Reckless Hate: A Bully High School Romance (enemies-friends-enemies-lovers-enemies) (Westbrook Blues Book 1)

by Thandiwe Mpofu

  “Is that a joke? Because that’s just shitty of you.” I grit out because I’m not really sure here. Maybe once I would have said these boys are not capable of such evil, but now. . .I don’t know what to say anymore.

  “There are even ghosts here too.” He says and starts laughing as we begin walking again but this time, it’s like I have just been transported to a whole other universe. Where the front of the house is old, rustic and just crappy, this side—only accessed by security clearance—is really posh and nice.

  There is a huge screen on one wall and a football game is currently playing and then leather couches are in front of it where Emmett sits, watching me take in the place with a can of beer in his hand. Then there is the table where Noah is now placing the plastic bag of food on it. The table is right in front of the kitchen area and the whole place looks like an open concept bachelor pad. It’s huge, void of any colors, exactly what I would expect from all three of them. But then something catches my eye to the left of the kitchen area.

  It’s almost like. . .no that can’t be it.

  I walk over there as if drawn by some kind of sick, twisted curiosity. Who has a wall with dead men’s bones and skulls on it? Who does that but as I walk closer and the crowns become glaringly obvious, I realize that this must be Ace’s. What the hell is this?

  “Right, we are all here. I don’t have all fucking day for all of this. Can we start?” Emmett says as he watches me stand in front of the wall. His gaze is hard, making me shiver but what the fuck is this wall? I turn to look at Noah but he already has a drumstick in his mouth, chewing away. It’s like none of them are at all bothered by this wall.

  “Yes, did you show her.” Ace’s deep voice comes from my right and I almost jump and scream because I hadn’t noticed him standing there, right by the wall watching me study the damn skulls and human bones that hang there.

  He doesn’t look at me, but looks through me, as if he isn’t seeing me at all. As if I mean nothing

  “Show me what and what the hell is this place?” I demand, unable to ignore the way my heart is pounding or the way my hands start shaking

  “I don’t think she knows yet.” Noah says, now looking at me too with a glint in his yes. The chicken gone and his arms folded. I turn to look around and Emmett is also looking at me the same way that Noah and Ace are watching me.

  I haven’t felt this way in forever. I haven’t been this scrutinized and watched since. . .since I met them.

  “What the fuck is going on?” I demand but this time I direct my question to Ace who watches me with a dead expression on his face. He seems unbothered, but those frosty eyes don’t scare me. But in this moment, I’m lying to myself and with the wall behind me, I’m terrified of him.

  “Em, show her.” Ace orders and the next thing I know, Noah is leading me to the couch and I sit mutely, feeling like a damn puppet. Then Emmett brings out a folder out of nowhere and I realize that it’s a police report.

  “Is that. . .?” I begin but Noah cuts me off.

  “Yes, it’s George’s file.” He explains and I accept it and then quickly without pause, driven by a frenzy and a need to know, I open the folder and the first thing I see is a police report.

  “I already read this.” I tell Ace as I look at him and he just shakes his head.

  “Yeah, when you went snooping.” Noah says with a roll of his eyes. “But we knew you would so we let you see it.”

  “So why then. . .” I start, getting angry. They purposely led me astray and allowed me to get false information.

  “Because someone was waiting for you to snoop around and we tried to stop you but there you went, in search of trouble. Again.” Emmett grits out and then sips his bear and focuses back to the game on screen. Wait so does that mean someone was watching me all this time, waiting for me to go snooping around?

  I look down at the report and read through, taking my time now. It mentions in short that George Allister Fields died in a car accident and was found dead by the time the emergency response arrived on the scene of the accident. It also says that he was heavily intoxicated and then the report was ruled as DUI.

  “What the hell, George never drank alcohol!” I protest, standing up and the room is silent, all three boys just watching me as I read the report again. I might have not been here for four years but I still kept in touch with my brother and I knew him inside, out He hated alcohol, all four of them did.

