4. Protect Your Own
Protect Your Own
Bex
K eene clears his throat again, shooting me an odd look as if we had been caught doing something wrong.
“We were… I was trying to talk some sense into your sister about the need to get the cops involved. Especially after what I saw on her phone.” His tone reverts to its usual one that makes me want to kick him in the nuts.
“And your teammate needs to learn boundaries. He took my phone, and he refuses to hand it back.” I accuse him.
“Because you were about to delete your accounts and meaningful evidence with them.” He retorts.
My blood pressure rises with every word that comes out of his mouth. “It’s up to me if I want to talk to the police. I told you it would only escalate things with my father. But you are incapable of listening to any opinion that’s different from your own.”
Luke is looking from me to Keene, and I swear to God, he’s enjoying our verbal sparring.
Or at least, I think he is judging by the amused glint in his green eyes.
“Didn’t we decide that the two of you would try to get along for everyone’s sake?” His tone is soft, almost benevolent.
“We were, but Keene is being unreasonable.”
He rolls his eyes, taking my phone out of his pocket.
“Let Luke be the judge of that. Your sister,” he says as if I weren’t standing right here.
“Is either too stubborn to see reason or she has a death wish. Either way, I can’t watch someone do something that stupid and not try to stop them.
Fuck, what’s your passcode?” he asks with a glare when he attempts to turn on the screen of my phone.
I flip him off. I know I’m being petty and childish, but right now I’ll take any win that comes my way.
“Give me that.”
“Asshole.” I say, outraged, when Keene hands my phone to Luke without arguing.
He doesn’t even ask for my passcode; he enters it on the first try.
“Oh, come on, seriously? It isn’t even our birthday.” I complain.
My twin brother chuckles. “I know you better than you think. Five is your favorite number, and you’re supportive, so number nineteen, my jersey number, is an obvious choice. The only thing I wasn’t sure of was the order you chose, but I was lucky.”
“Thank you for telling my passcode to everyone,” I scold him. “Now I’ll have to think of a new one.”
“Bex.” Luke isn’t paying attention to my grievances anymore. By the look on his face, I guess he found the post that got me and Keene into the argument he walked into.
“I’m sorry to tell you this,” my brother says. “But Keene is right. This is bad, real bad. We need to show this to the police. We need to make this stop.”
Why are these men so stubborn? Don’t they wear helmets during practice? By the way they keep ignoring what I’m telling them, you’d think they suffered too many concussions, and they lost their ability to think logically.
“Don’t you get it, Luke?” Stress causes my voice to tremble.
“You know Dad. He’ll stop at nothing to punish me for not falling in line.
We don’t know if last night’s incidents are connected to those posts.
What if he’s fishing? He might not know where I am.
If the police contact him about those posts, he’ll know for sure.
Maybe that’s why he’s having my former friends turn on me like that. ”
Again, Luke sides with Keene. “Or maybe he knows exactly where you are and he’s using his followers to get his revenge on both of us.
He knows how much I love you, Bexie-Boo.
Kicking me out of the house was just the beginning.
I was relieved not to have to hide who I am anymore and not to have to live under his rules, so not the hardship he thought it would be.
I thrived once I was free to be myself. The real punishment was keeping us apart and making me think that you wanted nothing to do with me anymore.
He knows that you’re a part of me, Bex. There is no one I love more in this world than you. ”
Maybe Luke is right. “I love you too, Luke. But what if calling the police only made him angrier? My instinct tells me to pretend he and his cult don’t exist and eventually, they’ll move on.”
“Will they, baby?” Jamie intervenes. “I’m sorry not to side with you on this, but Keene and Luke are right.
If it were just those nasty online comments, I would be inclined to say we wait and lie low.
But someone did find you, Bex. Whether it’s someone sent directly by your father, or one of his online followers, someone was here last night.
They know where you work and where you live.
You think calling the cops means escalating the situation?
I think we’re already at war. We were the second somebody put their hands on you. ”
I would still prefer to hide my head in the sand, but the guys aren’t wrong. “Ok.” I relent.
