Bug

by Hunter, Ellie R.

  “I’ll see if I can find us some decent coffee in this place.”

  Without taking his eyes from me, he shakes his head and gives his mother his instructions.

  “No. Go home and make sure this doesn’t get out. Cancel all her invites for the next few weeks. I don’t want anyone finding out about this. Oh, and make it known to the staff here that we’ll withdraw all donations if they leak it.”

  With a small nod, she leaves and closes the door after her. I’m too tired to be scared of him, so I lie still, watching him walk around the bed.

  “Is it true? Did you do this on purpose?” he asks.

  I close my eyes and block out the drowsiness and him in one go.

  “Answer me,” he sneers, and is in my face when my eyes fly open.

  “Yes.”

  I wanted to sound strong and hurt him, but it comes out as a whisper, and I only hurt myself. Fatigue takes over and I listen to the sounds of him scraping the chair across the floor. Pressure from his fingers pressing on the base of my wrist has me jolting up. His hand wraps deftly around my hand and he pulls me into him.

  “Don’t you ever do something so reckless and stupid again. Now, tell me why I’m sitting here in the fucking hospital because of your stupidity, when we could be home enjoying my return.”

  His return? Like he’s some sort of solider? He releases my hand and pushes me back down. He sits in the chair and leans back.

  “I keep asking you to let me go, yet you won’t.”

  “I see.”

  That’s all? I see? That’s all he’s got? A chill works its way up my spine as he leans on the edge of the bed.

  “Because I love you, because I give you everything I have, because I want to look after you, you think you can take advantage of me?”

  This is more like it. I’m prepared for this, him twisting this back to him.

  “From now on, I’m going to keep a closer eye on you. I’ve decided to work with my dad instead of finishing the year.”

  No. When he’s at college, it’s my time. Making plans will be much easier without him around every day.

  “I’m sorry, I won’t do it again,” I promise, because it’s what he wants to hear.

  “I’ve made my mind up. I won’t take any chances with you.”

  For the first time in our relationship, and I’m sure the first time in his life, a tear rolls out the corner of his eye and down his cheek.

  It takes me by surprise and guilt washes over me, then anger quickly follows. I shouldn’t feel guilty over this man.

  “I’m tired, Hux. I’m just so tired.”

  “Then sleep. I’m not going anywhere.”

  He leans up and kisses my forehead.

  “I love you, Bug. Why won’t you let me love you?”

  “I’m sorry,” I repeat.

  Am I sorry, though?

  I’m tired, that’s all I know.

  PRESENT

  “If there’s anyone who objects to this marriage, speak now, or forever hold your peace.”

  Someone, anyone, please speak up or I will never find peace. I hang my head, as the silence is too much to bear.

  “I object. I won’t let him hurt you too.”

  A collection of gasps and murmurs fill the room, and before we can turn around to see who spoke out, a shot echoes, and Huxley jolts forward and drops to the floor. Blood seeps through his startling white shirt, and a splutter of blood bursts from his mouth. Huxley’s blood. It has me frozen in place. Ryder pushes the boys toward Regina in the front row. She herself is in a state of shock and stands with a hand to her chest.

  “Someone call 911!” Ryder yells, disappearing into the crowd.

  Screams and shrieks fill the room, and chairs are knocked over in everyone’s rush to get to safety.

  “Help me, Bug,” Huxley chokes out, causing more blood to splutter from his lips.

  Bug.

  He’s been shot. I drop to my knees, and the blood is brighter somehow being closer. There’s so much of it. He’s going to die if he doesn’t get help soon, yet I’m not surprised when I don’t feel anything but hope. My old friend hope, it swells in my chest. I hope he dies. I’ll truly be free of him then. Of all the ways I’ve fantasised about how to get rid of him, him dying never entered my mind.

  “You should have left me in the past.”

  I lean over him and place my hands over the blood on his shirt. Anyone looking on will see I’m trying to stop the bleeding. My dress becomes a red and white piece of art, and if he dies, the cruel side he’s brought out in me would hang it on the wall so I can remember the moment he died. If he dies, that is.

