Chapter 41
FORTY-ONE
COLE
Ewas refusing to return home. It took two days of trying to convince him before he finally gave in.
Two days of only hearing about Rosalie’s condition through texts from my brother.
Colten told me I was a prick and needed to come home. He said Dominic De Santis wouldn’t leave her side.
That he was sleeping in her bed with her.
I hated it. Fuck, I hated it.
I liked Dom, but I wanted nothing more than to return home and rip his fucking head off for being so close to her. I was OK with one night, but several? No.
Understanding wasn’t beyond me, though. I knew he was trying to help. He had, after all, been through this shit with Bianca. Except she’d been alive, and Fox was dead.
I knew he was, as I stared down at his obituary posted online. They were doing a candlelight vigil for him at Mayfair. The entire fucking state was mourning him.
As they should. He was a good man, and we’d failed him.
Enzo barely spoke. He also refused to go home. He spent his time beating up anyone connected to Everett Church. He wanted him alive, and no one was fucking talking. He couldn’t find Dante Church either.
Everyone simply vanished.
Up in smoke, so to speak.
“Do you need help?” I asked E as he slowly dressed himself in a t-shirt and sweatpants.
“No,” he mumbled.
He wouldn’t let anyone touch him. He was completely withdrawn, but we’d heard his words when the doc knocked him out with meds.
The underground. He’d fucked her. Everett had fucked him. He ate food he didn’t want. Drugs. Rabbits. Knives. Candy. Sugar. Sharp. Sharp. Sharp.
We didn’t know if they were true or if he was just losing his mind because he babbled a lot of incoherent shit during his stay here.
I went over to him as he struggled with his pants. I reached out to help him, but he jerked away.
“Don’t touch me!” he screamed, recoiling from me. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
I held my hands up. “I’m only trying to help.”
“I-I don’t need help. Please. Just don’t…” He blinked back tears rapidly, his poor face still busted and bruised. At least his eyelids weren’t so swollen anymore.
Enzo had left because the saints brought in a tip that Dante Church had been spotted near the underground, which was now so far fucked from the fire that there was no way it was salvageable.
“I’m sorry,” I said weakly. “E, man. I want to help you.”
“You can’t fucking help me,” he muttered, sniffling. “Unless you can turn back time, I’d say I’m pretty well screwed.” He paused and looked over at me, tears streaking down his bruised cheeks. “It should have been me. Not Fox. Not fucking Fox.”
His words gutted me. A pang shot through my body, making my stomach twist.
“It shouldn’t have been either of you,” I said. “Neither of you deserved this shit.”
Ethan sat on the edge of his bed, crying softly. I moved to sit next to him, making sure to keep space between us so as not to freak him out again.
“E… did…did he suffer? Fox?” I asked the question that was haunting me.
“Everyone suffers in the underground,” he answered back, his voice a soft rasp. “They raped him. Just like me. They fucked us both over and over.”
Oh god. Fuck. Fuck. NO.
My hands shook as I balled them into tight fists, my tears stinging my eyes.
“I’ll kill them, E. All of them. I’ll kill them for you. For Fox. I’ll make them suffer,” I whispered fiercely. “I promise you, brother.”
E said nothing and simply continued to cry softly.
Nothing I said or did would change it. At least not now. Someday though… I’d find those twisted fucks, and there would be hell to pay.
That much I knew.
We walked into the house later that evening to the sound of Rosalie screaming and fighting Colten in the living room while Jamie begged her to calm down.
I rushed into action and wrestled Rosalie.
“Rosebud. Baby. Please,” I said desperately. “Baby, please. Please. It’s me. It’s Cole. I’m here. Relax. Please, you have to relax.”
“No. No! F-Fox! I-I have to see him. He’s not gone. He’s not! He promised! He promised me!” She tore at me, desperate to escape. “Fox! Foxy! Please!”
My heart shattered at her terrified, desperate cries.
She hadn’t even realized E was home and was standing in the doorway, tears streaming down his cheeks as Enzo stood beside him, a look of pure horror on his face as he took in Rosalie.
“Help me,” I called out to Enzo.
He seemed to snap out of it because he rushed forward and wound his arms around her as she continued to scream, her poor voice raw and cracking, her cheeks flooded with tears, her green eyes wild.
This wasn’t my Rosebud.
This was what tearing away a soulmate looked like.
“Rosalie. Rosalie, stop!” Enzo shouted, shaking her gently. “You have to stop.”
“Fox,” she wept. “Please. Just let me see him. I need to see him. Enzo, please!” Her small body shook as she sobbed.
“Fucking damnit,” Enzo snarled. “Cole, put her down. Fuck man, put her down.”
I caught the look on Jamie and Colten’s faces, but I couldn’t stand to see her like this.
Just one more dose.
I rushed into the kitchen amid Rosalie’s continued shrieks and wails and grabbed some meds we kept in there for E before coming back to the living room.
Enzo was holding her roughly against him as she continued to fight. E hadn’t moved a muscle. He simply stood watching, horror on his face.
Jamie was crying softly, and Colten was rubbing her back, a tight look on his face as he watched me dose Rosalie.
Her shrieks faded away as her body went limp in Enzo’s arms.
“Foxy,” she whispered. “Please. Fox.”
“Shh,” Enzo murmured, bringing her to the floor with him. He cradled her in his arms. “Sunshine, sleep. Please. Sleep.”
“I-I can’t do this,” she choked out. “Enzo… please… kill me. Please. Kill me. It hurts. I-I can’t…” her words grew garbled, her lashes fluttering. “Don’t… wanna… wake…”
My stomach twisted at her words. This was a nightmare.
