by Mia Storm
After an endless minute, Nate climbs off me. Sharp needles begin to prick my legs with the return of blood flow. White hot pain cuts through my hips and back as I roll on my side, away from him, but I swallow the gasp. I listen to him pull on his clothes and pray sincerely to God for the mattress to open up and swallow me.
I flinch a minute later when he leans down and kisses my cheek. “Love you, baby girl.” Then the door clicks closed.
I sob into my pillow until yellow light breaks through my curtains hours later.
∞
Nate and Marcus are downstairs. I don’t even know what time it is, but I’ve been laying here listening to them for what feels like hours. Every time I hear Nate’s voice, all my insides pull tight and my lungs feel like they’re being crushed again.
I’m never leaving this room.
Excited shouts erupt from downstairs. A second later, Marcus is banging on my door, calling my name. I pull the sheets over my head when the door is thrown open.
“You’re on the fucking news!” he shouts. “They’re bleeping the shit out of you! You gotta see this.”
I roll toward the window and bunch the pillow under my head. “I was there, so I think I’m good.”
He yanks me to my feet. “My sister’s fucking famous.”
A dagger shoots through my right hip with the motion and I cry out with the pain.
“You okay?” he asks, his eyes scanning me with sudden concern.
No. I look at him a long moment, wanting so badly to say it, but I can’t make my mouth form the word. Marcus wasn’t as understanding as my mother when everything with Caiden came to light. He wanted to kill Caiden. I got pissed at him for doing the same thing everyone else has been doing—judging Caiden based on things that have nothing to do with how we are together. Marcus was the person who understood me better than anyone else—the one person I was sure would be there to lean on. And he wasn’t. Things have been strained between us for the last couple of weeks. How much worse would it get if he knew I’ve been fucking Nate?
“It was just a rough night,” is what comes out when I finally open my mouth.
He bites his lips in a self-conscious gesture. “What you fucking did up there…it was brilliant, Blaire.” He squints a question at me. “You really loved that Caiden guy?”
A tear slips over my lashes. “I still do.”
He scratches the top of his head. “It’s just really hard for me to think about some fucking guy doing…that to you.” Finally, his eyes lift to mine. “We’re all dicks, Blaire. We don’t even need to like you to fuck you. I just don’t want some guy taking advantage of you.” He shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter how old he is. Doesn’t matter who he is. I’d want to fucking kill the guy.”
He spreads his arms and I step into them.
“What the hell are you wearing?” he asks after a second.
“I was cold,” I say, my hands bunching into the layers of cotton and fleece at my hips. I got up during the night and pulled on four layers of sweatpants and three sweatshirts.
He grins and throws me over his shoulder. I gasp with the pain in my hip but bite back the scream. “You’ve got to come see yourself. We TiVoed it.”
Marcus carries me down the stairs and sets me on my feet. Nate is on the floor with a throw pillow bunched behind his head. I nearly turn around when sends me his dimpled grin. Marcus sprawls himself over the sofa and yanks me down to sit on his stomach, then picks up the remote.
“Back it up, dude,” Nate says.
“What the fuck do you think I’m doing?” Marcus shoots back as the footage of me at the graduation mic speeds by in reverse.
He hits play and I get to watch myself tell the world off. It only makes me feel sicker when Nate winks at me.
“Where are Mom and Dad?” I ask when Marcus and Nate finally stop with the commentary several minutes later.
Marcus shrugs. “Fuck if I know. They were gone when we got up.” He slides me off him and peels himself out of the sofa. “I’m gonna hit the shower.” He crumples an empty Coke can and chucks it at Nate. “You heading home, dude?”
Nate pelts the can back at Marcus and drags himself off the floor. “Yeah. We partying tonight?”
“Always,” Marcus says, striding for the stairs. “Catch you later.”
I go to the kitchen without looking at Nate, because I’ve suddenly broken out in a cold sweat despite my layers of clothing. I hope he’ll take the hint and leave, but he follows me into the kitchen.
