“Did you tell them Isaac was there? That Oscar was there?”
“Oscar was never there, Mia!” My stomach did a one-eighty before launching up my throat. “And, yes, I told them about Isaac being there … but I really don’t think Isaac would rape me. Especially since I was more than willing to have sex with him. You know that. He knew that …”
“You’re kidding me, right?” I placed two hands beside her as I leaned over. “I saw it with my own eyes, Bria. You were on the floor, butt-ass naked and unconscious. Isaac raped you.”
“Then why didn’t you do anything about it?” she sneered.
I threw my hands in the air. “I couldn’t move, or else I would have!”
Flashes of Oscar kicking Bria out of the way like a ragdoll flooded my mind, and I couldn’t believe Bria was so naïve. Ollie was being set up, again, by his brother. It was the perfect plan, but this time, he had me.
Pushing off the hospital bed, I took one last look at Bria, who lay there defeated. “I’m sorry this happened to you, but you know Ollie wouldn’t do this. You need to open your eyes. Who is the only person who has come to check on you since you’ve been here? I bet Isaac never fucking came in here.” The look on her face twisted and though I couldn’t read it, I knew she was a lost cause. I turned and walked away, heading straight for Ollie’s dorm.
Ollie’s things were already packed up and gone like he’d never been here. I collapsed over his mattress and closed my eyes. The rage boiled, and I could feel it first in my fist as I dug my nails into the palms of my hands. I jumped off the mattress, the same mattress we’d fallen asleep on so many times before. The same mattress where he’d read to me. The same mattress where we’d made love. Adrenaline pumping through my bloodstream, I grabbed the side of the mattress and threw it across the room as I cried out.
My face fell into my hands as I sobbed. My legs buckled as I collapsed to my knees. “What did Ollie ever do to you to deserve this?” I asked out loud, desperation in my tone, heart, and soul. Was I so desperate, I had turned to God? I had to be going insane. As I shook my head, the cries only deepened, coming from the pit of my stomach. “What the hell am I even doing … You never listened. You never helped. We’re your little puppets on a damn string as you sit on your throne and toy with people’s lives. Well, you know what? You’re fucking sick!”
Dropping my head, my eyes landed on Ollie’s phone in front of me along with The Notebook. It must have been under the mattress.
My cries faded as I held the phone in my trembling hand. The phone was on, but it only had a quarter of its battery life left. Gathering to my feet, I stuffed the phone into my back pocket and swiped the book off the floor before heading back to my room.
It was day two without Ollie. The fog from the day before had lifted, denial dissipated, but it hadn’t taken me along with it. I was stranded and alone, and all I could think about was what he must be going through. Where was he? Was he even still on campus at all?
I finished The Notebook, and I wondered if Ollie had noticed the same similarities in the story as I. It was Ollie who always reeled me back in, to fight for me, to wake me up, to bring me back, to remind me, like Noah reminded Allie. Ollie never did anything without a purpose. Every word, every action, every movement was carefully considered. He’d known since we first opened this book what it would take to find me inside my walls. He’d known this whole time how difficult it would be, and he allowed himself to love me, anyway.
Day three wasn’t any better, only worse. I ate, but only because I had to stay, and stay strong. I showered and spent the entire Sunday in the library because it was the place I could feel closest to him. Jake and Alicia tried to talk to me, but Ollie’s absence didn’t disrupt their lives as much as it corrupted mine. They couldn’t understand.
Zeke was my silent rock.
It was the first day back in classes, and I showered in the morning, ate breakfast, and attended the first class of my new schedule for the second semester. The halls reverberated, bodies bumped into one another, and I pushed my way back toward my dorm after my second class before I was pulled away from the hall and into a closet.
Black eyes sliced into me as Oscar backed me into a corner. The bulb hanging from the ceiling swayed back and forth, casting shadows and lights over Oscar’s face. “Hi, pet,” he sneered—a smirk forming on his face. If I didn’t have anything left to lose, I might have been scared, but I wasn’t afraid anymore. I knew it was only a matter of time before he would try to flush me out and get me alone. “Have you been keeping your pretty mouth shut?” He ran his fingers over my lips as he took a step closer.
