Vicious Hate (Westbrook Blues Book 2)

by Thandiwe Mpofu

And two, my mother is trying to keep Denise from saying anything further. Which probably means that she knows about it and now she’s trying to protect. . .Denise?

  “What the fuck?” I breathe out as I take everything in.

  My mother is supposed to be declaring hell over Denise! Not trying to keep her mouth shut!

  I mean, the bougie-bitch just told us that she killed George and my mother is in her face talking about how Denise has no idea what she’s about to do.

  What the fuck does that mean? Why are the boys just. . .standing there?

  What the hell is going on here?

  Something bad is about to happen tonight. . .something really bad. I can feel it in my core. But what can top the fact that Richard might not be my father. My mother is a whore who spreads her legs for money and power. My mother also might have sold me. And the realization that Ace’s mother ‘got rid’ of my brother. What can top that?

  I feel like I’m drowning in deep, murky waters and no one is extending a hand to help me out. They all just. . .stand there.

  Denise’s presence here lets me know that whatever it is, I am about to find out from Satan herself.

  “Star, I think you should go to the party with Noah.” Ace speaks then, stepping closer to me.

  I sharply turn and look at him like he’s just lost his mind. I almost want to melt at his sweet yet calloused touch, allow him to whisk me away from all this but I’m breaking and he can see it.

  But then again, he is also allowing the breaking.

  “What?” I gasp out in incredulous energy, while shaking off Noah’s hold on me. I know I’m repeating that question but I feel so damn lost, confused and fucking heartbroken right now, I don’t know what to do with myself. “Did you hear what your mother just said?”

  Or what my mother just said for that matter.

  Nobody wants us to be together. . .

  I know he sees the words that I don’t want to utter, in my eyes when his nose flares and his eyes harden.

  Yeah, fuck that.

  I see the violent answer in his eyes, those fucking eyes that rope me in each time. But just behind that confidence, I can see the uncertainty. I can feel it expanding between us.

  “Do something.” I speak, looking up at his towering form. “What does your mother mean?”

  My world is about to crumble right in front of me. And it’s happening whether I want it to or not.

  “Baby Blue. . .” Noah starts but I cut him off.

  “Let go of me!”

  I step away, almost tripping over my own feet with the sudden move. Noah reaches over to steady me but I avoid his touch and I would have landed on my ass if it weren’t for Kim who quickly steps forward and makes a grab for my elbow, stopping me from planting my face in the grass like a drunk sorority bitch.

  “Why are you just standing there like that?” My voice is barely above a whisper as I look from one boy to the other. Why are you standing there like the woman who murdered my brother, your best friend, did not just confess?

  Something is off here and whatever it is, it’s my worst nightmare realized. Only, I’m not privy to that nightmare.

  I look at Ace, but his stare is tense, cold, calculating and not giving anything away. It’s as if he also doesn’t want me to know what’s happening and he’s trying to figure out the best course of action.

  But I can see the battle in him at the same time, as if he does want me to finally know the truth, to hear it all out right her, right now. I’m so attuned to him so much so that I can feel the unease from him without even touching him.

  But why is it there?

  “Why aren’t you doing anything?” I almost cry as I look at him, trying to figure out what he’s thinking. My head is spinning, my heart is pounding and my palms are sweaty as fuck, I could water the entire football field.

  I look at Noah who can’t hold my gaze. Instead, he looks down, as if suddenly finding the blazed of grass so damn interesting. My perfectly trimmed eyebrows—thanks to Kim—rise so high, I swear they probably look like they have just touched my hairline. Noah never looks away no matter what he has done.

  Unless what he has done is be an accessory to murder. . .

  “Answer me. . .” I plead, turning around to look at Emmett.

  I almost start crying as our gazes connect and I look into his pale green eyes. God, he’s so gorgeous and secretive at the same time, I want to kick his ass and burst out crying in his arms at the same time.

