by Evie Harper
Collision (Portland Street Kings)
Copyright © 2015 by Evie Harper
Published by Evie Harper, First Edition March 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing. Except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For permission requests, email the author at [email protected]
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places are incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy of each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
Cover Design: Louisa Maggio at LM Creations
Editing: Hot Tree Editing
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELEVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
EPILOGUE
YOU LOVED ME AT MY DARKEST - SNEEK PEEK
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
STALK ME HERE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Prologue
I step into the tiny bedroom I share with my five foster siblings. Four now. Agony explodes under my skin and causes my head to spin. A memory of her small, pale, dead and beaten body slams into my mind and nausea assaults me. I hold my stomach and turn my head to the side, trying to hold the bile down.
“Slater? What’s wrong; are you sick?” Hearing my little sister’s sweet voice causes a tear to escape.
A warm hand lands on my shoulder and my brother, Pacer, repeats the question. “Slater, what’s wrong?”
Just the thought of telling them, breaking their hearts, has me racing to the shared bathroom attached to our bedroom.
I kneel at the toilet and just as a wave of nausea hits me, my throat finally releases and I heave the contents of my stomach into the bowl.
When I’m sure I have nothing left to throw up, I sit back on my haunches. I sense the presence of my younger siblings behind me and break down. I physically feel the emptiness of one of my family members now gone, the girl I could never call a sister like Della. A girl whose smile brightened even my most terrifying days, one who made living in this dark, frightening house bearable.
Mia.
Della’s smile always warmed my heart and made me smile back at her. But Mia... her smile made my heart pound heavily with excitement and something else I don’t understand. It always felt strange thinking of her as my sister, but she was in our group home so we were all brothers and sisters, through circumstance, not family.
I grip the toilet seat and stand on shaky legs before I turn and face my family. All of them are staring at me with fear in their eyes.
Pacer steps forward, waiting for me to explain. As the second eldest at eleven, one year younger than me, it’s always been him and me looking after our siblings.
I look to Mackson and at nine years old, he’s already been through too much. Mia and Kelso were the only two who are the same age, at eight. We all joked sometimes that they must be twins. And then Della, the youngest at seven... So sweet and gentle, she often offers her food or water to us all, her nature to give and care for others. Even being brought up in this house, all of them are gentle, protective and giving people.
We are children who have lost all hope, who had our childhoods stolen away, who don’t smile often and when we do, it’s rare and something worth remembering. This is all we’ve ever known, all we can remember. We see what life is like on the outside through the little bit of TV we have been allowed to watch. We know we aren’t normal; we know our lives are set on a different and more terrifying path than others. I had thought that as I got older things would change and then I could get us all away from here, but that day has come much quicker than I thought it would. I’m scared. I don’t know how to feed or protect my family in the outside world. I only know the rules inside these walls, but I have no choice now. I will not lose another.
I stare at Pacer for strength as I speak, because I know seeing my younger siblings’ faces will break me.
“We have to leave, now. Phillip—” I pause as a lump forms in my throat. “Phillip killed Mia.”
I find the courage to look to my brothers and sister and find wide eyes and sorrow evident on their faces. Della’s lips tremble and she cries out, “No.”
I pull her into my arms as she grieves the death of the only sister she’s ever known.
My brothers start falling to the floor one after the other. Cries and moans echo around the bathroom as they grieve for their little sister. My eyes glaze over as I realize I don’t have enough arms to hold them all.
Ever since they started arriving, one after the other, I took them as my family and promised myself I would protect them as much as I could. We were all placed here through the system because our parents didn’t want us or couldn’t cope with us anymore. The system, which was supposed to protect children, willingly handed us over to a monster. A group home that held many screams behind its closed doors.
I knew the horrors which awaited the kids who came after me, as I was the first. Each of them arrived when they were five, just like me. Any time Phillip neared the boys I would grow tense and prepare for a battle with him. I took many beatings trying to save them from Phillip’s wandering hands. Usually, I would end up in our bedroom, beaten and crying, knowing what one of my brothers was enduring at that very moment. What I’d failed to prevent once again.
I could be more relaxed around my sisters; Phillip’s hands apparently didn’t like little girls. Thank God. But Phillip’s fists found their faces often when they didn’t keep up with their chores. We all did what we could to help the girls when Phillip wasn’t looking, and often we felt the belt across our backs when we interfered with him hitting our sisters.
I call to Pacer because I need his help to get us all out of here alive. We need to stay strong for just a little while longer.
“Pace, I need your help and we don’t have much time.”
Pacer’s eyes swing to me.
His tormented face brings an ache to my chest which attempts to explode from my mouth, but I stop before it can show them how close I am to falling apart. I need to stay strong. I need to get the rest of my family out of here.