  Or rather, they used to. Not anymore, according to Emmett.

  “Read on, baby girl.” Noah gently prompts, arms folded with a hooded gaze. I look at him, then at Emmett’s broody gaze but when my eyes land on Ace, he gives me what I was looking for. The strength to go on. So, with a hard nod from him, I continue but this time I don’t bother taking a seat.

  I flip to the next page and there is an autopsy report. “I already saw this one.” I tell them, thinking back to the report I read when I went to the police station.

  “That was a fake too.” Emmett’s deep voice says and I look at him then back at the report, feeling my wide eyes begin to dry up with all this air that I have exposed them to but right now, I’m feeling bewildered and hurt. I look down at the report in my hands and notice that this one dated to the very day that I arrived here. The one I read had the date for a day after my brother died. I thought that was too fast too.

  I read the report and here they say that my brother had a mixture of substances in his blood. “A mixture? What does that mean?” I ask the room but keep reading.

  According to this report, George had less than 0.03% of alcohol in his blood so that means he didn’t have the limit of 0.08%. So then, how was his accident ruled as DUI?

  “He was high.” Noah says with a sigh and I whip my gaze to him in dismay.

  “High? On what?” I demand but no one answers so I look down at the report and go through it, skipping the damages that they list happened to his body. I skip all of that as my stomach starts to roll and I start feeling sweaty. My entire body starts to shake and I know it’s coming. But then I see it, the very drug that Noah says my brother was on. Only he wasn’t high.

  “Xanax.” I choke as I look at the word. “My brother overdosed on Xanax.”

  “THIS IS BULLSHIT!” I explode.

  I throw the damn folder with all the papers as far as I can. It’s filled with false information and lying words that don’t tell my brother’s story at all. I watch helplessly as the papers fall uselessly on the wooden floor like the shit they are. It’s all a lie. “So, after killing my brother, this is your excuse? This is what you tell me is what happened?” I shout but all that echoes in my head is the word ‘OVERDOSED’.

  There is no way that George took Xanax. After all, he was trying to get me off of mine all these years. . .

  “George didn’t take any drugs at all.” Noah steps in then, taking me out of my misery.

  “What? So how?”

  “The drugs were forced into his system. Somebody gave him a lethal dose of liquid Xanax with an injection.” Emmett grits out then and my heart literally stops then. I knew that something had happened to George that he didn’t just die, but why.

  “What do you mean?” I stammer as I ask, in this very moment, I feel so damn scared and afraid of all the information that I now know and still don’t know.

  I feel like covering my ears and running back to London screaming but then I need to hear this. I know I do. Ace remains still, unmoving and not looking at me. I have no idea what’s going on but I can sense a storm brewing and it’s coming closer. A chill passes through me and I shiver.

  “George was murdered.” Noah says softly, but I think that’s for my benefit. I whip my head and look at him, narrowing my eyes.

  “I heard that Noah but why the fuck would he be murdered?” I scream.

  “Astraea.”

  “What threats?” I demand and look around the room, trying to catch Ace’s gaze but he isn’t looking my way anymore, instead he is looking down at a pink file i
n his hands, clutching it with a white knuckled grip. Somehow just seeing that tightens the grip that’s around my own neck. What's in that file? More lies?

  “Do you know the history of the three founding families of Westbrook?” Noah steps in then and I nod my head with a hard laugh.

  “Who the fuck doesn’t know about the sovereignty of the great Kings, the Easton’s and the Montreal’s? You love that shit don’t you?” I roll my eyes at Noah but he doesn’t smile or crack a joke like you would expect.

  “That history as superfluous as it is, is very true. But about fifteen years ago, things changed.”

  “How did they change?”

  Noah and Emmett look at each then for long moments, I swear they can hear the pounding of my heart in the quiet room.

  “I swear Noah, the next words spoken in this damn room had better be the truth or there will be blood decorating this bland room!” I’m heaving so damn fast and hard but I can’t, fuck, I can’t wrap my head around any of this.

