Chapter 44
CHAPTER 44
BETH
W rapping my arms around Teigan and Delaney, I barely hold in my tears. I’ve missed them so much, but I can’t make them stay. I can’t rip them away from Mr. Future Serial Killer over there, but what I can do is make sure they know I’m always here if they need me.
“We’ve missed you so much, Bee!” Delaney shrieks as she squeezes me.
I snicker. “Missed you, too, runt.”
“We’re gonna see Grandma and Grandpa tomorrow, but let’s chill after, okay?” Teigan mutters as she pulls away.
I try to memorize how they look right now. Young, happy, and thriving. I need to keep this image in my mind. I feel the despair leaking from their impending future. Something terrible is going to happen when they go home, and there’s nothing I can do to save them.
And I have the feeling it involves Malakai Harris.
“Yeah, sounds good.”
“It was nice to meet you officially, Beth,” Malakai says from where he’s leaning against his car, his hands stuffed in his letterman, a friendly smile on his face.
I wish I could say the sentiment was returned. Maybe then I could pretend this was all in my head and truly enjoy the rest of the time I have left with them.
“Night, guys! It was nice to meet you!” Aimee calls from her car and gives me a look to let me know she’s going back to my house, and I nod.
She’s not going anywhere. Why would she? Aimee O’Reilly is safe at my house.
“Be safe, Aimee!” Malakai calls out with a big fake smile before he gets into the car with my two childhood besties and speeds away, closely followed by Aimee’s blue sedan.
I should be relieved by their departure, but so much needs to be done. I can’t rest until I know Aimee will be okay.
“We need to go, too,” I say as I turn to Nigel, but he must be oblivious to my conundrum because he pulls me into him and runs his nose along the line of my jaw.
“Yeah, go back to my place and get naked.” He growls against my throat, but I don’t yield.
“Later.” I gently push him back until I meet his lust-filled eyes. “We have something to do first.” Reaching into my back pocket, I pull out the recorder I’ve kept on me to avoid Aimee seeing it. She would never trust me again if she knew I did this. She might run and never come back. I can’t take the chance of her ever finding out about this, but I can’t let her be put in harm's way.
His expression sobers. “What’s on there?” he asks.
I say the only thing I can. “Everything.”
* * *
The party is still in full swing when we return, and–to show how much of an unfeeling demon he is, I’m sure–Oliver has a busty brunette in his lap with a mixture of fear and lust in her eyes.
A part of me feels like he’s been doing this to be vindictive. After all, I’ve returned to Nigel’s bed, but I also haven’t seen any signs of him screwing anyone. However, there’s still a woman on his lap and that turns me into the jealous type.
The word mine reverberates in the back of my head every time I see another woman look at him, let alone touch him. I know how hypocritical that makes me.
Grabbing the air horn from the key table near the front door, I hold it up in the air before pressing down on the small red button that releases the ear-piercing noise. A gaggle of drunk girls and even drunker guys screech from the pain of the horn before I lower it.
“Party is over. Out. Now .” The demand is clear in my voice, and Charlie and Oliver look at me like they want to maim me for interrupting their fun, but I’m not deterred. Everyone groans with irritation. “Either you leave now, or I get the fire extinguisher and the rock salt. If that’s not a big enough deterrent, I’ll just call the cops now to save time. Leave !”
A horde of teenagers race out the door, and even the ones out on the lawn disperse, but my attention is on the men in this room.
“I am not drunk enough for whatever this is,” Charlie mutters as he picks up his beer from the coffee table.
Oliver just glares at me, but that expression is nearly constant on his face. He even glares while fucking.
“I’m going to save it for later, but you are getting reamed for how you chased Nigel’s sister out of here–”
“Come on, crazy girl,” Oliver starts with a humorless laugh on his lips. “We didn’t chase her out of here. She wouldn’t tell us what she wanted other than she wanted to talk to your boyfriend .” He practically sneers the word as if it offends him. If he had an issue with how I handle my problems, he could’ve just said so. For someone who doesn’t do the whole jealousy thing, he looks like the textbook definition right now. “Do you expect me to read minds?” His glare returns.
“Hardly. I don’t expect you to not be a massive dick, either.” Don’t think about said massive dick right now, Beth. You have a point to make. “What I do expect is that when I tell you to shut the fuck up, you do as you’re told.” Maybe I’m being a bit of a bitch, but I’m still salty over what happened between Aimee and Oliver only a few hours ago.
Being the genuine asshole he is, Oliver mocks me the whole time I’m talking with a hand gesture of a moving mouth.
Fucking prick.
I reach into my back pocket and pull out the recorder, showing it to the four sitting around.
It’s odd to not see Judy or Arely at a party with Ronan and Oisin, but it works in my favor.
“What is that?” Oisin asks as he takes a hit off his joint before passing it to Ronan.
“The smart-ass answer would be a recorder,” I quip before adding. “We found Aimee, and she told me a lot of things. She wouldn’t let Nigel in her hotel room, but she let me in, and I recorded everything. She told me the whole demonic story of what she’s been through.”
All four men sit up straighter, even though Oliver’s expression remains unfazed.
“Where was she?” Ronan asks.
“Hempstead, out past Prairie View about twenty miles from here,” Nigel responds before sitting next to Oisin, exhaustion clear on his face.