“Pace, we need to move quickly and quietly so Phillip doesn’t hear us. I need you to silently close our bedroom door and move a bed up to it. If he tries to get into our room, I want time before he gets in here.”
Pacer nods and quickly races out of the bathroom. I don’t hear our door close but I hear a soft drag of a bedframe.
I pick Dell up, carry her to her bed and place her down. She curls her body into a tight ball and sobs into her knees.
I rush back to Mack and Kelso and gently pull their chins up, forcing their eyes to meet mine. “I’m sorry,” I say, swallowing bac
k the large lump in my throat. “I’m so sorry this has happened, but I promise you, today we’re getting out. We’re leaving this place behind forever, but I need you guys to pull together and help. Can you do that for me?”
Mackson is the first to nod in understanding that we need to act now and grieve later. He’s only nine, but he has always been the most level-headed one of us all. My gaze turns to Kelso and his eyes are still wide and glassy. “Can you do this, Kel? I need you, buddy.”
“Slate, how? Where is she? We can’t leave her behind.” Kel’s words come out strangled and they gut me to the core.
We can’t leave her behind.
I bow my head and take a deep breath before I answer him. “She’s gone, Kel.” I don’t tell him there was blood everywhere, that she was unrecognizable. “Now we need to leave so that doesn’t happen to one of us.” My words must register with Kel because he quickly nods and stands with Mack next to him.
“Okay, I need you two to pack all of our clothes into our backpacks, and then take the sheets and pillows from our beds, got it?”
They nod quickly, stand and run to the closet where our backpacks are stored, ones we were only ever allowed to use when we went to the store for groceries. Only Pacer and I got to go; the others had to stay behind. Phillip said it gave Pacer and me incentive to come back, and he was right. If he ever let us all go, I would have made sure none of us ever returned.
I scan the room, thinking of a way out without risking going through Phillip. I look to the windows. We are in a lone, two-story house at the end of a dirt road but not far from town. I think back to a movie where a boy tied sheets together to escape through a window. Does that work in real life? I don’t know, but it’s our only hope at the moment.
Mack and Kel are already taking the sheets off the beds, moving Dell gently to stand so they can grab hers, as well. I knew it wouldn’t take them long to pack all our clothes. We don’t have much—just a few shirts and shorts we all share and the girls only have a couple of long dresses they shared.
“Mack, Kel, pass me the sheets.”
They throw me the white sheets and I begin tying the ends to one another. I finish and count the knots; there are four. I look around for the sixth sheet. I find it on Mia’s still made-up mattress with her pillows still fluffed from this morning when she’d made her bed. A sharp pain shoots through my chest at thinking of disturbing her things. I decide to see if five sheets will be enough first.
I push the one window in our bedroom open, a chipped-paint, two-paned, wooden-framed, glass window which opens outward and faces the front of the house. Shoving it all the way out, it leaves more than enough room for someone to climb through.
A cool breeze from a midday storm, which just passed over us, blows into the room and the fresh smell of rain invades my senses.
I feed the sheets through, slowly letting them fall more and more with the weight of the material. When I’ve dropped all I can, I look down and find the sheets almost touch the ground. My family will have to jump down the last few feet.
I call Pace over and tell him he needs to go first and wait at the bottom to catch our siblings. He nods and readies himself to climb down.
I wrap the end of the sheet around my forearm and prepare to hang on tightly. Just as Pacer is about to lower himself down, I say, “Pace, when everyone is at the bottom I’m going to chuck you the bags, sheets and pillows. We need to take them with us.”
As if just realizing, Pacer asks, “How will you get down without the sheets?”
“I’m going to sneak through the house and out the front door or a window, whatever I can find to get through. We’re going to need our clothes and sheets. I don’t know where we’re going, but we will need them for shelter and warmth through the nights. We can’t go to the police because they will put us back in the system, possibly separate us. Or worse, put us with another monster. I’m not escaping one hell just to go to another. And we need money to survive, Pacer. I need to take Phillip’s wallet; it’s our only option. We’re going to need money for food and train tickets to get away from here, far away. We can’t let child services find us.”
Pacer shakes his head, not wanting to hear my plan. I place my hand on his shoulder and reassure him. “I will be fine, Pace. Right now, you need to get our brothers and sister out of here, and I need to get us the money to help do that. Take them to the store, and I’ll meet you there. When I arrive, we’re going to the station to catch the first train that pulls in.”
“Slate, if Phillip catches you—”
I cut him off. “He won’t, Pace. I promise, I’ll be right behind you.”
Pacer pauses, staring at me for a long moment before reluctantly nodding, turning and climbing down the rope of sheets.