My whole body seizes when he leans in behind me, where I’m hiding in the refrigerator. “I was thinking…maybe we should come clean with Marcus.”
A cold stone fist squeezes my stomach and I swallow back bile. I feel my hands start to shake. I wrap them around my middle and clench them into my sweats. “Come clean?”
If he tells my brother he raped me, I don’t even want to think about what Marcus would do.
He pulls himself up to sit on the counter. “I think we should date, baby girl. Make it official.”
“How much did you drink last night?” I ask, pulling a blueberry yogurt off the shelf and closing the fridge.
He grins. “You missed a crazy fucking graduation party, that’s for sure, but I’m serious. I like you. We’re good together. And if fucking Marcus can’t get over himself and be good with that, then fuck him.”
I look more closely at him as I move behind the table with my yogurt, putting an obstacle between us. There’s no hint of humor in his eyes.
I stir my yogurt but when I bring the spoon to my mouth the thought of putting anything in there makes me gag. “I’m serious, Nate,” I say, staring at the spoon. “I need to know how drunk you were when you came into my room last night.”
His dimples pop as a slow smile curves his lips. “Not so drunk that I don’t remember how you rocked my fucking world.”
A tear slips over my lashes and courses a crooked path down my cheek. “I didn’t want to have sex with you last night, Nate. I said no.”
The smile falls off his face and his eyes widen. “You said yes. I definitely remember that.”
“I was mostly asleep when I said that.” I lower the spoon and scrub the back of my hand over my face. “But when I woke up, I said no. I asked you to stop. I tried to push you away.”
I stiffen as he slips off the counter and lowers himself into the chair across from me. “Baby girl, I’d never hurt you. I…didn’t hear. I swear.”
I flinch when he reaches for my arm.
“Fuck,” he growls under his breath. I lift my head when I see him stand and pace toward the family room. “You don’t know what it was like, hearing what that cocksucker did to you. I want to rip his fucking dick off for fucking with you.”
A cold shiver fingers up my spine with the realization that this is what last night was about. Nate didn’t like that I fucked someone else.
“He didn’t fuck with me. I wanted to sleep with him.” I spin on Nate, suddenly finding a small reservoir of strength hidden inside the memory of how Caiden made me feel. “He didn’t rape me. You did.”
He lowers his eyes and rubs them. “I don’t even know what else to say, except I’m serious, Blaire.” He lifts his gaze to mine again, and I’m not sure what I see there. Remorse? Or just fear. “I really like you. I’ve never felt like this about anyone else. Just give me a chance to make it up to you, okay? We can slow way down. No sex. We can just hang out…spend some time together. Do normal shit, movies and whatever.”
I feel my body go weak and start to shake as the little bit of strength I found evaporates. I go to the family room and sink into the sofa before my legs give out, curling into a ball in the corner and pulling my knees up, resting my forehead on them.
I can’t begin to decipher what I’m feeling. He raped me, but it’s Nate. My Nate. He was drunk. Maybe he really didn’t hear me.
“I promise, Blaire,” he says, from the doorway to the kitchen. “I won’t touch you again until you ask me to. Okay?�
��
I feel myself nodding against my knees, though it’s not a conscious gesture.
“Listen…I’m gonna go. Give you some space.”
I stiffen as I see him in my peripheral vision, moving slowly closer, as if approaching a skittish animal. I work hard not to flinch again as he leans down and kisses the back of my head. “I’m sorry,” he whispers in my ear.
Then he’s gone.
Chapter 20
Caiden
Jail really isn’t much like they make it out to be in the movies. There are no three hundred pound guys with bandanas and tattoos who want to make me their prison bitch, the guards seem like pretty regular guys, and I don’t see much of a “black market” other than an old man who trades desserts for cigarettes that he keeps down his pants. Maybe it’s because I’m in county instead of the state penitentiary, but it isn’t all that bad. Rent’s free, so there’s that. The gym, where I spend most of my day, is decent and there’s no monthly fee. The food’s horrible, but so was most of what I cooked for myself, so I can’t complain on that front.
