by Letty Scott
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Copyright © 2014 by LettyScott
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DISCLAIMER
Please don’t be stupid and kill yourself. This book is a work of FICTION.
It is fiction and not to be confused with reality. Neither the author nor the publisher or its associates assume any responsibility for any loss, injury, death or legal consequences resulting from acting on the contents in this book. The author’s opinions are not to be construed as the opinions of the publisher. The material in this book is for entertainment purposes ONLY. Enjoy.
Married to the Bad Boy
By: Letty Scott
© LettyScott 2014
I would like to dedicate the story to my Aunt Jenny, she was the one who inspired me to start writing and has always supported me since.
Prologue
“You’re worthless. No wonder he didn’t want you,” I heard my drunken stepfather say right before I felt the stinging pain when his hand connected with my cheek. “You’re nothing to us! No one would want a fucked up kid like you.” The words hurt even though I’ve gotten used to hearing them. “You can’t even cook a decent meal without it coming out cold!”
He pushed me against the wall, causing me to slam my head, making my sight go blurry. Before my vision could even return, I felt him punch me across my left cheek, making me fall to the kitchen floor. The broken plate, the one he had thrown on the floor moments ago, surrounded me. He had been unhappy about his dinner becoming cold from when it had been waiting for him for the past ten minutes.
“Get the hell out of my sight before I end your useless life for you,” he snarled at me. I felt his foot connect with my stomach, as tears started running down my face as the pain spread through my body. I knew better though than to make any noise. That would just give him incentive to continue the abuse, with the knowledge that he had caused me pain.
As I started to crawl away from him, I heard my mother’s drunken laughter fill the air around me. I never understood how she could just sit there and let him do this to me. It seemed that the alcohol had blurred her vision and she wasn’t able to see what her husband was doing to her daughter. She would just sit there and laugh as he used me for his human punching bag, like she was watching stand up comedy.
I felt him kick me in the stomach once again, making me fall back onto the broken plate. I instantly felt the searing pain caused by a broken piece cutting my hand. I had to bite my lip to keep from screaming as I felt the small pieces dig into my skin. I could hear him walking away as I looked down to see the tiny drops of blood welling up and spreading across my hand.
From across the kitchen, I could hear him rummaging through the kitchen drawers then closing them. I blinked a few times, taking in his feet coming closer to me. I watched as he bent down onto his knee while holding a knife by the black handle.
“Here, take this knife.” His voice was snide, mocking. “Go into the bathroom, get into the tub and cut those wrists of yours open.” He held out a knife to me now, a spiteful gleam in his eyes. This wasn’t the first time he’d told me to do this. This had become a nightly thing, a routine almost. He would get mad about the craziest things, ending with me being used as a punching bag and being told to kill myself.
“Oh, just let me do it! I’d love to see her blood drain from her,” my stepsister, Mandy, called out, her voice full of malice. She’d always had it in for me, it seemed. I never understood why she hated me. I’ve never done anything to her as far as I knew.
It seemed she was never a big fan of me ever since my mother married her father. When we were kids growing up, she always picked on me, but I had learned how to ignore her insults though. All that changed though, when I turned ten and my father left me. He disappeared from my life forever.
When my stepfather found out, he got mad at me for crying over my father leaving me. And that was when the beatings started. He would hit me and tell me to stop crying. Then Mandy would come up behind him and join him in hurting me by saying what a worthless cause I was. Ever since then she would help him with tearing apart my soul till there was nothing left but an empty shell.
“See? No one wants you here! Even your own father left you because he couldn’t stand you,” my stepdad said, the words hammering me worse than the kicks and punches ever did. “You’re nothing but a burden to this family!” he yelled before he stood back up and kicked me in the side again. I screamed in pain and he pulled his foot back, kicking me again. I writhed in agony, begging for the pain to stop. Soon the darkness took over, just as it did every night.
1
I walked through the halls and pulled my hoodie closer to my face. I hoped no one would see the bruise that had formed there overnight. It wasn’t as if they pay that much attention to me anyway. Most of the student body thought of me as a loner, a freak or any number of other things they could think of and would just stay away from me. I wasn’t planning to get close to anyone and taking a chance of him or her finding out what's going on at home. I couldn't risk those around asking questions that I damn sure wasn’t willing to answer.
When I was younger, I had a few close friends and had been very social and outgoing with other people. After the abuse started, I slowly distanced myself from those around me because I didn’t want anyone to know what was going on in my own personal hell at home. I figured it would just be best to separate myself from all those who knew me and not trouble anyone else with my problems. My friends back then didn’t understand why I pushed them away, but they soon got the message. I wanted them to stay away, leaving me friendless by the time I got into middle school.