“That’s outside of our jurisdiction,” Charlie mutters with a shrug.
“You hand out justice. How can anything be far enough that you won’t step in?” I scowl at Charlie in anger. This is sheer bullshit.
“It’s not justice. We punish those who break our rules, not anyone else’s. No one outside of Grove Hill falls under our protection. It doesn’t matter if they’re Ni’s mother and sister.” Oliver’s fingers tap on the arm of the chair, and he never meets my gaze.
I send Nigel a look to tell him to leave the room if he doesn’t want to be traumatized the way I have been. He doesn’t move, though.
Lifting up the recorder, I hit play and toss it on the coffee table. “Let’s see how you feel after listening to that.”
My eyes should be on Nigel as the recording plays, but I can’t look away from Oliver. From the moment her voice comes onto the recording, his body language changes, and gradually, his muscles tense until his knuckles are white and that murderous look in his eyes is on fire.
I’ve never seen him show this degree of emotion before–not genuinely, anyway.
Oliver Doyle is an unfeeling demon most of the time–even when he’s talking to me–except when he listens to Aimee O’Reilly recount her torture, full of as much emotion as she does.
The others, however…Ronan’s face is contorted with pain, while Oisin looks like he’s about to cry. Nigel, the man I’ve learned to love no matter how twisted it is, is devoid of emotion. He’s catatonic at best, staring off into the distance as he listens to the tape.
This is why I didn’t want him to hear it. He loves his sister dearly and wants to keep her safe, but hearing this…I bet it's killing him on the inside. I want to tell him it will be okay, but that would be a lie. I have no clue if Aimee will recover from this, if she’ll ever have a normal life, or if she’ll ever find a healthy connection. What she has been through can change a person forever.
After a few minutes, the tape clicks, and instead of saying anything helpful, Charlie mutters, “Was there a point to that?”
My jaw slacks, and my eyes widen from how insensitive he is. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Oliver’s head slowly turns to Charlie like a demonically possessed doll, so slow it's calculating.
“Like I said,” Charlie starts before crossing his arms like a pissy toddler. “It’s outside of our jurisdiction.”
Out of nowhere, Oliver’s fist connects with Charlie’s jaw, sending him tumbling off the couch with a loud thud. The sound is so loud I jump back in shock, and Oliver stands to his feet, charging toward the hall.
“What the fuck, man!” Charlie yells, but no one else moves. No one even breathes.
Except me.
Without waiting a moment to gather my thoughts, I race down the hall, the sound of breaking glass calling to me, and stop at the entrance to Oliver’s bedroom. The door is open, and it's a rare occurrence. I won’t invade his space, but the way he just reacted…it was completely out of character for him.
Oliver Doyle doesn’t snap out of nowhere. He always calculates his moves.
Oliver’s back heaves as he rummages through the drawer in his bedside table, but I take in the shattered whiskey bottle on the floor at the wall, drops of the brown liquid trailing down the off-white paint peeling. The TV is knocked off his dresser and broken on the floor, along with a lamp and three picture frames.
I doubt many people have seen what it looks like when Oliver Doyle loses it. It's scary and heartbreaking.
“Oliver, what are you doing?” I ask breathlessly. If he is planning to go find Aimee, I won’t tell him where she is. He’s too emotional right now to be anywhere near her.
Suddenly, he speaks with a low and dangerous tone, “What everyone else is too weak to do.” Then, he slams the drawer, and it clicks.
He’s not going to look for Aimee. She’s not even on his radar right now.
“You’re going after him , aren’t you?”
He doesn’t respond. Snatching his hoodie off a nearby chair, he shrugs it on, tension evident in each move he makes before he faces me.
“Out of my way before I go through you,” he threatens, and I have no doubt he would, but there is only one problem with that.
“I’m coming with you.”
He blinks at me like I just spoke a foreign language, but then he shakes it off.
“No, you’re not.”
“Oliver,” I warn. He may scare some people, but I’m the most stubborn person in this town and I know him. He may say he’ll hurt me, but he won’t actually do it. He won’t deter me.
“Why the fuck do you care?” he growls as his words bellow from his chest. His words remind me of a time where I didn’t trust him and it makes my heart hurt.
I meet his icy gaze with unblinking conviction, and my head held high. “Do you really want to waste time standing here, listening to my reasons? Or do you want to get on the road and nail this son of a bitch to the wall? Make the choice.”
A dangerous snarl covers his face, and he slams his palm into the doorframe before nodding. “Whatever. Just don’t slow me down.”
I step back and follow him down the hall, staying close on his heels. I know Oliver won’t hesitate to leave me behind.
As soon as we make it out to the living room, Charlie has moved onto his hands and knees, readying himself to stand up, but I don’t give myself a moment to think. I reel my foot back and kick him right in the jaw. The bones crack on impact, and the sound rings through the room like a melody on full blast.
I’m about to do something terrible, but sometimes with bad things comes good change. Sometimes, bad and good can coexist. Vigilante justice has a purpose. It makes sure nothing goes unpunished. It ensures that the victimized can sleep at night knowing they’re safe.
We can give that to Aimee.
Pulling the hood of my jacket over my head, I run around Oliver’s black Mustang and slide into the front passenger seat before he has even reached the driveway.
Oliver climbs into the driver’s seat and barely has the car on before he speeds around the house, over the curb, and zooms out of the neighborhood.