  “The threats started coming in two years ago.” Emmett starts then, watching me like he is looking at a wounded wild animal. “We ignored them at first but they soon escalated. It started with random calls at odd hours of the day and night. Then slashed tires and keyed in cars.”

  “We thought it was the kids from the valley, I mean they hate us and shit but it wasn’t them. None of them would have been able to send us these.” Noah says as he extends some candid photographs towards me.

  I reach over and something about these photos look familiar and I gasp out loud. The subject of all the photos, is me. Me in different places, all over London. Me with my aunt, me at the school I attended there. Me with some of the friends I made there.

  “Someone was following me?” I gasp, my hands now shaking as each photo sears my eyes, and then the next. From the angle in which the photos were taken, I was definitely being followed by someone with a particular liking or favor of my eyes. In all the photos, my eyes are clear, not so much for the rest of my face. But my eyes are clear focus.

  “Who sent these?” I ask and they all remain mute, not saying a word.

  “George tried to find this person?” I ask as my heart drops. I feel like if I look up, the dizziness will hit me and I’ll just fall to my own ending.

  “Yes and no. We remained silent for a while, placed private security on you for all these years but nothing happened to you. And whoever it is couldn’t touch you.”

  Oh God.

  “So, you ignored him but he needed your attention?” I ask, beginning to piece things together.

  “Yes, that’s when we hatched a plan to start.”

  “Distance me from you all, make it seem like I wasn’t connected to you?” I finish.

  “Whoever is behind this somehow knew just how important you are to us, even if you left us.” Noah explains, his face becoming a blur as his words sink in.

  Beat.

  Beat.

  Beat.

  Heartbeat.

  My entire body convulses and I’m dragged back into that dark corner that I thought I had buried a long time ago. I thought he was gone but I remember it all. The darkness is back and it’s claiming me now.

  “The plan was simple. We just needed to have George tell you that we were no longer friends, that everything fell apart. Maybe that way, if the Fields looked like they were not part of the three families, then you would be safe.” Noah continues.

  “But what we failed to realize was that your family was already ‘initiated’ as the fourth family, balancing the spectrum of power.” Emmett finishes.

  “But why would you want a balance of power now? It’s been your three families for centuries upon centuries, why now?” I demand with a cry, my heart feeling so damn heavy. Ace still hasn’t looked at me at all. “I mean, we never asked for any of this!”

  “You, no. But your parents on the other hand. . .” Em starts.

  “We are trying to get to the bottom of it, but whoever it is that’s behind all of this, wanted a grand entrance, announcing that he is coming.” Noah says.

  “Why? Because he or she was scorned and didn’t get the power that they wanted?” I scream.

  “Astraea, please calm down.” Noah pleads but I’m way past that. It’s all too much, everything feels heavy. I can’t fucking breathe and there is no end in sight.

  I’m going to teach him a lesson using you.

  There is a vase on the table, I reach for it in my haste to get rid of the voice in my head and I quickly hurl it to the opposite wall where we came in from and I watch, my heart pounding as the once beautiful vase smashes into millions of broken pieces. But the voice is still there.

  He’s going to learn.

  Ace looks up and then straight at me like he knows what’s going through my head at this particular moment. I look down at the pink file in his hands and it somehow looks familiar. I look at it, then up at him. I look at the file then at Noah and Emmett’s concerned faces.

  The blood.

  The groans and screams.

  The stairs.

  The huge foyer.

  The sound of his zipper.

  The way he grunted.

  “It’s him isn’t it?” My voice is a whisper, I can’t bear to see the blank look in Ace’s eyes.

  “What are you saying baby Blue?” Noah asks softly but my eyes are on Ace.

  “Tell them.” The words are hoarse, the bitter taste of betrayal now souring my tongue. Anger, pain, everything comes at me in a wave.

  “Tell them!” I scream at him but he doesn’t say anything.

  “Tell us what?” Noah asks as Emmett walks over to Ace and takes the file in his hands. Ace doesn’t fight him at all, but his eyes never leave mine. I want the world to swallow me whole. I want to disappear. I want to go away. I want to die. . .

