If Sunday’s comically exaggerated wince is any indicator, the hug my aunt gives her is another bone-crushing one before she releases her and walks back around to the other side of the Cadillac. She slides in beside me, and my best friend trots to my window and motions for me to open it. Leaning in, she plants a smacking kiss on my cheek, making me laugh.
“Text me later, Stell. We can meet up tomorrow and figure out a plan for school on Monday since we both know how awesome that’s going to be.” The sarcasm drips from her tongue, and I can practically hear the eye roll in her voice. “Thanks for the ride, Spry. See you soon, Miss B.” She backs away from the car and turns to saunter up the entryway stairs, throwing a wave and a smile over her shoulder before disappearing into the house.
“I’m glad she was with you.” Cecily pats my hand. “She’s a really good friend.” A small smile turns the corners of my lips up, and I lean back into my seat before I answer.
“She’s the best.”
Pulling into the winding tree-lined driveway of Tweedvale Cottage is like seeing an old friend I missed more than I realized. The setting sun highlights the trees with a dark copper glow, and the shadows are falling softly in behind. Remembering how scared I was when Spry first brought me here almost a month ago is like recalling a story that happened to somebody else.
Home.
The word tiptoes in and wraps itself around my heart like it always knew the answer and was just waiting for me to catch up.
Cecily goes on ahead while I help Spry unload my bags from the cavernous trunk of the Cadillac. He carries both duffels, and I take my purse and backpack as we head upstairs to my room.
“Just drop the duffels in the closet, Spry. I’ll deal with them tomorrow.” Tossing my purse on the wingback chair and letting the backpack slide down my arm to the floor, I flop face-first onto my bed, breathing in the lavender and gardenia scent of whatever my aunt uses in the laundry. As Spry is leaving the room, I turn over and hastily sit up. “Can you please let Cecily know I’ll be down shortly? I just need a few minutes to get cleaned up.”
“Of course.” He pauses in the doorway, lowering his head slightly and speaking without turning to face me, his voice gruff with emotion. “I’m very sorry for what you learned before you left; for what happened to your mother. It’s good to have you home.” Without waiting for me to respond, he crosses into the hallway and closes the door quietly behind him.
What I learned before I left.
The defiling of my mother.
The nightmare of my probable beginnings.
Making a snap decision, I stretch awkwardly across the bed and hook the strap of my purse with two fingers, pulling it off the chair and into my lap. Digging until I find my phone, I compose the short text and hit ‘send’ before losing my nerve. I chew on my thumbnail while waiting to see if there’s a response—it takes probably forty seconds at the most, but it feels like an hour.
TOMORROW WILL BE FINE. NOON?
The resolve that settles over me brings a sense of peace along with it. My fingers quickly text back my agreement, and I set the phone in the docking station on the nightstand. Getting up, I make a stop in the bathroom to wash my face and then head downstairs to talk to Cecily.
A delicious-looking spread of cheeses, thinly sliced meats, olives, tiny pickles, and fancy crackers is set up at one end of the long kitchen table. My aunt sits calmly waiting for me while sipping a glass of white wine.
“It’s nibblies for dinner tonight. The thought of cooking seemed too much like work.” Cecily sighs and blows a stray strand of hair out of her eyes. “I hope you don’t mind,” she says hopefully as I pour myself a glass of fizzy water from the green glass bottle in the fridge.
“Are you kidding? If any of that tastes half as good as it looks, it’s fantastic.” Popping a fat green olive in my mouth, I drop into the chair across from her and pull up my feet, sitting cross-legged lotus style. “Okay, go.”
“Go? Where am I going?” My aunt tilts her head in confusion.
“You know, go.” My fingers drum out a nameless rhythm on my thighs. “You must have questions—why I left, how I feel, what I plan to do with the information from that awful night.” My throat tightens at the memory, forcing me to reach for my glass and gulp a mouthful of soda water. “I’m happy to sit here and stuff my face and talk. At the very least, I owe you answers. So, go. Shoot. Ask away.”
