“I’m out of here.” I brush past her and I am shoved by Cody Nichols. He presses me against the wall and I push back. “Get your hands off of me!”
He points his finger at me. “You are going to tell us everything! You owe us! You knew what she was like! You always knew! But in your own fucked up way, you actually loved her! Probably still do… but guess what?” For a scrawny kid he is strong. “She feels nothing for you.”
Juliet comes in front of me. “Tell us what happened! Tell us what happened to Karlie Dale! Were you involved?”
“Karlie Dale?” Jordana questions. They are all as shocked as I am at the mention of Karlie Dale’s name.
“He knows why I say her name,” Juliet says still glaring at me. “Don’t you all remember? August kept spitting out names of people who knew whatever the hell is scaring him. I’m kind of good at putting things together, predicting outcomes and to put it simply… I’m just a smart girl,” she sadly smirks. “This Karlie girl, from what I hear, was a good girl and I may have only known Scarlett for a short period of time, but even a child can see that Scarlett loves to destroy good things.”
My heart feels like it’s going to burst. Everything just comes rushing back. I’ve kept it for so many years on the edge of it breaking out. I slide down the doorframe and Juliet follows squatting in front of me. I don’t know I’m crying until I feel the wetness on my cheeks. “She…” I pause before finally confessing. “She never liked it when someone else got more attention than her,” I quietly say. “Karlie Dale… got more attention. She was just nice to everyone, not to mention beautiful. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t from money. Everyone knew she was going somewhere.” Silence still surrounds me and all I see is that night. “She was innocent and a virgin. She was pure, kind, beautiful… everything Scarlett wasn’t. Gabriel enjoyed destroying virtuous people, so when she asked him he was ecstatic. He took pride in the things he did. Chad did too. I… I just wanted to do whatever Scarlett wanted me to do. Gabriel tried to seduce Karlie, but it didn’t work on her, or so we thought. It turned out that Gabriel and Karlie were seeing each other in secret. I don’t know if he fell in love with Karlie, but he came close… as close as someone like him would. He was just changing. Staying more to himself. Not sleeping with anyone. So, Scarlett confronted him and he lied to her face and that only made her more angry. I was the one who told her. I followed him to the steps of the Met where he would meet Karlie. Scarlett was furious—Gabriel was her prized companion and there was no way she would lose him to her.
One night she invited Karlie to a supposed surprise birthday party for Gabriel. It was only Chad and I amongst the guests though. Chad likes it when women say no to him. He sees no as a beg for more. I was never like that, neither Gabriel. Scarlett drugged Karlie, slipped something in her drink and mine. She threw us in Gabriel’s room with Chad. He made me go first. He made me take Karlie’s virginity… then once I passed out, he finished her off.” I look at Ms. Eleanor who is in tears. “You were out of town that week.” I want to reassure her, tell her it’s not her fault. “Gabriel came home and found us all in his bed. He acted like it was nothing… but I saw it in his eyes. The hurt. Karlie went downhill from there. Gabriel tried to help her, but Karlie just drifted off into despair. I don’t know what happened after all that. I just know that she got into drugs and her mother sent her away.”
“Does anyone else need a drink?” Jordana asks after a moment of broken silence.
I wipe my eyes and stand up. “I need to go.”
“You need to go to the police,” Juliet says.
“No,” I say with conviction.
Her eyes stare at me with shock. “You really think you can just confess and then erase it all?”
“Yes. No one can stop her. She has everyone.”
“The hell she does!”
“You really don’t think my mother knows?!”
“What?” Cody stares in disbelief.
“My mother knows. Chad’s dad knows. And Jonathan Mandrake knows. Mrs. Brayson. Karlie was going to press charges. Scarlett recorded it and threatened to release the video if she did, but she didn’t care and then she turned it around on our parents and threatened them. So much happened. How do you think we were able to keep quiet? You really think our parents would let us be considered as deviants to the world? Let us tarnish the name of influential people of this city? They kept Karlie and her mother quiet. If Scarlett goes down, we all go down. She always wins. Get that through your skulls. Now you can either live with it like I have… or perish.”
