by Wild, Nikki
“Michael looked at me and just kept laughing,” she said, her voice laden with barely held back sobs. “I couldn’t see Greg anymore, and I didn’t feel right… He’d left me there, alone with those monsters. I felt all these hands on me, touching me, pulling me up onto my feet. The world started spinning and they just sort of… dragged me upstairs. They took me into a bedroom. There were so many of them...”
My fists clenched tight as I imagined Michael’s smug face, remembering what he’d said after making it with Becky at the party. I wasn’t going to let that piece of shit get away with this.
“I don’t remember much after that,” she said, her voice strained as she held back more sobs. She glanced over at Jessica for a moment. “I just remember waking up outside of the dorms with you over me with some of the other girls… I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t understand until after those cops had gotten there.”
“You told the cops that nothing happened,” Jessica said, swallowing as she too fought to keep her emotions in check. “Why did you do that? We could have gotten them by now.”
“I didn’t want anyone to know, Jessica,” she said, a new wave of tears escaping from the corners of her eyes. “I just wanted to be left alone, to crawl into the shower and try and wash everything off of me—to wash them off of me. If I told the cops then I’d have to keep telling this over and over again… telling it once has been bad enough.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, glancing over at Jessica for a moment before returning my gaze to Becky. “You don’t need to tell us any more if it’s going to make you any more upset.”
“Thanks,” she muttered, her head resting on the top of her knees. “I just… I want to be alone for now, you two. Please. I appreciate you coming. I just don’t think I can handle being around people right now.”
“Sure, Becky,” Jessica said, motioning for me to follow as she made toward the door. “I’ll be back later tonight, I guess.”
Beck kept silent as my stepsister and I left the room, her head still resting on the top of her knees. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I heard a new round of sobs beginning as we closed the door and stood facing one another in the hallway.
“Michael has the pictures of us,” I said, flexing my fingers slowly open and closed. I wanted to wrap them around that smug bastard’s throat. It wasn’t enough that he was just blackmailing us, he needed to add rape to his list of crimes. “We need a plan.”
“Is going in and kicking his ass not enough?” she asked, her voice tense. Those words coming out of her mouth almost made me do a double take. Jessica was always a level headed person, in fact it was a trait in her that I admired. I was always the hotheaded one in the family next to my father who would blow his top at the slightest provocation. Hearing my stepsister advocating to beat the hell out of someone gave me more than an idea of just how upset this had made her. “I’m not going to let my best friend go through college without the person who hurt her getting exactly what he deserves.”
“That plan always works for me,” I said as I headed toward the stairs with her in toe. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen, but I knew I wasn’t about to let Michael get away with this—not for a second.
Chapter 15
Jessica
“What is this even going to accomplish?” I asked, doing my best to keep pace with my stepbrother as we made our way across campus. “Do you know how many of them are in there? They’ve got you outnumbered, Richard! We need to be smart about this!”
“I’m not in the mood for smart, Jess,” he said, “and you shouldn’t be here to see this.”
“Why? Because of my delicate, feminine sensibilities?” I scoffed. “I’m not some innocent little girl.”
“No, innocent is certainly not a word to describe you, babe,” he grumbled. “Just stay behind me.”
The fact that my brother still saw me as some damsel was more than enough to get my blood boiling. He knew I wasn’t some delicate flower, and more than that he knew I was smart as hell. But when Richard was upset there wasn’t much I could do to really reason with him.
Once we’d found out that Michael was the one behind the pictures, my brother made it a point to head straight over to the Alpha Epsilon Omega house, despite my protests. Richard was just one man, but how he expected to face an entire fraternity of men was completely beyond me. If anything happened, someone needed to be there to make sure he got out safe—and apparently, that someone was going to be me.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” I said as the frat house came into view. The closer we got the more my sense of dread seemed to grow until my stomach was a knot of worry. Out on the lawn, the brothers of AEΩ were loitering, the grass strewn with the remnants of a kegger they’d had the night before.
“Not a clue,” he said before walking up the walkway toward the front door.
The moment Richard stepped on the lawn, the brothers of AEΩ took notice, their heads turning and someone calling out for the rest to watch. Somehow I had gotten the idea that they’d been expecting the two of us.
“Halt!” came a voice from behind us, though it carried all the sneer and none of the seriousness of an actual command. “Who goes there?”
“Go fuck yourself,” Richard growled, reaching out to grab the doorknob.
Before he could even touch the brass knob, a hand reached out and grabbed Richard’s wrist. I watched, and in that moment I wasn’t sure who I should have been more concerned for, Richard, or the frat brother.
“None shall—” the frat boy began, smirking for a few moments before he realized that Richard had turned, taking the boy’s arm and twisting it hard behind his shoulder in an arm lock. The AEΩ goon screamed out, his deep, throaty voice suddenly reaching a falsetto pitch. “Fuck!”
Before we knew it, three other members of the fraternity were on top of us, two of them going for Richard while the remaining member took hold of my wrist and pulled me away from my stepbrother. I struggled against the frat boy holding my arm, his grip stronger than I had been expecting from some half-drunk rich boy. I heard him chuckle, a look in his eyes that I knew all too well.