While waiting for her first question, I make little sandwiches out of crackers, meat, and cheese and arrange them on my plate. Adding some olives and pickles at the ratio of one for my mouth and three for my plate, I realize as much as I love Sally and The Juneberry, I’m ridiculously happy to eat non-diner food.
“Are you planning on staying for good, or will you be heading back to New York?” Cecily’s blunt question catches me off guard, and I inhale part of the pickle I was in the middle of chewing. The resulting coughing fit has her jumping up and rushing around to my side of the table. She pounds on my back until I dislodge the offending piece and resume breathing and swallowing properly.
What the hell is it with me choking on things today?
“Sorry, Stella. I didn’t mean to startle you like that,” she apologizes sheepishly as she sits back down across from me.
“No, it’s good. I’m good. That was just right to the point. I sort of expected you to start with something easy like ‘how was your flight’,” I chuckle. “Uh, well, I would like to stay. You know, if it’s okay.” Shrugging awkwardly, the mix of embarrassment, excitement, and fear I feel surprises me a little.
Suck it up, Bradleigh. Say what you mean. Since when have you been afraid of somebody saying no?
Since I actually started to give a shit.
“This is home now, here with you. You’re my family. I don’t want to leave.” The words leave my lips in a rush.
“And I don’t want you to leave either. This is your home.” A bitterness threads through her tone. “I’m thrilled you’ve decided not to let some evil asshole take this all away from you.” She pauses, appearing to choose her next words carefully. “Or take you away from me.” Looking down at her hands, she twists her napkin into something that resembles a gnarled tree.
Huh. Looks like somebody else has started to give a shit, too.
“You’re stuck with me forever now,” I say lightly, trying to ignore the sudden somber mood permeating the room. “Hey, speaking of evil assholes, can I just say how awesome it was when you spit on Callum that night? It seems like spitting on Torstens is something of a sport among us Bradleighs.” I raise my glass in a toast to her.
“What? Which other Bradleigh has been spitting on which Torsten?” Her eyebrows raise in surprise, while a grin that she’s trying admirably to hide tickles the corner of her mouth.
Whoops. I guess she never did find out about my spitting on Hali in the cafeteria.
“Oh, right. That. So, Aunty, there’s something I need to tell you.”
Chapter Seven
After witnessing her dirtbag landlord earlier firsthand, having Stella agree to come back to Folkestone with us permanently at least allowed me to breathe a bit easier. That guy deserved each fucking bruised nut and nail gouge he got, and then some. If I had my way, we would have left him rotting in a dumpster behind the sad, squat apartment building he ran, and I doubt anybody would miss him. I’m happy our feisty little Terrible Twosome proved they can handle themselves and kick some ass, but fuck if I didn’t want to skin that greasy bastard alive.
It had seemed strange when Sunday abruptly disappeared from the window, whacking her head on the frame in her haste, but we initially chalked it up to her being her. When we heard the scream though, Payne and I knew something shady was happening and booked it up to Stella’s floor. We ran down the hall not knowing exactly which unit was hers, and skidded to a stop at the open door, pausing for a millisecond to take in the scene in front of us.
Sunday clawing at the face of the shithead who wouldn’t stop squealing and
moaning in pain.
Stella trapped underneath both of them and trying to squirm her way out, the movement causing her shirt to slide off both shoulders and expose her black strapless bra.
The rage flooding my senses was echoed on my best friend’s face. Both of us lunged at the same time—Payne pulling Sunday off the top of the pile and carrying her out of the way and me throwing the dirty, skinny lech out into the hall. Adrenaline pulsed through me, and it took every single ounce of control I had to not wrap my hands around his scrawny neck and snap it like a fucking twig.
My need to inflict violence doesn’t come out to play very often anymore, and it’s a side of me I’d rather Stella not see. So I tamped it down, and it’s been festering under the surface since we left that sack of shit groaning in the hallway of the building.