  “Bitch,” he hisses.

  I lean down even closer so he can hear my whispers loud and clear.

  “I’m not your Bug, and although you came real close, you never crushed me like one. You’re going to bleed out, and I’ll scream and cry like the doting fiancée. You know the one, the one the town believes and will feel sorry for? You can die knowing I hate you, real hatred that can eat a person’s soul. Death isn’t good enough for you, but it sets us free, and that’s good enough for me.”

  “I’ll always be here, dead or alive…”

  “Are you still talking? Hurry up and die so I can take my son and rid him of you once and for all.”

  He lifts his hand and his fingers skim my cheek. Quickly losing his strength, it falls on top of his chest.

  “I just wanted to be with you.”

  “You wanted power, and you thought you could take it from me. You’re weak, you’re delusional, and you’re a filthy fucking rapist. You deserve this. The satisfaction it’s bringing me is better than any moment I’ve ever shared with you.”

  Choking on his blood, a trail of redness drips down the side of his cheek and onto the floor.

  “You’ll soon be in the cemetery, and don’t you think for a second that I’ll visit your grave like some pathetic widow. I’ll cry for the town, but when I’m alone, I’ll laugh, smile, and thank the Lord you’re gone.”

  He pales even more as the blood around his mouth turns a startling red.

  “I l-love…y-ou.”

  “That’s real nice, Hux. Now go and meet the Devil. I reckon you’ll get on great.”

  One, two, three…on the fourth wheeze, Huxley Bailey-Vaughan takes his last breath, and his eyes roll into the back of his head. My chest rises and falls rapidly, and the shock isn’t because I witnessed him die and I feel sad, it’s because I saw him die, and a future without him around is now a reality.

  My hands are slick with his blood. Pushing down on his chest for leverage, I scramble up to my feet and start screaming.

  “Please, please, help my Huxley!”

  Pressing my hands to my heart, I know I’m leaving more red prints on my dress. “Help! Someone, please, help!” I cry out, and Dash is the first to run over as he walks back into the room.

  Many questions start to turn in my mind, but there isn’t time to ask them. Like, for starters, why didn’t Dash run straight over when the shot rang out?

  Why didn’t anyone?

  Two EMT’s run up the aisle, and I step to the side to let them pass. As they fall to Huxley’s side, I scan the room and find the boys standing ten feet away, watching. Regina is nowhere to be seen, and Tobias has his arm around Trenton protectively. Shuffling toward them in this ridiculous dress, I scoop them both up in my arms. God, they shouldn’t have seen that. My hatred for Huxley blinded me momentarily and I forgot they were even here.

  “Come on, we need to get changed.”

  It dawns on me that the ceremony room is nearly empty. Police sirens whirl in the air, and so many officers swarm around the lobby, half of them heading for Huxley, the other half surrounding Kayleigh’s father. I stop when I see Ryder whispering in Mr. Dwyer’s ear as he’s being arrested. No. It couldn’t have been Kayleigh’s father who shot Huxley.

  Ryder sees us and waltzes over, takes me by the arm, and guides us to Huxley’s office.

 
“Act the broken-hearted bride,” he whisper-growls in my ear, and then he’s stepping aside for a police officer.

  So many questions, and all of them I could answer honestly because I have no idea what happened.

  One minute I was dizzy from the prospect of tying myself to Huxley in holy matrimony for the rest of my life, and then I was euphoric when he fell at my feet and bled to death. I felt nothing as he died. Nothing but relief anyway.

  If I couldn’t answer a question, Ryder could. He had so much more information on everything, such as people who disliked Huxley, his businesses. Everything I didn’t know, he did.

  No one sat in Huxley’s chair. I sat on the leather couch, the boys were crammed next to each other on the captain’s chair, and Ryder stood behind them like their protector. The two officers who asked question after question sat in the two empty chairs, trying to be gentle, yet thorough. I didn’t need to play confused because I was confused, and I asked them just as many questions as they did me. It wasn’t until Trenton started to whimper that Ryder put a stop to the interrogation. He saw them out, closed the door behind them, then walked over and collected the small boy in his arms, sitting with him at the opposite end of the couch as me.

