Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Berkleigh
Two Hours ago
Some complete moron—likely the asshole with no boundaries—has just woken me up. To be fair, it’s probably payback for puking all over his trashcans last night. I haven’t seen him all day. I imagine he waited until now because he can be a prick like that.
The snarky comments and general asshole aura he constantly emits are reminiscent of high-school—just minus the bitch gang led by Taylor Frey, my nemesis if there were such a thing for non superheroes.
Wait…that sound is coming from downstairs.
Scrambling from the bed, I rush over to my closet to find the baseball bat my dad insisted I keep by the front door in case of emergency. Not that our neighborhood is a dangerous one, but he was a boy scout and believes in being prepared.
Footsteps draw closer and my heart beats rapidly in time with my breaths, just as I find what I’m looking for. It’s actually from an old Halloween costume, “Good Night” written down the length, but I’m about as skilled with a baseball bat as a pony playing a keyboard.
Tanner has never breached the boundary of coming into my house in the middle of the night—not that I’m aware of—but right now, I’m praying it’s him because I don’t like how trapped I feel at the thought of a stranger in my home. It’s terrifying.
I can handle a verbal lashing, but a physical one? Not so much.
Case in point, my fat lip and sore knee after last night’s antics.
The footsteps are coming down the hall outside my bedroom and I have nowhere to go. Without making a sound, I close the closet door, while still inside, and back as far into the corner as possible.
“Where the fuck is she?” I’ve heard the venom in that voice before.
“We have a few more places to check, Boss.” That’s a new one.
“Slut’s probably out slutting.” The man from last night chuckles that same, awful scratchy sound as I remember. “We’ll just have to wait right here for when she comes home.”
Why is he here? And who has he brought with him?
Fear-fueled tears spring to my eyes, the situation I’m in getting more desperate by the second.
I left my phone on my bedside table without thinking, and now I’m stuck in a closet.
Maybe if I can wait it out until morning, they’ll leave.
It’s just after midnight, so only like five or six hours to sit and stew in my panic.
Having a strange car in my driveway isn’t unusual, but it still being there on a Monday morning will be. I never miss work, not even when I’m ill. I have student loans to pay off, a mortgage to deal with, and I want to travel, dammit.
Banging and shuffling outside my hiding place makes me hold my breath, my body completely frozen.
“Have you checked the closet, Boss?”
No, no, no, no, no, no, no…
I close my eyes and the first tears fall down my cheeks.
“There she is.” A large hand slams down on my head and pulls me up by my hair before a heavy palm smacks around my face and my stomach drops. “Look at me, bitch.”
I see him now, the same features I didn’t pay much attention to last night all scrunched up in a demented anger.
“Little Miss Cock Tease, did you really think I’d let you get away with leaving my balls blue?”
Okay, I’m scared, yes, my whole body shivering with adrenaline or fear or both, but what the fuck? The entitlement of this prick.
“I fucking owe you nothing!” I scream the words into his face.
His hand is still in my hair, pulling it taut in a way that is not fun or sexy.
My survival instincts must be somewhere else right now, the adrenaline winning over the fear, because I can’t help spitting in his face as he snarls.
Remembering the baseball bat in my hand, my frozen body comes back to life and I yell, swinging the bat at his arms first, which removes his grubby hand from my head.
Then I keep hitting him, his ribs, his back, and I gear up for a huge swing for his head, forgetting the other person in the room who is quick to stop me.
The bat won’t move from where I’m holding it above my head because the mountain of a man behind me now has it in his grasp, so I let go and make a run for the bedroom door. Only to get stopped by another mountain in a black suit. Why are they wearing suits?
“Cunt needs to learn some fucking respect.” Tiny Dancer stands from where he was hunched over, and I’m considering the fact that his nickname is really not fitting at all.
It was supposed to be funny, reminding me of the song I’ll forever hate because of this man, but now it feels too cutesy.
Tiny Prick, maybe. Tiny Balls, because beating up a woman in the middle of the night is what all the big, strong men do… not.
