by Roni Loren
“What the fuck?”
The booming voice cutting through the silence of the night sent Kaden jumping back to his feet and Tessa hopping off the swing. They turned to find Doug standing at the edge of the park with a few of the people from the party.
“Oh, no,” Tessa said, her hand going over her mouth and fear filling her eyes. “Doug, it’s not—”
“What is he doing with his hands and mouth on you, Tessa?” Doug demanded, his eyes filling with fury.
She lifted her palms to him. “It was nothing, just a misunderstanding.”
“That didn’t look like a misunderstanding. That looked like he was trying to maul you.”
She shook her head.
“Did you tell him no?” he demanded.
Kaden looked to Tessa, his heart pounding hard in his ears. He had no shot in this fight if Doug started one. Kaden was way outnumbered, but he was willing to fight for Tessa if need be. He willed her to tell Doug to fuck off, that she was with Kaden now. But as he watched the panic envelop her like a fog, saw her gaze jump from one person to the next, the old Tessa he used to know took over.
“I didn’t have a chance. It was just a mistake,” she said softly. “It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”
“When a guy tries to put his fucking hands on you, it is a big deal,” he said, his voice rattling Kaden’s ears. He nailed Kaden with a glare. “I always knew you were a freak. Goddamned rapist in training.”
Kaden clenched his jaw, and Tessa didn’t say anything to defend him.
“Tessa, go back to the house with these guys and find a ride home. Kaden and I need to have a chat.”
“No,” she said, her voice rising. “Don’t hurt him, Doug. He didn’t hurt me. It wasn’t like that. Just let it go.”
Doug grinned, but it had no humor in it. “Don’t worry, babe. I’m not going to hurt him. We’re just going to have a talk to make sure he’s never going to come near you again.”
Tessa looked to Kaden, her frightened rabbit expression tugging at him, but he couldn’t bear to meet her eyes. She wasn’t standing up and telling the truth. She was letting all these people think he’d tried to take advantage of her. She wasn’t going to come with him to Dallas. She never had planned to. That kiss was going to be her kiss good-bye.
“Just go, Tess,” he said quietly. “I’ll be f-f-fine.”
“Kaden—”
He lifted his gaze to hers. “Go b-b-back and be with your friends, homecoming queen. Your court awaits.”
She winced like he’d backhanded her. And he immediately regretted the snark in his voice. But he couldn’t stop the emotions from spilling out. He’d pinned everything on tonight, had hoped that if he could really make things different, he could change the path for them both. But it’d been stupid to hope.
Things never changed. People were who they were. He was the freak and she was the future debutante. Their worlds would never fit together.
He would never fit.
And it probably wouldn’t matter because based on how Doug was staring at him, he may not make it through the night.
Tessa left with the group, peering back over her shoulder one last time, and Kaden waited for her to be out of sight. Then he did the only thing he could do. He ran. Like a coward. He knew Doug had no interest in talking. This was going to be a conversation of fists. He wasn’t stronger than Doug. The dude lifted weights daily for football. But he hoped he might be faster.
However, when he ran into the woods behind the high school, he could hear Doug calling his name from not far behind. Branches cut at Kaden’s face as he raced through the trees in the dark. He figured if he could make it home he could lock himself inside and call the cops. His house wouldn’t be far once he made it to the main road. But his Vans were no match for the gnarled roots and slippery ground of the forest floor. His foot caught a raised root, turning his ankle, and he went sprawling face-first to the ground. All his air left him as he hit.
He did his best to scramble upward, but before he could, a foot planted against his spine and shoved him back to the ground. He landed with an oof and pain shot up his back.
“Where you going, freak? Think you could outrun me. That proves you’re not just a freak but stupid.”
“Fuck off,” he ground out.
“Excuse me?” His booted foot swung into Kaden’s ribs with a painful crack. “Someone needs to teach you manners, son.”
