“That’s a good idea. Take some ibuprofen for the pain, and keep icing that eye every few hours to help with the swelling, okay?”
“Okay, thank you, Leah. Truly, thank you.” She didn’t have to help me, but still, she did. That meant more to me than she’d ever know.
“Of course.” She stood from my bed and gave me a smile. “And if you ever need some girl time, let me know. Hanging around these boys on the ranch would drive me mad. I’m always around visiting the horses anyway, so maybe some days we can grab lunch or something.”
I gave her a true, genuine smile. “I’d love that.”
“Rest, Hazel. I hope you’re feeling better soon. And whatever you do, don’t let the asshole who did this to you get away with it.”
After Leah left, I locked the bathroom door as tears rolled down my cheeks from the pain shooting through me. The more time that passed, the more the punch to the face began to ache. The right side of my face was swollen and turning black and blue as each second passed. I looked like Mama, and that broke my heart so much.
Charlie had never laid a hand on me before . . . he’d never crossed that line because Mama would always take the hits for me. Now, I knew how she felt, what she’d been going through, the struggles she’d had.
The aching in my chest wasn’t solely for me—it was for Mama. I wanted to get her out of there. I needed to get her away from that psychopath. Who knew what kind of lies he was poisoning her with? What kind of drugs he was pumping into her without her even knowing? Charlie was desperate to control people, and Mama made it so easy for him to reign over her, because she was too weak and scared to fight back.
That night, I couldn’t think straight, because I was too fearful of what was going to happen with Mama. I stayed in my bedroom, not wanting Ian to see me in my current state. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, and I couldn’t stop crying. I kept thinking about how I had to get Mama out of that terrible situation, away from Charlie—or at least get Charlie away from her. I knew enough about Charlie from both Garrett and Mama to be able to set him up somehow. I could get him in enough trouble that he couldn’t pull Mama down anymore. I didn’t know exactly if my plan would work—but I knew I had to try. Otherwise, not only would Mama lose the child she was carrying, but she’d lose her own life too.
So, late in the night, I picked up Ian’s house phone, and I called the police station.
“Eres Police. How can I direct your call?” a tired voice said through the line.
“Hi, yes, I’d like to leave an anonymous tip for a big drug trade that will be happening over the next few days.”
The voice lowered on the other end of the line. “Connor, is that you? Are you pranking me again?”
“What? No. I really have a tip.”
“Ookay,” the person said, unbelievingly. “Out with it. What’s the tip?”
“Once a month, Charlie Riley distributes his supplies to his men to take out to other towns. It happens right on the outskirts of Eres, at the old laundromat on Wood Street and Timber Avenue. It takes place around two in the morning, and it should be happening two days from now.”
I was thankful for Garrett getting high enough to spill those beans to me all that time ago about where Charlie’s supply came in and went out. He’d been so giddy about his uncle giving him more lead in the family “business” that he’d gotten drunk and high and told me all about it during one of his video game binges.
“And how do you know this?”
“Trust me, I just do.”
“Yeah, okay, Connor, we’ll look into it.”
“I’m not Connor!” I argued, brushing my hand against my face. Did I really sound like a boy? What the heck? “Look, just trust me on this one. The laundromat is where Charlie’s deals go through. You’ll find everything you need there. Make sure you take backup too.”
“Okay. Is that all?”
“Yes.” I bit my bottom lip as my stomach flipped and turned. “That’s all.”
“Okay. Laundromat. Wood and Timber. Charlie Riley. Bad drugs. Got it. Good night, Connor.”
The phone clicked, and I took a deep breath as my panic began to settle, and I thought about how things would be different for Mama in two days. In two days, she wouldn’t have to escape Charlie’s hand. In two days, he’d be dragged away on his own.
She wouldn’t have to try to run from him ever again.
This time, we’d win.