“I don’t remember much, anyway.” I may not have been scared, but I was done being stupid.
“Aw, what a shame. I was about to make you feel really good before my little brother got in our way. Fucker broke my nose.”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “You must have deserved it, then.”
Oscar smiled. “Deserved it, yeah?” The evil in his black heart corrupted his smile quickly when his eyes narrowed. “Let’s get one thing straight. Oliver should have never taken what was mine. He knows better.”
“Is that why you drugged us? To take what’s yours because you can’t have me any other way?”
“I didn’t drug you. Isaac did.”
“Did you rape Bria?” I knew he didn’t, but I needed to keep him talking.
“Does that bother you, Mia?” He wrapped his arm around my back, reaching for my bottom, but I quickly moved his hand to the front of me. “Did it make you jealous?”
“A little.” I lifted my shoulder in a half shrug as Oscar undid the button on my jeans. “So you or Ollie never touched Bria? Only Isaac did?” His eager hand applied pressure over my jeans. I didn’t flinch. All I wanted was his confession.
“You want me to tell you how I fucked that little slut? Will it make you want me more?”
“I want to know the truth.”
Before Oscar could pull my jeans down, I slipped the phone from my back pocket and set it high on a shelf beside me with the recording still on without him noticing. “I don’t want you after you’ve been with Bria.”
Oscar’s hooded eyes searched my face as he grabbed my chin. “I didn’t bloody touch her. Your boy Isaac did, but for you—” He tried to kiss me, but I pulled away.
“For me what? What did you give me and what were you going to do?”
“Just a little something to help you relax.” He smiled, then yanked down my jeans. “See how tense you are without it?”
Okay, now I was getting scared. I had what I needed. I had Oscar’s confession. “You need to go, Oscar.” I couldn’t run out of here. I needed the phone. I couldn’t leave it on, or it would die. I’d been waiting this entire time for him to confront me, and this moment was here. I’d never thought about what would come next after getting the confession.
“I’m taking what you owe me.” He gathered my panties in one hand and moved them to the side when I spit in his face.
“I don’t owe you shit.”
A sudden force whipped my head around, and my face slammed against the side of the shelf. My hand immediately shot to my face from the initial burn on impact.
“You hit me,” I whispered in shock. A man has never hit me before, and suddenly I couldn’t feel the pain from it. I pushed against his chest, but he gathered my hands in one of his and slammed my face forward into another wall.
Something came over me, and I screamed at the top of my lungs before Oscar threw his hand over my mouth. I bit his fingers and screamed again until he covered them. He threw his weight against me, pinning me to the wall and pressing my face against it as he threatened me. But his threats were useless now. He had nothing to hold over my head anymore. Ollie was the only card he had left, and Ollie was already gone. Tears fell from my eyes as my screams muffled against his hand.
; The doorknob jiggled on the other side. Someone was trying to come in. Oscar’s entire body tensed against me as he held his hand tight over my mouth. He waited for the jiggling to stop and then I felt a blow to the back of my head.
It was almost midnight, but the string lights all around me lit up the sky before the fireworks could. “Mia!” someone shouted. “Can you believe we’re here? We’re in fucking London of all places! New Year’s, baby!” The girl handed me a drink, the liquid splashing over the rim and onto the cobblestone ground beneath me. My freshly manicured nails got my attention. They were pink. “Mia, come on. It’s almost midnight.” The happy girl with big brown eyes and brown hair grabbed my hand as she pulled me down the path. People buzzed all around us. Smiling faces, lights, a Ferris wheel. The crisp winter air took my breath away as we ran through the street. Laughing, music, and conversations blurred together as this happy girl shouted against the wind and noise. “We’re almost there!” We stopped along the edge of the water line as the smells of boat fuel, salty ocean, and fried food filled my nose.