Kaden’s knees pulled up and he rolled into the fetal position, the pain blinding him for a second. He tried to curl tight, protecting his midsection from another blow.
“You trying to take advantage of my girl?” Doug asked, his voice disconcertingly calm. “Think she could ever want a piece of shit like you when she has someone like me?”
“I’m n-n-not t-t-trying to take advantage of her,” he said, hoping to placate him, willing to suck up the humiliation if it meant he wouldn’t get kicked again. He needed to get up, get away, but his body wouldn’t cooperate. Knives of agony were stabbing his lungs.
“You’re n-n-not?” Doug mocked and kicked him again. Harder. “Then why is she kissing the guy who’s supposed to be her tutor?”
Kaden yelped even though he hated letting Doug know he’d hurt him. But that time he knew a rib had been broken. Tears sprung to his eyes, the sheer pain making it impossible to breathe.
“Yeah, I knew about that. I let it go because her parents are riding her about her grades. And I figured you weren’t worth worrying about. But Tessa’s weak. I realize that now. She buys into your poor me crap. She pities you and is mistaking that for feelings.” He shoved him in the side with his heel, flipping him onto his stomach and sending agony through his ribcage. Doug wrenched Kaden’s arms behind him and looped his belt around his wrists. Kaden tried to fight back but every movement made him want to weep. The pain made his head spin. “But you have nothing to offer her. You’re a fucking pussy, Fowler. You can’t even protect yourself, how would you take care of her?”
The toe of Doug’s boot made contact with his side and Kaden tasted blood. He tried to crawl away but it was near impossible without the use of his hands. He was going to die out here. Doug loomed over him and pulled him onto his knees.
“At least be man enough to look me in the eye and apologize.”
Kaden refused to lift his head and Doug started in with his fists. When knuckles crashed into his jaw, Kaden knew he was close to losing consciousness.
Doug crouched low, getting in his face. “Apologize, you pathetic piece of shit.”
Kaden spat blood in his face and Doug roared, backhanding him.
Kaden choked, his chest wheezing with effort. Black edged his vision. He forced words out through gasping breaths. “I’m sorry. Please. Just stop. Can’t breathe.”
“Oh, what was that? I couldn’t hear you,” he mocked.
Kaden swayed on his knees, half-hoping that if he passed out Doug would stop and go away, the fun gone, but he didn’t put it past the guy to kill him in cold blood. He swallowed down any pride he had left, hoping to survive the night. “I’m s-s-sorry, Doug. Please, just stop. I’ll leave her alone. I’ll do whatever you want. Just. Stop.”
Doug grinned and his teeth seemed to glow and sharpen in the dark. “Is that right? You’ll do whatever I want.”
Kaden’s vision blurred, two versions of Doug dancing before him. He closed his eyes, pleading. “Yes. Please. Stop.”
But Doug wasn’t going to be appeased that easily. The humiliation wasn’t complete. The sound of a zipper brought Kaden back from the edge of consciousness. His eyelids snapped open, though one was already starting to swell, and he watched in abject horror as Doug pulled his dick out of his pants.
Pure panic seized Kaden, and he tried to scramble to his feet, the pain in his ribs like daggers slicing through his organs. But
Doug just shoved him back down and laughed. “Where you going, asshole? I’m not done with you. Ready to show me what a pussy you are? Or maybe I should say cocksucker. I know that’s why you stutter. All that dick you suck.”
Kaden gagged both on blood and fear, choking out his words. “You’ll have to kill me first.”
“A valid option,” Doug said with a sneer. “But you’re not worth jail time.”