Most everyone keeps their heads down, minds their own business, and does their time. But there are two guys on my block who have an issue with me, apparently. The bigger one is about my height and has a few pounds on me, but he’s not as cut as Jones. He’s got a beer gut and looks soft, so I’m pretty sure I could take him if push came to shove. The little one is maybe five seven and wiry. I could snap him like a toothpick. I call the little one Hans and the big one Franz because they watch me in the gym, though I’ve never once seen either of them lift a weight. Every time I walk within earshot, they grab their dicks and mutter things about fucking babies up the ass. I figure if I can steer clear for two more weeks, they’re someone else’s problem.
The buzzer sounds, waking us for another day. I wait for everyone to stream down the block to the cafeteria before I drag myself out of bed and grab my shower stuff. When I step into the bathroom, for once, there’s no line. Three of the five shower stalls are taken, so I slip into the empty one on the far end. The guy next to me has a speaker in the shower with him, playing some loud, angry music that seems to vibrate at the resonance of my rage. I strip off my jumpsuit and hang it on the hook on the wall outside the curtain, then step into the water. I crank it hotter and just stand here with my hands braced against the tile wall, feeling the vibration of the music sink into my bones and letting all the shit slide off me and swirl down the drain.
In two weeks I go back out into a world where I have no place. All I’ve got that are in any way useful are my car and a Masters degree in comparative literature that I earned two years ago on my way to my doctorate. I’m sure Dr. Duncan would strip me of it he could, but the best he can do now is keep me from finishing my Ph.D. My dissertation is complete, but I missed my meeting with the board to defend it because I was in jail. If I want to reschedule it I have to appeal to the board, and since Dr. Duncan is the chairman, I’m fairly certain my appeal will be denied.
I know Chris would do anything I asked to help, but the problem is, I don’t know what to ask for. He has been here like clockwork every visiting day. He officially moved in with Taryn last month and I guess they both plan to apply to Sierra State next year. He’s building a life and I’m not going to screw with it.
I’m just reaching for my soap when something crashes through the plastic curtain, tearing it from the rod, and I’m slammed face first up against the wall. My forehead cracks sharply off the tile and I lose my bearings for a second as stars flash in my eyes.
“Hey, loverboy,” a deep voice growls in my ear. Franz. “Since you like to fuck babies, we figured you were fair game.”
My heart slams against the wall so hard I feel my body jerk to the rapid rhythm. Fuck. This can’t be happening.
I struggle against Franz’s grip, but the slick, wet skin of his beer gut is all up my back. He has me pinned to the wall with my right arm twisted behind me, his forearm across the back of my neck, and a knee between my legs.
“You got him?” comes the second voice. Hans. He sounds like he’s on the floor.
“Yeah,” Franz answers. “I got him. You go first.”
A hand clamps around one of my ankles and my leg is ripped out from under me. It stops when my foot slams up against the side wall of the shower. I slip down the wall six inches and would go to the floor like a break dancer doing the splits if Franz wasn’t holding me up. But my legs are now spread eagle and there’s nothing I can do to close them.
“Move over,” Hans says, just behind me now.
Franz shifts off to the side a little, and then a finger slides down my ass crack. “I’ve been watching this tight ass for a while,” Hans says, his finger perched right at my asshole. He shoves it inside and my breath catches. “Fucking sweet. This is prime virgin ass. Everything I hoped it would be.”
I struggle against Franz’s grip as Hans withdraws his finger. His hands spread my ass cheeks and then the head of his goddamn hard-on is pressed up against my asshole. “Ready for me, sweet cheeks?”
On an electric surge of adrenaline, I rotate and bring my left elbow back hard in the direction of Hans’s voice. There’s a satisfying crunch when I feel it connect with bone. He wails from behind me and Franz lets up his grip just enough that, with a hard jerk, I’m out from under him.
Hans is on the floor holding his bleeding nose, but Franz gets his hands on me, trying to wrestle me into a headlock. I swing with an undercut that connects with his jaw. His head jerks back and he staggers. I finish him with a knee to the balls. I kick Hans in the face when he makes a grab for me, then bolt, leaving everything behind.