  “Does Astraea know that she will be marrying Syrus’ son soon?”

  I quickly dismiss that thought, not allow t myself to even start thinking about that as I turn away from him only to be met by an icy gaze that watched the entire exchange but I ignore Ace as the immediate realization sinks in. I look up at the three boys.

  “You knew.” I gasp as I look at them, stepping away from them with the heavy realization. “Oh my God.”

  I almost break right then as the guilt glitters in Noah’s eyes.

  “Baby Blue, it’s not what you think. . .”

  “Don’t you dare tell me what I fucking think.” I almost scream, but even the pitch of my voice is pathetic, clogged by the confusion and the pain that has suddenly flooded my system.

  “Rumor has it that the Blue Boys killed your twin brother. . .”

  Kim’s words from what seems like forever ago come rushing into me, through me and around me. Casting me into this frenzied haze of. . .devastation.

  It’s funny how you are told the truth right from the start—hell, the evidence was all over the place, but I chose to ignore it. Trusting instead in the blind faith I had for the three boys I grew up with. Boys that held my soul within their grasps.

  But all along, they knew who murdered my brother and they never said a word.

  I look over at Ace but his jaw is clenched. He doesn’t say a single word. But his gaze? It never leaves my face. Not once. He literally watches me break and splinter but never says a damn thing.

  And why would he? He would always choose his mother over me any day. No one can fight that bond, not even me. I know that better than anyone.

  “You knew that your mother killed my brother!” I scream at him, my voice carrying into the night.

  I can feel treacherous tears fall down my cheeks, my gaze locked onto Ace, my heart pounding with the speed of lightning. I start trembling, feeling like at any moment now, I’m the one who is going to be struck by lightning.

  Devastation comes in many forms. Including the sour taste and the painful feel of betrayal and lies.

  Betrayal and lies that come from the people who you would least expect it from. That’s where pure devastation destroys people, friendships, families and even generations.

  When you trust so blindly, that knife plunges into your side and is twisted differently than when it’s your back. That devastation has aftershocks like nothing else in the world.

  And in the eyes of this boy who I gave my heart, my soul and my everything so many years ago, I can see him breaking with me.

  What are you keeping from me, Ace?

  Because none of this makes any sense!

  Our gazes are locked but there is a message in those eyes. I watch as if transfixed by it. It’s like, he’s begging me to trust him.

  But how can I?

  “What?” Denise shouts behind us. I turn around as soon as Denise’s shouted question reaches my ears. “You think I got rid of your brother?” She questions with an affronted lilt to her words.

  I watch her, taking her in from head to toe and I can feel my armor coming on piece by agonizing piece. If there is one thing I am familiar with—and can wield so perfectly—it's the art of war.

  And for my brother, I will go to war for him. Ace’s mother or not, fury caresses my lips, my palms and my heart until all I feel is the need to do irreparable damage to her Botox configured face.

  “Well didn’t you?” My voice is stern, hard and so damn angry. I can feel the fury in me. I can feel the anger ris
ing in me as I look at Denise’s pinched expression. How dare she look confused by what she just confessed to doing?

  “Child that is not what I said!”

  “I am not your child and you better start explaining the bullshit that just came out of your mouth before you eat shit.” I seethe, feeling my fists ball up. Ready for anything that may come my way now since it looks like I’m fighting this thing by myself.

  I can feel my world breaking and I’m going down. But I won’t go before I do some damage.

  I don’t even bother looking at Ace. I won’t even confront the pain that I feel right now. Pain that he caused. Again.

  “Eat shit? You have one hell of a mouth on you. Guess we all know where it comes from.” Denise taunts, with a beautiful smile on her face.

  “You would recognize trash talk now, wouldn’t you?” Kim says as she stands side by side with me. I look over at her and she reaches over and holds my hand, giving it a squeeze meanwhile staring at Denise with a hard glint in her eye.