I leaned over the railing and looked down below into the black sea as soon as the fireworks went off overhead. The reflection of the colors bled across the surface of the black ocean, and I lifted my head when the lights sizzled into waterfalls, cascading in the night sky. The fireworks dimmed, leaving a trace of smoke before new colors took their place.
“Beautiful,” a slow, deep voice said beside me. I turned my head to see bright green eyes—eyes more captivating than the fireworks. My entire body turned to face him. He had his arms folded over the railing, hunched over, but his head turned toward me with an awe-struck grin. He wore a white sweatshirt, black Converse, and his jeans were faded and ripped at the knees, and fit him perfectly.
I found his eyes again. “Yeah, it is,” I whispered.
The guy shook his head and chuckled. “No, love. I wasn’t talking about the fireworks.” Heat rose in my cheeks as he turned his whole body to face me and leaned into his side. “Tell me your name.”
“Mia,” I said in reflex, unsure of how the words were able to leave me as I’d forgot everything else I’d ever known.
The guy held out his hand. I reached to shake it, but instead, he grabbed my hand and spun me around before pulling my back against his chest. His hands returned to the railing as he caged me in, but I didn’t mind. He didn’t scare me. I was finally home.
He pressed his head against the side of mine and whispered, “I’m Ollie. You know what tonight is, Mia?”
“New Year’s?” My response was accurate, but I felt foolish for saying it.
“Tonight is the night we’ll be telling our kids about one day. The night my life changed.”
A relieved smile washed over me as another firework blasted from the charter boat off in the distance. My eyes followed the rocket up into the sky, and as soon as the colors burst over us, a gust of wind smacked me in the face. Ollie pulled me closer against him, wrapping his long arms around me to keep me warm. He smelled of nostalgia and marine breeze, with a hint of cologne. I closed my eyes to take in this moment.
“No, Mia. You can open your eyes now.”
“Mia, wake up. Open your eyes.” My eyes sprung open to see the nurse hovering over me with a flashlight pointed directly in my eyes. I squinted against the light when she said, “Oh, good. Now follow my fingers.”
The nurse held a finger between us and moved it from side to side. I did as I was told, still confused to where I was and what was going on.
She dropped her finger and her head all at once. “Do you remember what happened?”
My eyes blinked rapidly. “Ollie,” I said. Oscar. The phone. I stumbled to my feet with the nurse’s assistance.
The nurse looked me up and down. “You’re going to have to come to the station.”
I looked down to see my jeans down to my ankles. Shaking my head, I reached up for the phone and exhaled when I felt it beneath my fingers. “Please, I need to see Dean Lynch. It’s important.”
“You will definitely have to talk with the dean, dear,” she explained as she pulled up my pants, and I clutched the phone in my hand.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“And suddenly, when all is lost,
she becomes an explosion of hope.”
—Oliver Masters
“GOOD NEWS IS, I don’t see any evidence of rape,” the nurse said as she took off her latex gloves and rolled her chair over to a wastebasket to toss them. “But you are suffering from a mild concussion.” The nurse released my feet from the stirrups and set my legs out flat in front of me. She rolled her stool to the side of my bed, and she looked at me with the most delicate eyes a strong woman like her could have. “Mia, who attacked you? Who did this?” She genuinely cared.
The phone clutched in my hand burned a hole. “I need Dean Lynch,” was all I could say. She probably knew Oscar, and they were most likely acquaintances or possibly had lunch together. I couldn’t trust anyone.
My dark, heavy-set angel of a nurse sighed as I pulled the white sheet higher over me.
“Dean Lynch and an officer are already on their way to take a statement.”
I was able to exhale, calmer than I had been since Ollie was arrested. “Thank you for finding me.” I would have looked up to tell her, but the bright lamp above me was blinding.
“I didn’t find you. The janitor found you in his closet and came and got me. I’m only doing my job.” She patted my leg and stood. The way she said “I’m only doing my job” made her either humble or aloof. Nurses shouldn’t say things like that. “Now try to stay awake. I’ll flip on the telly to keep your brain occupied, yeah?”