Before he could pull me any closer to him, I stepped down hard onto his toes, driving the heel of my foot hard against his at the same moment as I yanked my arm away from his grip. The frat boy yowled, stepping backward in surprise. He stumbled back a few steps before falling right onto his ass on the porch.
I looked up just in time to see Richard punching one of the other AEΩ brothers right in the jaw, another doubled over and grabbing at his stomach. Out of anyone I knew that my brother could handle himself, but as I watched him do away with two of his attackers, I saw four more making their way up the stairs, a dark expression on their faces.
“Richard, we should go,” I called, backing away from the closing brothers and closer to my stepbrother.
“Go? But you only just arrived.”
I turned my head to quickly I might have given myself whiplash, taking another step closer to Richard as Michael stepped through the front door, a wicked smirk on his face. I felt like I was going to be sick, my mind unsure of whether to be afraid or enraged at what that monster had done to my best friend.
I heard Richard roar in anger, moving past my like a wild animal, his fist raised. But before he could even get close to Michael, four pairs of hands grabbed him and threw him to the ground.
“I wouldn’t, if I were you,” Michael said in his smug, cocky voice. “You’re a guest in our house, and assaulting your hosts is just so rude.”
Michael’s frat brothers laughed in a dim-witted chorus. My stomach turned as I watched him bask in their sheep-like admiration. This was the kind of thing that Michael loved, being the mastermind, the leader of “lesser men” as he called them. It made me sick just watching it.
“You know why we’re here, Michael,” I said. “We want the pictures back.”
“Pictures?” he asked, feigning innocence. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”<
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“Cut the bullshit,” Richard snarled, slowly getting to his feet under the watch of four muscled college students. “You know what picture’s we’re talking about.”
Michael made a pleased sound in his throat, his smile only widening like some psychotic Cheshire cat. That smile made my skin crawl.
“We should discuss business inside,” Michael said, motioning for his henchmen to step back. “It’s far too crowded out here, I think.”
Richard and I begrudgingly followed Michael into the house, a troop of brothers following behind, their faces taking on a menacing expression. I didn’t like the way they looked at me, hungry like a pack of wild animals. Was that the look they’d given Becky before they’d raped her? I wanted to vomit at the thought.
We were lead into was appeared to be some kind of sitting room, a set of leather armchairs set right in front of a roaring fire. The entire room was lined with bookshelves, and it gave off a definite air of sophistication and class. If this room had been in any other place on Earth I might have honestly been in heaven.
“Close the doors, gentlemen,” Michael called to them, his tone almost patronizing. “We’d like some privacy.”
We heard the soft click of the double doors closing behind us as Michael began to pace leisurely in front of the fireplace.
“So, little Miss Becky told you about our little party the other night,” he said. “She’s such a naughty little slut. But not as naughty as the two of you, I think.”
He casually drew out his smartphone and began to swipe his thumb across the screen, moving it from left to right as he gave a sinister chuckle.
“The things you two have done to one another,” he said, shaking his head and clucking his tongue. “Most people wouldn’t dream of seeing things like this…. And to your own stepbrother no less, Jessica? It seems like you’re twice the slut Becky is.”
“Don’t you dare talk about her like that!” I said, clenching my fists. “You’re lucky I don’t report you for what you did to her.”
“Luck had nothing to do with it, Jessica,” he said, smiling so smugly as he turned his phone toward Richard and I, a picture of Becky on the screen, his hair a mess, her eyes half open. With a touch of his finger, the video began to play and Michael’s recorded voice rang out clearly.
“You want this, don’t you? Tell me you want to fuck me. Say it right to the camera,” Michael said over the speaker.
Becky’s eyes turned toward the camera, confusion plastered across her face.
“I want it,” she mumbled, blinking slowly.
“And there you have it,” Michael said, shutting off his phone. “I believe they call that consent.”
“You drugged her,” Richard growled. “That doesn’t count as consent.”
“Where’s your proof?” he asked, looking around as though it might be in the room with us. “Did little Miss Becky get herself tested? A rape kit? Drug screening?”
My stomach tightened. Becky had been too scared to step forward, afraid of the judgement and the persecution that came with being a victim of sexual assault. She didn’t want to be another statistic, another “slut.”
“And in regard to our business,” Michael laughed, “I’m going to be keeping these pictures right here on my phone where they’re nice and safe… and if I ever need you to do something, then I’ve got everything I need to make sure that you do it. After all, you wouldn’t want Mommy and Daddy finding out their precious little stepchildren are getting nasty together at college, do you?
“And I don’t think the coach will be too thrilled to find out that his star freshman quarterback like to stick it to his family members, do you? Bad for publicity.”
I felt bile rising in my throat as the reality of Michael’s threat hit me like a ton of bricks. If he released those pictures—if our parents found out what the two of us were doing together—our lives would be ruined.
