Chapter 31
AVA - SCREAM INTO SILENCE
Jack
MC brawl again. Gas station. Civilian injuries. No fatalities.
That was all it said. No elaboration. No breakdown of charges or cleanup details. Just enough to make my stomach turn and my teeth grind.
Another incident.
Another scar on a town already stitched together with broken promises and duct tape.
I tossed my phone on the counter and stared at the corkboard behind the desk. Our wall of flyers and resources. Missing persons. Safety plans. Hotline numbers. Hope, tacked up like a band-aid on a bullet wound.
Three weeks until the anniversary. Sofia’s death still felt like a fresh bruise, a wound that hadn’t closed, and it colored everything.
Remi’s birthday had been last week, and we’d promised each other this year would be different.
No black-hole spiral. No pretending the date didn’t hang over us like a guillotine.
We’d planned a quiet evening with cake, cheap wine, maybe even laughter.
A night to prove we could make room for both memory and life.
But the world didn’t care about promises like that. Not here.
Remi walked in a few minutes later, jacket half-zipped, coffee in one hand, reading glasses in the other. Her hair was still damp from a rushed shower, and she looked like she hadn’t slept in days.
“You hear about the gas station?” she asked, eyes already narrowing.
I nodded.
She didn’t say anything else. Just dropped her bag by the couch and sighed.
“It’s never going to stop, is it?” I muttered.
Remi took a long sip. “Not while the system stays the same.”
“Or while the wrong people keep getting power.”
She hummed in agreement, pulling a file from the pile and opening it without really looking. “Violence and ignorance are easier than accountability. Always has been.”
I leaned against the desk. “It’s just... this whole place. It’s like everyone’s trying to survive the wreckage of something they won’t admit is broken.”
Remi didn’t look up. “Because if they admit it’s broken, they have to admit they let it get this way.”
The weight of it pressed against us both. Almost a year since Sofia, and some days it felt like nothing had shifted. We still buried women in silence. We still patched wounds with platitudes. We still walked into fire and called it duty.
“Maybe we should move somewhere... else... less broken?”
Remi lifted an eyebrow, deadpan. “What fun would that be?”
The phone rang.
I grabbed it.
“This is Ava.”
At first, I couldn’t hear anything. Just ragged breathing. Then...
“H-He’s coming... he’s... he’s outside the door... please...”
I straightened immediately, heart slamming against my ribs.
“Annalise? Where are you?”
“My apartment,” she sobbed. “I... I called 911...fifteen minutes ago...they haven’t come...he’s drunk or maybe he’s high or something...he broke the table trying to get me... only got to the bathroom before...”
A loud bang echoed through the line, followed by a scream I felt in my soul.
“I’m on my way,” I said, already grabbing my keys. “Stay on the line. Do not open that door. I’m coming.”
Remi was already standing; eyes locked on mine.
“What’s wrong?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Annalise. She called the cops. No response yet. Boyfriend’s drunk and raging. She’s trapped in the bathroom.”
Remi was grabbing her jacket before I finished. “Let’s go.”
“You don’t have to...”
“I do. You keep her talking, and I will drive.”
We didn’t stop to argue. Just ran.
The apartment complex was in one of the worst parts of town. Run-down buildings, peeling paint, cars with garbage bag windows. The kind of place the city forgot on purpose.
I slammed the car door and sprinted up the stairs. Remi was right behind me, boots pounding concrete. I didn’t hear sirens, not even in the distance.
Apartment 2C. That’s where she lived.
We heard the shouting before we even hit the top step.
“Open the fucking door, you bitch!”
A fist hit the wood, another scream from inside.
“Annalise!” I shouted. “It’s Ava!”
“Don’t... he’s still...he’s...”
The door opened suddenly.
Not from the lock. From being kicked in.
Remi.
She wasn’t waiting. She booted the door in and was moving before I could react.
And then I saw him.
He was barely coherent. Big. Built. Rage leaking out of every pore. His face twisted with fury. Pupils blown out wide and glassy. High.
“You’re the whores that have been in her head, huh?” he spat.
“Leave. Now,” I said, voice low and firm, eying the path to the bathroom. “Cops are on the way.”
“Cops ain’t shit,” he growled, stepping closer. “I got a solid thirty minutes ‘til they care. That’s more than enough.”
He moved toward me fast, and I braced, but then Remi stepped between us.
She didn’t think, hesitate, or falter.
He shoved her, hard.
She stumbled back. Hit the wall. Cracked her shoulder against the trim with a sound I’ll never forget.
Something in me snapped.
I grabbed the nearest thing I could, an old floor lamp, and swung. He caught the edge of it across the ribs and stumbled.
I looked at Remi, and she was already starting to stand. “Don’t worry about me, get her out. I’ll keep him distracted.”
I moved towards the bathroom, still clutching my phone.
He got back up and stumbled toward me, but then Remi was on him. She jumped on his back and was working her arm under his chin.
“Go, Ava,” she snapped. “Get. Her. Out.”
I took a step, and he raged. Started spinning and then threw himself into the wall. I felt the air leave Remi’s lungs. Heard the whistle. I picked up a broken piece of the lamp and waved it at him like a blade.
“Get out!” I screamed. “Get out or I will fucking end you.”
He lunged once more, then stopped, hearing sirens in the distance.
Coward.
He spat at the ground and stormed past us, out the broken front door.
I didn’t watch him go. I dropped the makeshift weapon and turned to Remi.
She was slumped against the wall, hand pressed to her shoulder, face pale, breaths laboured.
“Shit,” I whispered, kneeling. “Remi, I’m so sorry...”
“I’m fine,” she said through gritted teeth. “Get to Annalise.”
I nodded and pushed further into the apartment.
Annalise was still in the bathroom. Dents evident in the barely-there door.
“Hey,” I said gently. “It’s me. You can open the door. You’re safe now. He’s gone.”
The door opened, and she flung herself into my arms. She sobbed once and collapsed into me. We tumbled to the floor, and I held her until the cops arrived.
And when I walked back into the hallway, I found Erin standing there, gun on her hip, badge on her belt, and a fucking smirk twinkling in her eyes.
She didn’t say a word.
But I saw it.
I wanted to scream at her, but this time I kept quiet as I followed the medics carrying Remi on a stretcher. And helped Annalise to the second ambulance waiting to take her in to get checked out... to validate the “extreme use of force” that Remi and I had used to get to her in her apartment.
And I wondered how many more girls would scream into silence before this town finally admitted the whole damn thing needed to burn.