Kaden spit blood at him again, using the last shred of energy he had and Doug hit him in the side of the head, knocking him to the ground. He couldn’t move. He’d been beaten until his ribs had cracked and he could barely breathe. He wasn’t going to make it out of these woods. And that end would’ve been welcome because the next thing that happened was worse than death. Doug grabbed Kaden by the hair, took his dick in his hand, and forced it down Kaden’s throat. It was sweaty and hard and disgusting. Doug laughed at him, calling him a bitch, and telling him to act like a good one. Kaden tried to bite down but Doug yanked on his hair and told him if he used teeth, he’d put him in the dirt and fuck him with one of the fallen tree branches. Kaden gagged and choked, fighting for breath and the urge to upchuck, but Doug was enjoying it all, getting off on Kaden’s ultimate humiliation. When Doug came, Kaden did vomit, then he blacked out.
When he woke up, he was naked, tied up, and bleeding under the bleachers of the school’s football field. And he’d had no idea how he’d gotten there, where his clothes had gone, or what Doug had done after he’d passed out. He refused to talk to the groundskeeper who’d found him. Everyone would already know who’d beaten him. Nobody would tell. Including him. There were some things you never wanted to relive, things you never wanted anyone to know, things you didn’t even want to acknowledge in your own mind had happened. And that morning as they patched him up in the hospital and asked him a hundred questions, he’d slammed the vault shut on that night. His secret would stay in those woods. Buried. Along with that boy who was bullied. He would never let anyone have that kind of control over him again. He would never be weak or vulnerable. He would become someone else.
Kaden Fowler died that day.
Doug Barrett had killed him.
THIRTY-ONE
Tessa lay in the bed in the guest room of her former house, trying not to make a sound so that she could hear any little noise in the place. She hadn’t heard anything in a solid hour. Her heartbeat had finally slowed when she realized that if Doug planned to make some sort of move on her, it wouldn’t be tonight. Not that she would’ve let him. She loosened her grip on the chef’s knife she’d tucked under the pillow. Kade had informed her that first night that an expensive one was sharp enough to cut off fingers. And God knows she’d never used this one when she lived here, so it was as sharp as the day it was honed. But thankfully, it didn’t look like she was going to need it to protect herself.
The chilling text message Kade had sent her earlier was still burning in her mind. I’m coming to get you. Don’t stay in the house with him. He’s a sociopath and a rapist.
Rapist. The word made what little she’d eaten in the last twenty-four hours want to come up. At first the accusation hadn’t made sense. Kade hadn’t seen Doug since high school. How would he know that? But then the answer had come crashing down on her. Because Doug had done something more than beat up Kade that awful night. The thought had almost been too much to take in.
No one had seen Kaden afterward. Rumors had spread that he’d been beaten badly, but she hadn’t known what to believe. She’d tried to go to his house, but his stepdad had told her he wasn’t there, that he was moving in with his real dad. She’d wanted to tell Kaden she was sorry and make sure he was okay. She’d wanted to tell him she’d go with him to Dallas. But he’d left town before she’d gotten a chance.
Then over time, Doug had convinced her that nothing bad had really happened that night. That it was all just rumors. He’d said that he’d told Kaden not to come back to school or he would beat him down. That’s all. He said he didn’t want Kaden around her and did it to keep her safe. And she’d wanted to believe him because she didn’t feel like she had any other options. Her eggs were in Doug’s basket, and she’d wanted to believe the good parts about him. He’d lavished her with attention and made her feel like he was being overprotective because he loved her. She’d been stupid to let herself believe it. Stupid and too scared to do anything on her own.
Doug had been across the room when she’d received the message from Kade, and she’d had the instant urge to take the very knife under her pillow and damage him, make him pay for every sick and cruel thing he’d ever done to anyone. But she’d held back, bided her time. She needed a plan. She needed him to think she was cooperating.
And now she was lying here, counting on three things she knew about Doug for sure.
One: He always took a sleeping pill before bed.
Two: He obsessively documented everything down to how many minutes he ran on the treadmill.
Three: He always underestimated her.
