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They’re still not bored of me, the twins sit with me every day for lunch with their posse. Okay, maybe they're not so bad. Knight has made sure to let his whole defensive line know I’m off limits and anyone who thinks I’m not, will answer to him and Rook. I gave them shit about that but truthfully, I don’t give a shit. I don’t have time for dating or fucking. Monday to Friday I work my ass off at school. Friday and Saturday nights, I’ll be fighting at Gage’s gym—making some good money, I might add. Rook has asked me where I disappear to over the weekends and I lie. I’ll never tell him or Knight that I fight. Carlina and I coexist but that’s it. We don’t speak to each other in our room, which suits me just fine because I work better in silence. The course load here is fucking intense, it’s kicking my ass daily but I’ve never been more… happy? I scoff to myself, what the fuck would I know about being happy. The bedroom door slams open and I peer over my shoulder to see Car walking in with her arms full of bags.
“No thanks, I’m fine.” I stare at her in confusion as she glares at me.
“What?” Her upper lip pulls back in annoyance.
“Don’t offer to help or anything!” I snort.
“You bought that shit, you carry it.” I shake my head and turn back to focus on my English essay that needs to be finished by tomorrow.
“You’re a real bitch, you know that?” My anger sparks. I clench my pen so hard I fear I may snap it. “You know what, happy fucking birthday, you bitch.” Something smacks me in the back of the head. I push back from my desk and stand, shooting a glare at the pampered princess in front of me.
“Why the fuck did you do that?” She drops the rest of her bags to the floor and places her hands on her narrow waist as she stares at the ground near my feet. I follow her gaze and that’s when I see a pair of all white Converse’s laying on the floor next to my feet. I stare at them like they are a foreign object.
“Happy birthday, Kiara.” Her whispered words shock me back to reality. I scoop them up from the floor and slowly lift my gaze to hers. Car may be able to fool every other girl here with her mask of indifference but I can see straight through it. The look in her eyes tells me she is nervous about how I am going to react to her buying me a… gift.
“You remembered,” I say, barely above a whisper. She huffs and rolls her eyes.
“Of course I did. It’s not a day I’m able to forget, no matter how hard I try.” I nod unable to speak as a lump forms in my throat. No one has ever cared about me like Carlina. She would always share things with me as a child. My deadbeat, broke-ass, drug addict mother never fucking bought a single thing for me. I always wondered about who the hell my father was. I gave up trying to find him and was just grateful for the cheque I would get each month from him. The man is a loser but at least he is smart enough to put the cheque in my name and not Moms or it would end up being liquid gold in her veins, as she called it. “Are you going to say something?”
“T-thank you.” She scoffs and grabs another bag from the ground then tosses it to me. I catch it with ease and stare at her for a beat before she motions for me to look inside. I slowly open it and will my emotions to stay in check as I peer inside the bag and smile. I pull a photo from the bag and run fingers over it, remembering the day this was taken. Tony was out of town and my mom was off somewhere, so I stayed with the Murdoch’s. It’s one of the only pictures of the six of us together. Car and I stand in the middle with a twin at each of our sides. King stands behind Car and Bishop stands behind me. I remember feeling so nervous and self-conscious with him being so close to me and wondering if his heart was beating as fast as mine, or were they in sync with each other? I remember the smell of his cologne and the heat of his body pressed against mine. The way his mere presence surrounded me and made me feel complete for the first time in my life.
“It was the last summer we spent together before you… took off.” I hate the note of vulnerability I hear in her voice. I lift my gaze to hers and the look in her eyes destroys a part of my soul. I hate Tony Murdoch more than I ever thought possible, he not only destroyed me but stole the only people in this world I ever cared for. “Why did you leave?” The watery tone of her voice hits me like a dagger to the heart. Would she believe me if I told her the truth? Car has always been a daddy’s girl and I may have been her best friend, but who would take the word of their friend over the person who created and raised them? I place the items on the foot of my bed and take a deep breath trying to work up the courage to even broach the subject of my leaving.
“I never meant to hurt you, Car––”
“But you did! You broke my fucking heart, Kiara. My brothers and I searched for you and when the trail ran cold, Bishop went to dad to ask for his help. We fucking thought you had died until you show up here for orientation!” I stare at her in shock hearing that Bishop would do anything like that for me. Guilt eats away at me for the pain I caused them all.
