It’s only then that Jackie’s anger shows. “No one will EVER get their hands on MY son, do you understand?” She lunges at Kennedy, but I pull Kennedy back and Henry swiftly moves to stand between them.
“We’re on the same side as you, regardless of whether you like it or not,” he tells her. “We’re stronger together.”
“I don’t want to be in your little cult,” she sneers, and I feel Kennedy tense up in my arms like she wants to lunge around Henry and throttle her for talking about the Elite that way.
That’s my girl.
But Kennedy reins it in, and because I sense that, I let her go to stand next to Henry. I’m close enough that if Jackie tries anything that would put Kennedy in danger, I can intervene.
“The father of your son almost died last night, and the first thing he said when he knew he was okay was that he wanted to see Thomas.” Kennedy extends her hand to Jackie, silently asking her to come with us before adding, “You need to do this for your son. He’s not safe, none of us are.”
Jackie doesn’t take her hand, but she does pull the door shut behind her and begins walking toward the elevator. I don’t know where this will lead, but it’s the first time in a long time that I feel like we might actually have the upper hand.
When the elevator starts moving toward the ground floor, Jackie leans forward, grabbing her long, curly red hair and flipping it back so she can knot it up on the top of her head in what Kennedy calls a ‘messy bun’. She’s quiet for a moment, leaning back against the wall before she looks Kennedy in the eye and says, “I might hate Tommy now, but I did love him once.”
23
Kennedy
My stomach twists as we pull up to the frat house around midnight. We’ve been planning this all day, except for Tommy and Miles. Cassandra woke up, albeit for a short while, but the progress was enough to make Miles refuse to leave her side, and after what happened the last time he went to see her alone, Tommy decided to go with him. It wasn’t until ten PM that we headed over to the frat house to hopefully put an end to all of this. Henry didn’t explicitly tell me not to catch Tommy up on Jackie’s involvement in our plan tonight, but he alluded to it and how it could potentially throw him off his game. Guilt filters through me, but I try to shake it away. He’d be all in his head if we told him, and this isn’t a fucking hockey game with their rivals. This could be our lives.
Per usual, the frat house is packed, music is blaring, and oblivious college students drunkenly walk across the green. They have no clue that their little party is concealing one of the most heinous crime rings to probably ever exist in the tiny town of Darlington.
“It’s nearly time, they’ll catch on any minute,” I say about the Learys when we spot Jackie walking up from the basement. The plan has been set into motion. I watch as she takes the chain off of the door and tosses it into the bushes nearby. She pockets the padlock and swiftly begins walking toward our SUV that’s parked several rows away from the back door.
Everly reaches back from the front seat where she’s sitting on Patrick’s lap and grabs my hand. “I love you, Ken. We’re almost out of this,” she tells me before Patrick cuts in, ruining the moment and making me want to roll my eyeballs up into my skull permanently.
“The two of you don’t leave this truck, you hear me? I’m not fucking playing, Kennedy.”
Tommy spots Jackie as she makes her way toward us and I hear him growl from the back, “What the fuck is she coming over here for?”
But before any of us can answer, Kevin seems to appear out of thin air in the row in front of us, right behind Jackie.
“Fuck,” Miles lets out, and I hear Everly gasp as Kevin grabs Jackie by the hair. I feel Zach grip my hips, moving me to sit on his lap because he anticipates what’s about to happen next.
“Out of the fucking way, Kenney,” Tommy barks, then barrels over my seat and is out the door before any of us can react.
“Stay here,” Zach tells me, then he’s out too, followed by Henry, Miles, and Patrick.
“We can’t just sit here,” I say to Everly, and she nods, opening the front passenger side door since the child locks are now on in the back. I climb over the seat and set my phone on video record before I follow her out. That’s the whole point of all of this, right?
Patrick has Kevin in a chokehold, and I glance around quickly looking for Andre, but he must still be inside the frat house trying to get footage of everything his brothers are doing with his father and the college’s knowledge.