“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Jordana says.
“Always the problem with people like us, right?” Juliet says to me. “We want to be gods; we are gods therefore we make no mistakes and if people see that we make a mistake… they will question everything.” She looks up at me. “Go… go live in your life full of lies and in pathetic wilderness. Just remember when you look anyone in this room in the face again, you will be staring in the mirror that shows how disgusting you truly are.”
“Juliet, we need him for the police.” Jordana says.
“I just want to get Hugo out of jail and I think I have an idea on how to get him out,” she says and glares at me. “Go.”
I look around the room one last time. All their eyes on me. Nothing but disgust and disbelief in not the past but the present and the present is now and the now is what I will continue to spurn.
HUGO
“I didn’t rape anyone.”
“That’s not what fifteen-year-old Rebecca Townsend tells us.”
“Well obviously she’s lying.”
“Yeah, yet her track record is clean.” He leans down on the table. “I’ve heard about you. You have a real scandalous reputation.”
“Did you get that from Gossip Girl?”
He bitterly laughs. “That’s funny.”
“I. Didn’t. Do. It.”
“Then how do you explain the drugs we’ve found?”
“Someone planted them. It does not matter that you found drugs. You have no evidence from her but her word. The only reason why you even arrested me is because a pissed off wealthy Patrick Townsend pressured this entire precinct. You have no physical evidence that I even touched her so this is all a fucking waste of time.”
“We have statements from witnesses. Two people who say you arrived at the Townsend’s building for a little party.”
“Let me guess, Scarlett and whatever idiot she got to lie for her.”
“I’ve known guys like you my whole life. Get everything handed to you and still that is not enough. What happened, Mandrake? The girl said no, rejected you? You got angry, huh? You’ve never earned anything in your life. Always take.”
There’s always some cop from a bad neighborhood who holds a grudge to the wealthy.
“Listen, I get it. Alcoholic father abused you, wanted to make a man out of you. Before your mother abandoned you, you watched her berate your father for not giving you a decent income. I get it. Life sucked and yes I do get a lot of things. I’ve never earned anything in my life. I can have almost any woman I want. I could fuck your wife and your daughter between Sunday and Thursday. You’re too strict. Probably haven’t had sex in a month and when you do, you come too quickly—no foreplay—and you’re too much of a hard ass on your daughter. If I was the asshole I used to be, I would definitely go pay a visit to your marital bed. I’ve done it before with a certain headmaster at my old high school. Trust it can be done. But no… I am now a reformed asshole. I may be spoiled, I may even be bratty, but I have never and never will be a rapist.”
“I can’t wait to watch you burn at a stake. Not even your own rich daddy is saving you.”
“Yes, well my father and I are not on speaking terms right now.”
“What happened—you took the jet without daddy’s permission?”
“No, I fucked his wife.”
“You really are a piece of work.”
“So they keep telling me,” I mum
ble as someone comes in. Yay, it’s my lawyer, Camereon Beckwith.
“This interview is over. If you excuse me, I would like to speak to my client right now, detective,” he says, his black rim glasses on his face, brown hair combed to the side and a grey suit and blue tie.
The cop looks at me then leaves out.
“Hugo, you have gone and done it now.” Beckwith sets his briefcase on the table and sits across from me.
“I didn’t rape anyone. Can we please pay my bail and get out of here?”
“That’s just the thing, Hugo. Your father isn’t paying your bail.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes, told me to do the best I can to get you off, but other than that, no.”
I let out a bitter laugh shaking my head.
“You’re all alone, Hugo.”
Of course. Which is what Scarlett wanted it to be. Back where I started, alone. If she couldn’t have me, no one could.
The door opens again and someone comes walking in, this time a woman in a black pants suit, hair pinned up and brown eyes.