He would regret all three of those things tonight. Once she was sure he was asleep, she slipped out of bed and put her tennis shoes on. She quietly made her way downstairs and put in the code to turn off the alarm. She held her breath at the beep signaling the disarmed state, but the walls were heavily insulated and she knew it was hard to hear what was going on downstairs when you were upstairs. After waiting a few minutes to make sure Doug didn’t come down the stairs, she went to the sliding glass door at the back and opened it.
The crickets and other night bugs greeted her, but she knew they weren’t the only ones out there. She gave a little all-clear signal, and Kade melted out of the darkness at the side of the yard. Stress had morphed his features into a hard mask, but the instant his arms were around her, she saw the relief there. “You’re okay?”
“I’m fine.”
He kissed the top of her head, whispering thanks to God. “You should’ve never left with him. You had me out of my mind with worry. Why would you do that?”
“I was trying to protect you. He had charges against you and a witness, he has pictures of us from the other night—ones that would ruin things for your case. I needed to do what he wanted and come with him. But I have a plan. You didn’t need to come here and be around him again.” She shook her head, tears gathering in her throat. “I can’t imagine what it must be like to be anywhere near him.”
“Hey,” he said, cupping her face and forcing her gaze to his. “Don’t do that. Don’t pity me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I couldn’t tell anyone, Tess. Seventeen-year-old boys aren’t supposed to get raped. You know what people would’ve said? That I wanted it. That I should’ve been able to fight him off otherwise. I just wanted to forget it ever happened. I needed to bury that person I was that night in order to move on with my life.”
Tears fell and she pressed her face into his shoulder. “I’m so sorry. It was my fault. If I’d have stood up for you that night, he wouldn’t have gotten you alone. Everything would’ve been different.”
“Don’t do that to yourself, baby,” he said softly. “It wasn’t your fault. We were young and neither of us could’ve guessed he would’ve taken it that far. And it’s truly in my past. My dad saw the state I was in when I showed up. He didn’t know exactly what had happened to me, but he saw enough of the depression to know I needed therapy. I worked through it. The only other time it came up was when I started realizing I had dominant urges. I thought at first it was because of what had happened, my need for control in all things, but then I started looking back and seeing all the signs that were there way before that night. Maybe that night fast-forwarded my desire to be in charge, but it would’ve shown up eventually anyway. I truly hadn’t thought about Doug in years until you showed up in my life again.”
“And, of course, I bring all that bad stuff back up.”
&n
bsp; “Baby.” He grabbed her shoulders and leaned back to look at her. “You coming back to me has been the best thing that’s happened in my life since Rosalie was born. I feel like all this time I’ve been cycling through relationships, I was just waiting for what I really wanted. Who I always needed. You.”
“Kade—” Her chest squeezed, words leaving her.
“And I don’t care what the fuck Doug has on us, I’m not letting you do anything for him. I will figure out the custody situation. Reid just found out that my ex’s husband plays tennis with the judge who ruled on our case. So he’s petitioning for a different judge based on conflict of interest.”
“Maybe we won’t have to get faux engaged after all.”
“No, we won’t. I’m not going to allow it anyway.”
She blinked. “What?”
He took her hand and kissed her left ring finger. “When I put a ring on this, it will be for real or not at all. I’m done hiding it. I love you, Tess. I did then. And I do even more now. You’re it for me.”
She lowered her head, the weight of the words making her want to slide down to the ground. Love. It’d been said to her before. But somehow this felt like the first time anyone had truly meant it.
“I’m willing to give you the time you need to figure out what you want because I know this has happened quickly and that I come with a lot of fine print. I’m dominant and that’s not going to change, so being with me would mean being my submissive. And I have a little girl who will hopefully be a big part of my life. Plus, I’m in the public eye, so people would scrutinize us. I realize it’s a lot. But I need you to know that this hasn’t been a fling for me. This hasn’t been about fantasy. This has been me falling in love with you all over again. Day by day. Moment by moment.” He laced his fingers with hers. “You walked into my restaurant that first night, and before I even realized who you were, it was like the world shifted beneath my feet. Nothing has looked the same since.”