Текст книги "Rule"
Автор книги: Jay Crownover
Соавторы: Jay Crownover
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Текущая страница: 17 (всего у книги 20 страниц)
Just to test the waters of how deep I was in I put a hand on her thigh under the table and felt her tense at my touch. I waited for her to move or to pry it off with her own hand but she never even stopped the flow of conversation with my mom. It was obvious that they had missed each other and I felt a stab of guilt that Shaw had missed out on a relationship she obviously appreciated because of her loyalty and feelings for me. I let my dad and brother draw me into a conversation about the Broncos and kept an eye on Shaw as we ordered dinner. She never moved my hand but she never once looked my way either and I just didn’t know what to make of it. I was grateful however that as long as my mom was focused on her she didn’t so much as bat an eyelash in my direction allowing the dinner to go as smooth as it could considering the circumstances and hostile undercurrents. Dad ordered a bottle of champagne with dessert and before it showed up my mom got up to use the restroom finally giving Shaw a chance to turn and look at me. When she did her mouth was tight and her super light eyebrows were furrowed over her eyes.
“We need to talk.”
My own eyebrows shot up so hard they pulled against the hoops pierced there. “That’s kind of hard to do when you won’t answer the phone when I call you and you make up lame ass excuses night after night to avoid spending time with me.”
I saw her flinch and she leaned closer so that our heads were bent near one another. She hissed in a tone low enough that only I could hear, “Well excuse me for not knowing what to say to you considering the last time we didn’t talk for a few days you stuck your tongue down the first willing girl’s throat. I don’t know what’s going on with you, but I feel like you’re turning into a stranger and I hate it.”
I scowled at her and tightened my fingers on her leg. “Do you trust me at all? Geez Shaw maybe I was just trying to be a better boyfriend, one that doesn’t flip out over stupid shit all the time and one that isn’t in jail while your psycho ex is still on the prowl? Maybe I was trying to act right for a change. I was trying to be the kind of guy you deserve.”
She blew out a hard breath through her clenched teeth and her emerald colored eyes sharpened with an anger that I was surprised to see burned as hot as mine. “Maybe you should have asked me before deciding what I deserve, Rule. Maybe I liked the you that flips out over stupid shit. Maybe I miss the you that is passionate enough about me, about my safety to risk going to jail over my psycho ex and I sure as hell never asked for you to be a better boyfriend, in fact the boyfriend of the last week has done nothing but make me confused and sad.”
I don’t think either of us realized that we had raised our voices or that we now had a captive audience. In fact it took my mom making a noise low in her throat like a wounded animal as she wobbled on her heels next to her chair to get our attention. She was looking between me and Shaw with huge eyes and had a hand pressed hard into her chest. My dad looked far less surprised but worried about my mom as usual.
“What did you just call him?”
Shaw looked at my mom then back at me. She sighed and answered softly like she was afraid the news would shatter the woman before her. “Rule had I have been seeing each other for a little over a month now. I told him he needed to stop acting like he needed to be someone else to be a better boyfriend.” She turned to look at me and I could see her doing some kind of internal warfare with herself. Finally she sucked in a deep breath and turned back to my mom. “I’ve been in love with him since I was thirteen, Margot.”
I went still at her confession and felt everything inside me turn to jelly. She loved me. This perfect, wonderful, kind young woman loved me and had for a long time. I didn’t know where to put that because my mom started blinking back tears and for the first time that night turned her attention to me.
“It’s not enough that you took Remy’s life? You had to take the girl he loved from him too?”
Stunned silence landed on the table like a ton of bricks. My instinct was to push away from the table and storm out of the restaurant but I couldn’t because Shaw clamped a hand over mine on her leg and my dad and Rome both leapt to their feet in outrage. “Margot!” “Mom!” Voices were raised and the other patrons in the restaurant were starting to pay all kinds of attention to the scene we were making but I was too stunned to care. I heard Shaw say my name, felt my brother put his hand on my shoulder but I just wasn’t there, at least I wasn’t there until Shaw climbed to her feet put her fingers in her mouth and let out a whistle that has us all looking at her in shock. She put her hands on the table and leaned forward so that she was talking directly to my mom but she made eye contact with all of us.
