Blackthorn Elite: The Entire Series

by Beck, J. L.

  When I hear the front door close with a soft click, I get up from the couch and lock the deadbolt, then I head to the bathroom for a shower. My entire body is one massive ache, and as I turn the shower on and step under the stream of water, a terrible feeling overcomes me.

  My stomach churns and tightens, and I feel like such a fucking dick. Hating Kennedy is my life now. I’m consumed with my need for revenge. She took the only other person besides herself that mattered to me. She killed my twin. Hating her is the nicest thing I can possibly do.

  Washing my body, I’m overwhelmed by the fact that even if I don’t want to admit it to myself, I still care. It’s why I didn’t push her into traffic that day, why I couldn’t actually go through with forcing her to give me a blow job.

  Clenching my fist, I lash out at the tiled wall with rage. My teeth grind together, and I hate myself a little more for not being able to fully hate her, for there being a morsel of care beneath it all. Why? I just want to hate her, to forget that she ever mattered to me, and yet every time I look at her, I see the little girl who hugged my sister on the first day of kindergarten. I see my sister’s best friend hugging her. I see someone that should’ve protected her, instead of harming her, and maybe that’s half the problem. I never should’ve expected that from Kennedy.

  Punching the tile a couple more times, my knuckles are a meaty mess as I get out of the shower. Blood drips all over the pristine white tile, but I don’t give a fuck. Drying off, I walk into my bedroom and pull on a pair of shorts. As soon as I step out into the hall, I hear a knock at the door. Gritting my teeth, I stop at the front door. I swear to god if it’s Kennedy, she is going to wish she didn’t show back up here.

  My patience to deal with her is non-existent at this point, and though I don’t want to physically hurt her, I’m toeing the line between right and wrong at this point. Unlocking the deadbolt, I tug the door open, a barrage of words cling to the roof of my mouth when I find it isn’t Kennedy at all, but Talon.

  “Hey, fuckface, got out of there fast enough,” he says, shoving into my apartment. Fucker wants to get punched in the face, doesn’t he?

  “What the fuck do you want?” I whirl around to face him, slamming the front door since I already know he isn’t going to be leaving right away. I’m not really in the mood for company tonight. I’d rather drink myself to death at this point.

  “Is that any way to greet the person who comes with twenty-five thousand dollars in his pocket for you?”

  My face deadpans. “Just give me the money, jackass. I’m not in the mood for company tonight.”

  Talon wiggles his eyebrows at me. “Oh, really? Is that why you ran out of the pit and to that chick? I saw her walking down the street on the way over here. Did you fuck her?” I don’t say anything, mainly because there isn’t anything to say. I don’t have to tell him who I fuck and don’t fuck. Does he think he’s my dad or something? Agitated, I roll my shoulders. It feels like I’m being interrogated.

  “I’m going to take your silence as a yes since you aren’t denying it.” He smirks. “Did you at least make it hurt? She deserves some pain after the story you told me. Hell, you should’ve kept her here, maybe I could’ve fucked her too. Made sure she got the point.”

  I don’t understand my reaction to what he’s said, but I pounce, grabbing him by the front of his shirt. “Don’t fucking touch her! She’s mine. Do you hear me? Don’t touch her. Don’t look at her. Nothing.”

  “Jesus, dude.” Talon tries to push me off, but my grip on him is too tight. I’m tempted to rearrange his face, but I hold back. I’ve hurt enough people tonight. “I heard you loud and clear. Don’t touch the blonde. I got it.”

  I release him with a shove, and he stumbles back. The shock over my outburst is written all over his face, and I don’t want to see it. I’m ashamed to be feeling this way. I hate Kennedy, fucking hate her so much, it’s all I can feel sometimes, but every once in a while there is something else, something deeper. It comes out of nowhere and makes me think twice about what I’m doing to her.

  “You okay, man? You’re acting weird,” Talon says, pushing me to my limits. His voice is a saw cutting through me. I want to flatten him.

