Chapter Thirty-Seven – Rebel
The moment Axel, Ryder, and Ransom’s voices traveled through Rebel’s partially open door, she roused herself from her bed and found a pair of puddle pants and a white pullover, then pulled on socks and chose a pair of Vans to stick with the same designer as everything else she wore.
She didn’t bother with her hair. Very shortly, she’d focus on what cute style she wanted to wear to Harley’s stupid play.
After texting Momma to let her know her destination, Rebel left her room and darted down the back staircase, then hurried across the breezeway and out the door that led to the swings and treehouse.
The property was endless with enough land to build a family compound, ideal for the boys but sucky for her. Probably Jo, too.
Several minutes later, she reached the iron fence that separated her parents’ place from the Taylor residence, happy to see the big gap that Rebel, Mattie, and Harley once used in extreme emergencies, when disabling the cameras to hide their movements was too time-consuming.
It was how Mattie was able to sneak off with Eric and Billy. They’d tell everyone they were going to the swings and Mattie would book it to the breach in the fence. In hindsight, Rebel regretted her stupidity. At the time, she just thought she was being a good cousin and thwarting Uncle Johnnie.
A high-pitched squeal suddenly cut through the quiet and Rebel jumped almost ten feet in the fucking air. Hogzilla’s icky little hooves thundered from behind a row of bushes, her piggy eyes locked on Rebel.
Screaming, she backed away, afraid to take her eyes off that hefty ho, trying to maintain a zigzag pattern but finding it so fucking hard to do.
Hogzilla grunted, squealed again, thundering toward Rebel with impressive speed for such a big pig.
Why hadn’t Daddy shot this bitch yet?
The earth felt as if it shook under Hogzilla’s impressive girth, drawing ever closer to Rebel, who worried she’d run into a tree and knock herself out. Then, instead of Rebel feasting on Hogzilla, she’d be that bitch’s meal.
Yelling at the top of her lungs, Rebel turned, almost running into the fucking tree that she’d suspected was near. She couldn’t have been lucky enough to zag, the movement that kept Hogzilla off course. She zigged, and the pig’s snout butted her legs.
“You fucking unfried pork sausage,” Rebel cried, jumping up to try and grab the tree limb. Unable to reach it, she landed on her feet and lost her fucking balance, falling right in front of a psychotic pig with an evil glare and bad breath.
A whistle saved the day. That overgrown blubber of death sat down as if she didn’t make a fucking sport of chasing anyone she could.
“Bad girl!” Uncle Val chastised, suddenly there and patting Hogzilla’s big, stupid head.
“That pig needs to die!” Rebel shouted, scared and angry. She punched the ground, creating a small cloud of leaves. “I didn’t even know she was out.”
Uncle Val crouched down and that bitch nudged him like a puppy. “Daddy got to talk to your Aunt Meggie to ask her to put you on her No-Kill list.”
Outraged, Rebel gasped. “You can’t put a fucking pig on that list!”
“Your Uncle Outlaw might want to shoot you for playing hide and seek with his daughter.”
“Hide and seek?” Rebel yelled. “Try seek and kill. That bitch wanted me dead.”
Still petting her, Uncle Val looked at Rebel with disapproval and shook his head. “No, Reb. She might’ve pretended she had horns and seemed like she wanted to gore you. My princess destroyer got a good imagination. But she wouldn’t have bit you, just rammed you a little with her snout.”
“And crushed me if she ran me over.”
“Fuck. I never thought of that.” He scratched behind Hogzilla’s ear. “You wouldn’t have done that to your Cousin Rebel, would you have, sweet girl?”
“That’s what Aunt Bailey calls Harley!”
Still cuddling Hogzilla, Uncle Val frowned at Rebel. “She gave me the idea, Reb. I couldn’t think of something so poetic on my own.”
Too outdone to think of a response, Rebel noticed Hogzilla’s collar that read Daddy’s Little Diva. “Daddy’s little asshole!”
“Cover your ears, girl,” Uncle Val said to Hogzilla, doing the job himself and then shaking his head at Rebel. “Puff don’t like this one either. But I can’t find her ‘Princess Destroyer’ one. I think her step mama threw it away.”
“You call Aunt Zoann that pig’s stepmom?”
“Zoann can’t give birth to a pig, Reb. Besides, I don’t want my girl thinking I’m trying to erase memories of her real mama.” Uncle Val stroked the pig’s head. “Enough about my daughter. What are you doing in her territory? You must’ve had a score to settle if you went in search of her.”
Rebel remembered she was at the back of Uncle Val’s property. “I thought Hogzilla was penned!”
“My girl don’t like to be all closed in. That’s why she always escapes.”
