Chapter 17

Zoe

I'd arrived at school early, hoping to avoid running into Ben, and I was actually early enough to avoid seeing almost everybody. The hallways were practically deserted.

So this was what school was like for people who got there early. Hmm.

I set my backpack on the floor and twirled in the code for my combination lock, removed it, then lifted the handle to open the door to my locker. As I started to bend over, something caught my eye. I raised my head a little, then straightened completely and gawked. Taped to my shelf was a full frontal nude picture of myself. My heart raced, and I slammed the door shut.

Oh, my God!

I glanced to my right, then left. The bang of the door caught the momentary attention of a few people, but they glanced at me and looked away. I stared at my locker as if it was Elm Street and Freddy Krueger was not a morning person. Before I could completely wrap my mind around the fact someone broke into my locker and hung a naked picture of me—and got a naked picture of me in the first place—something slammed into me and pinned my body against the lockers. His breath was in my hair and his voice was low, but it was the only thing existing for me in that moment. He kicked my bag out of the way.

"Welcome back, Zoe."

My heart hammered. The cool metal of the locker on my cheek was bracing. I glimpsed a foreign exchange student who was in my English class clutching about ten textbooks to her chest as she stared at me. I couldn't speak.

He swept my hair over to one shoulder and placed his mouth on the other. I closed my eyes. The wetness took me right back to his car. I struggled against him.

"Unless you want everyone to set their eyes on that porn-o-graph-ic picture of you in the locker—which I jerked off to this morning, by the way. Hope I didn't get anything on it—you'd better act like everything is kosher between us and not draw any more attention."

I opened my eyes and stilled.

"Good girl, Zoe." His face came into my line of vision. "Very good."

I wanted to smack the sick smile off him, but I was terrified. I knew he couldn't do anything to me here, but it was as if my body was reacting without the consent of my brain.

"Now," he breathed. He rubbed against me and I shuddered. "Unless you want everybody on the Internet to view that, and your daddy to receive a big old fat envelope full of glossy eight-by-tens of your lovely body in all kinds of positions..." his tongue ran over the top of my ear, then he clenched it in his teeth for a second, "...you will not, I repeat, not tell anybody about our little date on Saturday. Which left me very dissatisfied, for your information. Good thing I was able to gratify myself this morning."

He backed away, took me by the shoulders, and spun me, pushing my shoulder blades against the lockers and again using his body to trap me, his arms on either side of me, further blocking escape. I flashed to when he had me against the car.

"Do you understand?"

For the first time in my life, I knew what it was like to hate someone. I clenched my jaw. He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. "Am I gonna have to make you the next Internet star? Not to mention me letting Daddy see some parts of his baby girl he hasn't seen in a long time? I said..." he brought his face closer, "...do we have an understanding?"

I pictured my dad's face and how it would appear if he would open an envelope like that. I nodded rapidly.

He waited a beat. "No. I want to hear the words come out of that pretty mouth of yours."

I breathed in and out, my chest tight. I drew more air into my lungs. "Yes!" I screamed, shaking with rage and fear. Heads twisted in our direction. He looked around and chuckled nervously.

"Sorry," he announced. "She gets loud when she's turned on." Slowly, they all went back to what they were doing before. He fixed his gaze on me. "You'll want to be careful with me, Zoe. I tend to react poorly when I get pissed off." He spat the last two words out, then shoved off me and walked away. I remained frozen, my arms and back against the wall, and squeezed my eyes shut.

He had pictures of me. I didn't know how he'd gotten them, or how he'd put one in my locker, but I knew he wasn't bluffing about using them against me. My heart thundered. I ran into a bathroom across the hall and puked my guts out.

* * *

Zack

That morning, for whatever reason—whether it be hitting all the lights right, or lighter traffic—I got to school early. When I turned the corner onto my hallway, I was smacked in the face by the sight of Zoe and Ben. He was pressed against her, his mouth on her shoulder. I whirled around and headed rapidly in the opposite direction. The punch of it didn't fully hit until I was halfway down the hall. I couldn't erase the image. It was as if it was burned into my brain. The intimacy of their positions. The rush of longing to be the one sharing that with her. I was swamped by both the need to be sick and the desire to punch something. My feet carried me farther and farther away. I thought about leaving school entirely.

In the end, I robotically went to class. The book I needed was in my locker, but I wasn't going back.

* * *

Danielle

I woke with a start. Bill's face was leering over me. I flew up. I was alone in a dark room. It took me several seconds to understand where I was at—on the couch in my living room—and that I was dreaming. Bill was safely back in Illinois, no doubt slobbering on his pillow. I lay back and twisted onto my side, bunching my pillow. The tug of my internal stitches, or perhaps the adhesion of scar tissue, had me adjusting further.