Two guys shaving at the bathroom mirrors watch me go.
“Thank you very fucking little for the help, assholes,” I call over my shoulder.
When I pass through the gates back into my block at a stiff clip, the guard there looks at me funny then follows me to my cell.
“What’s this about, inmate?” he says, waving a hand at my naked form.
I’m breathing hard as I drop onto my cot. “Thought I might wait until someone’s not trying to rape me to finish showering.”
His hand goes to the butt of his baton as he lifts his radio. “Detail to Block C showers.”
“Roger that,” a disembodied voice comes back.
“Stay here. I’ll find you a towel.” He turns and when he leaves, I hold my head in my hands while the adrenaline charging my blood begins to ebb.
So maybe I was wrong about this not being like in the movies.
“Here,” the guard says a minute later, and a towel lands on the mattress next to my leg.
I shake it open and stand, wrapping it around my waist. “Those fuckers are a piece of work.”
“You just described ninety percent of our population. Exactly which fuckers would those be?”
I shrug. “Don’t know their names, just call them Hans and Franz.”
He cracks a smile but quickly loses it. “If they’re still in there, the detail will take care of them.”
“Broke Hans’s nose, pretty sure,” I say, shaking my hand as pain just starts to register.
He juts his chin and nods. “How much longer you got?”
“Twelve days.”
“I’m Don. I’ll tell the guys to keep an eye on you. And if you point out Hans and Franz, we’ll watch them too. Shit like this doesn’t happen here.”
I nod. “Appreciate it. Thanks.”
“I’ll go find your jumpsuit,” he says, turning for the hall.
∞
Twelve days later, they spit me out into a hot late-July day. Hannah is outside the gates, waiting to pick me up. She’s the only one other than Chris who came to see me in prison. There was no one else I could call.
She pulls me into a hug. “You’re free!” she says in my ear.
“Guess so.”
We climb into her car. “Let me take you out for some real food,” she says as she pulls away from the prison. “Luigi’s? My
treat, to celebrate.”
I glance at her as my mouth starts to water. “That sounds really good. Thanks.”
We find an open booth in the back. Once our orders are in, Hannah looks at me. “How bad was it?”
“Prison?” I shrug. “Other than the two guys who wanted a piece of my virgin ass, not too bad.”
Her eyes widen. “Are you serious? Did they try anything?”
“They jumped me in the shower last week. My kickboxing came in handy.”
“So they didn’t…?”
“Naw. The guards were pretty cool. They kept an eye on me after that.” I smile at her. “And then you came to my rescue.”
The waiter drops our drinks and a basket of breadsticks on the table, then moves past.
Hannah grabs a breadstick and dips it in marinara. “Was she worth it?”
I take a deep breath and watch my fingers slowly spin my beer glass on the table. “Yes.”
There’s a long silence. “Do you miss her?”
I laugh under my breath even though there’s nothing remotely funny. “Only when I’m breathing.” My smile dies and I take a long swallow of beer. “She’s about the freest spirit I’ve ever met, but not in a frivolous way. She’s deep, and courageous, and incredibly insightful, and self-aware, and her mind works in ways I can’t even fathom. She’s fascinating.”
“You love her.”
I lift my eyes and nod.
“She sounds awfully mature for a sixteen-year-old.”
“Seventeen…now.”
“Seventeen,” she repeats. “What’s her home situation?”
I shrug. “Don’t really know too much about it. Just that her parents are around, I guess, but still pretty absentee. She and her brother took care of each other growing up.”
“Maybe that’s why she’s so mature,” Hannah says, setting her beer down. “She had to learn responsibility early.”
“Maybe.”
“So, what are you going to do about her?”
I shake my head. “What are my choices? She won’t be eighteen for another year. And…” I bite my lips between my teeth. “I’m not convinced the courts aren’t right. Especially if your theory is true. If her parents have already stolen years off her childhood, who am I to take what’s left?”