  “I’m fine. Now get the fuck out of here before I beat the fuck out of you. I want to be alone,” I yell at him, pointing to the door. He backpedals, his entire face ashen now. I can’t imagine how I look at this point. Like a beast that’s ready to explode.

  Slamming down onto the couch, I take my head into my hands and listen for the door to close. When it slams shut, I shove up from the couch. Her fucking scent is all around me. It’s in my head, under my skin. I hate her. I fucking hate her. There is no room for anything else inside of me. Walking into the kitchen, I grab the bottle of bourbon off the top of the fridge, twist the cap off, and bring it to my lips.

  My muscles quake as I tip the bottle back and let the liquor pool inside my mouth before swallowing it down. It burns a path of fire deep into my belly, warming the coldness inside my chest. Tears prick my eyes as I sag to the floor and continue drinking.

  “Why the fuck did you do this to me, Jillian?” I scream into the empty space.

  It’s not her fault she died. It’s not her fault that she got into the car that night. It’s mine. It’s Kennedy’s but never hers. She didn’t deserve to die. I drink some more, letting the brown liquid cloud my mind, but nothing can truly make me forget. This is a temporary fix. Tomorrow, I’ll wake up and be reminded of it all over again. Such a vicious fucking cycle.

  “I hate her so much, Jill. I hate her, and I don’t want to care, but a part of me does, and it feels like a betrayal. She killed you, took you from me…” I sob, feeling the loss of my sister for the first time. I never cried at her funeral. I couldn’t. I needed to be strong. For my parents, for myself. Plus, crying wouldn’t fix anything, wouldn’t bring her back, but not allowing myself to mourn—my best friend, my twin, my other half—only made the emotions I was feeling ten times worse. I held it all in, thinking I could swallow it down, but all it did was swallow me. I was drowning, and there wasn’t a lifeboat in sight.

  Sighing, I down the rest of the liquid, and when it’s empty, I toss the bottle at the wall, watching as the glass fractures, flying in a million directions. I’m not sure how many shards of glass the bottle has become, but I imagine that’s what my heart looks like now.

  It’ll never be whole again.

  Feeling the unbearable rage building inside me again, I want to hurt someone, but like always, there is no one here to hurt but myself. Needing to unleash the pain, I rear my hand back and punch the wall. One hit isn’t enough, and neither is two.

  I clobber the wall like it’s the pain I face every day. I beat my fists into the drywall until I’m sure someone is going to call the cops, until my knuckles are bloody, and there is nothing left inside me. No anger, no sadness, just a numb feeling that washes over me, taking all the good and bad with it. Tonight I realized something… Kennedy might have been the one to kill my sister, but I helped. I helped put her in the ground. I’m to blame too. Sagging against the floor, I close my eyes and hope that I never wake up, that the nightmares become my reality.

  77

  Kennedy

  It’s been a week, and I still feel used. Like I whored myself out. I don’t want to see Jackson again or think about what we did. It was wrong. We shouldn’t have gotten pleasure from each other’s pain, but somehow, we did. Immersing myself in classes, I focus on schoolwork and nothing else. I pick up a bunch of extra credit and toss myself headfirst into the work.

  It’s the only thing I can do to stop myself from thinking about him. Any time that my mind starts to wander, it’s to him. I think about how angry he was and how he felt inside of me as our bodies became one. Thank god, I haven’t seen him since that night. I’m not sure what I would do, or even say if I did.

  As I rush from the library–with three books for my extra credit project in hand–I nearly collide with an
other person. Looking up from the ground, I prepare myself to apologize, only to realize that I know the person I just ran into.

  “Oh, hey!” the girl says. I rack my brain, trying to remember her name.

  “Hey,” I mumble back, noticing that we aren’t alone. There are two men with her, hovering around her like protective animals. Both are brooding and dark, with a possessiveness in their gaze. Is she with both of them? Are they her friends? I shake the thoughts away before they can take root. I don’t care. I’m not interested, at least not really.