Ten Years Ago
“Come on, Hazel, hurry up. Just grab a few things,” Mama ordered as she pulled me from my bed. She had a suitcase sitting on my bed and was slinging some of my clothes into it.
The sky was still dark as I yawned. “What’s going on, Mama?” The sun wasn’t even awake yet, so I didn’t understand why I was.
“We’re leaving, sweetheart. We’re getting the hell out of here, okay?” Her voice was so low, and she moved on her tiptoes, as if not wanting anyone to hear her sounds.
I knew it was because of Charlie.
Mama always whispered when she didn’t want Charlie to hear her.
“Now come on, and be as quiet as you can, okay?” she asked.
“We’re really going?” I asked, my voice timid.
Mama had talked about leaving Charlie before, but we’d never really packed our bags to go. I’d started to believe we’d always be under Charlie’s control, no matter how much we wanted to go. He was mean to Mama, and I didn’t like how he made her cry.
“Yes, honey, really. Now, grab anything you need, because we aren’t coming back.”
“Never?”
She bent down in front of me and combed the hair away from my face. She had tears in her eyes, and that made me sad. I hated when Mama cried, and she cried too much lately. “Never ever, baby. This is it. We are getting away and never looking back at this town. Okay? Just you and me. Just the two of us.”
I grabbed my stuffed animal on my bed and hugged it close to me as I put my free hand into Mama’s. “Okay.”
“Ready?” she asked.
“Ready,” I replied.
I’d been ready for so long that I couldn’t help but smile at the thought of running away with Mama.
“Just the two of us,” I murmured to myself as I walked off with Mama holding my hand.
That was all I’d ever wanted.
“Are you crying because you’re sad?”
“No, honey. These are happy tears.”
Happy tears.
I didn’t know people could cry when they were happy.
When I found that out, I started crying too.
9
IAN
“Are you boneheads done rehearsing? If so, I can give you a lift home, James,” Leah said, walking into the barn house with the same smile that was always plastered against her face.
“You can give me a ride home? Didn’t you take my car today?” James asked. “Therefore, wouldn’t it be me giving you a ride home?”
“Potato patahto. Come on. I need to binge You on Netflix and stuff my face with popcorn.” She waved to me and the other guys. “You guys are sounding pretty good.”
Eric nodded. “We could sound better. Are you following us on all social media platforms, Leah? We’d really love the support.” Eric was like a social media hustler—always after that next like and follow.
“Sure am.” Leah beamed and walked in my direction. She stuffed her hands into her shorts pockets and swayed back and forth in her flip-flops. “Hey, Ian. How’s living with Hazel going?”
I shrugged. “We don’t really cross paths that much.”
“I graduated with her. She’s a really cool person. Quiet, but nice. You know, I think she’s pretty interesting once you get to know her. She was always really smart in school too. I bet she gets lonely sometimes.”
My eyebrow arched at the overly sweet Leah. I knew she was getting at something; therefore, I wished she’d just spit it out. “What are you trying to get at, Leah?”
She smiled bright as always and shr
ugged. “I’m just saying—it wouldn’t kill you to get to know her. She’s been through a lot of terrible things. It would be nice if she had someone nice to talk to sometimes.”
“I’m not a nice person,” I told her.
She rolled her eyes in the most dramatic fashion and patted me on the back. “Yeah, okay, Ian, and I’m not addicted to the Kardashians. Don’t think for a second I forgot who showed up for two weeks straight to play tic-tac-toe with my grandma when she was in the hospital after breaking her hip.”
“What can I say? I’m a sucker for tic-tac-toe.”
“Just be nice to her, dumbo. I get the feeling she could use a friend.”
“Then you be her friend.”
“That’s in the works, but for the time being, she needs a roommate friend. Someone who’s around her enough to crack open her shell.”
I grimaced, still unsure, and Leah gave me yet another dramatic eye roll.
“Fine! Be a jerk, but just be a lesser jerk, okay? Stop being so hard on her around the ranch.”
