12. Briggs
12
brIGGS
I sit in my truck with my windows rolled up while smoking the joint I rolled this morning. I’m in the campus parking lot, waiting for my little toy to arrive, the weed calming the ever-raging storm inside of me. I needed this after hearing my drunk father yelling and breaking shit around the house all night. Tia came crawling into my bed around midnight, scared of Dad and what he’ll do. I hate it. I hate not being able to shield her from this mess.
Taking another drag of the joint, I hold the smoke in my lungs for a few seconds before blowing it out. I watch it bounce against the windows and windshield and back at me while thinking about what I’m going to do to my little bird today.
The weed starts to warm my insides, making my head swim with endorphins and lifting my mood. My whole body relaxes and, for the first time today, I feel like I can breathe easily. Maybe I’ll give her a little break today, I think, feeling the full effect of the drugs in my system now.
Closing my eyes, I lean my head back against the seat and enjoy my high for a few minutes. Of course, nothing this good lasts long. A knock at my window forces me to open my eyes just to find Carter outside my door.
I roll down my window, taking another drag from the joint. “What?”
“You lied,” Carter accuses.
“Huh?” I have no idea what he is talking about.
“You wouldn’t let us play with Wren because you gave her your word ,” he makes air quotations with his fingers. “But you clearly played with her anyways, without us. That’s just rude, man.”
“What are you talking about? I haven’t seen her since we left that classroom.”
“Then who gave her the shiner?”
“Who gave who a shiner?” My thoughts are starting to run together. Damn, this weed is strong. Shaking my head, I put the joint in the little glass tube I brought and let it go out for later.
“Wren, she has a black eye. I just saw her.”
The warm and fuzzy feeling the weed provided is suddenly tainted by something else. I can’t put my finger on it, but I know I don’t like it. I remember the bruises on her wrist, and suddenly, I feel bad about not pushing her further on it. Damnit, why do I even care? Because she is my toy . Mine to torment.
“It wasn’t me.” I shrug, trying to hide how much this actually affects me.
“Well, maybe she got into a fight with some girl or something. Whatever, I guess,” Carter says. “I have to go to class. Talk to you later.”
Nodding, I watch as he walks away before I roll my window back up. I get out of my car, feeling a bit lightheaded as I walk to my own class. I’ll deal with this later, when I’m less high.
My engineering class drags on, but the joint makes it more bearable. Once we’re dismissed, I head to where I know Wren will be next. I catch her before she can slip into the auditorium. Grabbing her upper arm, I spin her around to face me.
I take in her swollen face, her right eye slightly smaller, and her skin is a hue of blue around her eye and upper cheek.
“Who did this to you and don’t give me that shit about falling again,” I growl into her face.
“What do you even care?” she sneers back. “Let go of me.” She tries to pull her arm away, but I refuse. When will she ever learn?
“Tell me who, and I’ll let you go,” I offer.
“Why?” she asks curiously.
“Because you are mine to play with, and I don’t like my toys all scratched up.”
When I don’t make a move to let her go, she finally huffs. “Some guy my roommate knows.”
“Where is he now?”
“I have no idea. He won’t come back. My roommate threatened him with a shotgun,” she explains, and I believe her, but that’s still not enough for me. I want to pay him a visit myself.
“What’s his name?”
“Are you serious?”
“Deadly.”
She bites her bottom lip like she is thinking about telling me or hiding it. “Brandon… I don’t know his last name,” she finally says.
I release her arm, and she immediately takes a step back.
“Can I go now?” she questions, sarcasm dripping from her voice.
“You are dismissed,” I tell her with a smile and a wave of my hand.
She shakes her head and walks away from me.
I always look for an excuse to beat someone up, and I think I just found one. Wren is mine to use and abuse. No one else gets to touch her but me.
Fuck trying to concentrate this afternoon. I can’t get the memory of Wren’s bruises out of my head long enough to do anything but seethe. Forget going to class. I doubt I could sit still long enough. My blood is simmering, on the verge of a boil.
Who the fuck does this guy think he is, whoever he is? What did Wren say about him? A friend of her roommate. Anybody living in that shitty little apartment is probably a loser, which tells me that’s the kind of person I’m looking for. Losers attract other losers.
My bruised little bird might not know anything about him, but that roommate of hers will, whoever he is. Something tells me he’s not going to be busy at this time of day. Call it a hunch. I wouldn’t normally go out of my way to visit their apartment building again, but some things are worth the hassle. The stench of piss pretty much everywhere as I enter and jog up four flights of stairs before knocking on the dingy front door.
“Yeah, yeah, calm your tits.” The voice on the other side of the door makes me snicker. It soon swings open, and I’m faced with a bleary-eyed, mullet-wearing guy in a stained T-shirt. Several feet stand between us, yet his odor of beer and cigarettes manages to outshine the piss in the hallway.
“Are you Wren’s roommate?” I ask, eyeing him. For all I know, he could be the asshole who hit her.
“Who’s asking?” He looks me up and down and has the nerve to sneer. Like I couldn’t snap him in half. As it is, he keeps squinting, like he sees more than one of me. It would be nowhere near a fair fight, not that I’ve ever been concerned with that.
“Somebody looking for the fucker who gave her that black eye,” I tell him.