  He kept him there in his hold until Trenton drifted off to sleep, with Tobias never taking his eyes off of them. We sat like that until darkness fell, every moment painfully ticking by in silence. I didn’t want to speak, not wanting Ryder to say anything with the boys in earshot. The boys didn’t attempt to say a word. We all sat there doing our best to process the events we witnessed. Huxley’s body was taken away an hour ago, and we were notified the ceremony room was still a crime scene, and they were conducting interviews with witnesses in the kitchen.

  I can feel my soul being sucked down into the depths of my mind, the two clashing with one another.

  Looking around, the boys are both asleep, and I can’t stand the silence any longer. Not in this room, his office, his space.

  “We should get them to their rooms, they must be uncomfortable.”

  Between the two of us, we make light work of it, and I’m grateful when they don’t wake as we tuck them into their beds.

  My dress whooshes against my skin as I cross the hall and open the door to Huxley’s room. It’s never been my room, but all my clothes are in here, and I need to wash his blood off my skin.

  Winding my hand behind my back, I pull my zipper down far enough for it to fall over my hips and pool at my feet.

  The door softly clicks closed behind me as I walk into the private bathroom and slam the door after me. I turn the shower on and crank up the heat. Stepping under the spray, I begin scrubbing. I squirt more soap on my hands, over my arms, down my legs, over my stomach. I drop the bottle on the tiled floor and rub the soap into every pore until all the blood is washed away.

  Turning the shower off, my skin prickles at the cold air, but I feel nothing as I dry myself down.

  The ridiculous ‘his and hers’ robes hang on the back of the door, and I ignore them in favour of my pyjama bottoms and a sweater. I also ignore the bruising on my thighs and focus on dressing.

  Ryder is perched on the end of the bed with his hands hung between his knees as he watches my every move.

  “Whatever you want to know, sit, and I’ll tell you everything. I promise.”

  I sit beside him and clasp his thigh. Even through the fabric of his dress pants, I can feel the warmth radiating from him.

  “I don’t want to hear anything tonight. For the first time since I was sixteen, I get to fall asleep in a world where Huxley doesn’t exist, and I’m tired, Ry.”

  “Ally, the shit that went down today, we need to talk about it.”

  Standing, I pull the sheets back as far as I can with him still sitting on the edge of the bed and climb in. Lying down, my back faces him, and the bottom of the bed moves when he stands.

  “Allison, are you serious? You don’t want to know?”

  “Not tonight. Maybe tomorrow. Right now, I want to sleep.”

  I close my eyes, and as I drift off to sleep, the vision of Huxley’s eyes rolling into the back of his head brings me peace for the first time in a long time.

  Ryder – The Past

  The sound of the rain hammering against the windows drown out Kallie’s ragged breaths. Her naked body is beautiful, and a pleasure to play with, but her as anything but a plaything reminds me of everything I don’t have.

  I want a girl who after I’ve fucked, I don’t want to leave. I’m kidding myself. There’s only one girl I want in my bed, every second of every day, and that’s Allison Miller.

  If she were mine, I’d be so fucking happy. I wouldn’t have a care in the world. Huxley has her, though, has her to the point she does everything he says, and he still isn’t happy. He has her hanging on his every whim, and it’s still not enough for him.

  “This is the third time we’ve been together. You know, some would say that makes us a thing.”

  How can her tits be so perfect, but the sound of her voice be so annoying? It truly doesn’t make sense.

  “Some are stupid. We’ve had sex three times, that means we’ve had sex three times. Nothing more, nothing less.”

  “Don’t you like me?”

  I can’t be bothered with this shit. I can’t be fucked to look at her or listen to the crap that comes from her mouth. I’m so fucking tired of everything.

  “You should go home,” I say, throwing my legs over the edge of the bed.

  “You didn’t answer me,” she continues, unmoving.