I sighed when I finally got to my locker and was able to hide my face a little better. I reached up to get one of my morning books when a shot of pain slightly ran down my side. I crossed my arm to my side, hoping the pain would go away quickly, and breathed deeply through my nose and out of my mouth. The agony was almost unbearable.
When I had woken up this morning, I was still on the kitchen floor surrounded by the broken plate. My hand had dried up blood on it next to the knife my stepfather had given me. On top of the knife was a pink Post-it note. ‘Clean up this mess or else you know what will happen.’ I had quietly cleaned the kitchen up, desperate to not take the chance of waking up anyone. After I was done,
I went to my room, moving as soundlessly as I could, and got ready for school. It was then that I saw the bruises that had formed on my face. I could only gasp in dismay.
I was so focused on the pain and memories from last night that I didn’t notice the person walking up to me until I heard a male voice.
“Hey, Kami! You okay there?” the voice asked from the other side of my locker.
“Yeah, I’m fine. I just hurt my side this morning,” I lied, hoping they would get the hint and leave me alone like everyone else did. I knew people had seen me in pain before, but they never offered to help me. I closed my eyes as I heard him move around me, but he didn’t walk away.
I felt whoever it was place his hand on my shoulder and I had to keep it together in an effort not to scream out in pain. My shoulders were sore and bruised from where it had been slammed against the wall last night.
This person gently squeezing it made me clench my teeth together from the discomfort it was causing. I had to shrug my shoulder to get whoever it was to let go, since he obviously wouldn’t know that he was causing me pain.
I could hear him clearing his throat and I knew whoever it was, he wouldn’t be leaving me alone any time soon.
“You don’t look fine. Maybe you should go to the nurse and have her take a look, make sure that everything’s all right,” he said, his voice laced with concern.
“No! I’m fine!” I screamed and looked up into a pair of warm, brown eyes. Those eyes belonged to someone I never expected to show me any kind of compassion: Brandon Mitchell, the school bad boy. His eyes widened and then narrowed as he took in my bruised face, making his eyes switch from concern to rage, and he took a closer look. I don’t know how he was able to see the bruise through the hoodie, but he did.
“What the hell, Kami?” he asked while pulling my hood down and then looking at my face. “Who did this?”
The look on his face was murderous. All I could do was shake my head at him. I couldn’t tell him who did this. I couldn’t tell him how it had happened. So much worse things could take place if I did. I just stood there shaking my head at him as I felt a tear slip down my face. When the tears started slowly falling, his face softened up a little.
“Kami, don’t cry. Just tell me who is hurting you and maybe I can help you, if you let me,” he said softly, stepping closer to me.
“No one did it. I told you, I fell and hurt myself this morning,” I stated firmly, stepping away from him while pulling the hoodie back over my head. I didn’t need the rest of the student body seeing my bruised face and start questioning what happened to me too. It was bad enough that Brandon knew.
“I swear to God, if your boyfriend did this, I’m going to find him and bury his sorry ass six feet under.” He swore with his fists clenched tightly in anger. His voice had risen slightly, which caused a few people that were walking through the hall to turn and look over at us.
“I don’t have a boyfriend,” I muttered, eying the people who were looking our way. “And keep it down! I don’t need anyone else knowing about this, ok?”
“Then tell me who did this to you,” he demanded again.
I could tell by the way he crossed his arms over his chest that he was getting frustrated that I wasn’t telling him anything. The look on his face was scary, telling me that I had better tell him or else he’d find out another way.
“It doesn’t matter who, what, where, when or how I hurt myself, Brandon,” I said with an equally frustrated sigh. “Just leave it alone and go back to doing what you normally do. Leave me alone like everyone else always does.” I said the last part in a whisper. Looking back into my locker, I reached up to get the book I had attempted to pull down just a minute ago and tried to ignore the pain that raced down my side.
Before I could get to it though, Brandon grabbed hold of it and handed it to me. I reached for it, but he pulled it away and held it out of my reach. He took my outstretched hand, though, and entangled our fingers together.
“Brandon, what the hell? Give me my book and let go of my hand,” I demanded, trying to pull my hand out of his only for him to grip it tighter.
“You’re coming with me.” His voice was deep and commanding, allowing no room for argument. “We’re going to talk about this.” With that, he pulled me to him. He used the hand that held my book to shut my locker. He started dragging me down the hall with all of the student body witnessing it.