Bill. The image of Sam's beautiful cake crashing to the ground flashed through my brain. Such a bastard. Then, for some reason, that Justin Bieber song popped into my head. I hated Bill, and I liked everybody. Only he could be five hundred miles away and still ruining my sleep.

I fell back asleep, but the thought of him continued to drag me down all day long. Like Ryan said, why couldn't he just leave Sam alone?

Tucker was upstairs with Tabby, and I was confined to the couch with my laptop and a sleeping baby for company. I found myself looking Bill's number up. I dialed it without thinking and as it rang, I wondered exactly what I would say to him if he answered.

"Hello?"

"Bill? This is Dani McCord." Okay. Pretty standard, but it was all I had.

"Oh." His voice gained an edge. "What do you want?"

The snide tone made my insides coil like the cobra on the car that was probably parked outside. "I know you've been calling Samantha."

"So? I am her husband."

"Ex-husband. She has another one of those now." Speaking to him left a bitter taste in my mouth. I wanted to spit it out.

"Is there a point to this conversation?"

I fisted my hands. "The point is, you need to stay away from her."

"You know what? You never liked me from the start."

I couldn't deny it. I knew his story before I even met him. But I would have disliked him anyway.

"You're not a very likeable man, Bill." Did I say that?

"Well you're a whore who got what you deserved and may still get more." The line went dead.

I wanted to throw the phone across the room and shatter it on the fireplace stones, but a sleeping baby, and the ridiculous cost of replacing it, prevented me.

Errrr. Why did I call him anyway? What was the purpose of that? Why was I even thinking of him at all? And what did he mean by I got what I deserved? Was he referring to the accident? Could it have been him behind the wheel?

I set my laptop on the coffee table. Tucker had turned it to fit the bassinet in close to the couch. Flopping back on the couch in a prone position, I searched for my blanket. Not finding it, I had to sit forward again and I moaned, blaming the pain on Bill.

"Are you okay, honey?" Tucker was running down the stairs.

"I'm fine. Stay up there."

"No. I was headed to the kitchen anyway." He came to my side—peeking into the bassinet on his way over—and helped me to settle the comforter around my shoulders before sitting next to me. "Did I hear you talking to somebody?"

"Bill." His name always came out like a curse.

"Bill? Why did he call you?"

I shifted, trying to get more comfortable. "I called him, actually."

"You called him? Why?"

His perplexed expression mirrored my own feelings. Why did I call him? "I don't know. I want him to quit messing with Sam's head."

Tucker's face was grim. "What did you say?"

I broke into laughter. "I told him he wasn't likeable."

"No, you didn't."

"Yes, I did."

A grin spread out over his face. "What did he say to that?"

"I don't know." There was no reason to tell him about Bill's empty threat. He had enough on his plate. "Something stupid and full of hot air, similar to what he always says."

"I still can't believe he ruined their cake. After things settled down a bit and the reception was underway, I thought about going after him."

"You did?"

He nodded. "Then I remembered I had no idea where he went."

I twisted onto my side. "He inspires all sorts of stupid behavior." I curled around Tucker tighter, messing up the covers we'd adjusted, but I wanted to touch him. He put a hand on my shoulder and caressed me. My bunched muscles began to relax. "I just want Sam to be happy. When she's upset, I'm upset."

"It's the shared brain thing."

I grunted in response.

"Do you need anything? Something to eat...?"

I flipped onto my back again. "A kiss."

He smiled and brought his lips to mine.

"Mmm. That's exactly what I needed."

"Funny thing. I needed it, too."

I played with the buttons on his shirt. He hadn't even changed from work yet. He went in for a few hours after Zoe got home from school. It was nearly nine o'clock. "I'm sorry you're having to do everything."

"Stop saying that. You're healing."

"I know. But I wish I could help out more."

"That'll come soon enough. Sit back and—"

Myles cried.

"Oh." Tucker reached into the bassinet and drew the baby out. "Someone wants his momma."

"Hey there, little guy." Tucker cuddled him into my side and Myles quieted. We comforted each other.

"See, that's all he needed."

I looked at my husband. He was a wonderful father and one hell of a husband. "I love you."

He bent to kiss me on the forehead. "I love you, too." We sat and watched Myles sleep. "Should I go get my computer and work in here for a while?"

I smiled. "That would be nice."

He patted my shoulder and looked at Myles again. "Okay." He rose from the couch and left the room to get his laptop in the kitchen.

I sighed and looked into Myles' wide-open eyes, listening to his cute gurgling noises.

I wanted Sam to be happy like me. She deserved it.