“Hello, Hugo, I’m Angie Wallace. I will be representing you.”
“Excuse me?” Beckwith and I both stare at her confused.
“I can get you out of this place in less than two hours.”
“What… Who sent you?” I ask her.
“If you let me represent you, I will explain.”
I look at Beckwith then back at her.
“Hugo, you can’t be serious. Don’t be stupid.”
“You know why I don’t like you, Cam? You sound like my father. Tell him to go fuck himself. Get out.”
Beckwith shakes his head and leaves while Ms. Wallace sits at his seat.
“So, what is this?” I ask.
“Mr. Mandrake, I am here on behalf of someone who wants to see you seek justice.”
“Who do you work for?”
“Let’s just say my benefactor is a close friend.”
She wasn’t kidding. She got me out in less than two hours. The hearing was short. There is no evidence except Rebecca’s testimony and the drugs found. The judge is probably a family friend of the Townsends. The next time we will meet again in court is scheduled and my bail is set at $1 million. Paid for.
“Don’t even think about leaving the country, Mr. Mandrake,” the judge warns me, evoking my passport.
I’m livid and I need to get back to my brother and Juliet, but the real question is who paid for my bail? Who sent this lawyer?
“Where are we going?” I ask the lawyer once we get in the limo waiting for us.
“You’ll see,” she says, smiling.
After twenty minutes we arrive to Trump Tower. I will admit I’ve never been in here. Only because I’ve met the guy once and he is as big of a prick as everyone thinks he is. We walk right in; the people at the front desk already know the lawyer. We take the elevator up to what Wallace says is the Two Bedroom Park View her benefactor recently purchased.
“She’s been traveling for a long time,” she informs me.
“So, it’s she,” I say noticing.
“Yes, she is a she.” I can tell Ms. Wallace is anticipating me meeting this woman. I am too.
We step into the living room suite and I already see the benefactor. I thought maybe there was a possibility that I would know her, but I don’t. I don’t recognize her at all. She’s a very gorgeous woman. Tall, chocolate skin, wearing a black and blue dress with black heels. Her hair is jet black and falls around her neck. She stands like Scarlett, confident in what she has and the power she has over people. She smiles at me like she knows me, but I don’t know her.
“Hello, Hugo. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for a long time now,” she says as the door closes behind me.
JULIET
“You want me to do what?”
“You know what I find funny? I call your office and tell you that August has jumped off the roof of the building and you get here within an hour and a half.”
“I was in a business meeting and you didn’t sound that hurt.”
“Well, you never know, I could have emotional numbness disorder.”
Jonathan Mandrake narrows his eyes at me. “You’re actually Hugo’s girlfriend?”
“Yes, I am and yes I want you to bail him out.”
“I’ve already sent my attorney to handle his case.”
“Well what did he say?”
“I told him not to update me. I don’t want to hear about the case. Hugo wants to be a man and defy me and act like he doesn’t need me, then he freely can.”
“He’s been defying you for years,” Jordana counters.
“Yeah and you don’t do anything but make false threats,” Cody adds.
“Okay, what is this? The breakfast club?” Mandrake rudely spits out.
“Classic American teen film, but this is just a classic case of a horrible father,” I say.
“Excuse me?”
“Your first wife killed herself. Your second one took you for half of your money and your recent one shagged your son. The son that you do nothing but berate and bully along with your son who is autistic. You are a bully because that is all you have ever known. Hugo has been given a second chance and now Scarlett is destroying that by lying.”
“And how do you even know? Huh?” He comes closer to me. “You’ve known my son for what? A month? You have no idea what he or anyone is capable of. Trust me on that, Ms. Spears. You live in this world long enough, you will see what people are capable of to get to the top and I am at the top and I’ll be damned if I let my childish son ruin everything our family has built.”
“Like keeping another rape and drug overdose involving a girl on scholarship quiet?”
His eyes broaden and his brow creases.