“I never meant to worry any of you or make you feel abandoned, Car. You all were the family I never had and leaving you guys was and still is the hardest thing I have ever had to do in my life.” She closes the space between us and grips both my hands in hers, her gaze bores into mine pleading with me to let her in on my darkest secret.
“Why did you have to leave though? We were all happy and I know you wouldn’t have left because of your pathetic mother. She was fired three weeks after you disappeared. The bitch never said a word about your whereabouts no matter how many times we asked after you.” My mother had no idea where the fuck I went. After I ran from the Murdoch’s is when I met Gage. He gave me a roof over my head and a place to feel safe. If it wasn’t for him, I honestly don’t know if I would even be here right now.
“S-something happened and I just had to get away.” Car isn’t having any of my half-truths. She narrows her eyes and chews on her bottom lip. I know her so well and can tell she is trying not to push me too hard and risk me running again.
“Whatever happened, you can tell me. I just want to help, Kiara, I swear.” I open my mouth ready to spill but decide against it. I yank my hands from her grasp and spin away, for one fucking moment I thought I might actually be able to tell her the truth but I was a fool. Of course she would think her father is a savior. “Don’t shut me out!” I peer out the window and will my emotions to stay in check, I can’t let her see me crumble.
“I don’t want to keep you in the dark, Carlina. You’re the one person I wish I could have run to and asked you and your brothers to protect me, but I couldn’t.” I hear the anguish in my own voice and it pisses me off that even the thought of him can reduce me to a pussy.
“Protect you from what?”
“The monster that parades around like a saint,” I whisper, then slam my eyes closed and will my tears back.
“Who are you talking about?” I shake my head. No one, aside from Gage, knows the truth about what transpired.
“I’ll always love you, Carlina, but I can’t. You wouldn’t believe me and honest to God, I don’t blame you for that. I wouldn’t believe me either.” She grips my arms and spin me around to face her, her eyes are rimmed with tears.
“Kiara, I swear to you, I will believe whatever you tell me. Me and my brothers will never allow anyone to hurt you.” The conviction in her tone has me wanting to crumble. I feel the unshed tears behind my eyes.
“What if I told you I ran because of your father, would you believe me then?” Her eyes widen as she drops her hold on me and stumbles back a step. I shake my head as I see her begin to wall off her emotions from me. “I told you that you wouldn’t believe me. Can we just forget about the past and move on?” She reaches up and covers her mouth with her hand, shaking her head from side to side. I stand tall and wait for her to lash out and accuse me of being a liar, that her father is a good man.
“He raped you too, didn’t he?” She may have spoken the words quietly but I stumble away like she screamed them in my face. I grip the window ledge for balance as I peer at her in shock. My mind is reeling and I can’t even think straight or form any words to answer her. Tears threaten to spill as reality comes crashing down around me. How the fuck does she know? She wraps her arms around herself as if trying to hold herself together, drops her chin to her chest and quiet sobs begin to wrack her tiny frame. I want to go to her and comfort her but I’m too stunned to even move. She said,he raped you too—what the fuck does that mean? I decide to block out all my warring emotions and comfort my friend––my best friend. I never stopped loving her or missing her. I never blamed any of them, except for Bishop. I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight as she breaks down in my arms.
I sit with my back against the headboard of Car’s bed and her head in my lap as I stroke her hair. She finally stopped crying about twenty minutes ago but neither of us have uttered a single word, too lost in our own thoughts. I want to ask her so many things but I can’t get my fucking mouth to open. I want to push for answers but seeing the way she broke and screamed like she lost one of her brothers keeps me from asking. Whatever Car endured at the hands of that man is clearly just as bad, if not worse, than what I went through.
“I was six when it started.” I startle at the sound of her voice, but continue to stroke her hair and remain silent, giving her time to sort through her thoughts. “He would come in each night and give me a bath. It started with him washing my hair, then it moved on to him washing my body, then… he started to do other things. At first, I loved that he wanted alone time with just me. He would spend so much time with my brothers daily and I would be left out. What a fucking idiot I was, right?” She doesn’t need me to answer that. “After a while I knew what he was doing wasn’t right. A part of me thought it was normal for a father to touch his daughter this way. I mean, I didn’t know any better I was fucking six!” A sob bursts from her and I hate Tony so fucking much more in this moment then I ever have before.
“You did nothing wrong, Car. You were a fucking child. He took advantage of you and he’s a piece of shit!” I try to take some calming breaths and tamp down my rage. She needs me to be silent and listen to her vent, not hear me raging on about how much of a cunt her father is.
Chapter4
