Chapter 29
29
S ometimes all a girl needed was a hug from her mom. Sometimes, that tight embrace could make all her problems melt away and the anxiety lift. Sometimes…it fixed everything.
But sometimes the problems were too big for a hug to fix, so her embrace served to offer support and remind a girl she wasn’t in it alone.
“Ashley, baby, why didn’t you call me sooner?” my mom asked as she hugged me close, stroking my hair. “You could have died. Your doctor said?—”
“I know,” I mumbled into her shoulder as tears flowed from my eyes.
Mom didn’t push the issue, always being one for the whole don’t cry over spilled milk way of thinking. What was done, was done, and hindsight was useless now. She sighed, continuing to hold me while I cried.
Eventually, my tears dried up and I released her. “Sorry, I just?—”
“Hush. We don’t apologize for needing support, darling.” She smoothed my hair back with her fingernails, stroking my bruised cheek gently. “Gosh, you poor thing. What can I get for you? Coffee, or something stronger?”
I gave a sobbing laugh, wiping my eyes on my sleeve. We’d not long arrived at Max’s house after Mom picked me up from Prosper Private. She’d apparently given Heath a thorough dressing-down when she’d seen him in the waiting room—for no real reason other than the fact he was there and looking guilty—then hugged Carly so hard my friend burst out crying too.
Mom had that way with people. She made them feel safe enough to let their walls down and release their tightly held emotions.
“Um, coffee is fine,” I replied, “seeing as it’s not even midday.”
Mom shrugged. “Okay, no need for that. I’m just being hospitable.” But she’d also been teasing so I wouldn’t take her up on it. She left me curled up on the leather sofa while she went to ask Max’s housekeeper for coffee and cake.
I’d not spent a lot of time in Max’s home, but I could see Mom’s influence on the decor. Little things here and there, making the place warmer and more inviting. Most noticeable was the addition of framed photographs, displaying their wedding and honeymoon…and little kid photos of both me and Nate, along with several old pics of the four boys together. They’d been friends a long time.
“Okay. So, I think I need to hear everything from the beginning,” Mom announced, returning to the living room and planting her hands on her hips.
I nodded. “I think so too. But I think Max also needs to hear what’s been going on.” It made me feel like shit even thinking about tattling to Nate’s dad about his bullshit…but things had gone too far.
Mom’s brows lifted. “Oh. I see.”
I grimaced. “Yeah.” A shiver rolled through me and I rubbed my arms.
Mom frowned and grabbed a sweatshirt off the back of the sofa. “Here, put this on. It’s Max’s but he won’t mind.”
“Thanks,” I murmured, accepting the garment and pulling it on. It was a cashmere knit pullover and smelled of fresh laundry detergent.
“I’ll go get him. You wait here.” Mom left the living room and I snuggled into the sofa deeper. I had taken a dose of painkillers before leaving the hospital and it was still firmly in effect, which was nice. My doctor had warned me that everything would hurt when it started to wear off, though.
Max’s housekeeper, Susan, carried a tray in a few minutes later with coffee and cake loaded up.
“Here you go, honey,” she murmured, handing me one of the coffee mugs directly before setting everything else out on the coffee table. “How are you feeling?”
I smiled. “I’m okay. Thank you.”
Her hard stare told me I didn’t look okay by any means, but I was well aware. The bruise from Paris on my left cheek was fading but my right side was a mess. I’d needed a stitch in my cheek from where I’d split my face on the rock and the bruising covered a good third of my face. Not to mention the dozens of scrapes on the rest of me. My feet were bandaged, but with luck they’d heal up quickly.
“You don’t hesitate to call for me if you need anything else,” she told me, and I nodded my agreement.
Mom returned with Max a moment later, but to my dismay they weren’t alone.
“Nope,” I snapped, sitting up straighter. “Not him. Get the fuck out.”
Nate’s eyes narrowed in a scowl. “I live here, Layne, get over it.”
Liar. He lived with his friends near Nevaeh, but I guess he would always technically have a room in Max’s house as well.
Max shot a troubled look between the two of us and sighed. “Carina, maybe it’s better if Nate gave Ash some space?”
Mom had her lips pursed, though, a stubborn tilt to her head. “No, I think whatever Ash has to say includes Nate. Isn’t that right?” Her glance between us was accusing and I choked back my fury at seeing him.
Nate said nothing, just folding his arms and staring at me with his dark eyes. Unreadable as always.