  “Remember me? I’m Stella.” She smiles, and her eyes twinkle with excitement. She’s way too eager to make friends.

  “Uh, yeah…” I press my lips together. I don’t really want to do this. Not today, or tomorrow, or ever really. I don’t need or want friends, but for some reason, I can’t bring myself to tell that to this girl.

  “It’s funny that we meet again. Maybe we can go get a coffee or something? Or even have a glass of wine sometime?”

  All I can do is shake my head and backpedal. “I… I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  One of the guys she’s with places his hand on her shoulder and gently pulls her toward him. “Let’s go, Stella. She doesn’t want to make friends, no matter how adamant you are.” The smile he gives her is one of love and admiration, and I’m only a little jealous. A frown appears on Stella’s face as she brushes some blonde hair from her eyes.

  I feel bad, like someone kicked me in the stomach, but I still turn around and rush back to my apartment. I’m halfway to my complex when I realize the streets and quad are much fuller than usual.

  “I can’t wait to show you my dorm and the library. You’re going to love it, Mom,” a girl exclaims as she walks past me, a middle-aged couple following behind her.

  Oh, god. Pressing a hand to my forehead, I can already feel the onset of a migraine. I continue down the sidewalk, and that is when my reality becomes a nightmare because of all the things I could forget, family weekend definitely shouldn’t have been one of them.

  “Kennedy!” my mother squeals as she runs down the sidewalk, wrapping her arms around me. “We called, but it went straight to voicemail. I wasn’t sure if you still wanted us to come, but since we hadn’t seen you in a while, I figured it would be nice to make the trip,” she says as she pulls back. I gaze at my father over her shoulder. He hasn’t moved an inch and doesn’t look like he’s happy to be here either.

  My mother takes my clammy hand into hers and walks me toward my father as if I’m a small child that can’t do it on her own.

  “Kennedy,” my father greets in a monotone voice. He used to tell me he loved me, that he was proud of me. Now, he barely acknowledges me.

  “Hey, Dad,” I mumble back.

  “I got you a dress, sweetie. I want you to wear it to the dinner they’re having for us tonight. Your father has to work on Monday so we can only stay tonight. We’re gonna make the best of the time we have together.”

  I force my lips into a smile. It almost hurts, definitely feels strange and wrong because I’m not even close to being happy.

  “Thanks, I’m so happy you guys are here. I need to head back to my apartment and drop off this stuff, then we can do whatever you want.”

  The next twenty-four hours are going to be pure torture, but at least it won’t last forever. Soon enough, they’ll leave, and I can get back to my life, or what’s left of it.

  “Of course. Let’s go,” Mom exclaims, and I want to groan, but bite back the sound. If one thing is off, this could turn into so much more than a weekend from hell.

  “Let’s,” I reply and start walking toward my apartment again.

  * * *

  It takes far too long to get my mother to leave my apartment, and by the time we do get out, it’s too late to show them around Blackthorn because the dinner party is starting soon.

  With each step I take, I worry about the dress my mom made me wear riding too high up my thighs. It’s not terribly short. It sits above the knee, but only a few inches higher is where my scars begin. I don’t want anyone to see those, least of all, my parents. God, they would ship me off to the next loony bin in a heartbeat.

  “I don’t understand why you couldn’t have put on a bit of makeup?” my father says under his breath as we walk inside that banquet hall. His remark both hurts and angers me. It’s obvious when he says put makeup on, he’s asking me to cover my scar, so I don’t draw any attention to us. Or, more so, to him. It’s been clear to me for some time that my father cares more about himself than me. Ever since the accident, I’ve been more of a nuisance to him than a daughter. He is ashamed of me, and he doesn’t miss a chance to show it.

  My stomach lurches into my chest when we walk into the event, and I see how many students and parents are inside. I’m tempted to turn around and run back to my apartment, but if I do that, my mother would question me, and my dad would have yet another reason to belittle me.

  I’ve told her I’ve been working on being more social, working on getting outside my bubble. I’d be giving myself away if I tried to leave now.