The thought of either one of them spending another night in that place made me crazy, and if Stella had changed her mind and refused to come back to Folkestone with us, I knew Payne and I would both be camped out in that shitty little apartment with her and Sunday, whether they wanted us there or not.
Now that we’re finally on our way to the airport, everything feels sideways and strained.
Payne and Sunday are trying their damndest to pretend there’s no sexual tension between them and are being annoyingly polite while somehow still managing to argue.
My father keeps aiming very pointed sidelong glances my way, and I know he knows I haven’t mentioned anything about my previous travels to Stella. I also know he is less than pleased by that fact.
To top it all off, Stella herself has been utterly silent since we left the diner. Turning to check on her every so often, I get glimpses of a lifetime of emotions as they flicker across her gorgeous but strained features. Her temple rests against the tinted glass of the back passenger-side window, a forlorn air smothering her natural spark.
There’s nothing I’d rather do than climb into the backseat, shove The Bickerson twins out of the way, and pull Stella onto my lap. My fingers flex on their own as I imagine digging them into her round ass and ravaging her full lips until the crushing sadness that haunts her violet eyes is gone. But I bite back the desperate urge to try to fix her. She needs to work through her demons in her own way, and I have to believe she can.
My nerves are already stretched razor-thin when we pull onto the tarmac, and the look on Stella’s face as she stares down the jet when we get out of the car tells me the fun isn’t over yet.
If she fucking bolts, I will lose my damn mind.
Sunday pulls me aside and explains the depth of Stella’s flying phobia, and I know I need to do something to help without embarrassing her. Five hours of peace can go a long way toward soothing a multitude of hurts, and that’s exactly what she needs right now.
After I manage to get her on the plane, and she’s tucked in and tuned in, I settle beside her and lace our fingers together. Her surprisingly strong hand relaxing its death grip on mine shortly after takeoff makes me feel ten feet tall and bulletproof. When her head droops, letting her soft cheek fall against my shoulder, I know she’s fallen asleep, and I glance up to see Sunday staring our way with an exaggerated expression of shock. My cocky smirk earns me an eye roll and a middle finger from her before she chuckles and turns her attention back to whatever’s playing on her iPad.
I managed to keep my cool and appear outwardly calm on the flight back to California because I knew Stella needed that from me. Now that we’ve parted ways and she and Sunday are on their way into town with Cecily, all my pent up anger comes pouring out.
“That dirty motherfucker!” The force of the car door slamming behind me as I practically dive into the backseat rattles the metal of the seat belt clips. “Putting his filthy hands on her? Groping her? Choking her? Do you know how badly I wanted to rip his junk off and feed it to him?” I know I’m ranting and yelling, but I can’t seem to stop. “Contrary to what the masses may think, I’m not a snob, but living the way she was?” My palm scrubs across my face, and I pinch the bridge of my nose in frustration. “The drunk guy passed out in the stairwell, and the holes punched in the hallway walls. The asshole pervert landlord. Bro, the thought of Stella living there on her own for two goddamn years makes me want to strangle Callum Torsten with his oxygen tube. It’s his fucking fault she’s lived the way she has up until now.”
Trying to get the fury flooding through my veins under control, I lean forward and rest my elbows on my knees, dropping my head and closing my eyes.
“Christ, dude,” Payne says, “the urge to punch that guy’s teeth down his throat was hard for me to resist, too.” He grunts in disbelief. “What a piece of shit. He and Callum both deserve to be thrown into a hole somewhere; maybe they’d kill each other.” There’s a pause before he continues, speaking the words we both know are true. “Honestly, I’m just glad Stella decided to come home. You know Sun wouldn’t have come without her, and then you and I would have ended up fighting over that ratty ass couch,” he says, garnering a small laugh and a fist bump from me.
“Those two certainly seem to have gotten close,” my father comments from the front seat. “Catherine would’ve been happy about that, I think.”