She went still in Enzo’s arms. I watched him press a fierce kiss to the top of her head before he looked at me, tears shimmering in his eyes.
“Take E upstairs. He needs a shower. He needs to rest. Drug him, too, if you need to. I’ll take her to bed.”
I backed away and went to E.
“Come on, E,” I said, reaching for him.
He jerked away from me as he tore his focus from Rosalie on the floor in Enzo’s arms.
“Don’t,” he whispered, stumbling forward.
I watched as he fell to his knees at Rosalie’s side. He wept softly as he stared at her.
“This is my fault. It should have been me. She wouldn’t hurt so much if it had been me,” he said.
“E,” Enzo said softly. “That’s not true. She’d break just the same if it were you. Don’t say those ugly things.”
“I-I can’t do this,” E murmured in a shaking voice. “I-I can’t. I can’t look at her. Look what I did. Fuck, when she finds out…”
“E, come on,” I said gently. I didn’t know what he was talking about, but I knew it wasn’t anything he could be blamed for. My guts churned at the implications.
He didn’t move for a moment as he stared down at a passed-out Rosalie.
“Go with Cole. Shower. Rest,” Enzo instructed. “Please, E. We all need to rest.”
E said nothing for a moment before getting to his feet and walking upstairs.
“Watch him,” Enzo muttered, looking exhausted.
I nodded and went to E’s room to find he was sitting on the edge of his bed.
“I’ll start your shower,” I said.
He didn’t answer me, but that was fine. I went into his bathroom, turned on the water, set up a towel and washcloth for him, and added some fresh soap.
I came out to find him right where I’d left him.
“E, come on. Let’s get you showered.”
“I can do it myself.” He stood and moved past me. I watched him walk into the bathroom. He closed the door behind him, leaving me alone in his room.
I lay back on his bed and stared at his ceiling, my heart in my throat. I heard Enzo on the stairs and Rosalie’s door open. After several minutes, Enzo’s footsteps sounded out as he went downstairs.
He wouldn’t even stay with her.
I knew he was hurting and blamed himself, but he needed to face this shit or we’d fall apart.
I sighed and sat back up. A crash sounded out from the bathroom. Immediately, I rushed in to find E on his ass, curled into himself, sobbing.
“Fuck,” I snarled, turning the water off. “Ethan. Man, hey.”
“Don’t touch—”
“You’re bleeding,” I said thickly. “Let me help you.” I reached for him, but he scooted away and huddled in the corner of the shower.
I exhaled and swallowed. “Ethan, you’re hurt. I’m tired. You’re tired. Please. Let me just get you out of the shower and bandaged. You can go to bed after. I promise.”
Once more, I reached for him, but he jerked away, this time kicking his foot out and screaming for me to get away.
He caught me in the chin, knocking me on my ass.
I let out a snarl, tired out of my fucking mind, and went to his room and called Enzo from my phone.
“I fucking need you in here. E fell. He’s bleeding. He’s fighting me.”
“Coming,” Enzo said before disconnecting the line.
A moment later, he burst into the room, looking as exhausted as I felt.
“Come on,” he muttered, going into the bathroom with me, E’s meds in his hand.
Ethan was still curled on the floor, his elbow bleeding from where he’d fallen and opened up one of his wounds.
Enzo reached in to help E up, but once again, E fought, kicking out and knocking Enzo into me.
Enzo let out a snarl and latched onto E’s leg and dragged him kicking and screaming across the floor.
“Help! HELP! Don’t touch me! Please. Please. PLEASE! HELP! Don’t! Don’t!” E shrieked.
I took the meds Enzo tossed at me and worked as fast as I could to deliver them into E’s veins. His words faded off, tears leaking from his eyes as he stared at the ceiling from his back.
“Don’t…” he whispered. “I don’t… like to be… touched…”
I swallowed hard as his lashes fluttered and he faded away much like Rosalie had.
We were quiet for a moment as we stared at Ethan’s battered face.
I let my eyes drift over his naked body. He’d lost a lot of weight.
“Fuck,” I whispered as I took in the damage across his skin. So many bruises and deep cuts.
“What the fuck,” Enzo murmured.
I followed his gaze to see Ethan’s groin. It was black and blue, his balls torn to fuck.
Bite marks on his dick. His balls. His fucking thighs. So many teeth marks.
Bile burned my throat as I stared in horror at the mess.
He had stitches in some places. The doctors told us he was banged up, but they weren’t specific, likely because E told them not to share the information with us.
We hadn’t even told his parents what happened to him because they’d been through enough.
We thought it better this way, and now I was glad we hadn’t called them.
I rushed to the toilet and heaved my guts into the bowl. Nothing about this shit was OK. It was so much worse than I thought. I had no idea what he’d gone through. What Fox had gone through. The thought they’d endured so much fucked up shit made me heave again.
I wiped my lips and flushed the toilet before rinsing my mouth at the sink. When I was done, I grabbed the first aid kit from under the sink and knelt next to Enzo.
“It’ll be OK,” Enzo whispered. I wasn’t sure if he was talking to me or E, but it didn’t matter.
Nothing felt OK.
Quickly, we wordlessly worked on bandaging his wounds before we hefted him up and took him to his bed.
Enzo grabbed him a pair of boxers and slid them up his legs, and I got a t-shirt on him.
After tucking him in, we left.
“Rosalie?” I asked softly as we stepped outside E’s room.
“Sleeping. Hopefully, she’ll be out all night.”
“Do you want to sleep with her tonight—”
“No.” He turned and walked to the stairs.
I hesitated for a moment before following him.
We needed to fucking talk.