It’s like a lightbulb goes on behind his bloodshot eyes. He even stands up a little straighter, though he still has to lean against the door for support. “That son of a bitch better never show his face around me ever again. I wasn’t kidding when I warned him about my shotgun.”
He looks me up and down again, and his lips twitch under an unkempt mustache. “What, are you her bodyguard?”
“Not exactly.” Though what I’m going to say next sort of counters that. “But I do need to know where I can find him. Brandon.”
“Yeah, all right. I’ll tell you where to go.” I pull out my phone, and he gives me an address. “I think that’s where he’s staying now. He was supposed to be crashing here for a while, and I can only think of one other person he knows who would bother letting him stay.”
“What’s he look like?”
“Uh, a little taller than me. Sort of longish, black hair, a little curly. Mean eyes,” he adds, narrowing his, “and he’s got a snake tattoo on his right biceps.”
“Good enough.” I look past him into the apartment. It’s pretty dark in there with the curtains pulled—the guy is probably dying from a hangover. How much would a habitual drunk need to drink to have a hangover like that? I only have Dad to go by as an example, but I try not to pay close attention to him and especially when it comes to drinking. Or anything else.
“Who are you, really?” he asks. “Her boyfriend or something?”
The thought makes me want to gag, but I manage a small smile. “Or something. Would it be okay if I stop in her room real quick? I wanted to leave a surprise for her while I’m here.”
“Yeah. Go ahead.” The guy is either hurting too much to care, or he’s the most trusting fucker who ever lived. He steps back and lets me in—which is when I realize he’s not that dumb. If I showed any confusion about which room was hers, he might have a reason not to believe me. Good thing I’m already familiar with the apartment’s layout and have left DNA in one of its rooms.
I plan to do it again, going straight into Wren’s bedroom and closing the door. What I hear in the living room can only be the creaking of couch springs—either that or someone is torturing a cat. He turns on the TV, something I’m grateful for, since it means he’ll be distracted.
I’m already half-rigid thinking about how much fun it will be to teach this Brandon prick a lesson about not touching things that aren’t his. All it takes is looking down at Wren’s bed to get me the rest of the way there. Remembering her reluctance, her hatred.
It’s almost like it’s her hand wrapped around me when I pull myself out of my pants. Pumping up and down my length—the lotion on the nightstand helps like it did before. Except in my head, it’s her saliva coating my shaft. Or her sweet, hot pussy juices. They would gush from her while my cock pounded her until she couldn’t take anymore and begged me to stop. Though I wouldn’t stop. I would make her submit to my will.
I can see her in front of me, legs spread, all wide-eyed and innocent. My hand moves faster, and I clench my teeth, giving myself over to the fantasy. It can’t be a fantasy for much longer. I’m going to have to make it real. I need to hear her whimpers. To hear her moan my name.
“Fuck,” I groan, closing my eyes, letting the rush come over me all at once. The ache in my balls eases, and my knees are weak by the time I’m finished.
The sight of my little bird’s pillow coated in my sticky cum makes me smile to myself as I zip my fly. “Sweet dreams, Wren,” I whisper.
Within minutes, I’m back behind the wheel, plugging the address into the map app on the phone and following the directions it provides. It’s not a long drive, barely five minutes, not far enough to take me into a better part of town. If anything, this is even worse, since the buildings on either side of the street look abandoned. It’s damn depressing, but I’m about to do something that will perk up my mood.
There’s a set of stairs that runs along the outside of the building, which is what I use to get up to the second floor where Brandon is supposedly crashing. I don’t know whether he’s there alone or not, not that it’s going to change anything. This is between the two of us, anyway. Anybody else feels like getting involved, playing the hero? They’ll regret it.
I pound on the door with the side of my fist, looking around at the cigarette butts and beer cans littering the landing. A few shuffling footsteps are followed by creaking hinges as the door slowly opens. This guy is in even worse shape than Wren’s roommate, blinking hard against a cloudy day. “Yeah?” he mumbles before burping softly. He’s a charmer.
Black hair, slightly curly.
Flat, mean eyes.
Snake tattoo on the right biceps. Shitty work, too, not that I’m surprised. “What, did you get that in prison? Or was the artist stoned?” I ask, nodding to the sloppy ink.
“What the fuck did you say?” he asks, standing up a little straighter. “Who are you?”
“The question here is, who are you?” I counter with a smile, my hands folded in front of me. “I’m looking for Brandon. Are you Brandon?”
He really is a stupid son of a bitch. “Yeah, I’m Brandon,” he drawls, almost like he’s proud. Like he has a reason to be.
“Good to know.” And then I cock my right fist back and piston it forward, throwing my weight behind the blow for extra impact.
It’s always easy to take down a coward like this, though I didn’t expect him to drop so easily. “Jesus, dude,” I mutter, stepping over his prone body and shoving his legs out of the way with one foot before closing the door behind me so we can be alone.
Straddling him, I roll him onto his back, then slap him hard enough that his eyes snap open. He’s dazed, blinking rapidly, muttering thickly.
Taking him by the neck of his torn T-shirt, I pull him partway up and give him a smile. “Don’t go to sleep yet,” I croon. “I’m not done with you by a long shot.”