His words are sharp, and as his eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror, I’m reminded some things are going to have to be dealt with sooner rather than later. Keeping Payne out of the loop makes me feel shitty, but I have no idea how to admit the secret I’ve been carrying around. And if I can’t admit it to my best friend, how in the fuck am I going to be able to admit it to Stella? Telling my father was the single most awful experience of my life so far, and telling her will be so much worse.
Secrets are assholes, and either this one will eat me alive if I keep it, or Stella will kill me when she finds out.
I turn to Payne and awkwardly force a change of subject, essentially trying to ignore the warning in my father’s voice and silence the guilty one whispering in my head. Discussing cars and music and Raff’s latest conquest keeps me distracted until we get to the Halliday homestead. I’m relieved when my dad immediately heads inside, leaving my oldest friend and I standing in the driveway.
“Bro, what’s up? That whole random topic change wasn’t subtle in the slightest. Something’s going on with you.”
“It’s nothing. Just wired and tired. It’s been a strange couple of days.” Lying to my friends is not something I’m comfortable doing, so in an attempt to shrug it off, I grab our bags from the trunk and hand Payne his. Taking it from me and tossing it in the front seat of his car, he looks back at me before slipping behind the wheel.
“You forget, I know you better than anyone, Halliday. It’s not nothing. When you’re ready to tell me what the hell is going on, you know where to find me.” Even though he means well, the concern in his voice is grating on my nerves because I know he’s right—I’m not okay. Right now though, all I want to do is go inside, shower, and sleep for the next three days.
“Thanks for coming with us to get the girls.” My brain is screaming at me to stop being such a pussy and tell him, but I can’t deal with the reality of it all, not today. Shooting him a quick salute, I turn and run up the stairs, closing the front door behind me before he even starts his car.
Chapter Eight
The slam of the front door startles the maid dusting one of the sculpted monstrosities my mother calls art, and she jumps in surprise.
“Shit, sorry, Valeria.” My sheepish look garners a dismissive wave and a titter of laughter from the small Columbian woman who's been part of the staff here for as long as I can remember. She shoos me along, and I take the stairs up to my room two at a time.
My bedroom has always been a sanctuary for me—an escape from everything and everyone. It takes up almost half of the second floor of this wing, with smoky grey walls, high ceilings, and an abundance of windows adding to the airy, open feeling. There’s a sixty-five-inch tv on the far wall, and many a night has been spent in front of it with Payne, Raff, and Heller, the four o
f us kicking the shit out of each other in Mortal Kombat or racing the same cars we drive in real life in Forza.
Two of my favorite things about it though are my insanely comfortable king-size bed, and the fully automated sound and lighting system that was an unexpected birthday gift from my father. My bag lands on the floor just inside the door because I can’t be bothered to do anything else with it right now, and I let myself fall backward onto my bed. Flicking through my playlist, my thumb stops on ‘Julia’ by mewithoutYou. Spread-eagled on my back, I stare at the ceiling and listen to the music swirl around me. For about twenty seconds, I wonder how the hell I got into this mess. Then my brain spends the next fourteen and a half minutes trying to figure out how to get myself out of it.
There are hard and fast rules among the Founding Families and the Heirs. Not a ton of them, but the ones we do have, are ironclad. One of the biggies is if a favor is asked of one of the Heirs, unless it puts their life in danger, and even sometimes then, it gets done without hesitation or argument. The Hallidays were next in line behind the Bradleighs in the pecking order, so when Catherine disappeared, my family became the top of the food chain. That meant my father became the de facto leader. That same order is followed by the Heirs as well, and even though my friends and I see ourselves as equals, if an elder were to ask for a favor, they would most likely ask me.
Which is precisely what happened.
Why couldn’t it have been Payne she asked? Or, at the very least, why didn’t I just come clean with Stella right away?
Halliday, you are a fucking dipshit of epic proportions.
Frustration and adrenaline and different time zones have taken their toll, and my internal clock is a mess. Forcing myself to my feet, my joggers and hoodie fall in a pile on the floor. I strip off my boxers on the way to the shower, throwing them in the direction of my laundry hamper.
Fractured Things (Folkestone Sins Book 2) Page 6