  I almost sink with relief. I didn’t know I needed some semblance of support until this second. It dawns on me that the support system that I thought I had, betrayed me yet again.

  They did kill my brother after all. . . why was I so stupid? Why was I so easily swayed by their stupid charms?

  “Who on earth are you?”

  “Someone who will make you eat your own shit if you don’t start talking right this instant.” I speak up, my spine straightening.

  If Denise wants to fight, I think I’ve got enough of that in my system right now to take her on. And I know Kim will be down for whatever.

  “Yeah, what she said.” Kim echoes.

  My mother is crying hysterically and is now sitting on the grass, with her delicate hands covering her face. It looks like her attempts to stop Denise were useless and futile.

  Denise cocks her head to the left as if to study Kim but doesn’t say anything. Like, she really takes her time to study Kim, eyes narrowed and everything.

  “Mother.” Ace’s tone is cold, distant as he reprimands his mother.

  Look at that! Lightning must have struck somewhere in the world as Ace steps forward from where his feet must have been frozen in place. He glances at me briefly and then proceeds to step closer to his mother. Everyone stills around us. Noah sighs because we all recognize that tenor of his voice.

  In this moment, Ace might just be the most dangerous person in the empty stadium, hell even in the entire county. His eyes are trained steadily on his mother but what he says next floors me.

  “You will keep your damn mouth shut right this instant. It’s not your place.”

  What the actual fuck is happening right now? Of all the things I expected to come out of his mouth. . .

  This doesn’t make any sense. What’s going on? Why would Denise King confess to getting rid of my brother in the first place? In all intents and purposes, the bitch is too smart to confess to any of her crimes, let alone murder.

  Does that mean something else is going on?

  I watch as Denise looks up and her gaze softens as she looks at her son. She actually mellows as Ace steps closer but I’m not a fool, I can see the calculating gleam in her blue eyes from where I’m standing.

  The bitch just fucking said she didn’t say she killed George. Is she mentally unstable too? I wouldn’t put it past her, something about those frosty eyes of hers. . .

  “Oh, Alexander my baby, she deserves to know. The truth always comes out.” Denise’s voice is back to its sugary softness that makes my stomach swoosh and rumble. I’m going to throw up.

  “It’s still not your place.”

  “What exactly isn’t her place?” I step forward then, agitated despite myself by everything that is going on around me. I have no idea where my father—no—where Richard is.

  “I mean, her nose has always been in my business and she clearly knows something I don’t. So why don’t you and your lying ass shut the hell up and let your mother speak.” I grit out the words, watching Ace’s eye frost even further.

  Yeah, that hate is back. Not so bubbly after all, are we?

  My heart twists painfully.

  “Astraea dear.”

  “Cut to the chase bitch!” I seethe as I look at her now. I swear, fire drips from my fingertips as I continue stepping closer to her. I feel like a damn panther that will spring on her at any second now. And I don’t fucking care how that makes me look. I’ll tear her up into millions of unrecognizable pieces, even if she is Ace’s mother.

  But after what she did to her own son, I think I’ll need a medal of honor for my handy work.

  “I don’t think there is any easy way to hear this, dear. Especially after finding out the kind of loose genes you come from. . .”

  Kim gasps behind me. My own mouth falls open.

  “But what I meant is.” She continues on like she didn’t just insult me and my mother at the same time. My mother, who is a pile of nothing on the grass.

  “All this time I spent wondering if you knew that you and George were not the only children that Amanda had.”

  Heartbeat.

  Heartbeat.

  Heartbeat.

  “What do you mean by that? We don’t have any siblings.” I gasp out the words, but the pounding of my heart says otherwise.

  “Mrs. King, with all due respect. . .” Noah starts.

  “You can keep your respect and shove it back into your lying mouth Noah.” Denise cuts him off without even looking at him. Her sights and her proverbial claws are all aimed at me right now. And something tells me she is about to sink into me and rip me apart.