As we walked down the hallway, I kept my head down, trying to make myself as small as possible. I was sure that everyone was wondering why Brandon Mitchell was holding my hand and escorting me down the hall. If anything, they probably thought I was the latest of his victims who fell prey to his player ways.
Brandon was one of those boys who liked to cause trouble in school. If it wasn’t disobeying the teachers and interrupting classes when he showed up, he was rough housing around in the halls with the other students just to show how strong he was. It seemed that since he had this bad boy vibe about him, the girls fell under his mercy. I was sure he had his fair share of girls in bed, making him somewhat known as a player also.
Since I kept to myself, I didn’t even think I was on his radar. He could have any girl he wanted, so why did he pay attention to me today? Why couldn’t it be a day that there wasn’t a bruise on my face? He had decided to notice me today of all days and now it looked like there was more trouble coming my way.
He pulled me into a dark classroom and shut the door, turning on the lights. As the lights lit up the room, I turned to see him leaning against the door with his arms once again crossed over his chest. I took in his six-foot-two height with his just-rolled-out-of-bed messy brown hair. The way his shirt hugged his biceps and lay against his chest, you could tell this boy had some strength in him and was one of those guys you didn’t want to double cross.
As I took in his appearance, I saw his eyes travel up and down my body, as if he could see through my clothes and examine all the bruises that lay underneath. “Take the hoodie off,” he ordered. I just stood there like a deer in the headlights, gaping at him in disbelief. I didn’t know what to say in return, which made him kick the door and walk over to me, causing me to take a step back. I wasn’t sure what he was going to do, but all I knew was that I wanted to get out of this classroom.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Kami. I’m against hitting girls, so you have nothing to worry about.” He looked at me steadily for a moment before continuing. “I just want to see how badly damaged you are, so I can figure out how severe I need to kick this dickhead's ass. Now, I’ll ask one more time. Take off the hoodie.”
“Why does this matter so much to you?” I practically shouted at him as I kept backing away. He followed me, relentless. Why was he acting so concerned about me when he didn’t even know me? We have never been friends. Brandon just ignored me and stayed with his own group of friends. So why was he acting as if we’re friends now? This boy was confusing me and it was getting harder for me to think straight. This could end up being very dangerous, leading to mistakes that I could end up paying for.
When I finally hit the desk behind me, I fell down into the seat and had to look up at him. He leaned down and placed one hand on the back of the chair and the other on the desk as he looked down at me. He had managed to cage me to keep me in place. I had the distinct impression it was done deliberately.
“It just does, ok?” he said in reply to my question. “Now take off the hoodie and let me see how badly hurt you are. Then I’ll know how rough I need to go on this guy.”
I sat there shaking my head, trying to think of a way to get out of the awkward situation I had just gotten myself into. I looked to the front of the classroom at the white board thinking of a way to get this guy away from me. “I told you. No one did it! I fell a few days ago and hurt myself. Please, just let me go,” I pleaded with him.
He stood back up, giving me a little more breathing room, but I could still feel his eyes looking down at me. I then saw him pacing the room bac
k and worth, letting out an irritated sigh. “Why are you protecting this person? They need to be thrown in jail.”
I looked back at him to see him walking to the classroom door now. “Since you’re so against telling me, maybe I should go to Officer Pilgrim and tell him about the bruises across your face. Then you’ll have to talk to him and answer his questions. I’m just trying to help you, Kami. Unlike everyone else in this school, I’ve noticed things. I know this isn’t the first time this has happened to you.”
“Brandon, please just let it go. There's nothing you can do to help me and getting the police involved is just going to cause more problems for me,” I replied, hoping that he finally got the picture.
That's when we both heard the school bell ring, which alerted us that we needed to get to class. Brandon had his hand on the doorknob by then. He turned and looked at me one last time. “This isn’t over,” he said firmly, walking out of the classroom. I was starting to get frustrated with all this. I just wished he would let it go.
Walking out of the classroom about the same time the other students walked in, I could feel their eyes on me. I knew they were trying to figure out what Brandon and I had been doing in there. When I got into the hall, I looked over to see Brandon walking into the school office. The only thought I had at that moment was that he was going to go tell the school cop about the bruise on my face. I ran down the hall as fast as my sore body would let me, which wasn’t much more than a fast walk, to try and stop him from telling.
When I busted through the door, Brandon was slamming his hands down on the reception desk. “I don’t care if it's too late in the school year. Change my schedule to Kami Van’s now.”