  “Let’s get a table,” I say and tug my mother in the direction of an open table. She’s bubbling over with excitement while I’m drowning in misery. Guess things never change.

  “Kennedy, is that you?” I know that voice. The softness of it. For a long time, Jillian and Jackson’s mom was like a second mother to me. I can’t tell you how many times I slept over at their house. How often she made me pancakes or bandaged up my scraped knees. Still, seeing her after what I did, all those good memories are tarnished by the one bad thing I did.

  I really don’t want to turn around because I know Mrs. Wislow isn’t alone. Her husband is here, and Jackson is definitely here. This is slowly becoming an actual living nightmare.

  Building up the courage, I turn around and come face to face with Trish. Her eyes become glassy when she sees my face, and she rushes toward me, wrapping her arms around me as if I didn’t kill her daughter. As if there isn’t tons of misery and pain between our two families.

  “Kennedy,” my father calls my name sternly, but I’m an adult now. Not some kid that can be pushed around. If I want to hug Trish, then I will.

  “You look good,” she says, pulling away, her emotions written all over her face. It’s stupid of me, but I chance a look around her and find Jackson’s green eyes feral and honed in on me. He’s not even bothering to cover up his disdain of me. “I’m so happy you’re here and going to school.”

  “We’ll be at the table, sweetie,” my mother leans forward and whispers into my ear. I can’t see my father’s face since my back is to him, but I’ll bet he looks close to murder. He and Jackson probably have matching facial expressions.

  “We… We don’t have to do this,” I tell her, the wounds of my past becoming raw as she stands before me.

  Ken, her husband, walks up to me as well, leaving Jackson to stand alone, his arms crossed over his chest, a sinister look flickering in his eyes.

  Trish wipes away a couple stray tears that have escaped her eyes. “There is nothing to do, honey. Ken and I, we just, we had tried to reach out to you before, but your parents said you moved away. We wanted to let you know that we forgive you.” She places her hands on my shoulders as if she knows I need the weight to hold me to the ground.

  “You… you forgive me?” I’m shocked. That is not how I envisioned this would go.

  Ken nods, his eyes are soft, and the same color green as Jackson’s. “Jillian loved you like you were her sister, and we know you loved her too. We’ve come to terms with the fact that it was a horrible accident, and sometimes things happen that are out of our control. We miss her every single day, but hating you, or being mad about it isn’t going to change that she’s gone. Jillian wouldn’t have wanted us to treat you that way. You’re like a daughter to us. Losing Jillian wasn’t a choice, something out of our control, but we can control our relationship with you.”

  Tears f
ill my eyes, but I blink them away. I will not cry. Trish smiles at me, and her smile reminds me of Jillian’s. She was always so happy, even when everything looked like it was headed south, she made the best of a shitty situation. She was smart beyond her years.

  “I thought you would hate me forever,” I manage to whisper.

  “Oh, sweetie, we are sorry, and I’m sorry we didn’t come to the trial. At the time, we were just too hurt and grieving too heavily to go,” Trish pauses, “we lost Jillian that night, yes, but we didn’t lose you, and we kind of forgot that at the time.”

  My throat tightens. What do I say to that? I can’t even get my brain to form a coherent response. They shouldn’t be apologizing to me. I should be apologizing to them, and yet my tongue feels like it’s weighed down with concrete.

  Somehow, I get a response out, “I… I’m so sorry. I love you both, and I loved Jillian so much. I miss her every day. Every single day,” I tell them, damn near breaking out into a sob. Forcing myself to breathe, instead of falling face-first into my emotions, I slowly get myself.

  Trish’s lips quiver, and I know she wants to cry too. “I would love to have lunch together sometime. Catch up? I want to hear all about your life since you disappeared with your parents.”

  Again, I’m shocked. “I… I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” For some stupid reason, my eyes cut to Jackson, who is staring fiery holes through his parents and me. His mother turns and looks over her shoulder, discovering what I’m looking at.