“I’m hard on everyone around the ranch,” I muttered, a touch annoyed by what Leah was getting at. I treated everyone the same around these parts, and I didn’t like how she made it seem as if I came down harder on Hazel than any of the other ranch hands.
Leah sighed, growing tired of my responses the same way I was growing tired of hers. “Whatever, Ian. You treat Hazel worse than the others. I’ve seen the way you boss her around when she’s probably one of the hardest workers at this place. I mean, hell, she puts in more work than my bozo brother.”
“Hey, leave me out of this!” James shot out as he packed up his things. “But she’s not wrong. Hazel is a damn good worker, and you do sometimes come down hard on her.”
Well, there was nothing as grand as being tag teamed by the Scout siblings. The shitty thing about it was that they were two of the nicest people around. So if they had issues with the way I was treating Hazel, they were probably spot on about it. True, my judgments based on Charlie might’ve affected the way I’d treated Hazel at the ranch, and having Leah and James point that fact out to me made me feel like a big ass. I’d do my best to keep it in mind to take it a little easier on Hazel.
Which meant I had to remind myself repeatedly that she wasn’t the same type of person that Charlie was simply because she’d been raised by the devil himself.
“You should take it easy today. It’s too hot out to be working that hard,” I warned Hazel the following day as she was shoveling hay into the back of a pickup truck. The temperature was nearing one hundred degrees, and she was dressed in her usual all-black outfit, with her long sleeves. It was too damn hot for that type of wardrobe, especially when Hazel was working directly in the sun. She even had a hoodie on, with the hood up like a madwoman.
“It’s fine. I got this,” she muttered, her voice low as she shoveled the hay. She hadn’t said much over the past few hours, which was odd. Normally, she’d have a rude, sarcastic comment to make toward me, but there was none to be heard.
She hadn’t even mocked me the previous night about me burning dinner. Come to think of it, I hadn’t even seen her at the house. Her bedroom door was closed, and even though I heard her moving around, she didn’t step foot outside. When I woke in the morning, she was already off to work on the ranch.
“Don’t tell me you’re still pissy about me not wanting to open up to you about my feelings and crap that other morning?”
“Contrary to popular belief, not everything is about you, Ian Parker,” she snapped.
I should’ve left it—and her bad attitude—at that. Still, watching that sun beat down on her was making me dizzy. Shit, I was seconds away from passing out for her.
“Come on, darling. Don’t be stupid. Heatstroke is a real thing.” I called her “darling” to try to get under her skin, and she didn’t react whatsoever. Damn. What was with that girl?
She pulled on the edges of her hood and cleared her throat before going back to work. “It’s fine. I’m good.”
“At least head to the pigpens. I’ll even help you in there. Or take a water break. It’s too—”
“I said I’m fine!” she finally snapped.
The moment she turned toward me, my chest tightened. Her eyes were bloodshot red, as if she’d been crying for the past forever hours, and she was wearing pounds and pounds of makeup. Sure, she wore makeup on the regular, but she currently looked like she was auditioning for RuPaul’s Drag Race.
I didn’t even know why, but seeing that level of sadness in her eyes broke my cold fucking heart. “What’s wrong?” I hammered.
She shook her head as tears proceeded to dance down her cheeks. “Nothing. I’m fine.”
“You’re lying.”
“Drop it, Ian.”
“Can’t, darling.”
She parted her lips to maybe sass me, which would’ve made me feel a little bit better about her current state. If she had enough in her to sass me, then she wasn’t too far away from her regular annoying self.
But instead of her speaking, her eyes crossed, and she dropped the pitchfork in her grip. As it fell to the ground, I watched her body waver back and forth.
Fuck.
She was going to pass out.
Her eyes began to roll back in her head, and I rushed over to her, catching her just in time before she crashed. She passed out in my arms, her body going limp against me. I lifted her up and hurried off in the direction of the house and kept repeating the same words over and over.