  “What’s going on?” Noah says again but I’m already in shock, my body frozen in place, watching as Ace advances towards me.

  “WHAT THE FUCK?!!”

  The roar should be deafening to my ears. The raw, anger filled growls should terrify me as Emmett loses his shit and Noah shouts. But the noise is nothing but background mayhem. My eyes are stuck on Ace.

  “No, this is a lie!” Noah roars. I guess he just read that file as well. “You better fucking tell me that this is a lie!” I can hear his voice is hoarse, trying to hold back the anger.

  “Tell them.”

  That’s from Ace as he comes to stand right in front of me, his eyes so damn compelling but telling and showing me. . . nothing.

  For the first time in our lives, for the first time since I met him, for the first time since I literally swooned when his eyes laid on me, for the first time ever, I feel the hate as intensely as ever.

  “I was raped that night.” I say after the room falls silent.

  “I was molested, abused, hurt, destroyed scandalized to within an inch of my life and I owe none of you an explanation.” I can hear the collective shock in the room. I can see Ace’s fists balling but I can’t be in his presence anymore. I can’t stay here at all. I’m suffocating and I know what’s coming next. I can’t continue seeing the loathing in his eyes. The hatred and the pity in Emmett’s. But Noah, I can always fall into his arms because he will always catch me.

  “Noah, please take me home.”

  And with that, I leave.

  Suddenly, everything wasn’t blue anymore.

  Everything was deep, deep darkness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  ACE

  YOU WOULD THINK THAT after so many revelations that somehow there would be some modicum of peace, but that just doesn’t exist here. It’s fucking hell here.

  The entire safe house is trashed. Everything is broken or in a state of being about to be broken. Noah came back from dropping off a silent Astraea and took a baseball bat to everything else in the room. Emmett has been drinking since and is now drunk, sitting in the cold outside and hasn’t said a damn thing since. What’s there to talk about?

>   And I? I can’t breathe at all.

  Just thinking back to the way the rape kit was detailed in information. The injuries that they stated. The fact that she wasn’t . . .

  A crush is heard in the distance as glass shatters everywhere. Then there is the sound of wood being broken, the sound of glass again. Even though I can hear everything, I feel like I’m not here at all.

  “I was raped.”

  “You do fucking know that she was targeted right!” Noah screams as he comes back outside where Emmett and I seated. I’ve smoked blunt after blunt, been drinking since I can’t fucking go anywhere. Noah took both Emmett’s keys and mine away over five hours ago. Five hours ago when everything blew sky high to shit.

  “Where the fuck were we that night? Where the fuck were we?” Noah demands, his voice breaking.

  “Camping. Your idea.”

  “Why didn’t we fucking take her too?”

  “Alex said no.”

  “Oh, and how do you feel now your royal highness? Couldn’t fucking deal with the way she was growing up to be a fucking beauty that defied you at every turn Your own type of kryptonite, your personal brand of lethal poison is what she was growing up to be, so you what?”

  I get up so fast, he doesn’t see me coming and without even thinking about it, I punch him right in the nose.

  “Fuck you! You think I’m not blaming this on my fucking self? This is my damn fault you son of a bitch!”

  And once the words start, they can’t stop. Noah though doesn’t bother keeping quiet, he makes things even worse, spitting blood everywhere.

  “Yeah asshole it’s your fucking fault. I thought maybe it was just the intruder that scared her to trauma but no, it’s the fucking intruder that raped her, hurt her this fucking violent! Did you read that report? Let me quote it for you!”

  He takes a paper from besides Emmett who doesn’t flinch at all, just keeps on drinking.

  “It says here, ‘victim was sexually assaulted in a highly violent manner in her anus. The sphincter of the victim was broken, evidence of violent intrusion, the scaring and bruises as a result of x-rays taken, shows that the trauma was deeper. This shows that the suspect was a grown man. . .”