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Pain and grief filled her eyes, but I didn’t let myself react.
It was a lie.
She was a lie.
Calm. Furious.
“You’ve done your job, Jessica. All of them, apparently. You should be proud of how good you are.”
“Fuck you, Kieran.” A sob ripped from her throat as she threw the money at my c
hest.
I didn’t try to catch it.
I just stepped around her and walked out.
Letting the sound of her cries be the last piece of her I would have.
The last lie I would hear.
I hadn’t been standing on my street for more than a few minutes the next night when red and blue flashing lights lit up the buildings around me, and I heard an all-too familiar, high-pitched, whop whop.
I whirled around, a grin already on my face as I stared down the Raleigh patrol car coming to a stop not far from me.
Lifting my hands in the air mockingly, I stood still as I waited for the officer to either approach me or speak to me over the PA system in his car. My smile froze, and I had the sudden urge to cry when he stepped out of the driver’s seat.
Jentry . . .
The need to tell him what was happening in my fucked-up life was as strong as the impulse to cry. It was enough to consume me. Wreck me.
I wanted to relieve my shoulders from some of the weight and let him bear it for once.
But it wasn’t as easy as that. It never had been. It never would be.
Jentry accepted the perfect life when we were eight years old.
To him, I was just a person he once knew. A person who now disgusted him.
To Jentry . . . I needed to leave the life he disapproved of behind. As if it could ever be that simple.
What he’d escaped was nothing compared to what I’d suffered.
Nothing compared to what I was chained to.
I could feel it bubbling up as he walked closer . . . the laughter and madness. The taunts making their way to the tip of my tongue. They were there, mixing with my need for Jentry to fix a lifetime of horrors.
Make it go away, Jent.
You’re weak.
“Officer Michaels,” I teased. “To what do I owe this wonderful pleasure? Let me guess, you missed your whore sister? Because you and I both know I sure missed you.” I giggled wildly when his jaw ticked.
“Put your hands down, Jess,” he said with a low, firm tone.
“What? Don’t want to pat me down for drugs this time?” I cocked my head and sent him a look like I thought he was adorable. “I told you they weren’t mine. Oh, wait, because they weren’t. And why was that? Because there weren’t any drugs. Like I told you there wouldn’t be. But you didn’t believe me, did you?” He started to speak, but I continued over him. “I mean, why would you? It was me. And in your mind, I’ve graduated from prostitute to addict.” I clapped gleefully. “I bet you’re so proud.”
“Jess,” he barked.