“Everyone shut up,” she pointed a finger at my mom and narrowed her eyes. “Listen to me Margot and for once you need to hear what I’m saying. I loved Remy, still do but we were never in love. He knew how I felt about Rule and at times both encouraged and discouraged it but at the end of the day he knew we don’t necessarily choose who we fall in love with.” She took a deep breath and I watched her chest rise and fall. She was struggling with something, something big if the flush on her face and the way her hands balled into fists were any indication. “Remy had secrets, I know you boys were close, that you all loved and respected each other but Remy was different than the two of you and he just didn’t know how to tell you. He thought that maybe it was best for everyone to just let all of you assume we were a couple because of how hard Dale and Margot were on Rule and all he did was tattoo himself and wear his hair all crazy.” She turned so that she was fully facing me and I saw she had tears in her eyes and that her bottom lip was trembling. I wanted to wrap her up in a hug and make it all better but even in my emotional shell shock I was experiencing I knew her words were about to change my world forever.
“I promised him and I owed him so much, I swore on my life I would never tell anyone,” she let her gaze skip around the table and land on all of us. “Remy was gay. He was my best friend, my surrogate family but he was a homosexual. He was involved in a serious relationship with a guy named Orlando Fredrick that he met his last year playing ball. That was the real reason he moved to Denver after school, Lando goes to DU as well.”
Disbelief foreign and cold snaked up my spine. Rome let out a string of nasty words and my mom started bawling in earnest. Shaw turned sad eyes in my direction and I looked at her like I had never seen her before.
“No way. He would have told me.”
She shook her head, sending white and black hair sliding across her shoulders. “He wanted to but he was worried you wouldn’t understand his desire to keep it quiet. He was scared you would push him to come out. It was never about worrying how you would react, he just knew it would kill Margot.”
“We were twins god damnit. He would have told me.”
“Rule.”
I pushed away from the table and glared down at her. “This is bullshit.”
Rome got to his feet as well and I noticed he was looking at Shaw with hard eyes as well. “You don’t need to make up lies about the deceased to try and fix things for Rule. That’s desperate and uncalled for Shaw.”
Tears trailed down her face as she looked back and forth between us she opened her mouth to say something but was cut off by my dad clicking his spoon against the side of his champagne glass.
“Alright everybody sit down and shut the hell up.” He cut a hard look at my mom and pointed to the seat she had vacated moments ago. She looked like she was going to faint and she looked about as happy to sit next to Shaw as she did when I stopped by a few weeks ago. I sat back down begrudgingly but surprisingly Rome was the hold out. He hovered by the back of his chair until my dad glared at him and pointed, “Ass in the chair solider.”
Shaw was crying next to me and now instead of wanting to comfort her all I wanted to do was get as far away from her as possible. My dad cleared his throat and crossed his arms on the table.
“Things in this family have been in shambles for a long time. There has been too much dishonesty and too much subterfuge for everyone’s sake and I’m done trying to sweep it all under the rug just to keep my wife happy because she isn’t, none of us are.” He rubbed a hand over his chin and suddenly he looked a hundred years older than he actually was. “Margot don’t pretend to not know that the way you’ve been treating Rule these last few years is cruel and uncalled for. I lost my son the same as you and I’m done watching you try and turn the remaining one into a stranger or into someone that hates us. He’s a good boy; he works hard, loves his family and clearly has qualities that are good enough for our girl to appreciate. I’m finished with freezing him out. We both know Shaw has been in love with him since she was a kid, we saw the way she watched him, the way she defended him and don’t think for one second I didn’t notice that’s why you were always trying to shove her in Remy’s direction.” He heaved a sigh that seemed like it came all the way from my youth and looked at me and Rome. “Shaw isn’t lying to you boys. Your brother did in fact live an alternative lifestyle. He might not have wanted your mother and me to know about it but teenagers are crap liars and he wasn’t exactly as discrete with it as he might have thought.” He slid a sideways look at my mom while Rome and I gave each other shocked looks. “Margot thought it was a phase that’s the main reason she was so eager to welcome Shaw into our home and family. At first she was convinced you were going to change him, make him like girls or more specifically like you but like I said it was pretty obvious your interest was in Rule and there was no way even if he had been straight that he would have done that to you. After a while we just adored you so much and saw how much love you were missing and how much you had to give that we couldn’t let you go even though I never approved of the way Rem let everyone just believe there was more between you two than friendship.”
