She has a cut lip, a black eye closed shut, swollen and puffy looking like an old bruised that’s constantly made fresh by repeated assault.
The last time I saw Kristine, she was pregnant and slightly showing but right now, her belly is swollen and round with child. She’s probably six or seven months along and she looks really bad.
“I look great, don’t I?” she spits angrily, but the sadness can’t be missed. “This must make you happy.”
Happy? That she’s was beaten this badly, not only that but she’s pregnant! Who does that?
“Who the hell did this to you?”
“Shane and his fucking brother, Sean,” she moans softly, tears running down her face, even from the closed eye. God, my heart shatters from her. “Don’t look at me like that, Ice Queen! I don’t need you fucking pity.”
Something—a vivid memory—breaks through my conscious at the familiarity of those words. I said those words to someone—Julian!
My heart starts pounding harder against my ribs and my insides feel like they’re shrinking, twisting up and bringing an onslaught of a different kind of pain I wasn’t anticipating.
Oh God, where is Julian?
“I don’t pity you, Kristine,” I say sadly. “I just… no one deserves to be treated like this.”
“Why?” she spits. “You hate me.”
“I don’t, Kristine.” I look up at her as I say that. I can only imagine how the pair of us looks, vulnerable, in so much danger right now and the fact that we might not see tomorrow. “Despite what you and anyone else might think, I’ve never hated you. In fact, I’ve always considered you a friend.”
She blinks at me with one eye. It would have been funny any other moment but this—this is too fucked up to even muster up s half smirk.
“How hard did they hit your head?” she murmurs, looking confused.
“Pretty damn hard,” I groan low in my throat. “It’s like I have helicopter blades whirring up there but even without that, I’d still say the same thing. Even when you were shitty to me and hated me or whatever way you felt about me, I never hated you.”
Hot. wet drops of liquid fall on my face,
“Shit, stupid hormones.” She sniffles, wincing when she tries to wipe the tears away. “Well, I can’t say the same, Mia and my reasons for hating you were, well, petty.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I focus on what can actually help us.
“Kristine, we need to get out of here,” I whisper but she’s already shaking her head before I even finish talking.
“That’s close to impossible,” she says hurriedly. “The assholes have this place in some kind of lockdown, and they made sure that there’s only one way in and one way out.”
“Where are we?”
“Some eerie slaughterhouse type or abandoned warehouse on the out skirts of Los Angeles,” Kristine whispers. “The shitty part of town.”
“Surely you’ve tried to call for help.”
“Yes, and I got beat up to within an inch of my life, Mia. I can’t risk it anymore,” she says, cradling her baby bump protectively. I have a feeling she isn’t talking about being shacked up in here either. “I don’t have a voice anymore.”
That cuts deep, the meaning behind those words.
It’s clear that the abuse she suffered isn’t new and it sure isn’t limited to just the physical. There are roots that slice deeper here that have obviously broken this girl who used to be my best friend.
“How long, Kristine?” I say softly, some cadence of my voice returning, trying not to think of what might have happened to me as I feel the aches all over my body.
“Longer than it necessary,” she whispers, and I close my eyes, the raw pain in her voice clear as day. “I’ve been subjected to this for a long time.”
“How?”
She chuckles, but it’s dead and flat, my chest aches.
“Well, you like him. I was jealous of you and I thought I could get him from under you, just to spite you, but you, I have to hand it to you, Ice Queen, you didn’t even seem like you cared. You never flinched, never looked twice or noticed how I was always with Shane at school. It was like you were in your own world.” I look away, thinking of the weeks that led to Nancy’s death and suddenly all I feel is shame and guilt. “I just didn’t know your new world now included the Fitz brothers until well, the night of the race where Julian was supposed to die in that car when everything changed.”
I jerk up, biting down on my lip as pain screams at my body, but I need to hear this. Kristine holds the answers I need, and it seems we’re currently alone. I don’t look at the huge warehouse full of rusty, old industrial equipment as I clutch the sheet to my body. Kristine must have taken this from the uncovered machines.
“What do you know about that know?”
“I really shouldn’t… we don’t have time. They’ll come back soon.”
“Where did those bastards go?”
“Well, after they took that picture to send to your man—”
“What?” I screech, unable to stop myself.
“Shh, don’t start freaking out now!” Kristine rushes, looking around nervously like she feels eyes on her already.
“Kristine, you have to tell me,” I croak. “What picture did they take and send to Julian?”
She eyes me through that one eye, and my stomach rolls, the meaning of that look making me want to throw up.
“Oh, God, no,” I whisper, shaking my head, the smell of blood now strong. I start feeling woozy again, but I can’t lose consciousness now.
“I’m so sorry, Mia,” she says softly in a voice I haven’t heard from her since we first became friends. “They drugged you and you were out of it, so Sean, he arranged you in a certain way on this bed and then his brother…” she trails off, but I’ve already got the mental picture of what happened.
The sudden silence is almost deafening, but the horror that slams into me at the thought of what Julian might’ve seen. Me, like this?
When I look down, I can see my self-inflicted cuts, both fresh and new. The two weeks since I last saw Julian—God, has it really been that long?—were the hardest in me. Emotionally, mentally I’m a mess and now this?