  “Because I don’t need to. If I didn’t like you, you wouldn’t be here. If I liked you a lot, you’d be here till morning. But I have things to do, and I like you like I like school. I can take it or leave it; it doesn’t bother me. So get dressed.”

  Huffing and puffing, she climbs out of my bed and starts to get dressed. She was a distraction, and she’s served her purpose for tonight.

  “Don’t forget you brought me here, dickhead. You’ll have to take me home.”

  For fuck’s sake.

  “I’ll call you a cab.”

  “No one will be out in this weather. You’re crazy.”

  I massage my temples. She’s giving me a headache. I’m about to curse her out when my phone rings and saves me from her tinny tones.

  Huxley’s name appears on the screen, and I answer it before the second chime.

  “What’s up?”

  “Ally’s broken down on Cove Corner. Can you go and pick her up?”

  “Why can’t you do it?”

  “I’m stuck at this dinner thing my mom dragged me to. Everyone’s fretting about this storm, and none of the drivers are leaving until it calms down.”

  I know what dinner gala he’s at, my parents are there too, which means I won’t have to put up with my mom’s incessant need to worm herself into my life tonight.

  “Please, I don’t want her out there on her own.”

  “Yeah, yeah, sure. I will.”

  When he has what he wants, he hangs up and I throw on my jeans and the hoodie I ripped off when Kallie and I got here.

  “I guess it’s your lucky night. Come on, I’ll drive you home.”

  She rolls her eyes at me and grabs her bag from the floor by the door.

  “Do you even know where I live?”

  Sighing, I finally look at her, and all I see is that she’s not Allison.

  “I’m sure you can tell me.”

  In less than five minutes, we’re in the car and I’m peeling out of my drive. Rain assaults the window screen like battle drums, and it puts me in a trance. I do my best to stay at a distance from Allison, and now I’m driving to her—to save her, to be her saviour, and none of it will matter to her.

  I drop Kallie off without so much as a goodbye from her and speed up the road before she can make it into her house.

  Cove Corner is the last road to be modernised in Bailey Cove, and I think it had something to do with Huxley’s parents wanting
the mansion kept in the darkness on the cliff. It’s protection for their mad shit.

  I slow down as the corner approaches and tusk when I spot her car, sitting in darkness. She should have her hazards on. Better still, she should be at home and out of this storm.

  Parking up behind her, I don’t bother with the umbrella, as it’d be no use out in this storm. I make a run for her and throw open her door. She yelps in surprise and relaxes when she sees me.

  “Why on earth are you out in this weather?” I snap at her.

  “Huxley wants me to meet him at his place.”

  In other words, he wouldn’t take no for an answer, because what he wants, he gets.

  “He shouldn’t have asked you to come out tonight.”

  “Well, he did. Are you here to fix my car? I think I’ve ran out of gas.”

  “Fucking hell, Ally. How many times has Hux told you to check your tank before going anywhere?”

  “Hux tells me a lot of things,” she sighs and takes the keys out of the ignition.

  “Come on, I’ll take you to Bailey mansion.” I hold my hand out for her, and the secret love I have for her intensifies at her touch.

  Most girls would fret over the rain, but Allison takes my hand, and as I help her out of her car, her head tilts back and she lets the raindrops beat against her face. She doesn’t shriek because her hair is wet. She doesn’t cry out because her designer clothes are being ruined. What she does do is smile.

  With her head thrown back and the beautiful smile on her face, she embraces the storm.

  If I could, I would push her up against the side of the car and kiss her like she needed me to survive. I’d willingly give her the air from my lungs just for one kiss. To feel her soft lips against mine…Fuck, I have to stop thinking this way. Sometimes I swear Hux can read minds, and if he heard the thoughts I have for his girlfriend, he’d kill me.

  “Come on, babe, let’s get you out of this rain.”

  “Do you think Huxley would ever purposefully be out here, letting the rain fall on him?”

  “You already know that answer.”

  The drive to Huxley’s is quiet, and I turn up the heat to stop her shivers. I have other ideas on how to warm her, but it’s not my place.