I growled. “He would have told me.” I smacked the flat of my hand on the table and my dad glared at me.
“No son, he wouldn’t have. Remy struggled with it, he struggled with who he was supposed to be verses who everyone else thought he was and that’s not something you’ve ever done. You’ve always owned you, and screw anyone that didn’t like it.”
I looked at Shaw and then at the table. I had tried to change for her and it had been an epic failure. I climbed to my feet again and let my gaze fall on my mom.
“I don’t understand why you’ve never been able to love me the way I am when you obviously had the capacity to love him regardless of his choices. It just doesn’t make sense. I need to get out of here.”
“I’m with you.” Rome looked as wild I was feeling on the inside. I looked down when soft hand clasped around my forearm. I flinched involuntarily and I think I actually saw her heart break in her eyes.
“Rule,” her voice was a broken whisper. “I’m sorry.” She let me go and I almost couldn’t talk over the lump in my throat.
“I understand what you meant about those closest to you hurting you the most now. I’ll be in touch.” But as Rome and I hurried out of the restaurant I wasn’t sure I was telling her the truth and I refused to think about how much walking away from her like this hurt.
Chapter 16
Shaw
It had been three weeks give or take a day with no contact from Rule. No text messages, no phone calls, no e-mails, no carrier pigeons, just a whole lot of silence and heartbreak on my end. Rome hadn’t even returned my calls or texts telling him goodbye and that I would miss him while he was gone. He had left for the desert mad at me and as upsetting as that was the daily battle I had with myself to call Rule and beg him to forgive me, to plead with him to understand that it was never my secret to tell regardless of our relationship was soul crushing. Ayden kept saying he would cool off and come around while Margot and Dale firmly believed he wasn’t going to speak to any of us ever again. They were in the same boat as me, neither of the boys was speaking to them and Margot had nearly had a nervous breakdown when Rome had refused to allow them to drive him down to Fort Carson for his send off, instead the brothers went together leaving the rest of us out in the cold.
I was hurting but I was also sick and tired of my love and affection not being enough for anybody. I had loved Rule longer and harder than anyone else in my life and that still wasn’t enough for him to look beyond his own hurt feelings and sense of betrayal to work things out with me. I was still pissed that he had spent the week prior to the bomb being dropped trying to act and behave in a way I had never asked for or wanted, but when I was alone at night and crying in bed I had to admit that while it was misguided it was still a really sweet gesture and if things hadn’t gone so south we could have totally gone somewhere great with everything. I remembered telling him to beware of how bad things could be if we tried to do this and somehow even finding him in bed time and time again with every skanky girl this side of the Platte River couldn’t hold a candle to this complete freeze out.
I tried really hard not to worry about what he was doing or who he was doing it with, but every day that passed it seemed more and more fatalistic. Whatever he had felt for me wasn’t enough to get him past the hurt he was feeling and it came nowhere near the heart wrenching emotion I had for him so as much as it nearly killed me, as much as it pained me to let it go after so much time I had to get over him, had to work at moving on because even if he did get back in touch with me there was just too great a chance he had relapsed into his old ways and there was just simply no way I was going to survive that kind of betrayal from someone I cared so deeply about. So instead of languishing about it I forced a smile every day, picked back up the shifts I had dropped at work, threw myself into my school work and spent as much time as I could with Ayden and Cora. I was carful every time I was around Cora to give nothing away and she was just as carful to never, ever mention Rule or anything having to do with him.