Tommy drags Jackie over to the truck and glares at Everly and me with hard eyes. “Get back in the fucking truck, this isn’t going as planned.” He shoves Jackie to stand next to me, and instinctively Everly and I grab her hands. We’re not her biggest fans, but to be honest, we don’t know her well enough to be. But we both know what it feels like to be jerked around and feel out of control, and for that reason, we’re solidly behind her.
“Are you okay?” Everly asks her, but Jackie’s eyes are locked on Tommy. She’s used to being jerked around, I suspect, and the thought makes my stomach sick. She doesn’t look anything but angry at Tommy. I glance up when I hear Patrick yelling at Kevin, he’s demanding that he admits who put their hands on Everly.
“This whole white knight shit you’re pulling right now is two fucking years late,” Jackie seethes, ripping away from us to shove Tommy, her hands connecting with his hard chest with enough force to make noise. “You will never hurt me again.” I see the pain contort Tommy’s features as he reaches out to hold onto her shoulders. She sidesteps him, and I wonder how many times she’s had to pull that maneuver with men in her life.
“Hurt you?” Tommy grits his teeth, and if I didn’t know his heart, I’d be concerned with the way he’s clenching his fists. “When were you going to tell me about my son?”
“I wasn’t.” She doesn’t hesitate. “You’re not half the man he deserves as a father.” Her voice falters for only a moment before she shoves a phone into his hands and pivots around him. “I’ve done my part, I’m out of here.” She stomps away, never looking back, and I lose sight of her when I hear Everly scream.
I was so busy watching Tommy and Patrick that I never saw Shane sneak behind our SUV. I reach out for Everly, but he’s holding her by her ponytail and he has a knife to her throat. Tommy stops me before I can make anything worse, scooping me up, and Shane shoves Everly toward where Patrick and the other boys have Kevin subdued.
“It wasn’t him, Carter,” Shane sneers, jerking Everly’s hair just enough to make her squeak in pain.
“Don’t let him go,” Henry instructs Patrick, whose eyes are trained on Everly and nothing else. I think Zach knows there’s no chance Patrick is going to be able to focus because his eyes meet mine right before he shoves Patrick out of the way, knocks Kevin to the ground, and roughly pulls his arms behind his back. He kneels on his back, which makes Kevin groan in pain, but the sick son of a bitch still finds the strength to laugh.
“I wanted to kill her, feel the life drain out of her that day,” Shane says, and I want to lunge at him, but Tommy’s grip on me is unrelenting.
“Let her go,” Patrick barks, taking a step forward, but halting as soon as he jerks Everly’s head back, exposing her neck and pressing the knife harder against her delicate skin. All it would take is one flick of his wrist to end her life.
Patrick’s name is barely a whisper when it leaves her lips, and I watch in horror as her eyes flutter shut.
“Shane, we can settle this, let her go.” Henry is the one who speaks because Patrick’s eyes are darting around and his chest is heaving with his accelerated breathing. Henry and Patrick make eye contact, and I’m certain that I see something pass between them without so much as a word or a gesture.
“You have too much shit on us to let you go at this point. You didn’t think we would be ten steps ahead of you?” shane bites out, and I realize that despite Kevin’s vile nature, Shane has been just as active in their heinous behavior. “Ty is
taking care of Andre and that bitch Jackie right now. You’re out of fucking plays.” I feel Tommy’s entire body clench at his words, and despite the fact that he’s preventing me from making my own choices, I squeeze his hand because I know he’s worried his son will be caught in the crossfire.
“Which one of you assholes set the house on fire?” Tommy yells, and the force of the anger leaving his body is palpable.
Shane answers him with a maniacal laugh. “That was Beth. She’ll do anything we ask. She’s such a fucking pawn. Anything we tell her, she believes, especially after Dalton overdosed. She didn’t hesitate to believe it when we said Andre was behind that shit.” I’ve never seen anything so evil in my life as when his eyes connect with mine for a brief second. “She’s fucking psycho. We told her to get rid of Cassandra since she wanted to play the role of an Elite bitch. She’s the one who came up with the idea to shoot herself and frame Andre.” His chuckle is gut-twisting, but it’s genuine. He’s impressed by her. “But Darcey? That wasn’t planned. She walked in on some shit she shouldn’t have seen, and we didn’t have another choice but to shut her up.” My stomach rolls. None of it was an accident or a cover-up. They murdered her.