I wet my lips, then jerked a nod. Fuck him, I refused to be intimidated. “Yes. It does.”
Mom’s soft smile was encouraging and proud. She wanted me to face my problems, and it was about damn time I did.
She and Max sat down and Nate leaned his back against the doorframe like he was preparing to flee. It was better he stayed for this, so there could be no misunderstandings.
“Go ahead, Ashley,” Max coaxed gently.
I drew a deep breath, searching for the words to explain what’d happened. I needed to start at the beginning and tell them about how Nate keyed my car. About how he sent Heath to proposition me and paint me as a prostitute. But instead, my anger and hurt skipped ahead to focus on the part I was most irate about.
“Nate tried to kill me,” I blurted out.
Shock and outrage morphed his expression and he jerked out of his relaxed pose. “What the fuck ? I did not! Why the hell?—”
“Ah ah ah,” Mom cut him off, holding her hand up. “That’s enough, Nathaniel, it’s Ashley’s time to speak and we are going to listen.”
His eyes pinched as he shifted his gaze to my mom, somewhat bewildered. “But Carina, she’s lying. I never?—”
“Nathaniel. I understand that you have some big feelings about this right now, and that what Ashley is saying might hurt your heart.” She spoke to him like a toddler and I nearly laughed. He was so shocked he didn’t even talk back. “You can hold on to those big feelings until she’s finished, or you can whisper them into your hand to hold for later. But right now, Ashley is talking. Got it, got it?”
I cracked a smile, I couldn’t help it. My mom just sarcastically gentle parented Nate like he was a three-year old, and it was fucking hilarious.
“Um,” I tried to remember where I’d been, but amusement was shaking up my anger and a glance to Nate’s furious, red face nearly sent me into a rage.
“Ignore him, Ash,” Max suggested. “Tell us what happened, please.”
I wet my lips, shifting my gaze to my mom instead so I could block Nate out. “Nate and his friends are part of a secret society, it’s called The Devil’s Backbone.” Neither Mom or Max flinched. Instead, they just shared a quick look, and I frowned. “You know about it?”
Max gave a small nod. “We’re not unaware. Carry on.”
I blinked my confusion, gently combing my fingers through my hair as I processed that information. “Um, okay. Well they’re the ones who abducted me from campus on Tuesday. They tied me up, drugged me, stripped me, and dumped me in the middle of the fucking forest. I bet they never thought I’d make it out alive, though.” This last part was directed right to Nate with a victorious sneer, and he glowered back at me with arms folded across his chest.
Mom and Max were quiet for a moment, then Mom reached out to hold my hand. “Honey, from what I understand of the Devil’s Backbone that’s not the sort of thing they do. Now, I’m not saying you’re wrong, I believe you believe it was them. But can you help us understand why?”
My jaw dropped in a touch of outrage. “Okay. Sure. Let’s see…there’s the fact that Nate specifically told me to fail the next challenge a whole fifteen minutes before I was attacked.”
“I didn’t mean—” he started to protest, but Mom hushed him with her hand in the air once more.
“Then there was the note nailed to a tree beside where I woke up, reading whore ,” I continued, “which is Nate’s favorite insult for me, since he seems to think I’m a working girl.”
Mom and Max both whipped their heads around to stare at Nate, and he had the grace to look sheepish as he stuffed his hands in his pockets. He didn’t try to defend himself, though, so maybe gentle parenting worked.
“Oh, and maybe that it’s not the first time he’d abducted me? Or are we pretending like you didn’t break into my dorm room in the middle of the night and drag me up to Cat’s Peak?” I glared daggers in his direction and he blinked back in shock. Did he really think I was keeping his shit secret after he tried to kill me? The gloves were off.
“Nathaniel,” Max scolded, horrified.
He wet his lips, giving his dad a tight smile. “It’s not how it sounds. It was a harmless prank.”
“Uh-huh, sure,” I said sarcastically. “That’s why Royce needed to patch up my injuries afterwards? So harmless. Oh, and while we’re on the evidence stack, I literally saw my attackers before they put that fucking hood over my head. So no amount of smooth-talking is convincing me this wasn’t part of your dumb society shit.”
Nate straightened up, alarmed. “You saw them? Why didn’t you?—”
“They were in those robes and masks that you all wear,” I snapped back. “Which I think you already know.”