To say my parents were excited that Rule was no longer in the picture was an understatement. My dad was so happy he took my newly repainted BMW and traded it in for a Porsche Cayenne because I was complaining one day about wanting an SUV to have when it snowed. I tried to refuse it, because I didn’t need to be bribed considering Rule had effectively left me, but the title was in my name and the BMW was already gone so I begrudgingly accepted it. My mom was even worse. She called every day to check on me. The woman that had never had the time of day for me was suddenly overly interested in everything I did and everyone I spent time with, I think she was trying to subliminally let me know that as long as I kept unsavory characters out my life I would eventually gain her approval.
The funny thing was now that Rule was gone I didn’t want it. I would have taken being disowned and disinherited a million times over if it meant I could just get him to talk to me, just get him to feel one half of what I had always felt for him. I think my disinterest made both my parents nervous. They were so used to dangling approval and acceptance in front of me like a golden carrot that now that it held no appeal for me they didn’t know what to do. Having the power now should have felt exhilarating or exciting but instead just left me hallow. I should have fought them sooner, should have felt this way as soon as Rule and I started whatever it was we had been doing. I wasted so much time it just made me pile more sadness and regret on top of what I was already managing.
“Thanks Lou.” I gave him one of the strained smiles that I was becoming a pro at and let him scoop me up in a bear hug as he walked me to my car after my shift. I hadn’t heard a word from Gabe in as many weeks as I hadn’t spoken to Rule, but it made me feel better to know someone still cared enough to make sure I was safe so I never turned Lou down when he offered to see me to my car, plus this was an odd night on for me meaning I had just picked up a shift because one of the girls was sick so Ayden wasn’t working and I was alone. In fact my roommate seemed to have shaken out of her funk and was on a date with a very cute physics major that just happened to be as opposite from a rock and roller as one could get. She had gone out with him twice this week and seemed a little more like her old self so I was happy for her even if it meant it was one more night I spent wallowing in misery by myself. No one said the road to recovery was pretty after all.
Lou set me back on me feet and gave me a peck on the forehead. “I miss that young man of yours, Shaw. He was a smartass but a good kid.”
I sighed because at least once a week I had this conversation with Lou. “I know. I miss him too.”
“Take care girly.”
“I always try.”
My new car was awesome; I’m not going to lie. It purred like all good sports cars should but had no trouble navigating the snowy and icy downtown streets as I made my way all the way across town to my apartment letting The Avett Brothers sing me really sad songs about broken hearts all the way. It was late, well after midnight so there wasn’t really anybody out and about considering it wasn’t a weekend. A dog was barking from somewhere and I shivered involuntarily as I climbed out of the SUV because it was cold and dark so I automatically hated this part of my trip home and it just drove home the point that I was really and truly on my own now and that just burned deep in my gut. I was lucky to get a spot right in front of the building and scurried to the security door because my uniform wasn’t meant to be worn outside even at the tail end of a Denver winter and punched in the code.
I blew warm breath on my fingers and dug around in my purse for my keys. Normally I had them out a ready to go but lately I had been so distracted by all the noise in my head and the heavy weight in my chest that maintaining my personal safety had fallen somewhere towards the bottom of the priority ladder. I had just pushed the key in the lock and was getting ready to turn the deadbolt when a deep voice said my name from over my shoulder. For a split second I was excited, unbridled relief flooding through me because the only guy that I figured would be waiting at my apartment for me was Rule, plus he knew the code to get in from when we were dating, but before I could turn around and do anything hard hands grabbed me by the back of the neck and shoved me face first into the door. I gasped in shock, some part of my brain flashing that I should be screaming for help right now but the door swung open with the flick of a wrist decked out in an all too familiar Tag Heuer watch and I went stumbling forward as rough hands pushed me inside.
My purse went flying and I was so stunned to see Gabe standing before looking as pressed and polished as usual, but with crazy eyes and a demented grin on his face that I couldn’t even move.
“How did you get in here?” I knew this wasn’t good. I wasn’t safe with him, didn’t want to be alone with him at all but the apartment was tiny and there weren’t many options to run to. I had mace in my purse on the floor and the Taser Rule had bought me was resting uselessly in my new car, and right about now I was really regretting I hadn’t let Rule leave his gun over here all the times he had asked when we were seeing each other.