“Your sister begged for her fucking life, Carter,” Kevin yells, and I hear a guttural noise spill from his lips when Miles kicks him in the side while Zach prevents him from getting off the asphalt.
Patrick doesn’t have a reaction and I realize he has tunnel vision, the only thing he cares about is getting Everly to safety.
“She was a fucking distraction for Andre, and poking her nose where it didn’t belong,” Shane says with a chuckle. He opens his mouth to continue but Andre appears behind him, grabbing the arm that has the knife against Everly’s throat.
It all happens so quickly, and there’s so much going on at once.
News trucks and vans that from the news stations I tipped off earlier today begin piling into the parking lot, causing everyone to lose focus.
Patrick lunges, grabbing Everly as Andre and Shane struggle over the knife. Tommy finally lets me go when Everly is securely in Patrick’s grasp. Henry’s grip on my arm is hard when he moves me over to stand with her, and I feel better when I see that she only has a small cut on her neck just before Patrick pulls her into his chest, his hand coming up to cup the back of her head.
Cop cars pull up, sirens blaring and lights flashing. Zach is in front of me now, and I realize Tommy has taken his place with Kevin. He cups my face, checking me over, and it’s only when we hear Andre yell and Henry’s grunt that we realize Andre’s been hurt. Henry has Shane pinned to the ground, and Andre is lying next to them. Zach and Patrick immediately move to help Henry, and Everly and I rush to Andre’s side. He’s been stabbed in the chest and he’s having a hard time focusing. He coughs, and blood dribbles from the corner of his mouth.
Everly takes his hand, then his eyes focus on her face, and he’s smiling like he’s remembering something that once made him happy. “Help is here, you’re going to be fine,” she tells him, but I can hear the worry in her voice. I block out the noise of the police pulling the boys off of Shane, and I grab Andre’s other hand because he’s not looking so good, and I don’t want him to be scared.
Everly uses the thumb of her free hand to wipe the blood from the side of his lip and he whispers Darcey’s name.
“She loves you so much, Andre. She was my very best friend and I knew her inside and out.” Everly blinks, letting tears fall and not bothering to wipe them away. “You’re her whole heart, even if it didn't seem that way.”
I can hear Shane yelling belligerently, and when I look up I see Patrick, Henry, and Zach are being led away by officers, probably to be questioned.
“We’ve got one down. Over here!” a police officer yells as he approaches us, and I realize his uniform is different from the police that have jurisdiction over Darlington.
I hear Everly gasp and let out a sob and my attention goes back to Andre. But it’s too late. His unseeing eyes stare up at us, a smile still on his lips.
He’s already gone.
24
Zach
A Few Weeks Later
Since everything has calmed down, we’ve all given formal statements against the Learys, the police department, and Darlington University. To date, 247 women have come forward with their statements of abuse they suffered at their hands. Darlington’s Academic Dean, Coach, all three of his eldest sons, and a handful of police officers have been charged with too many crimes to count. It hasn’t been confirmed, but we’ve been told that at least a dozen professors and staff will be indicted and formally charged for their part in the assault on the girls target by the Learys. Beth is facing an attempted murder charge and a slue of other charges that I’m confident she’ll be convicted of despite the rumor she’s pleading insanity.
We’re currently waiting for a hearing to determine the settlement amount we’ll receive from the university and the police department. Tommy is convinced that he’s a local celebrity because they chose to put a photo of him on the front page of the Darlington Gazette, a shot that one of the reporters captured that night at the frat house. For the most part, though, we’re all hanging in there, trying to remember what normal is like. If we’ll ever get that back, I’m not sure.
Patrick and Everly went on a weekend getaway, probably to have some alone time without Kennedy pranking Patrick and Tommy, and tonight’s our first dinner together since they returned.