Luke wraps me in a comforting hug, and I inhale his familiar scent.
“It’s going to be ok, Bexie-Boo. You don’t even have to go to the station.
The brother of one of our freshmen teammates is a deputy sheriff.
Their father is a hockey legend and the current town mayor.
They came to support Chance when we played a couple of exhibition games during summer training camp.
Ares will keep his investigation as discreet as he can.
It’s better to have all our ducks in a row before we alert Dad that we aren’t taking any of his threats lying down.
Connor, do you mind seeing when Ares can come over? ”
“On it.” Connor nods, typing a message on his phone. “He says he can come over in ten minutes. He’s on campus; he was driving his stepsister to class. Let me make some coffee to offer him when he gets here.”
Bex
“Nice to meet you, Officer Hunter. I’m Bex.”
The tall blond man doesn’t look much older than us.
“Call me Ares, Bex. So how can I help you? Connor said someone was in your apartment last night, while you were all out?”
I start from the beginning. I tell Ares how I got here and why I ran from my own wedding.
At first I was annoyed with Luke for sharing the details of what happened between me and Kurt before I left.
But now I’m grateful that my roommates already know.
I feel way less self-conscious when I recall those terrifying moments.
I explain how at first I thought the guy in the hockey mask at the art center was the same guy I kissed at the Zeta party; I continue with how things turned from romantic to dangerous and how I found Keene outside.
“When we came home, the door was open…” I conclude telling him about the missing items in the guys’ closets and about Aisha’s online post.
Ares listens quietly for the most part, interrupting just a few times to clarify timelines.
He then moves into the living room to speak to the guys one by one, in private.
Luke is the first one who is interviewed, followed by Jamie, Connor and Keene.
“Alright.” Ares concludes, returning outside.
“I’m going to double check the gym cameras and the ID logs to confirm that Keene was at the gym and check out how long it takes to jog from there to the art center.
Looking at the campus map, the timeline he gave me sounds reasonable.
You wouldn’t have had the time to assault Bex if everything checks out.
I’m satisfied that Jamie and Luke were being lectured by your coach, and again, I’ll retrace Connor’s steps from the Gamma house to the art center to make sure his timeline checks out too.
That should also clear the two of you of breaking in. ”
I blink, confused. “You thought it could be them?”
“Not really.” Ares shakes his head. “But I have to look into the most obvious options before casting a wider net. With Keene’s time accounted for, we’d have to look into your ex or a stranger.
He would have been the only one who would have had time to break into this place and then wait for you at the art center.
Connor could have in theory done one of the two things, not both.
We have the entire hockey team and your coach who can confirm at what time he left the Gamma house.
Again, I’m just doing this to cover all my bases. Neither of you is a real suspect.”
Keene shoots me an “I told you so” look before nodding.
“I understand. And this is my campus ID number to check it against the logs at the gym. Most rooms at the gym have cameras too, after equipment went missing and people were caught hooking up when it wasn’t crowded.
So you should be able to see that I never left until I got Jamie and Luke’s call asking me to walk Bex home. Happy?”
The last word is directed at me.
“Why didn’t you tell me all that last night?” I ask him, feeling guilty for coming to the conclusion that he was my attacker.
He rolls his eyes. “I would have if you hadn’t been hellbent on accusing me. You didn’t want to hear or believe anything I had to say.”
Shit. He’s right. I was one hundred percent convinced that he was trying to scare me off to make me move out.
“I’m sorry, Keene.” I hang my head.
He shakes his head. “It’s ok. In the heat of the moment, it pissed me off that you thought I would do something like that. But then I thought about the way I had acted from the second we met. I was a grade A asshole. I don’t blame you for coming to those conclusions.”
“Oh, ok.” I babble, surprised by his admission.
Keene didn’t say the word “sorry,” but this is a real apology. It’s the nicest thing he’s ever said to me. Even nicer than we he said I was beautiful earlier.
“After I’ve confirmed all your timelines, my next course of action will be to look into the whereabouts of your ex, Kurt Priestley.”
I tense up hearing his name, but Ares reassures me.