“I understand you’re pissed off and letting the fact that your wife will forever compare your dick to your young and more handsome son blind your low level common sense, but it doesn’t matter if you support Hugo on this or not. He is your son. He has the Mandrake name, blood, and unfortunately pride—only it’s starting to simmer down compared to yours. You are going to suffer from this. Now you go get him out. I love him and it may not mean anything to you, but there is someone who loves your son, both of them, and I intend to do a better job than you.”
“Well, that just adds more reasons why I’m hopelessly and annoyingly in love with you.”
I crank my neck to look past Mr. Mandrake and see Hugo.
“Hugo, you’re out,” Cody says.
“No, shit,” he says to him.
“Beckwith got you out?” his father asks.
“No… one of my admirers sent a better lawyer and paid for my bail.” I have to admit, I’m sort of jealous. I just made a great bloody speech. I was on my path to save him.
“Well, then I’ll be going,” his father says, buttoning up his suit jacket.
“How’s Kelly?” Hugo asks.
“Fine. We’re going to work it out. I guess your influence wasn’t as high standard as you foolishly thought.”
“No, it is… she’s just foolishly in love with you.”
“Like this one.” He nods his head at me and walks pass Hugo like he’s anything but his own son.
“I’ll be seeing you around.” Hugo looks him in the eye and they’re more controlled. It’s like he knows something more. “Dad.”
Mr. Mandrake arches his brow at him not giving Hugo’s piercing stare a second thought. He leaves us and before Hugo turns his head, I come running to him, wrapping my arms around him.
“You okay?” I ask.
“I will be.” He pulls away and I feel worried. He has this look like he’s disturbed. He walks to the bar and pours himself a drink.
“Hugo, you were arrested for rape,” Jordana tells him, noticing the same mood.
“Thank you for that eye opening truth, Jordana.” He takes a sip of his drink. “Cody go out to the front and wave to the limo outside.
“What?” Cody asks con
fused as we all are.
“Just do it.” Hugo speaks with sharpness and ease.
“What’s going on, Hugo?” Poppy asks.
He’s still staring at his glass until someone walks in behind Cody. I hope this isn’t one of his admirers because she is gorgeous. She’s tall, brown smoothe looking skin, kickass dress and heels. She has this look of confidence as she looks around the room.
“What are you doing here?” Our heads turn to a shocked Anika.
“You know her?” Cody asks.
“I… uh…” Anika starts to panic.
“Oh, yeah Cody. It turns out Anika has been secretly spying on us. Well, me because she goes to Columbia. Sent by this woman.” Hugo extends his hand towards her. “The woman who bailed me out. Her sister.”
“Cody, I can explain.” Anika rushes towards a confused Cody. He steps back in disgust while I try to pick my jaw off the floor.
“What is going on?” I ask. “Who are you?”
“I’m someone who too has been a victim of Scarlett’s… reign, as you call it.”
“So, you’re not one of Hugo’s girls?” Jordana asks.
“No, I was… I was with Gabriel.”
It hits me.
“Oh my God,” I say, eyes practically popping out of my skull. “You’re Karlie Dale.”
“No way,” Poppy says.
“Yes way,” Karlie confirms. “Only I go by my married name now… Karlie Fairchild.”
“No fucking way,” Jordana says. “You’re William Fairchild’s wife?”
“Widow, and I did send my little sister Anika to watch Hugo because I was curious to know more about him and I was not ready to out myself yet, especially to Scarlett.”
I look at Hugo, “So you know everything.”
“Yes,” he says sharply.
“Not everything,” Karlie adds. “Scarlett’s acts are not only of lies and manipulations. Gabriel didn’t kill himself. I know he didn’t. It was all her.”
“No, this is insane,” Jordana says, snatching the drink out of Hugo’s hand.
“Trust me… I’ve spent years developing a way to destroy the bitch and now I,” she looks to Hugo, “We… have a plan and we’re not just going after her, but his father, the Michelsons, and Rochesters.”
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