Chapter 20
TWENTY
Jada
The thirty-minute drive home felt like an eternity.
I was in shock, both physically and mentally. I had never been grabbed like that before. Even when Decker had threatened me or backed me against a wall, he had never actually touched me. The feeling of someone’s hands on me made me feel so violated, so vulnerable.
At least he’ll feel that pain in his back for a little while from the key.
I checked my rearview mirror a few times, fearing that he had followed me out of the parking lot. But I didn’t see him.
Surely, he wouldn’t be stupid enough to follow me.
I felt numb, unable to clearly process what had happened. My head felt like it was full of Styrofoam packing peanuts. The only thing that I could really feel was my arm, and it hurt like hell.
I swung my car into Kari’s driveway and ran into the house, looking over my shoulder. I burst into the front door, slamming it behind me and locking it. I leaned my back against it, closing my eyes and letting the scent of coconut envelop me and comfort me.
Breathe …
“Jada? Is that you?” I heard Kari call from the kitchen.
Please, God, don’t let Max be here.
“Yeah, it’s me,” I yelled back. I cleared my throat and made my way through the house to find Kari taking a pizza out of the oven.
“I don’t know how I burn frozen pizzas. I set the timer and everything,” she whined as smoke billowed out of the oven.
I set my things on the counter, jumping when the oven door slammed.
“Jada? Are you all right?” Kari asked, eyeing me.
I rubbed my eyes with my fingertips, not trusting my voice quite yet.
“What’s going on?” She set the oven mitts down and put her hand on her hip.
“What’s going on with what?” Max asked, coming around the corner.
I must have done something really wrong in a past life.
Kari and I just stood there, staring at each other. She knew something had happened, and I wasn’t about to tell her yet—especially not in front of Max.
“Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine. So you tried to make frozen pizzas again? Nice.”
“You’re a liar.” She crossed her arms in front of her.
“Not now, Kari,” I said through clenched teeth. “Don’t we have some Charlie to watch?”
“Not until you tell me what’s going on.”
I looked away to try to prevent the tears from falling, but my eyes landed on Max. He was standing in the doorway, his hands in his back pockets, Saints hat backward on his head. His stance may have been casual, but his eyes were unrelenting, assessing the situation in a way that only he could.
“Drop it.” I turned back to Kari, my eyes hard. “I’m just going to go to bed, okay?”
“Jada,” Kari said, reaching out to pull me in close.
As soon as her fingers touched my arm, I jumped back in pain and covered my arm with my other hand.
“Jada?”
I tried to turn away, but Kari pulled up the sleeve of my shirt before I could take a step.
“Jada!” she exclaimed, covering her mouth with her hand. “What happened to you?”
“Nothing.” I brushed her off, pulling the sleeve down over the purple marks starting to appear. “Just leave it be.”
“I will do no such thing! What happened?”
Max quickly covered the distance between us and picked up my arm gently. There was no point in fighting him, so I just let him look, closing my eyes, knowing that things were about to get real.
I hadn’t had time to dissect what Simon had done. Nor why. I didn’t know whether to call the police, to go to the doctor, or to just go to bed and cry. But this was about to get ugly with or without my consent.
“I’m going to ask you this one time, Jada,” Max said, his voice eerily calm, “and you will answer me. Who did this to you?”
I pulled my arm away from him, and he let it go, but his eyes forced me to stay put.
“I don’t want to go into this right now,” I said, my body starting to shake. “Just give me a few minutes to sort this in my head.”
“You can take all the time you want to sort whatever you need to. But you have about five seconds to tell me who did this.” His unyielding voice overwhelmed me. I knew he was looking out for me, but I just needed a damn minute.
I turned, frustrated, and walked across the kitchen with every intention of grabbing my purse off the island and going to my room and locking the door.
I really need to make getting my own apartment a priority.
I grabbed my bag and slung it over my shoulder and then picked up my phone. I looked at the screen and gasped, a chill tearing through every fiber of my being.
Simon: I owe you one.
I stared at the message, my mouth dry. Tears sprang to my eyes with renewed urgency, filling my lids before spilling down my cheeks.
Max grabbed my phone from my hand.
“Give that back to me!” I shrieked, reaching up to take it away. Blood was pounding through my ears as I became fully aware that this was no longer my secret. “Max. Give it to me!”
“That’s what I fucking thought,” he said, shooting me an angry look as he set my phone on the counter. “I reckon shit is about to hit the fan.”
CANE
There was no sense in trying to get any work done.
I slammed my pencil on the drawings, turning a circle in my chair.
I had brought a bid home to work on over the weekend, hoping that it would keep my mind occupied, but it wasn’t working. It hadn’t worked all day. Here it was, after ten on a Saturday night, and I was no better than I was twelve hours earlier.
All I could see was her face as she watched me walk out of that fucking bar. All I could hear was the sound of being sent to voicemail a few hours earlier.
She actually liked my fucked-up self.
Liked. Past tense. Dumbass.
I got up and walked to the window. Resting my head against the cool glass, I wished I could just redo the whole night before. I expected her to be pissed at me when I got there, but I should have stayed calm. And I sure as shit shouldn’t have walked out with that chick.
That was low—even for me.
My phone buzzing on my desk broke my thoughts. I turned and watched it bounce around.
Maybe it’ll bounce off the desk and smash into pieces.
I ran my fingers through my hair, tugging it roughly. I needed to feel something other than whatever this feeling was.
Is this what guilt feels like? Don’t you need a conscience to feel that?
I need to hit the bag for a while. Work this shit out of my system.
I headed back to the desk when the phone started ringing again. I saw it was Max.
“What’s up?”
“We have a problem,” Max bit out angrily.
For fuck’s sake. The last thing I wanted to deal with on a Saturday night was a construction issue.
I pay him to handle this shit. Let him handle it.
“Oh, do we now? What can you not take care of yourself, Max?” I instantly felt bad for being a dick, but I really just wanted to be left alone.
“Okay,” Max said, his words and their anger hitting me hard. “I just won’t tell you that Jada has fucking bruises on her arm.”
“The fuck?” I sat back down in my chair, confident that I misheard him. “What did you just say?”
“Yeah. Jada just got home, and she was acting nervous as hell. Kari grabbed her arm, and it has a bunch of bruises, Alexander.”
“From what?” I asked, praying that she didn’t do something really fucking stupid. But I had a bad feeling.
“I’d say in my infinite wisdom that they are fingerprints. They look like someone grabbed her.”
Adrenaline began to flow through my body, and I stood back up, my heart now pounding uncontrollably. “Who?” I looked around the room for my shoes, my mind three steps ahead of my body.
“Powers.”
I stopped dead in my tracks. Powers?
“How in the fuck did that happen?” I roared, snapping back to life. “Max! How in the fuck did that happen?”
“I’m just guessing that your stunt last night probably made her forget anything you said. Hell, that probably made her do it. Just a thought.”
“Now’s not the time for a fucking lecture, Max,” I bellowed. “Where the fuck were you? How did you not know she was meeting him?” I grabbed my shoes from the doorway and put them on.
“I don’t live there, asshole,” Max said. “But I think the real question is, where the fuck were you? Why didn’t you call her today?”
If he wasn’t my friend, I would have made sure he met his maker right after Simon. “I did. She didn’t answer.”
“You do realize how bad this could have been, right? Was getting a strange piece of ass worth this?”
“Fuck you, Max.”
“I’m coming up your street now. Be ready.”
“I’m walking out the door.”