Gabe ran obviously agitated hands through his dark hair and watched me like any other predator watched its intended prey. “I told your mother that we were working towards reconciliation and wanted to surprise you. She gave me the code. I followed you home from work since the freak is obviously out of the picture and the military monkey hasn’t been around I figured now was as good a time as any for us to get on the same page.” He was so cold, so matter of fact I didn’t even think he understood he had just forced his way into my apartment and that I was trembling in fear. I crossed my arms over my chest to try and bluff away some of the terror I was feeling but he just continued to watch me like he was mentally taking me apart.
“We aren’t even reading from the same book, Gabe. You need to go because in like two seconds I’m about to start screaming my damn head off.”
He shook his head and made a tisk-tisk sound. “Well you see Shaw things have really gone to shit for me. Ever since your thug of a boyfriend made me look like a pansy and my dad pulled the plug on my credit cards because of that little stunt you pulled with the restraining order things have been going downhill. I’m failing my political theory class, my fraternity wants me out because apparently it’s not okay to let some guy with the IQ of a sewer rat make you look like a sucker on your own campus, my parents are furious with me over the restraining order and the internship with your mother’s campaign I wanted fell through because she simply didn’t have time to get it together. So you see Shaw, ever since you decided to be a selfish whore and turn your back on all the great things we could have I’ve been having to work double time to get what I deserve.”
He was crazy, flat-out off his freaking rocker. I was trying to edge away from him because I knew if he moved close enough to get his hands on me things were going to go from terrifying to unimaginable horrible.
“I’m sorry you’re having a hard time with things Gabe but you shouldn’t have messed with my car. It pushed Rule over the edge. I told you to leave me alone or you wouldn’t like what he was going to do.”
I shrieked because apparently bringing up Rule was the wrong thing to say. Gabe moved faster than I would have thought he was able to. He chased me as I peddled backward trying to keep as much space between us as I could. Unfortunately he caught me in the living room and even though I fought he was just bigger and stronger so he grabbed me by the throat and we struggled all the way to the floor. I kicked an end table over which made a huge racket and earned me a back hand across the cheek that split the side of my lip open. He sat all the way across my middle, pinning my arms to my sides and wrapped a hand around my throat. My eyes were watering from the tears of fear and the struggle I was now having breathing. I clawed at his squeezing hands and flailed my legs but he just bent over me and continued to tighten his hands around my neck.
“You think I care what that loser thinks? You think I give a single fuck what that degenerate wants to do to me? He’s nothing. I told you all along that he wouldn’t stick around, now look at you. All alone and finally doing things my way, I told you I would get my way, I always do.”
I needed to get away from him, he was going to kill me, seriously kill me. My vision was starting to blur in and out and my lungs were on fire, but he just kept squeezing and sitting on me while telling me all about how we were getting back together and how I was going to call my mother and have her reconsider her actions about his internship now that we were a couple. I shook my head back and forth trying to gasp for any air and managed to get my hands between us enough that I jabbed my nails hard into the underside of his biceps making him wince and reel up enough that I could crawl a little bit away from him. I sliced my hand open on a piece of the broken lamp as I scrambled to get my feet under me only to be dragged back down by a cruel hand in my hair. I grunted as his weight landed squarely on my back and had to blink away a steady flow of blood as the side of my head made contact with the leg of the overturned table.
“Ayden is going to be home any minute.” My voice was thready and thin from the pressure he had put on my neck but it wasn’t like it mattered anyway he simply jerked me back to my feet and pressed me so that I was folded in half over the back of the couch. I was trying desperately not to think about how little of a barrier my work uniform offered in the way of deterring him but he bent his face low to mine not seeming to mind in the slightest that blood was getting everywhere.
“Who cares? You’re my girlfriend Shaw, you belong to me. If your roommate comes home you’re just going to tell her things got out of hand while we were making up.”
