I looked him over. The tight jaw, the sincere look in his eyes. Once, I’d have said Jackson wouldn’t lie to me, that I could spot it a mile away, but I couldn’t say that anymore, could I? “You knew how much it hurt me when she left, and you and Travis went behind my back and kicked her out anyway.”
“It hurt you when she stayed, too.” Jackson paced back and forth in the tiny bedroom. “I don’t know what Travis’s reasons were, but I always got rid of her before you saw her because you were a wreck every time she rolled into town and then again when she disappeared.”
“And that gives you the right tolieto me?”
He paused, eyes fixed on the floor. “I was going to tell you today.”
“Oh, so today,afterwe have sex, is the day you decide to stop lying to me aftereight years?” I reached for the nearest object to throw at his head. It was a pillow.How unsatisfying.
He didn’t even try to stop it from hitting him in the face. Maybe because it bounced ineffectually off his cheek.Double unsatisfying.
Turning on my heel, I ignored Jackson screaming my name as I stormed out of the house. It wasn’t a far walk to Savannah’s place. Tanner would pitch a fit about me coming over so late, but Savannah wouldn’t mind. I’d kept her up to date on everything via text, and she’d understand if I needed to cool off before I strangled Jackson.
What I wouldn’t give to head over to my own place, maybe cuddle up with my orange fluff ball, but after that confrontation with my mom yesterday, I didn’t want to go anywhere she might look for me.
A crinkling through dry leaves had me jerking my head around. “Jackson? That better not be you. I swear to god, if I see you between now and tomorrow morning, I can’t be held responsible for my actions.”
Then a burst of pain lit up the side of my skull, and everything went black.
I woke up with a raging headache. The only thing keeping me upright was the ratty chair I was tied to, in the ratty living room of a ratty flophouse.
I blinked a few times until my mom and her shitbag boyfriend Joel came into focus, both leaning over me. Mom’s dark hair was pulled back in a stringy bun; Joel’s hung around his face. Both their pupils were wide as saucers.
“Told you, twenty-four hours,” Mom muttered under her breath, which stank to high heaven.
I glared at her. It’d been a bit more than that since our last meeting. I should have stayed in the damn house, no matter how mad I was at Jackson.
“There, see?” Joel said. “She’s fine.”
“She’s bleeding.” My mom tsked. “She won’t give us nothing now that you roughed her up.”
Joel snorted and backed up a pace. He couldn’t stand still, every move jittery. “She don’t have nothing to give us. Besides, we can make twenty grand off her in a week or two, and then our problems are solved.”
A pit opened in my stomach as their meaning sank in. “I’ll bite the first guy’s cock off.”
Joel slapped me across the face, and the metallic taste of blood hit my tongue. He must have split my lip, but I barely felt the pain. Fear and adrenaline took up too much space.
Mom cut me a derisive look, then turned it on Joel. “I told you, she’s not gonna go easy.”
“We’ll tell ’em not to use her mouth.” Joel stuffed a wad of cloth in my mouth. It tasted like old socks and grease, and I tried not to gag, afraid I would somehow swallow some of the filth if I did.
Sue shook her head. This woman didn’t have the right to call herself my mom anymore. Not with the kinds of plans they were making. “If you’d been patient, let me work on her a bit, we could have gotten her to hand over the money, no loose ends. Now you’re going to make a big ole mess ’cause you wanted it quick.”
While they argued, I tried to think through the pounding in my head. No one knew where I was. That pit in my stomach got deeper, like the floor opened up just for my guts, but didn’t have the mercy to take the rest of me. I’d left Jackson’s house in a rage, so he didn’t even know to come looking for me.
And why would he? He’d been trying to protect me from this horrible woman for years, and I hadn’t even bothered to hear him out.
It was up to me to save myself. Surreptitiously, I tested the rope on my wrists, which were bound behind me. Hopefully they’d been too high to tie me up well.
“Not about want, bitch.” Joel flung the insult casually, the way another man might saybaby. “It’s about need. We don’t pay off Domino soon, it’ll be you on your back.” He swept an appraising look up and down her body. “Only it’s gonna take you a lot longer than a week. Besides, you weren’t getting anywhere with her. You lose your temper too quickly.”
The rope had a little give. Enough to start loosening the knots. The knots weren’t great—Joel must not have been a Boy Scout. I thought I could get them loose in another ten minutes without them noticing, as long as they kept arguing.
Shouldn’t be too hard. Sue liked to argue, especially when she was high.
Even now, she bristled. “I’m not the one that got us into this mess, Joel! Maybe it’s your ass that should get whored out!”
“No one would pay for that,” Joel said, upper lip curling.