“What-t,” I stutter. Clearing my throat, I decide to put that aside and focus on the now and what I can potentially change in my neat future. I don’t want to be that bitch who’s found dead in some abandoned mat warehouse which already has a funky stench of death hovering over it. I wouldn’t even be surprised if this place also saw swine flu by the looks of it.
“What happened the night of that race, Kristine?” I demand. “Did you know they were going to attempt to kill Julian?”
I see the fear in her eyes as she realizes that her admission would probably be considered as conspiracy to murder. I don’t know what she sees on my face though because she swallows and nods mutely.
“They’d been talking about it for weeks before that, but I never thought they were actually serious,” she rushes to say. “I mean, it’s been public knowledge how much Clintwood and St. Jude High clash but the rival between the Fitz brothers and these pathetic third rate, asshole Matthews is personal.”
“Did they know about me? That I was now living with the Fitz brothers?”
“I’m not sure but they knew something was up when both Liam and Julian directed all their attention on you, something they’ve never done to anyone. I mean, you know they can get any girl they want. Liam basically has his own real-life Tinder selection and Julian, well, he doesn’t just touch anyone. There was Casey of course, but everyone knew she was wanted more but Julian considered her as nothing more than—”
“Kristine, you’re rambling,” I snap, cutting her off.
“Oh sorry, I just, well, I’m jumpy and hormonal and I—”
“Just breathe and focus on what happened that night and what you know.”
She takes in deep breathes, but the alarm in her eyes and the stiff posture of her shoulders indicates a
girl too accustomed to things going wrong and always not in her favor. In that regard, I can relate completely.
“Well, after everything went sideways when Liam drove Julian’s car, I saw Shane panic, but his fucking evil brother wasn’t. He was as cool as fucking cucumber and he even said it was some kind of justice. Like one down one more to go type of thing.”
Anger, fast, hot and furious swooshing in my blood. “After everyone cleared out though when the car blew up and the cops were on their way, Sean stayed. When he met up with his brother and they both said you were the key.”
“Me?”
“Because of the way Julian handled you, the way he was looking at you at a gathering with all those fucking people. It was like he was stripping you bare at the same time, bend you over for defying him. Honestly, it was hot and it made the rest of us there feel inadeqate.”
I remember that night, but I didn’t feel any of those things. If anything, the deep resentment and hate between Julian and I over the mess I made for him and his family in the past was all I could think before he pressed me up against that tree and blocked my escape with six foot four of hot, solid and thoroughly pissed off and aroused male.
“Surely that can’t be it,” I murmur, feeling the loss of what could’ve been between Julian and I, so heavily on my chest.
“Well, of course not. Sean said after the explosion, you stayed behind and raced to get Liam with Julian.” Yes, that did happen. “From the moment that beady-eyed snake saw you, you were done for, Mia. He made sure all the suspicion of that explosion fell on you after all, everyone witnessed the way Julian handled you and the way you mouthed off with both of them. Because was using me like fucking rag doll, fucking me anyway he wanted, had me strung up on drugs so I was constantly high and out of my mind, Sean had me go to the cops and report the whole thing and open an investigation against you as the sole suspect in an attempted murder.”
Fuck. I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know it was this twisted, this messed up. It’s clear that Sean and his brother don’t just have it out for Julian and Liam, they have it out for me too.
“But it all went to shit at that party you held at your old house,” Kristine goes on, her voice low, almost as whisper. After what she just said about doing drugs, I now see that the wild look on her eyes is not just fear, it’s withdrawal. Shit.
“The night we got arrested?”
“Yes,” she says. “Julian, Cole and Liam all bested Sean and that enraged him even further. I mean, Julian beat him up pretty badly that night after Sean said something to him that made him snap and he vowed to make him pay.”
“Through me,” I whisper, seeing it all now. She nods, her eyes wide. “That’s why they beat me up to kidnap me?”
“That and the fact that you were fighting like a banshee out of hell, you even punched Sean who then knocked you out with a blow to the head,” she says. I don’t really remember anything or how I got here, I just have one thought in mind.
“What happened to me, Kristine?” I whisper, dread choking me up. “Did they—”
“Just don’t, Ice Queen,” she says softly. “Don’t do that to yourself. Right now you need to focus on staying alive than anything else.”
Silence falls over us.
I can’t stop the horrors in my mind or the scenarios of what happened to me when I was out. Anything could’ve happened. Maybe they already raped me…
“Kristine, we need to get out of here,” I seethe.
“You’re not listening to me,” Kristine says. “It’s impossible.”
“You just said they’re not here.”
“Yes, but they locked us in here and the windows are all the way up there and only a fucking rat can get through them.”
Looking up, I can see what she means but I refuse to think there’s no way out.
“There must be another place to escape, a door they didn’t check or a window at the back.”
“I checked everywhere, as soon as they left to set up a trap for the Fitz brothers—”
“What?” I demand, snapping my head to look at her. That’s a bad move as agony rips me a new one. I’d rather someone behead me than feel this acute any second longer, but Julian… “What do you mean ‘to set a trap’?”