“I wanted to talk to Ryan,” Rebel grouched. “I was going to find a rock to throw at his window and hopefully hit his stupid head.”
Shame crossed Uncle Val’s face and Rebel regretted her impulsive words. She hadn’t come to cause any more hurt. Diesel had done enough damage to her earlier.
Standing, Uncle Val grabbed Hogzilla’s collar. “I can’t apologize enough, Reb.”
“He should say sorry for the rest of his fucking life.” Rebel got to her feet and dusted off her backside. “You shouldn’t.”
“As my niece…” Uncle Val bowed his head. “I don’t know where I messed up with Ryan.”
“The only thing I hold against you is her.” Rebel tipped her chin to Hogzilla, deceptively sweet and calm right now. “Nothing else, but I want to see Ryan. My brothers got home, so I figured he was, too.”
Uncle Val looked at his watch. “Puff’ll be home in ten or fifteen minutes. She’s all excited about Harley’s play.”
“Ryan’s secret is safe, Uncle Val.”
He nodded and relaxed a fraction. “Come on, baby. We’ll go in through the kitchen.”
Luckily, she was none the worse for wear after her run-in with Hogzilla.
Rebel rarely visited Ryan, especially in his bedroom. They’d just recently forged a friendship because he’d been such a fuckhead for so long, especially to her twin.
When she knocked on his door and he invited her in without asking who it was, she walked into his room and smirked at the alarm in his eyes.
Uncle Val had worked him over good, every bruise and cut quite deserved. A towel around his neck, his brown hair damp, he wore only boxer briefs.
“No wonder you have such little man energy,” she said, plopping on his bed and enjoying his anger. “Oh no, fuckhead, check yourself before I punch you in your fucking mouth.” She beamed at him. “Or call Diesel and laugh while he guts you.”
Ryan paled and raised his hands as if he resisted an invisible barrier, then he swore under his breath and glared at her. “You hate me. I get it. But you can’t have me killed because of Mom. If I could’ve died, Diesel would’ve done it last night.”
“Or my father,” Rebel said in bored tones.
“Now that you’ve told me what a piece of shit I am and not part of the family and how you despise me, get the fuck out of my room.”
“One thing about having a father who always twists situations to have his fucking way is I can detect guilt a mile away. You see, little man, I didn’t say one fucking word of what you said I said. You think I feel that way because you know it’s what you fucking deserve.”
“You think you know me, bitch?”
“Nice try, fuckface. Not a deterrent. Your bullshit is child’s play when you have my brothers under the roof.” Straightening, she folded her arms and glowered at her cousin. “Do you know what I hate the fucking most, Ryan?”
“What? Not that I fucking care,” he added on a sneer.
“You fucking care, you miserable motherfucker.”
Clenching his jaw, he glanced away.
“I hate that I care too, asshole. I hate that I had started to trust you and like you as a cousin and a cool guy. I hate that I saw you as part of the family.”
“I’m so—”
“Don’t say it again.” Rebel swiped an angry tear away. “What you did hurt me so bad, Ryan. So get off your fucking pity party and guilt trip to convince yourself that no one ever really liked you. We did. You’d become one of us. If you hadn’t, it wouldn’t be so devastating.”
“Everything started happening at once, Reb. I stopped being invisible to everybody and I started regretting what I was doing. I didn’t know how to get her back.”
Rebel drew in a breath. “And you went to fuckbreath, dickbrain John Donovan because he knew the entire story about why Molly’s Dad took her.”
“Yes.”
“It wasn’t a fucking question, Ryan,” she snapped. “I know that motherfucker. I’m going to fucking kill him so brutally when I turn eighteen. I hate him so much.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying. Seeing a body is a lot. Death. But causing it—”
“I don’t care,” she said, and her voice trembled.
“The one bright spot of today was I got my cast off. Everything after that has been shit. I once loved my room. Now… it doesn’t matter.
You haven’t been Uncle Johnnie’s target.
Only one of his casualties. But he hates my mom.
And he hates my brother. He refused to help you because Molly’s absence devastated CJ.
If that wasn’t his only reason for withholding his assistance, that was a primary reason. ”
“He never said why.”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s done. No one can undo these past weeks. But I want you to look me in the fucking eye and tell me you didn’t help Willard spy on me and Harley because you wanted to make CJ suffer, too.”
“Rebel—”
“Mattie said my videos started in early January. You placed the camera the night of Daddy’s birthday party, didn’t you?”
“I’m sorry.”
An impatient noise escaped her, but then she came to the hardest question. Or revelation because deep inside herself, she already knew the answer. “Rule saw them, didn’t he?”
Ryan’s eyes flared. “I don’t know—”