Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
HANNAH
“Krystal!”
The tone in Michelle’s voice brings my shoulders to my ears as her son’s phone clatters to the floor.
Rye stares at me in a way I’ve never seen before. Eyes into slits, they judge, they burn. It’s like he’s holding a knife and I’m the only thing on the table to stab into.
“Hannah, you should leave,” Michelle says, her voice shaking as she turns to me. “You should leave, now.”
My chest fills with dread, a clarity coming to me that wasn’t there before.
“I-I’m sorry, I just wanted to—” Ryung storms to me, cutting off my words before he grabs my arm.
His grip is tighter than it’s ever been, my skin burning as he turns me around and pushes me through the threshold.
I still feel him between my legs, I still feel his body on me, but this motion is different.
It’s cold. It’s harsh. “Rye, wait, I only did this because—”
“You did this for you,” he says, gritting his teeth as he speaks.
“For you, Hannah. You can’t handle being out of control.
You can’t handle batting for anyone but yourself.
I know what happened to you at school. I know what Krystal did.
That up there? It was all so you can get ahead.
All so you can really fuck me outside of that dirty little cunt, and congratulations, Hannah. You did. You fucked us all.”
“Mom?” Krystal’s voice comes from behind him. “Mom!”
“This is what you wanted, Hannah.” My stomach twists as Rye eyes me from head to toe with disgust, his mouth twisting. “You fucking win.”
Slam!
Fuck the girl who wants a happy ending.
Or kisses in the rain.
Or roses and whispered apologies.
What about the girl who wants to walk into her home without flinching?
Crash!
I’m greeted by that familiar sound when I return to our mansion, and I know what that means.
What about the girl who wants a life without men trying to ruin it?
“Elena, look at what you’re making me do!” Another loud crash and a scream from my mom bellows down the hall, my chest so tight it might snap.
Ember calmed me down as much as she could. The minute I climbed into the car, I exploded. My hands slapped against Mac’s dash, Rye’s voice echoing in my head with his release still between my legs.
“You fucking win.”
It doesn’t feel like it.
My back hits our front door when I close it behind me, my hair covering my face when I let my head hang.
There was something different this time when our bodies collided. I wanted to use him. I wanted him to know it. So why don’t I feel as triumphant as I thought I would?
“You did this to us!” my father yells. “You did this!”
SMASH!
“Carlos!”
My hands turn to fists, my heels clicking towards the sounds of chaos.
They're the reason I'm so fucked up. They're the reason I messed everything up.
When I get to their bedroom, it’s carnage as usual. Designer clothes ripped out of their closet, crystal and glass littering the floor. My eyes narrow as my father dangles my mom off the ground, both hands around her neck.
My mother chokes, gurgling as she fights for air.
I'm so fucking sick of this.
Moving to their fireplace, I grab the poker as I storm towards my father. As I get closer, my pace slows, my palm sweaty.
“Father,” I call, letting him know I’m here. He doesn’t care. He’s too focused on my mother's pale face. “Let her go.”
He glances back with a smirk. “Oh, look, it’s the whore of a daughter you raised.” I can tell he squeezes harder with my presence, my mom’s body going limp.
The room becomes smaller. Redder.
“It sure is.” Those are my last words before I push the poker right through his leg.
My mom drops to the floor, my father’s body freezing. So does mine.
He turns towards me, my eyes dropping to his leg and hell, I really got him.
The poker sticks out of his leg like an arrow, my eyes widening as blood starts to pour from the wound.
Then he charges at me.
I back up, stumbling over my feet.
He gets to me before I can get up, his hand wrapping around my throat. His squeeze feels tighter than Rye’s, my hands coming to my father’s as I try to pull him off. My back hits the wall, my heart racing.
“Your mother told me what you tried to do.” My father chuckles, his grip tightening. “Know that I run this family, understand that? You two would be nothing without me."
“You run a fear factory.” It’s hard to speak, his hands cutting off my air supply.
My father spits in my face, a warm glob landing right under my eye. “You ungrateful little—”
“Carlos!” Carrie calls from the door.
He loosens his grip as I fall to the floor with a hard thud. My hand comes to my throat, my skin tender as he whips a finger at Carrie. “Who called you here?”
She looks at me, then my mother, before she stutters, her eyes wide.
“Leave her alone,” I force out. “Or will you try to kill her too?”
"Enough!" My father’s loafer connects with my stomach, a pain ripping through my body. My mother gasps, but she still doesn't help. A groan leaves my father, more blood pouring from his leg. “This is the last straw. You're no daughter of mine.”
Rye
The screen on my phone lights up in my hand. The phone she used to ruin me and my family. Again.
Mac: I didn’t know about their plan. Ember and I will talk
Mac: I told you to stay away from Hannah
Throwing my phone across the room, it slaps against the wall before clattering to the floor.
The air still smells like her, a piece of duct tape by my left boot. Leaning over, I pick it up as I head to my bar, my eyes on that bottle of gin.
Rolling the tape between my fingers, her moans play in my head.
Her touch. Her skin. Bottle to my lips, I try to drown out her words, her cries, her begs.
I don’t go raw with anyone but I hardly question it with Hannah.
It feels too good to be balls deep inside her.
It feels too good to give her my all. Too good for it not to all fall apart.
CRASH!
The bottle hits the wall before my hands grip the cold glass of the bar. The semester flashes through my mind. Hannah doesn’t back down. She’s a force, and I reckoned with it. If I want things to go back to normal, I can never touch it again.
I can never touch her again.
“Your sister is leaving.” My mother’s voice comes from behind me. Looking over my shoulder, she stands in my doorway with a large red scarf draped around her. She grasps an open bottle of vodka in one hand, a crumpled-up tissue in the other. “You should say your goodbyes.”
I reach for my pack of cigs on the bar without responding. I can’t face Krystal like this. She just got here. I’m the one who pulled her into this war. I promised to protect her. And I failed.
“I’ll speak with our lawyers about your father.
” My mother hasn’t mentioned much about him since his “disappearance.
" I tried to protect her from it. I failed that, too.
Tapping out a cigarette, I keep my eyes on the bottles behind the bar.
They block the full view of my mother in the mirror. “That girl is poison, Ryung.”
Pulling the cigarette to my lips, I finally respond. “So am I.”