I grab a tight hold of the sheets and sit on the floor with my back to the wall. I grit my teeth as I hold on with all my strength. After a few minutes, they go slack in my hands.
I jump up quickly and let out a relieved sigh as I see my brother safely on the ground, gesturing for me to hurry up.
Della goes next, then Kel and last, Mack. I throw down the sheets, pillows and three backpacks stuffed full of our clothes.
When they have everything, I mouth a silent, “Go!” They stare up at me with terrified eyes for a brief moment before they turn and start running, racing from this house of horrors, toward the road into town.
I turn and walk to the door and as quietly as possible, I drag the bed away and twist the handle softly. Opening it just a bit, I still my body to listen for Phillip in the house. I hear nothing, so I peer out into the hall—it’s clear. I race to the end of the hallway and descend the stairs, stopping halfway down and listening again for any signs of Phillip inside the house. I hear nothing except the pounding of my heart in my ears.
I creep down the last set of stairs and inspect the living room before heading left into Phillip’s room. I take three quick steps backward as my heart crashes against my chest. The door to Phillip’s room is open when it’s usually closed and locked unless he is in there. I freeze on the spot and strain my ears to listen for anything, but when I still hear nothing, no sound of him in the house anywhere, I creep down the rest of the stairs. I move closer to his bedroom and slowly push open his door. Fear slams into my heart as it sounds with a creak as it opens; my pulse races and sweat drips down my face.
With the door now wide open, I can see Phillip is not in here. My heart is beating wildly as I rub the sweat away from my forehead with shaking hands.
I scan Phillip’s room for his wallet and am thankful when it’s the first thing my eyes land on. I take quick steps, scooping it up and looking inside. I see many bills and cards, cards I have no idea how to use; the bills will have to be enough. I will have to wait till I’m with Pacer to find out how much is in the wallet as he is the only one of us who knows how to count well.
I grasp tightly to the wallet in my palm and turn quickly, racing out of the room and heading straight for the front door before I freeze. Mia. I want to see her one last time. I need to say goodbye.
I tiptoe through the living room and peer into the kitchen. I can’t see Phillip anywhere. Where is he? Did he run, knowing he had killed Mia? Did I send my siblings rushing off for no reason?
I crouch behind the bench in the kitchen and look around to Mia’s body still lying lifeless on the tiled floor. Her right arm is outstretched, appearing to reach out for someone to take hold and help her. I stretch my hand out and softly touch the tips of her fingers, still so soft and warm.
Grumbling comes from the back door, and I hastily pull my arm back and scurry behind the counter. I hear Phillip mumbling, but no steps coming into the kitchen. I carefully look around the counter again and see him bringing an old blanket and a shovel covered in wet soil just inside the back door. He’s going to bury Mia in the backyard. No! I need to get to a phone, call the police and tell them what he’s done. She needs to be buried in a cemetery where she belongs, where I can visit her one da
y.
I look back to my unrecognizable Mia and my heart squeezes, twisting painfully as I force myself to say my last farewell. Tears fall as I swallow past a lump in my throat and finally I’m able to whisper, “Goodbye, Mia.”
Watching as Phillip goes back outside, I decide now is my chance to quietly move back through the house to the front door. I make it and find the door locked as usual, and Phillip is the only one who has the key. The window next to it is slightly opened and has been missing the screen for months now. I quietly, but with all my strength, open the window which hasn’t been touched in years. It squeaks once and I pray Phillip is too busy to worry about any sounds in this old, run-down house.
I jump up and slide my body through the window, scraping the skin off my hips as I barely fit, and fall to the ground with a hard thump. I bite my lip from yelling out in pain.
I’m out.
Terror grips my heart as I sprint frantically from the house, not looking behind me in fear I will find Phillip chasing me.
As I run from the only home I’ve ever known, the house of horrors, the only thoughts I’m having are ones I’ve never let released before this moment.
I think I was in love with her.
Not family love, but a different kind of love.
Now I’ll never know.
Chapter One
Street Thug
Slater
My clenched fist slams into his jaw, and bones crack and break under my bloody knuckles.
I stand and look down at the almost-unconscious asshole who was making fun of a woman with a stutter. Usually I don’t get involved in this shit, but damn, seeing her beautiful face frown and hurt cross her features, as if it was setting in stone to stay there forever, made me want to kill this fucker. And I’m the one man who’s capable of doing it.
A scowl etches its way onto my face at the memory of her eyes lowering to the ground. Watching as her features twist to sadness spurs me to reach down and grip the shithead’s shirt and begin punching him again and again.
I’m finally forced to stop when my brother, Mackson, pulls me off the asshole.