Kristine looks uncomfortable now, her eyes shifting from one side of the warehouse to another, and me? I can’t breathe right anymore. My boys are in danger.
“Kristine, please. You have to tell me.”
“And then what, Mia? What are you going to do? Climb up there to get out through those tiny-ass windows so you can save those more than capable gods, when in fact, they should be saving you?” Kristine spits, getting up now, her body trembling. She looks wild and unhinged. “Look around you, Mia. Those bastards chose their stage well. There’s no leaving this hellhole until they say so and even then, I think it’ll be us in body bags.”
A shudder goes down my spine. The truth is, she’s right. About everything, but that still doesn’t stop my heart from yearning with the need to protect them. “What are they planning for Julian?”
“Some mind game, Mia, what do you think?” she snaps. “Right now, they’re hosting some kind of back-to-school party bullshit at their mansion and they invited Julian, Liam and Cole. I heard bits and pieces of their plane.”
“And what is it?”
“Mia—”
“What’s their fucking plan, Kristine?”
“You really don’t want to know.”
“I’m naked, bleeding, half frozen and fucking somewhere no one would care to find me, what is the fucking plan?”
She’s silent for a beat but doesn’t look away. “They want to prolong your torture. The things that they’re planning for you…”
She trails off but I get the warning. I get the message. It finally sinks in. I’m not just bait, I’m the torture device. And knowing Julian, he’ll go full-on devil-Hercules on them. He’ll snap and be on a war path that I’m pretty sure will make blood flow like a river. I can’t have that.
“Mia, they plan to make you suffer in the most excruciating, humiliating way and I just… I have no if either of us are going to make it.”
“But you’re pregnant.”
“Like that matters,” she spits, but the sad note in her voice is hard to miss as she cradles her baby bump.
“Who’s the father, Kristine?” I whisper, my heart racing.
She shakes her head, tears streaming down her face all over again.
“Just don’t, okay,” she snaps. “I just woke you because you were doing this weird thing of shivering then you stopped and muttered something unintelligible right before you went stone cold, like you were dead. It freaked me out.”
“Dying,” I sigh. “It would help right about now.”
I feel her gaze on me, and from the corner of my eye, I see her eyeing my arms now exposed over the sheet, holding it to me. “You’re all sorts of messed up, aren’t you? Not so perfect as we all thought.”
“I never painted myself in a perfect light, Kristine,” I snap, tired of her narrative of me. “I was just a girl, trying to go through high school—”
“Which you didn’t need. You were just dumbing down, letting us think you were like us when in fact, you’re like a freaking genius.”
“My mother was dying!” I yell, pain slamming me in the chest once more but this time, I let myself feel it. “The woman I thought was my mother was dying from ALS and all I knew was I wasn’t going anywhere because she needed me. So, forgive me if I didn’t give you the attention you wanted, Kristine. Forgive me for keeping my emotions tightly reigned in, which all goes to shit the moment Julian sets his piercing gaze on me. Forgive me for being human and like you said, fucked up because you know what? I’m still fighting,” I say, breathing hard and fast, pain swooshing through my body in waves. “I might hurt myself and think of dying more often than not but I’m not allowed to die. He will never allow me to and that makes it my will also to stay alive at any costs because
I love him! I love Julian with all my heart, against my better judgement and you know what? We might never be anything beyond a summer fling and enemies for the rest of our lives because of all the hate, but I want to live!”
She stares at me with that one eye, tears falling down her swollen, battered face. “What about you, Kristine? Standing there, looking all helpless and defeated when you have a life growing inside of you that you must protect. A life I know under all this mess you love more than anything else because at the core of that hard exterior you’re not just strong, you’re a sensitive person full of insecurities but mostly love and now you’re talking about ‘there’s no way out’? There is a way out of this shithole, damnit! We just need to find it.”
We stare at each other, the irony of this situation not lost on me. There was a time I might’ve said screw it, I’ll save myself and leave this bitch, but I’m no longer Mia from before the summer. Or the Mia before my life unraveled the day I moved in the Fitzgerald mansion. I have no clue who I am. Amy as my father said or Mia, a name I gave myself, but one thing is clear. I’m not staying here to find that out.
“Okay,” she says, her voice small and shaky. “Let’s do it.”
“You’re damn right we’re going to do this. We can’t give them the satisfaction of breaking us. No way.” We can do that al by ourselves anyway, if cutting myself in the bathroom is evidence enough.
I don’t need anyone to use me, and I’ll be damned if I let Shane and his fucking older brother Sean to assault me, hold me hostage and dop all the shit they have planned on me just to hurt Julian.
I attempt to stand up, having managed biting down the pain while I was somewhat sitting upright. I almost fall oyt when I’m upright, realizing that my legs are asleep.
“Shit, okay, you’re useless in moving around.”
“What sort of drug did they give me?”
“The kind used numb your entire body until you can’t move. Can’t talk. Can’t make a sound, but you’ll be awake, watching everything happen to you.”
Silence.
She’s had this drug used on her before. But before I can ask more, she quickly helps me back on the bed.
Bitter Kisses (It's Just High School Book 3) Page 10