Max gave a long exhale, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Okay. Thank you for telling us, Ashley. Is there anything else we need to know?”
I hesitated. Should I tell them about Abigail’s diary? How her notes were the only thing that helped me survive? I bit my tongue and shook my head. I’d keep that to myself, for now—if Nate really didn’t know about her diary, I didn’t want him finding out from me.
“No, that’s the important stuff,” I said quietly.
Nate shook his head. “No it’s not. Tell them about the text messages.”
Shock made me double take. “Excuse me?” Why the fuck would he be volunteering that information? It made no sense, and it sure as hell didn’t make things better for him and his friends.
Nate pulled out his phone and crossed the room to hand it to me. It wasn’t his phone, it was mine.
“Where…where did you get this?”
His jaw tightened. “I found it outside the library. I went back to find you and instead I found your broken laptop and your handbag scattered all over the path. You’ve got a new message from Abigail.”
My mouth went dry and I looked down at my phone.
“Who’s Abigail?” Mom asked, looking between the two of us for answers.
I frowned, staring at the one new message icon but not brave enough to open it just yet. “You found my stuff?” I asked in a weak voice, focusing on the wrong part.
“Nate was the one who reported you missing,” Max said softly. “He’s been working with the police to find you and to actually investigate.”
It didn’t make sense. “But you knew where I was. Why waste the police time when you?—”
“Because I didn’t ,” he growled. “I had nothing to do with this, Ashley. When I said to fail the next challenge, I was thinking about ducks…not dying .”
I shook my head slowly. “I don’t believe you.”
“Clearly,” he muttered, dropping to sit in one of the chairs opposite where I was curled up on the sofa. “But when have I ever lied to you?”
My mouth opened to point out dozens of lies he’d told, but as soon as they popped into my head I realized the distinction. Telling lies about me wasn’t the same as lying to me. He’d always owned his shitty behavior, hadn’t he?
“Honey, who is Abigail? What are these messages Nate’s talking about?” Mom squeezed my hand, bringing me back to focus.
I sniffed, shaking off the weird moment between Nate and I, and turning my attention back to my phone. Before I could talk myself out of it, I opened the message.
Unknown: It’s started now. You’ll be dead soon, just like me.—AM
“Ashley is getting threatening text messages from a dead girl,” Nate explained, clearly deciding that if I was spilling his secrets, he’d spill mine.
Max and Mom looked suitably alarmed by this information, and I sighed. “They’re not threatening,” I corrected. “They’re warnings. I think. Abigail was in the society too, and had all these awful things happen to her. She’s just trying to warn me before I also end up dead.”
“But…she’s dead?” Mom asked, clearly confused. “How can she be contacting you?”
I grimaced. It was a great question.
“That’s what I want to know too,” Nate replied. Smug fuck. Look who was acting the concerned brother all of a sudden. He needed to win an Oscar for the way he performed in front of our parents.
Max huffed an annoyed sound. “Okay, so someone is pulling a sick joke pretending to be a ghost. I’ll have one of my people look into this.” He reached out his hand, and I passed over my phone without protest. “For right now, though, I want to sort out this ugliness between the two of you.”
I swallowed back a groan. I really didn’t want to play happy families with Nate, and I was sure he felt the same.
“Sounds good to me,” Nate said, startling me. “I’ve got nowhere else to be.”
“You’re such a prick,” I hissed. “No one is buying this act.”
“Okay, Ashley, that’s enough,” Mom scolded. “You’re both acting like children.”
My cheeks heated and I sulked a little. “He started it.”
Susan, the housekeeper, appeared in the doorway and knocked lightly to get attention. “So sorry to interrupt. The boys are here. Would you like them to come in or…?”
Mom sighed, then gave Max a long look. Something passed between the two of them like they shared a telepathic connection and Max gave a small shrug. “I’d like them to come in if it’s okay with you, Ashley? Either they can help resolve this animosity, or they’re involved which also requires addressing.”
I flinched, unable to hide my reaction to that. Yeah, he could say that.
“Sure,” I grudgingly agreed. “May as well rip the Band-Aid off all at once, I guess.” Although it was going to hurt a whole shitload more than a Band-Aid if I discovered Heath was part of the abduction.
…or Carter for that matter. Then again, if “Abigail” was to be believed, Carter had already killed once, so maybe he was capable.
This was an awful idea, but it was out of my control. I just had to trust that I was safe here with Mom and Max, regardless of how this all turned out.