“Are you sure you don’t want us to come with you to see Cassandra?” Everly asks Miles as she puts a large bowl in Patrick’s hands. She swats him on the ass, shooing him into the dining room of our new house that Kennedy has forbidden Tommy from giving any dumbass names.
We have a secret guys only group chat though, and he’s been coming up with some good ones.
Miles pulls her in for a hug and kisses the top of her head. “Thanks, Ever. I’m okay. She’s allowed to leave for a little while today, so I’m gonna take her to get some ice cream or something,” he tells her. “I still have to tell her about Andre and her brothers. It’s probably best if it’s just me.” He lowers his head, and I don’t envy him in the slightest. Cassandra has been through so much, and now he’s got to tell her that Andre died at the hands of her other brother while trying to save Everly. Her father and older brothers, despite their high price lawyer, won’t see the light of day for a very long time. Her mother hasn’t tried to see her once; instead, she was the one who organized a defense team for the men in her family.
Andre’s death doesn’t feel real yet, at least not to me. I’ve tried to process everything over the last couple of weeks as we settle back into our everyday lives, but it’s weird going from complete chaos to peaceful days. Even Patrick has calmed down, although not about anything to do with Everly—he’d still fight a brick wall for her, but he seems to be at least trying to take everyone else into consideration.
After all, it was his idea that Andre should be buried with Darcey. He was cremated and his mother never made arrangements to pick up his ashes, but somehow Henry managed to convince her to let us have them. You know who your real friends are when you’re digging a hole at a cemetery in the middle of the night.
I glance over at Kennedy as she uses a wooden spoon to mix up some sort of chocolate dessert. Tommy is hovering over her, watching intently to make sure she adds in the cookie bits that he requested. I can’t help chuckling when she raises the spoon at him, telling him to back off. He dips his finger in the chocolate, puts it in his mouth, and scurries over to stand with Everly like he isn’t a six-foot-two hockey goon.
I move over to stand behind Kennedy, leaning down to kiss the side of her head. She tips her head back against my chest to smile up at me. “I love you,” she says, and before I can respond, Tommy chimes in.
“EWW, can you guys not.”
I wink at Kennedy and she pivots her body to face Tommy, still holding her spoon. “I’m thinking of going couch shopping tomorrow, do y
ou want to come with?” She giggles when he holds his hands up in defeat, still traumatized from the floral secondhand couches that sadly couldn’t be saved from the house fire.
“You win, no more Craigslist shopping, please,” he says, trying to reach the food on one of the trays Everly has set on the counter, but Everly swats at him and he snatches his hand back.
Tommy pouts, heading toward the dining room, making the girls laugh in the process.
Just as we get everything carried into the other room, Henry arrives home without any indication of where he’s been all afternoon. I see the knowing look that passes between him and Kennedy, and I wonder what could possibly be going on. Because it’s Kennedy, it could be that she’s blackmailing him into helping her take down Patrick, the end result being domination of the new Elite house. Or maybe he’s just letting some of his walls down and he chose Kennedy to do that with.
Nah, it’s gotta be blackmail.
“Have you heard anything?” Tommy asks Henry as we all take a seat at the table, ready to have our first real family-style dinner since everything calmed down.
“I should hear back any day now,” Henry says, waving Everly away as she tries to pile the lasagna on his plate. Patrick is regarding his dish with reservation because Kennedy is already digging in, which means there’s no meat in it. Henry reaches for the bread instead and pours himself a glass of ice water. “She couldn’t have gotten far.” And it’s then that I realize he’s talking about Jackie. Tommy went looking for her and his son, and no one seems to know where she went or who she’s with.
“Wait till I get my hands on that…” Tommy starts, but Kennedy interrupts him.
“Mother of your child who openly admitted that she loved you even though you were a douchey freshman hockey player with no moral compass who has grown significantly as a person and would never call her a bitch?” Kennedy rattles off the words and I’m amazed at how quickly her brain fires sometimes, but it’s Patrick who makes me laugh because he looks up from picking through the sauce with his fork to furrow his eyebrows at her like she has seven heads.
Damaged Elite (The Darlington Elite Book 2) Page 21