Chapter 39 Summer
Summer
When I park the rental, Dizzy crawls over the seat and lands on Kelsey’s lap. She kisses the surprised woman on the cheek. “You don’t mind if we get a little friendly, do you?”
“I live on a rock tour, remember?” Kelsey pinches Dizzy’s side. “Just watch where you put your bony butt.”
“Are you ready for this, Summer?” Dizzy asks.
Am I ready to get a confession? Get some payback? It’s hard to take a full breath unless I concentrate on doing so. I want them to know they aren’t going to get away with what they did to me anymore. I’m going to make sure they don’t do it to anyone else in the future. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Dizzy squirms, staring out the windshield in front of me. “That’s the place?”
“Only mechanic in town.” It seemed like as good a place as any to start.
“And which naughty boy lives here?” Dizzy cranes her neck.
“Kurt.” I bite my lip as I gather up my bag of supplies.
I did check for any other addresses that might have been listed for him, but it seems when he took over the garage, he also took over the apartment above it.
“It would have been easier to get Travis to talk, but as far as I can tell, he still lives with his mom out at their place in the pines. As much as the woman is a part of the problem, I have no interest in making this more complicated than it has to be. According to my online research, Kurt lives on his own. No girlfriend. No roommate.”
My hand is shaking as I reach for the door handle. I take a deep breath to steady my nerves. Until Rebel pushed me out of my comfort zone, I was a good girl. Overly protected by my brothers. Putting on a tough girl face.
The closest I’ve come to committing a crime was stealing my dad’s moonshine. I learned my lesson all too fast. The punishment was too severe to do anything like that again.
But sometimes the crime fits the punishment. What they did to me has stayed with me while they got to brush it off like it never happened. Tonight, I start to change that.
Pushing open the door, I climb out.
Dizzy is right behind me. Crawling through the driver’s side on my heels. Kelsey and Ivy climb out too, their doors shutting loudly in the quiet.
“Shh,” I whisper.
“It’s loud because you’re heightened.” Dizzy twirls like a ballerina. “Can you feel it? All the adrenaline pumping through your blood?”
It must be nice not to be scared.
“So we go in, tie this guy up, and get him to confess?” Ivy rubs at her arms.
“Something like that.” I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing. I’m working backwards from the outcome I want and hoping everything goes without a hitch. It’s impulsive, but I couldn’t let it go anymore.
“Let’s get in and out as quickly as possible.” Kelsey darts a glance over her shoulder.
“You’re no fun,” Dizzy tells her as she skips ahead.
“This isn’t meant to be fun,” Ivy whispers as we make our way around the building single file to where Dizzy holds a door open for us.
“I didn’t have to pick the lock. It was open.” Dizzy beams as we pass her. “I love small towns. Everyone is so trusting.”
I used to believe that too.
It reeks of oil and metal inside the garage. A couple of cars with their hoods taken off are parked in the back bays. A tractor is in pieces, its huge tires stacked one on top of the other. Tools and machinery line every horizontal and vertical surface.
“Someone should keep lookout,” Dizzy says.
Ivy puts a finger up. “I can do that.”
“Kelsey, you do it,” Dizzy orders as she wraps an arm around Ivy’s waist. “You, I’m keeping in my sights the whole time.
You’re my sister and the bride-to-be. If I don’t get you back for the wedding in one piece, I’m going to be in a hell of a lot of trouble.
Rogue will want to kill me. West will murder him. It’ll be a bloodbath.”
“How can you be blamed for something that wasn’t your idea, Dizzy?” I don’t believe it would go that far, but it’s true that I’m putting the bride at risk. “If anyone gets blamed for anything, it’ll be me.”
“Maybe we should go,” Kelsey says.
“We definitely should.” Forget we came into town. Get some sleep so we’re fresh for tomorrow.
I’ll be leaving once the wedding is over anyway.
It’s just… I am done with being shamed and scared because of these assholes. “I can’t. I need to do this.”
A light switches on at the top of the stairs.
“Shit.” This is already not going according to plan.
“Don’t worry. I’ve got this.” Dizzy snatches the plastic bag from my hand and charges up the steps. A series of thumps come from up above.
