––––––––
I took his car and drove back to school, my hands shaking on the wheel.
I didn’t want to go home and be alone. Not with Jake no doubt coming after me. I had to be around people. I had to be safe. So, I went where I knew people would be. School. It was almost three o’clock. The jocks would be at football practice. Ariel would be at swim practice. People would be around. People who would protect me.
I ran in and went straight to the locker room, looking for someone that I could sit with. Who would be a witness in case anything happened to me. I considered calling the police, then decided against it. Detective Harding still hadn’t gotten back to me. Maybe the cops thought I was lying. Or worse, that I was somehow trying to throw off their investigation.
I burst through the locker room doors, only to find that they were mostly empty. No one sat on the benches. No showers ran. I walked past the aisles, looking for someone, anyone.
There, sitting in front of her locker, looking vacant, was Ariel. Her red hair looked tangled, like a red bird’s nest. Ariel never let her hair tangle. She was constantly styling it or combing it. It was her pride. Her joy. She turned to me, and my blood ran cold. My heart stopped.
She knew.
“I told him that I never wanted to see him again,” she whispered. Her face remained calm. I wouldn’t have even known she was upset if her eyes weren’t so filled with anger and hatred.
“You know?” I asked.
She nodded.
“He told me what you did. What he agreed to do. How could you do that to me? I loved you. I thought we were friends. How could you humiliate me like that in front of everyone? You knew how I felt about him.”
“I ... I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? That’s all you have to say?”
“Ariel, I just wanted you to be happy.”
“I loved him. Did you know that? I loved him, and it was all a lie! A game!” She shook her head, confused. “Did I do something to you? Did I offend you? Did I say something to you that you didn’t like?”
I ran to her, and took her cold hands in mine.
“No. You were perfect. You were the best friend that I ever had.”
“Then why did you do this to me?”
“Because I loved you and I wanted you to be happy!”
“By making me love a lie?” She jumped up, nearly throwing me backward off the bench. “I thought that we would grow old together. That it would be you, me, and Jasmine forever. I trusted you with my life, and you turn around and stab me in the heart!”
She shoved me, and I fell backward off the bench, banging my head against the locker behind me. Pain exploded in my head and I saw stars.
“I trusted you and you took everything from me! I hate you! I will hate you for the rest of my life, and, when you die, I will write backstabber on your grave.” She stood over me. Screaming at me. I deserved every hate filled word. “We are done. Do you hear me? Done. If you even look in my direction, you will regret it. You called yourself my friend, but you are nothing more than a faker.”
She grabbed clothes out of her locker and stomped away.
My worst nightmare had come true.
Ariel had found out, and now she was gone. Out of my life forever.
They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. This was my hell. A life without my two best friends. My good intentions were plastered all around me. My choices were made.
I wished that the ground would swallow me whole.
But there was no time to grieve.
Doors slammed open and Jake’s voice bellowed through the locker room.
“Bella, I know you’re here!”
He had come for me.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
I pressed my back against the locker, trying to gather my scattered thoughts. How did he get back here so quickly? Did he steal someone’s car? Did he keep a spare vehicle at the docks just in case? Had he called one of his drug cronies to give him a ride?
Heavy steps echoed through the locker room. Row by row, looking for me. I backed away, keeping as far away from his echoing shoes as I could.
“You’re going to pay for what you did to me. I can promise you that.”
I could barely hear him over my panting breaths and my banging heart.
I could see the doors to the locker room, still swinging from the force that he’d pushed them with earlier. I had to get out of here. If I stayed, Jake would kill me. I was sure of it.
With a burst of energy that I didn’t know I had, I sprinted to the door. It moved closer, and closer. I willed my feet to move faster. It was almost within reach. And then, I ran in to a wall of a man.
Jake. His wild eyes. His strong arms. He’d found me, and I had no idea what he was going to do.
“Looking for me?” he asked. An evil grin stretched his face. “You’re going to pay for that little stunt in the yacht. Oh yes. You are going to pay.”
I struggled against him, desperate. He was going to kill me. I was sure of it. I had to get away. I had to.
He flipped me around, until my back was pressed to his chest. No chance of my knees finding their way to him now. I squirmed and screamed.
“Let me go!”
“No one is around to hear you, Bella. Scream all you want. It’s just you and me now.”
He kissed the back of my neck, and my mind flashed to what he was going to do to me. My stomach rolled.
God, no! Please kill me instead.
I let out another bloodcurdling scream. Jake laughed, his hand moving to my belly. Vomit rushed up my throat. I swallowed it back down.
“Fight me, Bella,” he said. “I’ll like it better that way.”
This was it. My penance. All my lies had led to this moment. My screams went unheard. I was pinned to the locker, my arms immobile. I struggled to think. To breath. Horror stole my facilities. I squirmed my shoulders, but he only pressed closer.
“Get off her!”
Like a lion, Cole’s voice roared through the locker room.
Jake froze, then released me, turning to his brother. I crashed to the floor, my body weak with fright.
“This doesn’t concern you, Cole!”
“What were you going to do? Rape her? Is this what you’re doing to girls now?”
“I said that this doesn’t concern you, Cole!”
“She is my concern!”
“Not anymore. You hesitated, and she’s mine now. Mine to do whatever I want with.”
“She’ll never be yours, Jake. Ever.”
“If you want her, you’ll have to come through me, and we both know that you’ll never win.”
“I will. I will, because she’s worth it.”
