“Why?” The word warbles out before I can stop it.
“Why did I watch, or why didn’t I stop him?”
“Both!” The anger’s coming back, but I force myself to swallow it down.
“I watched because I like you. Because you were enjoying it. Because I wanted to see what you look like when you come.”
I should be flooded with horror or disgust. Instead, I stare at Reuben with morbid fascination.
I thought it was him. That’s the only reason I allowed—
“And I didn’t stop him, because I was pretending it was me in there, not him.”
His words spear into through me like a blunt knife.
“What?” I belt out, thumping his chest with my fist. “That makes no sense!”
He grumbles faintly as he steps back and lets me slip to the floor. I’m breathing so hard you’d swear I ran a fucking marathon. “That makes no fucking sense, Reuben!” I yell, bashing my other fist into him.
He catches my wrist before I can get off another blow and then closes his arms over me, crushing me to his massive chest. I let out a strangled yell, but fighting him is pointless.
“Can I kiss you now?” he asks.
That knife twists, scraping over my bones and shredding my heart. It takes every ounce of self-control I still have, but I manage a hoarse, “No. Never.” I clear my throat and force strength into my words. “Never, ever again.”
Then I shove at him with all my might.
And he lets me go.
I don’t look back when I leave, but I manage not to slam the door. I take two steps before the smell of his rosary hits my nose again.
I leave it hanging from his door handle, blinking back tears as I stalk back to my room.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Zach
My heart almost explodes from my chest when I spot Cass sitting on the couch. I wasn’t sure if he’d be here. A part of me wishes he wasn’t. A part of me can’t be more relieved to see him.
Cass looks up from the latest edition of Pussy Pounder as I slip into our lair through the narrow opening in the bookshelves. I can’t wait for the day we’ll have a space of our own with a proper fucking door. No, fuck that. No doors. Just an archway.
I know exactly where we’ll go when this shit’s taken care of.
Whenever I go into town on the weekends, I spend an hour or so at the local coffee shop. Their filter coffee tastes like the shit you scrape out of a gutter, but that’s not why I go there.
Their Wi-Fi, although spotty, opens up a new world. For an hour, I can escape this shitty school and the decades-long path my brothers and I have been trekking.
For those few precious minutes, I go house hunting. It started as a mental itch I had. We have a game we play. Can’t remember the last time we did, but since our answers are always the same, I have that shit committed to memory.
It’s called: what would you do, if you could do anything?
Not highly original, but for a bunch of kids trapped in a dark basement who’d never played sports or gone to the mall or even asked out a girl to the prom…it filled a void.
We played it once or twice after we escaped, but it became painfully obvious that we’d be adults by the time we’d had our revenge.
What did it matter, then, what dreams we had as kids?
But those things stuck with me.
Apollo loves the ocean even though he’s never set foot on the coast. Before he was taken, he’d watch surfing championships on television and imagine it was him slicing through those waves on some beach in Malibu. Honestly, I think he just secretly wanted to take photos of chicks in bikinis. But who the fuck am I to judge, right?
One day I went to town on a supply run, hungover as fuck after a night of blunts and whiskey, and I decide to get a plate of something greasy at the coffee shop. Only to discover they have Wi-Fi.
In this place?
Shocker.
I had one of Apollo’s old laptops with me. He wanted me to send it in, because he swore the on-board graphics card was malfunctioning. I stopped listening after the fifth time he mentioned the driver and took it with me anyway.
They keep forgetting they don’t have to repair shit. Ever. If it breaks, I’ll buy them a new one. Money means fuck all to me.
So, hungover as fuck, I decide to get Apollo’s laptop out of the car and go online while I’m waiting for my grub.
I’m guessing the laptop didn’t shut down properly because as soon as it boots up, the browser pops open and loads the last website Apollo had been on.
A Youtube video of some surf competition.
Minutes later, I was hunting down coast-side properties in California where I’m guessing—probably incorrectly—that a guy can catch the best waves.
Then I found it.
Six bedrooms, five en-suite. An infinity pool overlooking the ocean. A garage big enough for as big a collection of classic cars as Reuben wants. A game room for Cass, replete with a fucking billiards table. Billiards, not pool, because he’s snooty like that.
There’s even a fucking dance studio with wrap around mirrors on the walls, perfect for Cass to admire himself in.
I haven’t told them about the property.
I also haven’t told them I put in an offer on the place on Saturday. I know I’ll be getting that call sometime this week—my offer was ten grand above asking.
It’s eating me alive, but I have to make sure it’s happening before I break out the champagne.
And yeah, I bought champagne. Four bottles of the most expensive brand the liquor store stocked.
“Love the new look,” I tell him, pointing at my neck. “Just give me a heads up if you’re about to start reciting bad poetry, though.”
He’s wearing a black turtle-neck shirt and dark jeans. Sullen colors which match the smudges under his eyes.
“I could have died,” he says, voice as dead as his eyes.
“I think you were dead for a few seconds.” I wish there were a power outlet down here so I could brew some coffee. The only other alternative is alcohol or weed.
I choose the whiskey, turning my back to pour out a shot. Fuck the fact that’s it quarter past six in the morning.
“But luckily, you’ve always been a stubborn sonofabitch.” I glance at him over my shoulder when I don’t hear the rueful chuckle I was expecting.
“It worked,” I say.
Cass shifts a little, and then runs his palms down his legs. “Yeah?”
“She took the drive to Rube last night.”
“So why aren’t they here? Why aren’t they going through his shit?”
“You know Apollo has to be in the kitchen before breakfa—”
“You think I give a fuck?” Cass yells.
I set down the bottle of whiskey and turn to face him. He’s on his feet, hands bunched into fists at his side. But he’s glaring at the floor, not me, as if he can’t bear to make eye contact.
“Cass…”
“I risked my fucking life for that shit,” he says, finally looking up. Eyes the color of dirty ice stab through me. “I don’t care if you have to go drag that little cunt out of the kitchen by his fucking ball sack, you go and—”
“Christ, Cass, I’m here,” Apollo says.