“What the fuck?” The voice—which I recognize from this afternoon’s run in—is thick with sleep and surprise. Kurt.
There’s a thud. A giggle.
“Who are you?” he demands. The sleep has evaporated from his voice.
“Do you think she’s okay?” Kelsey stares at the ceiling above us. We all wince when something crashes.
There’s another thud. This one is much heavier.
“I have a feeling...” Ivy’s gaze is also glued to the ceiling. It follows the sound of giggling as something heavy is dragged across the floor over our heads. “Yes.”
Everything is silent for a long minute before Dizzy reappears in the doorway at the top of the stairs.
“That was fun.” Her face splits into the brightest grin. “He’s all tied up and ready for you.”
This is it then? I force Kurt to implicate himself and the others by getting him to confess what really happened. No one will be able to look the other way then. They’ll know the truth. Then Kurt and Duke and the others will all get what they deserve.
I march past Dizzy and step into the apartment above the garage. It’s small and dated, with wood panelling and brown-on-brown carpet. There are cigarette burns in the cheap synthetic pile and oil stains on the furniture.
Car manuals and coffee mugs cover every surface. I gag on the smell from a pile of pizza boxes on the coffee table. A couple of flies do an aerial display that comprises of dive bombing the boxes in tandem.
An unconscious Kurt lies on his stomach in front of two sagging recliners with his hands and feet trussed together behind his back.
I planned to tie him up. That’s why I brought the baling string and cable ties, but this is... I turn to Dizzy. “You hog tied him?”
“I added this for you.” She grabs the twine that runs the length of his torso, and tugs. His head rises a couple inches, and he makes a choking sound. “That should help you get a confession out of him when he comes to.”
Ivy hugs herself as she studies her sister’s handiwork. Unlike Dizzy, she’s somber. She chews the inside of her cheek as she turns her focus to the other woman.
I take my phone out, open the voice recorder, then prod Kurt with my foot. “Kurt?”
His response is unintelligible, but his eyes open. Remembering he was mid fight when he went down, he tries to get up, but the ropes hold. “What the fuck?”
“Feeling vulnerable, Kurt?” I kneel in front of him. It’s weird to see him weak and incapacitated. For so long he seemed much bigger and scarier than me. Little by little, I’ve grown strong. I’ve learned how to live and that I’m capable of protecting myself.
That girl they hurt is a fierce woman now, and she’s come to set things right.
I’m almost sad Dizzy took him down on her own. I didn’t get the chance. But I’m the one who will get him to confess.
“Jesus. Fuck. Summer?” His gaze clears. His lip curls up in an ugly way. “You bitch. What do you want?”
“I want you to confess.” I hit the record button. “I want you to admit what happened in that bathroom the night you assholes attacked me.”
“You know what happened. You started it, slut.”
“Hey, we’re about to have company,” Kelsey calls up from the garage.
Kurt grins. “I was worried someone was trying to break in, so I called the cops. You remember Kyle, don’t you?”
“Tell me what you did.” I yank on the rope like Dizzy showed me, and his head lifts from the carpet. His eyes bulge, and he makes that garbled sound again. Spit descends in one long string to the carpet.
“Ease up,” Dizzy says.
“Not until he admits what they did.”
He slaps the ground, tapping out.
I drop the rope.
“Fine. I... I spiked your drink. I put the drugs in your punch when you got to the dance. You were already pretty tipsy. Duke wanted to send you over the edge. I had some pills the doc gave me to help with the pain when I broke my arm in that game against Flowerdale. They made me drowsy. I figured they’d do the trick. ”
They definitely did the trick. I suppress a shudder. “And then?”
“I helped you to the bathroom. Helped you take your panties off.” His body is wracked by a cough. “I didn’t do nothing else. It was all Duke and Kyle. Kyle was the one who bashed your head into the toilet.”
Nausea coils in my belly, all cold and bitter. He’s filling in details I wasn’t sure about.
“We better go.” Dizzy drags Ivy to the stairs and then comes back to grab me. “West is going to kill me if we get caught. And I don’t mean metaphorically.”
I’m at the bottom of the steps when a man appears in the shadows. A breathless squeak escapes me as more figures come out of the darkness behind him.
Holy shit. This is my worst nightmare.