Chapter 11 Reverie #2
By the time I regain control over myself again, my stomach continues to roll with nausea, and tears have soaked my cheeks, plastering strands of hair to them. My upper back aches, feeling as if my lungs are constricting around a rock with every inhale.
I’m given no further warning before my stomach lurches, and vomit rises.
I’m scrambling to my feet and into the connected half bath in my dorm.
My knees hit the tile with a crack, but I feel nothing outside of the awful pain of purging my stomach into the bowl.
The little amount of lunch I ate earlier comes right back up, then nothing but bile.
For several long minutes, I dry heave, having nothing left to give despite my body demanding I expel more. I’m happy to spit out every one of my organs as long as it puts me out of this misery.
Finally, my body calms, and I spend an indistinguishable amount of time with my head on my propped-up arm, my world spinning, just trying to breathe.
I have no energy left, but I scrounge up just enough to coerce my muscles to stand and take the two steps over to the sink, squeeze a dollop of toothpaste onto my brush, and scrub my tongue and teeth, leaning heavily on the porcelain as I do.
If I die, I refuse to go out tasting vomit in my mouth.
Then, I convince my legs to carry me back into the room and collapse on my bed. Sloppily, I pat around the mattress until my palm slaps my phone where I haphazardly threw it before getting changed.
I’m unable to see a damn thing I’m doing until I rub the tears from my eyes and quickly find Barry’s contact number.
The phone rings and rings before going to voicemail.
“Fuck,” I mutter beneath my breath, hanging up and instantly redialing. My other hand flies to my North Star necklace, anxiously sliding it back and forth on the chain.
It’s nearly midnight in California, but I know for a fact that man always has his ringer on high, just in case he gets called in.
Just when I think it’s going to go to voicemail again, his voice comes through the speaker.
“Rev? Is everything okay?”
Within four words, it went from riddled with sleep to alert.
“No,” I choke out, fresh tears bubbling out of my eyes. I sniff heavily and wipe away the excess snot leaking from my nose with the back of my hand.
“What happened?” he barks.
“Barry, he’s here,” I cry.
“What?” he barks. “What the fuck do you mean he’s there?” In the background, bedsheets rustle, along with Brenda’s soft voice asking what’s wrong. “Lionel’s in Colorado and found Rev,” he mutters to her before returning to our conversation, and demanding, “Tell me everything.”
“I-I just came home from work, like, twenty minutes ago,” I start, my voice cracking.
“And there was th-this random pink barrette and a note on my bed.
I don't even know where the hell the hair clip is from.
I-I don't know if it used to be mine as a kid?
I don't fucking know! But he…” I squeeze my eyes shut, desperately trying to compose myself as tears leak past the seal of my eyelashes and trail down my cheeks in rivulets.
“He what?” he snaps impatiently, though I know his anger isn’t directed toward me. He’s one of the few people in this world who actually gives a shit.
“He said he missed me and he has my bedroom ready for my arrival.” The words taste like gasoline, and if I had a match, I’d happily set my tongue aflame to never have to speak them again.
“Fuck,” he hisses beneath his breath. “Fuck, fuck, FUCK!”
“How did this happen? How did his parole officer let him leave the state already?”
“Sweetheart, I-I don’t know, but I’m going to get to the bottom of this. Can you stay with Sable tonight? I don’t want you in those dorms until I’ve alerted risk management and they move you somewhere else.”
I feel like vomiting again, but I manage to swallow it down.
“Yeah, I’ll see if I can stay with her,” I mumble, my bones suddenly weighed down with exhaustion. Whatever energy I possessed seems to have dissipated like smoke, and I feel even more tired than when I first walked in.
I hear a beep, and I look at my screen to see Sable calling, as if I summoned her spirit. I go to message her to tell her I’ll call her back, but Barry distracts me.
“Hey, it’s going to be okay, sweetheart, all right? I’ll get on the first flight there—”
“No, please don’t,” I cut in earnestly. “I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to you.”
“Sweetheart, with all due respect, I'm a goddamn FBI agent and can handle that motherfucker just fine. I’ve been chomping at the bit to kill him myself for years. All the bodies we’ve found—” He cuts himself off abruptly, and I know he’s trying to gather himself.
He lets out a harsh breath. “That is a sick, sick man, and I know you know that already. I will happily die protecting you, but God willing, Reverie, I will bring that son of a bitch down with me.”