“Why shouldn’t I just take that fucking phone from you right now?” Richard asked, taking a step forward threateningly. Michael only let out another laugh.
“Because, Richard, those pictures aren’t just on my phone… they’re up there!” he said, pointing into the air above him. “Up in the Cloud, where they can be nice and safe in case something silly might happen to my phone. Isn’t technology grand?”
“You son of a bitch,” Richard growled.
“I can’t deny that,” Michael chuckled, “my mother is an enormous bitch. But that’s not the point here, is it? No, the point is that I’ve got proof of something that you don’t want the world to know about, and for the low, low price of whatever I want, it’ll stay that way—tucked away in my little corner of the internet, never to be seen again.”
“And if we say no you’ll release the pictures all over the internet,” I said, a crushing feeling of defeat crashing over me like a ton of bricks.
“Still as smart as ever,” Michael sneered, his tone mocking as he slipped his phone back into his pants pocket.
I turned toward Richard, hoping that he might have an answer to what was happening, some kind of clever trick he might be able to pull out on Michael that would save us both from both embarrassment and possible disownment from our parents. Richard’s life would be ruined and his college football career over before it even had a chance to really start.
“What do we do?” I asked, my voice low, though I knew Michael could hear every word. I could practically feel him gloating over both of our misfortune. He had us right under his thumb—exactly where he wanted us with no foreseeable way out that didn’t ruin our lives.
“I don’t know, Jess,” he said, his eyes staring into the back of a high backed leather chair that Michael had taken to leaning on heavily. “I really don’t know.”
“Well, for starters, the two of you could get out,” Michael said, his voice filled with mocking cheer. “This is a house for the brothers of AEΩ, which neither one of you belong to. We pride ourselves on keeping out the garbage… though I could make an exception, if sweet little Jessica were willing to spread her legs a bit.”
Richard moved forward like a tiger about to jump in for the kill, his face a deep, dark red, his expression filled with rage. I barely had enough time to reach out and pull his arm back, stopping his just shy of slugging Michael right in the jaw.
“Don’t!” I shouted, looking right into Michael’s smirking face. “That’s what he wants.”
Richard’s body was so tense, each of his muscles ready to spring at a moment’s notice.
“He wants an excuse to leak those pictures,” I whispered, putting myself between the two of them. “We can’t give him a reason.”
“You are just so smart, Jessica,” Michael said, false admiration filling his voice. “You really should take her advice, Richard. After all, who knows how long something like fucking your own sister is going to follow you through life?”
“Let’s go,” I whispered, pushing against my stepbrother’s nearly frozen body. Slowly I felt him giving against my efforts until finally he moved back a step and turned. Richard didn’t say a single word, his jaw clenched shut the entire way out of the AEΩ house and out onto the street.
The silence was almost unnerving as I fell into step behind Richard, unsure exactly where either of us were going at first.
“You’re kinda scaring me, Richard,” I said, swallowing hard around the still present lump in my throat. “Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”
“My dorm,” he grunted, though he never turned his gaze back toward me as he walked.
“Why there?” I asked, my brow furrowing as I hurried to keep pace with him.
“We need to regroup and come up with some kind of plan.”
Chapter 16
Dick
“What now?” I groaned. “If we don’t get those pictures then we’re going to have that bastard looming over our heads for the rest of our time here. Those pictures are going to ruin us… especially if mom and dad find out.”
“I know,�
� she sighed, her head in head hands. “We are completely fucked.”
The two of us had gone back to my dorm after the confrontation with Michael at the fraternity to figure out what our next move would be. As it stood, Michael had the upper hand on us. The pictures themselves didn’t technically exist outside of his phone, though with the way things worked now, that meant that the pictures were also floating around in the Cloud, able to be retrieved regardless of whether that bastard’s phone was smashed. The only way to save ourselves was to find a way to delete those pictures from existence and hope Michael hadn’t been smart enough to make backups.
“There’s no way we can get those pictures,” I said, running a hand through my hair in frustration. “Not unless we suddenly learn how to hack into Michael’s phone. And I’m not sure if you noticed, but none of us are that good with computers.”
“I know that, Richard,” Jessica said, frowning at how upset I was getting. If these pictures got out, it would be the end of my football career, and I hardly believed that my dad would fund his son’s college if he knew what his step-daughter and I had been up to while we were away from home. “I probably know that just as well as you do.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, resting my face against my hands. “I’m just worried, that’s all. I don’t like being threatened, and I especially don’t like you being threatened, either. I just wish I had a solution, something that I could actually do to make all of this go away. But like I said, neither of us are that good with computers.”
I looked up from my hands just in time to see Jessica sit up suddenly, her eyebrows raised. It was like a light bulb had gone off over her head.
“What about Greg?”
“Greg?” I asked, frowning. “This is all Greg’s fault! Why would he help us?”
“I think we’re going to make him help us,” Jessica said, a smile creeping onto her lips. “Greg is a Computer Science major, and from what Becky kept saying about him, he’s like a Steve Wozniak-level genius. If we can convince him to help us, then we’ll be one step closer to being in the clear.”