“Yeah, okay,” I mumbled.
Fifteen minutes into a British soap opera, the Dean and an officer walked in. It was a different officer, not the same one who had taken Ollie days before.
Dean Lynch introduced him as Officer Scott. The blue-eyed and dirty-red-haired man in uniform seemed less threatening than the one who had taken Ollie away from me. He was young, as if he was fresh out of the academy. He looked at me, and his face fell. You could tell he was new at this and didn’t quite know how to handle himself. “Now, Officer Scott here is going to take your statement. Do you feel comfortable with me staying in the room?” Dean Lynch asked.
Yes. I prefer it. But, “Where is Ollie?” was my reply. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked. I didn’t want Lynch to assume my only mission was to get Ollie out. Somehow, it made my story a little less credible by bringing up Ollie so soon.
Lynch adjusted his suit jacket before crossing his arms. “Ollie is being held here in solitary confinement, but we need to talk about what happened to you.” The vague answer, then re-direct tactic. He must have learned that in training.
I looked over to Officer Scott, and his eyes set on mine. He examined my face, but my gaze didn’t hinder him. I brought my fingers to my face, and there was a slight sting under my eye. There must have been a bruise or a scratch. I hadn’t looked in the mirror yet. “Oscar,” I said.
Lynch’s arms tightened against his chest as his brows furrowed. “My security guard Oscar?”
“Oscar is Ollie’s brother,” I informed them. “Did you know?” I was angry at the fact the Dean could know this and put Ollie in this situation in the first place.
“No, I didn’t know.” He sighed.
“You should do more extensive background checks.” Lynch shook his head, and I continued, “Oscar did this to me. Isaac was the one who raped Bria, and Oscar and Isaac were the ones who drugged us.” He shot me a skeptical look, and I held up the phone. “Here is Oscar’s confession.”
Together, Lynch and Officer Scott listened to the recording. Officer Scott’s eyes darted back and forth from me to the phone. Lynch’s nostrils flared, and his eyes only grew bigger after each word that came from Oscar’s mouth. Furious, he excused himself immediately.
Officer Scott bagged the phone for evidence, but he stayed behind.
“Mind if I ask you a few more questions?”
“Sure,” I said and adjusted in the bed. “Has anyone ever told you that you look like Prince Harry?”
He chuckled. “More than you know.” He rolled over a chair and kept a safe distance from the hospital bed as he rested his pad and pen on the bedside table. “I know what you’re thinking, I look young, but you can trust me.”
“What makes you believe I don’t trust you?”
Officer Scott raised a brow. “I can see it on your face, and I can’t even begin to understand what you have been through. Though, I do have experience with the look in your eyes.” He paused and drew in a breath. “My younger sister was raped, and I’ll never forget the change in her eyes after it happened. I know the nurse said you weren’t raped, but I’m trained to follow my gut, and my gut tells me you haven’t told the entire story.”
His blue eyes wouldn’t turn away from mine; they held on, shouting at me, telling me he was sincere, and my eyes watered. “My story, Officer Scott, would keep you here for a couple of hours.”
He didn’t smile. He didn’t flinch. “Please, call me Ethan. I’m still not used to people saying Officer Scott quite yet.”
“What do you want to know?”
He pulled up his chair an inch closer and relaxed a bit. “Start from the beginning.”
It was the first time I had gotten through my whole story without crying. Ethan listened intently and never once reached for his pen to take notes. He had to close his eyes a few times to lessen the blow I was sure was all too familiar with his sister. He was kind, and by the end of our conversation, he slipped me his card to call him in case I would ever need it.
Examining his card, I said, “I think you forgot where I am.”
Ethan dropped his head into his hand and shook his head. “Sorry, I get lost in the routine of things.” He let out a small sigh. “To be honest with you, you’re making me nervous.”
Stay With Me (Stay With Me Series Book 1) Page 32