did to me. What he allowed others to do to me. But now, it was mixed with the deep, aching loss of my mother. I spent most of my life trying to escape the quicksand victim mentality that, often, crippled people, but right now, I felt very much like a victim.
When Ramsey first asked me if I loved him, I admit, I wasn’t exactly sure what love was, but I had felt like I did. Now, feeling his crushing blow of betrayal, I know without a doubt that I love him. It wouldn’t hurt this horribly if I didn’t.
Whatever he had heard about me, he had chosen to believe it without even asking me for an explanation first. No matter his talk of love, no matter everything we talked about that weekend, no matter how many times I had taken him into my body, he believed his first initial opinion of me.
He believed I was a whore even though he saw the blood for himself the first time I accepted him.
I shook off the heartbreaking thoughts and got back to getting my life back on track. I was not going to let myself be a victim no matter what I was feeling. After I unloaded what paltry personal possessions I possessed and unpacked them in the trailer, I drove down to the first Walgreens I saw and bought a prepaid cell. I shot off an online message to Roselyn, letting her know I was safe and that I’ll always be grateful for her help and went on to tell her I was a better person for knowing her. After a heart wrenching message back from her, I deleted all my social media accounts and steered away from anything online.
Roselyn was solid, and I knew she wasn’t taking my choices personally.
I drove up to The Cozy Diner that was in the center of town. It’s where I used to work part time while I went to school. I got out of my car hoping there was a job opening. Part time, full time, I didn’t care. I’d take whatever I could. That’s one of the upsides to growing up poor, pride wasn’t a hindering factor. I wasn’t too proud to work in a diner. I wasn’t too proud to beg for a job. I wasn’t too proud to live in a trailer. And, thank God, or I’d be lost right now. Survival was the priority right now, school second and dignity a distant third.
I walked in the diner and the first person I saw at the counter was Muriel, the owner. She looked up at the ringing of the customer bell and her eyes widened as she noticed it was me. “Oh, my stars,” she gushed. “Emerson, dear!”
She rushed around the counter and didn’t stop until she had me embraced in her familiar scent. I hugged her back, and it took all I had not to fall apart in her arms. “Muriel,” I whispered.
Muriel held me by my shoulders and stepped away from me taking me in. Her kind, brown eyes scanned me from head to toe and her smile was warm and genuine. “It’s so good to see you, dear.”
I found I had a genuine smile for her, too. “It’s good to see you, too, Muriel.”
“Oh, oh,” she went on gushing, “you sweet, sweet girl. Why don’t you come right over here and tell me what’s going on with you.” Muriel ushered me to the counter, and before my ass even hit the seat, she was around the counter pouring me a Pepsi. “So, tell me, what are you doing back in Hantover?”
I twisted the cold glass of soda around and around in my hands then shrugged my shoulder. “I never really wanted to leave here. I had no choice when my aunt made a play for me since I was a minor, but I turned 18 Thursday. So, here I am.”
Her face was maternal and caring, and I knew she had a million questions, but Muriel was classier than that. “Well, I’m glad to see you under any conditions, Emerson.”
“I…I was wondering if you had any job openings. I moved back into my hou…the trailer, and…I have enough money to get me by for a while, but eventually, I’ll need a steady job,” I said, owning up to the reason I was here.
Muriel’s eyes watered over. “Oh, of course, I have a job opening for you, Emerson.” She reached over and patted my arm. “I will always have a job opening for you here.”
The relief I felt was so overwhelming, I could feel the pressure behind my eyes and the tears starting to form. To Muriel it might be a small thing, but to me, she was saving my life. A place to live and a job to support myself was all I needed.
“Thank you, Muriel,” I whispered. “Thank you, so very much.”
She winked at me. “Just show up tomorrow morning and we’ll give you a quick refreshing of things,” she instructed. “I gotta tell you, girl. It’ll be nice to put an end to these 12-hour shifts with your help now.”
I grinned at her. “You’ll never give up your 12-hour shifts, Muriel. You wouldn’t know what to do with yourself.”
She smiled, then asked, “Are you hungry?”
“I could eat,” I admitted. “Nothing big, though.”
“I have just the thing,” she says, then hollers over her shoulder, “Gale, a light tuna on rye.” She turns back to me. “After you eat, and I push these remaining customers out of here, you and me are going to have ourselves a gabfest!”
And we did.
I told her about my narcissistic aunt. I told her about Bailey and her selfish ways. I told her about the suffocating pretentiousness of Sands Cove and Windsor. I told her about Roselyn. We, even, talked about my father and mother. The only thing we didn’t talk about was Ramsey.
I didn’t mention him, his suppo
sed love or his betrayal. Or the fact that his betrayal is what forced me to come back to Hantover.
Muriel didn’t look at me with pity or wariness in her eyes like everyone else did. She looked at me with sympathy and compassion. That’s what made me trust her. That’s what made her my friend. I was scared that if I told her I was so stupid as to give my virginity to the first boy who truly ever treated me like shit, she’d see the destructive pattern in me and start to pity me.
And it was a destructive pattern.
I fell for an abusive boy, and like all abuse victims, I felt comfort in how he treated me cruelly. I let myself fall in love with him after everything thing he had done to me. And I was taking the blame like your classic victim, only not really.
I don’t believe I deserved what he did to me. I don’t believe I deserved how cruelly he treated me. No. No, I’m at fault because I knew Ramsey was dark and I willingly surrendered to his darkness. I traded weeks of maliciousness and bullying for two days of sweet touches, deep conversation and endless sex.
I knew he was mean. I knew he was ruthless and unconscionable. I knew it and I laid down for him anyways.
Ramsey didn’t deserve my forgiveness, but he wasn’t solely responsible for the hell I was feeling now, either.
Nope.
I could admit when I’ve made a mistake.
Chapter 31
Ramsey
It took over a week for me to find Emerson.
I had one of my father’s security experts flag her name as soon as I realized Roselyn really didn’t know where she was. Or really wasn’t going to tell me.
Martin had sent me a text message with an attachment showing that she was employed at The Cozy Diner in Hantover.
She had gone back home.
I spent all week living in my own personal hell and it never occurred to me that she might have gone back home.
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