  “Unfortunately, little girl, I can see in your eyes that you are not certain about that yourself.” She smiles then but there is nothing soothing about it.

  “You see, you and your dear brother, may his dear soul rest in peace, were not born as twins.”

  My heart pounds in my chest. I don’t think I’m breathing at all. My entire body starts shaking. I’m trembling from head to toe. Here it is, the final act of ripping me apart.

  “What does that. . .mean?” I’m stammering. I can’t see anyone else right now. All I can see is Denise King and the faux sympathetic smile on her face.

  “Denise if you know what’s good for you and the hell I can bring, you will shut your mouth right this instant.” My mother cries out then, waving a shaky finger in Denise’s direction but she only smiles.

  “You see, once upon a time, Amanda was pregnant! No one knows apart from her of course who she got pregnant by but I think it was that ugly mechanic.”

  She turns to look at my mother then, tapping her chin like she is really pondering over it, with a smile on her face. “Was it Bob, Amanda? Or wait, it was that boy from that band that was just passing through town?” She taunts.

  How does she know any of this? Is this even true? Did Denise have my mother investigated? Is there truth to the matter that Richard is NOT my biological father?

  “Stop. . .” I breathe out but Denise doesn’t care as she shakes her head, looking at me.

  “You see, your dearest mother wasn’t just pregnant, although I think you should know that the first two years of you and your brother’s lives were spent in a home or was it an orphanage, not sure what they call them nowadays. . .”

  “What?!”

  “Denise, I swear to God. . .” Ace says at the same time as I utter a broken, plea veiled as a question.

  “Alexander dear, the truth will set her free.” Denise says but I’m frozen in place. “She didn’t tell you that obviously and I doubt you remember anything but your mother actually gave birth to triplets!”

  She claps her hands in glee.

  “Two bouncing baby girls and a boy that held both of those girls’ hands when they were born. How sweet!”

  Silence.

  Sometimes lightning does strike in silence, but the results are more devastating, I think.

  Devastation. . .

  Oh my fucking gosh.
r />   “You are a damn liar!” I scream but she only laughs.

  “Come on Raea, let’s go.” This is from Emmett.

  I have no idea when he came close to me but I shake off his hold as tears continue streaming down my face. I feel like I can’t breathe at all.

  “Aww, did she not tell you?” Denise mocks then turns around to look at my mother. “Amanda you didn’t tell your daughter that you gave birth to triplets?”

  My mother doesn’t say a damn thing.

  “You didn’t tell your kids that you had two daughters and one son.” Denise goes on and I stagger back, as if I’ve just been struck clear across my face by her words.

  No. . .

  “You didn’t tell them that you had me get rid of one of those girls now, did you?” She goes on, as if she is enjoying this. I think she is.

  “You didn’t tell your boy and Astraea here that you only went back to the home for them just to pin the kids on Richard so you would both have a glamourous life in Westbrook Blues?”

  ♥

  I feel it coming before I can say anything or respond.

  It’s coming and I don’t know what to do about it, but let it go.

  “Emmett, let her go!” Ace shouts.

  But it’s a split second too late. I double over and right there, on the sideline of the beautifully manicured and maintained football field, my mouth opens automatically and I vomit my guts out.

  It feels like I’m about to die as everything I have in my stomach and everything that I don’t, comes rushing out of my mouth.

  It’s painful but I keep going like I’m vomiting everything I have ever had in my entire life. I feel light-headed, tears continue falling down my cheeks but I can’t help but keep going.

  Denise’s words are ringing through my ears, making me retch more.

  “Raea, are you okay?” I can hear voices around me but I can’t respond in any way as another torrent attacks me, pressing down on my stomach until I have no choice but to open my mouth again and let go.

  “Astraea!” Someone shouts behind me but I have no bearing as to who it might be, because nothing matters anymore. Nothing makes sense.

  I close my eyes and I can see my brother.