Mountain One and Two double-team me, and each grips one of my arms as Tiny Balls approaches, a bleeding gash on his temple. I don’t recall getting his head, but I’m proud of the damage I caused all the same. I want to do it more, over and over again.
My tank top and shorts PJ combo is torn from my body, leaving me frazzled and bare in front of these three evil men. I have no way out of this, no more weapons, no skills, no fucking friends.
I’m screwed.
The moment Tiny Balls steps closer to me and touches my naked breast with his clammy palm, I want to curl up and die. He squeezes, way too hard, and I cry out in pain, praying to whatever deity will listen that this will be over quickly.
At some point, I passed out. I don’t know whether to be thankful or not that I can’t recall everything they did to me and my house.
My vagina feels hot and raw, my body beaten and broken, and my mind is…
I have no idea. I think I’m in shock. No amount of education and knowledge can ever prepare you for this feeling of loss, like something has been taken from you and you’re not sure you’ll ever get it back. A piece of your very essence stolen.
Sitting up at the bottom of my stairs, I dare to look at the damage caused to everything I have worked my ass off to own.
My back feels bruised, my ankle swollen, and I think I can recall being pushed down the stairs when they were finished, just before they walked out the front door without a care in the world.
I need my phone.
The cops will have more than enough DNA evidence from my body, regardless of the threats from those men to come back and finish the job if I report them.
I manage to drag myself about halfway up the stairs before I see it, and my hope deflates in an instant.
My cell is on one of the steps, crushed… useless.
Tears flow freely down my cheeks in despair. This is so fucked it’s almost unreal. I’m angry, I’m scared, and a whole other heap of emotions along with it. Confusion doesn’t even begin to explain how my brain is feeling while trying to process everything.
The neighborhood is supposed to be safe, and now Tanner’s worry about danger coming here because of me has come true. I need to get help but I’d give our older neighbors a heart attack if I showed up on their doorstep at almost two in the morning, which leaves me with one option.
Tanner Black.
I’ll eat my weight in humble pie if I have to. It’s better than dying alone in my house because I’m too stubborn to ask for help.
Using the banister, I pull myself to standing and make my way back down the stairs, finding something else to lean my body weight against as I head for my front door and out of the house.
Once outside, there’s nothing to hold on to, and it hurts too much to walk on my own, so I do the only thing I can before I fall and hurt myself more.
I crawl.
I crawl on my hands and knees, slowly but surely, to the asshole next door.
Rain pelts down, battering my naked body and making my hair stick to my face.
Red droplets fall to the ground after washing away my blood, potentially some of Tiny Balls’.
The wet grass and mud clings to my palms, shins, feet, and knees, but I’m thankful I can at least still feel things.
I’m not as numb as I think I should be. As I want to be.
Tanner’s security lights ping on as I reach his porch, highlighting the mess I’m in, but I couldn’t give two shits how I look.
I bang on his front door as hard as my weak body will allow, over and over…
but nothing. How is it that he’s always here to mock me, no matter what time of day or night I’m outside, but the one time I need him… he’s gone?
The porch light eventually goes out as I still, unable to move anywhere else as I hug my knees to my chest for warmth, desperately hoping he gets home soon because I’m spent. I’m cold, I’m in pain, and I’m close to passing out again, but I’m trying real hard not to.
Time passes as I drift in and out of consciousness.
I know I should move but it feels like an impossible task.
Then hope flutters when I hear the soft rumblings of an engine and tears begin to freefall once more, my body still non-stop shivering from the cold or the shock.
Then headlights of a car shine brightly…
and there he is…standing over me. The way his wet hair hangs over his forehead, his concerned brown eyes staring straight into my soul…
I could almost forget the way he treated me in high school.
“Berkleigh? What the fuck? Who did this to you?”
I thought it would be easy, but I can’t seem to find my voice, the tears and pain taking over everything. I try to control my sobs, silently pleading with him to not be his usual asshole self about this, before the words I never thought I’d say to him finally break free.
“I didn’t know where else to go.”
The usual hardness in his eyes softens, or I’m hallucinating, which is entirely probable considering my state of mind, and he scoops me up in his arms. My heart leaps to my throat, but not in fear.