“I got you, darling,” I muttered. “I got you.”
The moment we made it to the house, Hazel was coming to, and I hurriedly tossed her into the shower and ran cold water over her body. The sensation of the chill woke her up quickly as she squeaked in horror.
“Oh my gosh, that’s cold!” she cried out, shivering from the ice droplets hitting her body. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms as she sat in the tub.
“Good,” I grumbled. “I told you it was too damn hot to be out there in that sun.”
She reached forward to shut off the water and shivered. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not. You need some electrolytes to recover from the heat. I have some sports drinks in the fridge. Here’s a towel to dry off.” I grabbed the closest one on the hook and held it out to her. She quickly began wiping the water from her face, and with the water went her makeup.
“What the fuck happened to your face?” I barked out, horrified by the bruises that were revealed as she removed the makeup.
Her eyes widened, and she turned away from me. “It’s nothing.”
I placed my hands on her shoulders and turned her back to face me. “Bullshit. That’s not nothing. It looks like someone fucking punched you in the damn face.”
The way her eyes watered made me realize that was exactly what had happened.
Holy shit.
Someone had punched her in the damn face.
“Who did this to you?” I asked, my voice tight with anger. I didn’t even know who the hell I was mad at, but I was pissed. “Was it a man?”
She nodded slowly.
“Tell me who,” I ordered.
The tears began falling faster than ever down her cheeks as she shook her head back and forth. “It’s okay. I’m figuring it out.” She went to get to her feet and stumbled a bit, still off balance, and I caught her in my arms. She gave me a broken smile. “You’re good at that.”
“At what?”
“Catching me.”
“Well, it would be best if you’d stop falling.”
“Trust me”—she released a weighted breath—“I’m trying.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, because it sounded so damn heartbreaking. I wanted sarcastic and rude Hazel Stone back. The sad one made me want to cry right alongside her.
“What can I do for you?” I asked, my voice cracking as I stared at her swollen eye. What kind of asshole laid his hands on a woman? What type of weak bastard would do such a fucked-up
thing? I knew who—my father. I remembered watching him attack my mother in his drunken rage when I was a kid. I remembered Mom’s bruises and how she’d tried to hide them with makeup—the same way Hazel had done.
I wanted to kill him.
I didn’t even know who he was, but I wanted blood.
Hazel tried her best to keep smiling through her pain. “Well, first, sports drink,” she said. “And then tonight, vodka.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Aren’t you too young to be drinking?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “But I had a pretty bad day.”
Well, okay then.
Vodka it was. After the sports drink.
If there was an award for the world’s biggest lightweight, it would go to Hazel. She’d taken three shots under my watch, along with a mixed drink, and was dancing around in circles in the living room. She hummed a tune that I couldn’t quite place, but somehow it sounded perfect.
“Why don’t you drink too?” she asked me, raising an eyebrow as she plopped down on the sofa.
“I’m not feeling up to drinking tonight.”
“What? Of course you’re feeling up to drinking tonight. Everyone should be feeling up to drinking every night. Drinking is fun,” she exclaimed.
I sat on the opposite side of the sofa. “And how many times have you drank?”
“Oh, psh.” She puckered her lips and blew out a heavy breath. “Counting today?”
“Uh-huh.”
She held two fingers up, and then she studied her fingers with a dumbfounded stare. Then she dropped one finger. I couldn’t help but snicker, because she left her middle finger up without even knowing.
Hazel Stone was officially partaking in her first ever drinking display, and she was officially shit faced.
“You know what I miss?” she asked, rubbing the back of her hand against her mouth.
“What’s that?”
“The shed.”
I laughed. “Am I that bad of a roommate that you’d rather live in a shed?”
“No.” She giggled, and it sounded kind of beautiful. “I just mean I miss looking up through the ceiling at the stars and sky. I love the stars and moon. It makes me realize that there’s so much more than my problems out there.”
The Wreckage of Us Page 9