My chin trembles, and more tears spill down my face. A massive headache is forming, but it’s nothing compared to the ache in my chest.
I was so fucking stupid to have any hope college would be what I needed to start living again.
I came here just to have one man dig my grave, and the other throw me back in it.
“The entire campus knows who my father is because of Dread,” I say before inhaling a shuddering breath.
“I thought I was going to get to start over, be someone else, but I’m still Charlotte here.
She never got to have a life, and Dread made sure it stayed that way—that I stayed a ghost. And now, Lionel just might make that a reality.
Fuck, Barry, I shouldn’t have even gone to college. I—”
“No, don’t do that. We already talked about this, Rev.
Lionel has already taken so much from you.
He doesn’t get to take your future, too.
He doesn’t get to stop you from living your goddamn life and being a normal fucking kid.
He got out nearly two decades sooner than he was supposed to. None of this is your fault.”
I shake my head, jostling out a few more tears.
“And I’m happy to take care of that little prick, too,” he continues, his voice rising. “You would have a solid case against him if you’d press charges. That pretty face of his will serve him just fine while he’s rotting behind bars.”
He’s wanted to handle Dread since he started terrorizing me, but I refused to let him get involved. Barry knows only the surface of what Dread has put me through over the years, but I’ve purposely kept most of it to myself, lest Barry take matters into his own hands, regardless of my wishes.
We both know Dread hurts me because he’s hurt, and I feel responsible for handling him myself when it’s my family that ruined him. This endless loathing between Dread and me is just that—between Dread and me.
I sigh, the pounding in my head worsening.
“It doesn’t matter anymore, Barry. Dread is the least of my worries, and it’s done and over with. Lionel found me.”
“Yeah, well, now it’s my turn to find him,” Barry growls. “Dread goes to that goddamn school, too, and with him being the family of a victim, Lionel shouldn’t have even been granted approval to go there. God, he—fuck!” He stumbles over his words, his anger taking over any coherent train of thought.
“Sweetheart, relax. Your blood pressure,” Brenda admonishes gently in the background.
Barry heaves out a harsh exhale to calm himself, instinctively listening to his wife without a second thought.
“Maybe they let him come here to see Roxi,” I mumble.
“That’s bullshit,” he spits, but he knows it’s a possibility.
Lionel may not be allowed on HCU’s campus, but that doesn’t mean all of Colorado is off-limits. It doesn’t even make Hollow Canyon off-limits. And as sickening as it is, Roxi gives him the perfect excuse to be here.
Barry knows this, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a really hard fucking pill to swallow.
“Can I get a protective order against him? Or at least a temporary one? Will that help?” I ask.
Barry sighs. “They’ll give you a temporary order without issue, but you’re still required to set a court date to prove he’s a danger to you. There needs to be hard evidence he’s threatening or harassing you. Until he does, a court won’t grant a permanent order just because you want one.”
I close my eyes in defeat.
“If his parole officer granted him a temp permit to leave, Lionel is required to tell them exactly where he plans to be and who he’ll be with before they approve it,” Barry continues.
“They are extremely strict, and deviating from those plans is taken very seriously. So if we can prove he violated his parole by going on campus, he will go back to prison quicker than he can shit in a proper toilet.”
I refuse to feel any hope.
Not even a pin drop.
Because deep down, Barry knows as well as I do nothing is ever that easy where Lionel D’Amour is concerned.
“Call Sable and tell her you need to stay with her,” Barry instructs, his tone soothing.
“Don’t drive to her in case Lionel knows your car and is tracking it.
Don’t let anyone else know where you are.
I’m getting an officer there right away, and he’s going to take you to her place and keep watch overnight. Got it?”
I nod, forgetting he can’t see me.
“Rev?” he pushes.
“Yeah, yeah, I got it,” I rush out quickly, my voice hoarse and throat raw.
“Okay, sweetheart. In the meantime, I’m going to contact his parole officer and figure out what the fuck is going on. I’ll text you, and you better let me know when you’re there safe, okay?”
“Okay.”
I’m so out of it, I just stare at the wall blankly for a few beats before I hear him gently say, “Hang up now, honey.”
Blinking, I whisper a goodbye and click the end button, already arguing with myself about calling Sable.