Cole and Jake rushed at each other, their fists and bodies clashing like warring titans.
Cole grabbed Jake by the collar and swung him in to a locker. Jake’s back crashed in to the metal with a loud clang.
“Get off me!” he cried.
But Cole didn’t let up. He reared back his right hand and punched Jake in the chin. The nose. The mouth. Again and again, he rammed his fist in to his brother’s face until Jake’s body collapsed on to the floor. Cole threw himself on top of him, grabbed him by the collar, and readied himself for another swing when...
“Stop!”
An older man walked in to the locker room.
Cole immediately stood, leaving his brother woozy on the floor.
I pressed my back against the metal, my body still weak.
Who was this man? He looked to be in his sixties, with white hair and pock-marked skin. His body was strong and tall, and his face held the look of someone who’d seen more than a few fights in his life. He wore a black suit and shiny shoes.
“Dad,” Jake sputtered. “What are you doing here?”
Dad? So, this was Ivan? The famous Russian gangster?
“Watching my sons kill each other,” he said a long string of words in Russian.
Cole nodded and walked over to me, standing by my side.
Jake withered beneath his father’s hard stare.
“I told you to play your football and stay out of trouble. I told you that this life was not for you. And yet, here I stand with a dead girl all over the news, the police sniffing around my home, and my son’s very expensive school filled with my drugs.”
He kicked Jake hard in the side. Jake rolled over with a groan.
“I should ship you back to Russia to live with your grandmother. Would you rather raise goats?”
“No.”
“Then why am I hearing reports that my son, my flesh, my blood, has been taking my supplies and selling them to his classmates? Why am I getting anonymous calls saying that my oldest son is a drug dealer?”
“Papa, it’s not true.”
His father nodded, and crouched next to his son.
“That is what I said. So, I asked your sister. ‘Regina, tell me that these things I am hearing about your brother are not true’. And do you know what your sister, your blood, did? She clammed up like a dead fish. Your sister, the one who can’t shut up, was speechless. So, I went to that kid you hang out with. The kid that I said was no good. Kenny. My men held him upside down over the river, and he told me everything. Every bag of coke, every pill, every drop off, every safe house, every dime you made. That punk kid has no honor. He’s not blood. He’s not family. You are trusting him while you steal from me!”
He stood, sending another sharp kick to Jake’s ribs. A loud cry rang from Jake’s lips, and he rolled over again, groaning in pain and holding his side.
“I told you not to be like me, but you didn’t listen. Your brother told you to stop, and you didn’t listen. You and your sister were in cahoots against your own father.”
Jake’s eyes went wide.
“No, Papa.”
“You do these deals and cut me out?”
“No, Papa!”
“You lie! That’s exactly what you did. You stabbed your brother and me in the back. Your poor mother, the saint that she is, is home dying, and this is how you repay her?” He picked Jake up and shoved him against the locker.
“You are banished!”
Jake’s face fell.
“No, Papa. Please!”
“You and your sister will go back to Russia to live with your grandmother. There, you will learn the true meaning of loyalty. Respect. Family. Only then, will I allow you to return.”
“Papa, please!”
“Get in the car before I forget that you’re my son and put your body in the river next to your friend’s.”
Jake’s face turned red, and he fled the room.
Ivan’s strong presence turned to me. He had such intense eyes. Eyes that made me want to cower. But I wouldn’t cower. Not in front of anyone ever again. I stood up straight instead.
“Who are you?” he asked.
Cole moved a little closer to me.
“I’m Bella French, sir,” I replied, surprised at the strength in my voice.
“Are you the girl that sent the flowers to my wife?” he asked.
I nodded. “They always brightened my mother’s day when she was dying. I hoped it would do the same for your wife.”
His stare softened.
“She says that the sunflowers are good, but daisies are better.” To my surprise, he gave me a little smile. “French woman.”
I smiled back, my body still feeling a little woozy.
Ivan looked from me to his son.
“Is this the girl that you are taken with?” he asked.
Cole nodded.
“Yes, Papa.”
Ivan grunted.
“She is a good woman. Not an idiot, like your brother and sister.” His eyes fell on me again. “My son is going to assure me that you will never tell anyone that I was here. He will assure me this, because he knows that he is the only reason why you aren’t in a trunk. Is that clear?”
I nodded.
“My son will also assure me that there will be no further calls to Detective Harding, who is now my permanent employee. Any issues you have with my son will be addressed with me directly.”
Cole stepped forward. “Yes, Papa.”
“Let her answer.”
I locked eyes with Ivan. He was infamous, his name said in the same breath as Scarface and Noriega. I refused to look away.
“I never saw you,” I said. “But you have to keep the drugs out of my school. Promise me.”
His chin raised, a smirk on his face.
“Me, promise you?”
I stood strong, my hands fisted.
“I want your word.”
He examined me for a moment, then looked at his son.
“French?” he asked.
Cole smiled. “In name only.”
“Good enough.” His eyes fell back to me. “You have my word that this school will be clean. If it is not, you will call me, and I will take care of it. Clear?”
I nodded. “Clear.”
And with that, Ivan grunted and turned away, leaving Cole and I alone in the locker room.
It was over.
With everything out in the open, I felt free.
Alone. But free.
And, surprisingly, hopeful.
“I’ll take you home,” Cole said.
I leaned on him, basking in his strength. In his love.
“Yes,” I said. “Please, take me home.”