He put so much of his weight on my back that the way he had my hand wrenched up behind my back couldn’t take the torque and with a sickening pop that made both of us jerk my shoulder found its way out of the socket. I screeched in pain and went limp on that side. Fear and panic rose up hard and fast in my throat as I struggled knowing that I had to get to my purse for the mace or the kitchen for some kind of weapon to use against him. He let go of my hands now that one was totally useless and put one on the back of my neck to keep me bent over the couch while he used the other to start tugging and pulling at the bottom half of my uniform. He was muttering all kinds of broken sentences and talking about how he was going to make sure that I understood we were a couple. He was rambling about getting married and making our families one and I was starting to seriously cry because there was no way I was going to let him violate me in that way.
Fortunately part of the lamp I had kicked over landed close enough to the couch that a piece was imbedded in one of the cushions. While Gabe was busy tugging and pulling at my clothes I wrapped the fingers of my good hand around it. I could feel the little ruffly shorts I wore under the uniform start to rip and that was enough to spurn me into action. The only thing I could reach from my prone position was the meaty part of his thigh and I wasn’t sure that I had enough strength to do any real damaged but I swung the glass shard as hard as I could and heard him swear as he suddenly jerked back. I slumped to my hands and screamed bloody murder as my weight landed on my injured arm. I crawled across the floor while he struggled to get the glass out and managed to get to my purse. I was just struggling back to my feet as he was thundering towards me but I got the mace out and the nozzle turned toward him and gave him a full dose right in the face while he bellowed like an injured bear. I squeezed the mace in my good hand and bolted out the door. I was sure I looked like an escapee from an insane asylum, I was crying hysterically, had blood all over my face and could barely talk because of the damage to my throat, but none of that mattered because as soon as I made it to the security door I ran smack dab into Ayden and collapsed into a blubbering mess as she caught me.
She was screaming my name, demanding to know what happened and I heard her dialing 911 on the phone but between the shock and pain I just shut down. I blinked up at her through the blood trailing down over my face and was aware dimly of a crowd coming out of some of the other apartments but it was just too much and everything faded to black. I was pretty sure she caught me before I hit the ground but the next time I was cognizant of anything I was strapped to a stretcher and getting loaded into the back of an ambulance. The lights from all the sirens were making my head throb and the young paramedic was firing a million and one questions at Ayden as she scrambled up into the back with me. She immediately grabbed my hand and squeezed and I noticed she was crying just as hard as I was.
“Gabe?” My throat was on fire, talking made it feel like I was speaking through a forest of razor blades.
Ayden brushed away her tears with shaking hands and I winced as the paramedic turned all his questions to me.
“The cops have him. His dad showed up as they were putting him in the back of the police car but the mace you used on him was hard to miss so he couldn’t really deny he was in our apartment. How did he get in through the security gate?”
I flinched as the paramedic prodded at my shoulder. He turned sympathetic eyes to me. “You’re going to have to get it reset. It’s dislocated and I think the cut on your forehead is going to be deep enough that it’s going to need to be glued or sewed shut. Sorry.”
I wanted to tell him it was okay because I was alive and at least Gabe hadn’t gotten away with the ultimate violation but talking hurt too much so when asked about needing a sexual assault exam I shook my head no and squeezed Ayden’s had as she started crying again.
“My mom.” The words were broken and not just because of my throat. “She gave him the code because he told her we were getting back together.”
Ayden let loose with a string of swear words that would have made Rule proud and we spent the rest of the short ride just clinging to one another. The next two hours was a blur of doctors and police officers. After the first fifteen minutes it was clear I wasn’t going to keep up my end of the conversation with my vocal cords being as abused up as they wore so I had to resort to writing everything down for everyone. Gabe was in lock up at least for the night and there wasn’t anything his dad could do to get him out. The detective that took my statement let me know there was a good chance his family would post his bail in the morning so he would be out but there was now a mandatory restraining order in place and there wasn’t a thing his dad could do about it. Not that it mattered, they were keeping me at least a night in the hospital to see how bad the damage to my throat really was and I needed super strong pain killers to dull the migraine I was battling on top of the pain of having my shoulder placed back in the socket.