I have never been afraid of Tanner—only ever angry at him.
It’s a foreign feeling with him holding me; a safe one, I think.
The inside of his house is nothing like I remember.
He’s renovated the whole thing to be completely new, like something out of a minimalist magazine rather than the trash hole it once was, and I don’t blame him.
His parents were the worst kind of people and he spent a lot of time at my house for meals, until everything changed one summer and he turned on me.
I still have no idea why. I just know that he became a different person and instead of being the boy next door who loved my mom’s cheesecake, he became the asshole next door who loved to make my life hell.
With a softness I didn’t know he possessed, Tanner lays me down on a bed that smells like the sweetest pears mixed with something I can’t place.
I love a pear scent, it always calms me.
He leaves me there, and I watch him as he turns and walks out of the room, his fists tightly clenched at his sides.
My body doesn’t feel like it’s shaking as much as before, but the loss of contact with his warmth and the idea of being alone again makes me curl into myself and sob. I don’t know what I expected from him, but he’s already done more than I thought he’d be comfortable with.
A hand between my shoulder blades and a dip in the bed beside me lets me know he’s back and I hiccup another sob, trying to catch my breath.
“I’m just checking your injuries, okay?”
Not once, never, have I heard Tanner ask for permission, but I nod, regardless. My throat is too raw, my voice too broken for me to use words.
He handles me like the most delicate flower, nothing like those cockroaches who attacked me. I should hate it, should shy away from his touch and his judging gaze, but I’m allowing myself to believe he’s still the boy he once was. My best friend. I can trust him with my life.
Tanner checks each bruise, each mark on my body, until he grunts and stands again.
“Nothing life threatening, no broken bones. I’m going to clean you up a little before you sleep.
” He doesn’t wait for a response, grabbing a blanket from a chair in the corner of the room and placing it over my naked body before leaving.
The shock is beginning to wear off and the throbbing ache has begun to seep in even more, but I know I’m not dying. So there’s that.
“Here, take these.” Tanner comes back into the room with a tray of things, placing it beside me on the bed. He passes me two small tablets and a glass of water. “They’ll help with the pain.”
I don’t question him, blindly trusting that he won’t hurt me in my moment of need. I swallow the tablets and sip the water, wincing a little as they go down.
“Thank you.” Speaking just reminds me of how much my throat hurts and I feel like I’m in this strange bubble, like I’m looking down at myself lying here, helpless.
Calling the cops has crossed my mind again, but I’m just so damn tired and there’ll be a lot of questions I’m not in any kind of mood to answer…
my house will still look like a crime scene in the morning.
It can wait. If I was my own client, I’d give myself very different advice, the logical kind, but being able to help other people doesn’t mean I’m good at taking care of myself. Clearly.
Right here, right now, the madness is but a dull ringing between my ears, soothed only by the fact I’m not alone.
In silence, Tanner lifts the bottom corner of the blanket and reveals my feet, taking one in his hand and pulling his tray closer.
There’s a large bowl of water, and he begins washing my feet, taking his time to clean them thoroughly, but also using the lightest of touches in case some of the dirt is a bruise.
Carefully, he makes his way farther up my leg, where he no doubt has to use a lot more water to remove the mud. After what I’ve just been through, with three men in my home, being here with my tormentor seems like a walk in the park.
It’s strange how safe I feel with Tanner. So safe, in fact, that I’m drifting off to sleep as he washes down my body. I know, bone deep, that he won’t take advantage of me like that. He may hate me, but right now, he is my savior.
As I get closer to unconsciousness, thoughts of the helplessness I feel swirl through my mind. I’ve been stagnant, stupid, and na?ve.
I make a vow to myself that no man will put me in this position or lay a finger on me in anger ever again.
And then I cry myself to sleep, silent tears creeping down my cheeks, and I must be hallucinating some more because the softest of lips press against my forehead and promise a revenge I can absolutely get on board with.
“I will find him for you, Sweet Bee, and I will bring you his motherfucking dick as a trophy.”