“I am not any man’s property, Dean. Least of all yours.”
I cough and glare up at her. “You think not?" I ask. I try shaking my head, but it’s difficult with her nails scratching my scalp, holding me there. To think, just hours ago, those nails had been in different places and for much different reasons. "That’s all your pussy’s ever meant to be, baby," I spit out. "Property. And I think that’s what kills you inside. So, regardless of how I might look to you now, Ava. I win and I will always win. You fucked with the wrong man."
She laughs. An honest to God, fucking laugh. “You think you’ve won? Oh no, Dean.” She shakes her head. “You didn’t win. You opened Pandora’s box, and my demons are coming for you.”
With that, she drops my head and walks away. I don't hear or see where she goes and I can't seem to make myself get up off the cold tiled floor. Droplets of red continue to drip from my face and I don't know how long it takes for me to get back on my feet, but when I do, I have to use the wall for support.
Goddamn her.
"Dean!" Abel's half panicked voice reaches my ears, and I wince at how sharp it sounds. He comes barreling around the corner, panting, sweating, eyes blown wide and shaking.
Shit. Tonight is not the fucking night for this, I think, but he's my fucking brother, so I straighten away from the wall and head towards him even as I snatch up a hand towel and start wiping my face.
"What is it?"
"Where the fuck is Avalon?" he demands, but before I can say anything, he shoves the screen of his phone in my face which clearly depicts Avalon in our garage, grabbing a key from one of the hooks on the wall. I watch in utter shock as she waltzes right over to where Abel's Mustang is parked, gets in, and peels out. "She stole my fucking car!"
I take a deep breath and release it. Braxton comes around the corner and stops when he sees us. While Abel is too freaked out to notice, I know Brax sees the cuts of my jeans and the blood staining my clothes, and it doesn't even surprise me when he crosses his arms over his massive chest and waits for me.
"Pull up the tracking," I say coldly. "We're going after her."
"Damn right we are," Abel snaps. "What the fuck is she thinking?"
I know what she's thinking. She's thinking she can run from me. But no. That's not fucking happening.
51
Avalon
I put my foot to the gas, and floor it. The wavering pointer on the speedometer jerks up and then inches over, slowly but surely making its way to the 100mph mark and then beyond. The headlights wash over the dark backwoods road. The longer I stare, the harder it is to see until I realize it isn’t that the road is hard to see, I’m just crying.
Sobbing actually. Big, heaving sobs wrack my frame as tears slide from my eyes. They slip down my cheeks, dirty little things, leaving me with a salty taste in my mouth that’s tinged with a metallic edge. Tears and blood. How? Because I’ve bitten my lip so hard that I can feel where the skin has broken and blood seeps from the wound onto my tongue.
“Fuck him…” I whisper. I lift my fist from the steering wheel and bring it down hard. Hard enough that it sends a ricochet of pain up my arm. “Fuck them,” I amend, because it wasn’t just Dean Carter. It was all of them. All for one and one for fucking all. They would back him, I had no doubt. So fuck them all. “Fuck them. Fuck them. FUCK. THEM!” I scream until my lungs hurt.
It hurts. Fuck, everything hurt. The worst pain imaginable. Like being shredded open and left, gasping, in a pile of trash. That’s essentially what he’s done. Never in my life have I ever let anyone make me feel like I was just as dirty and disgusting as my mother—not even the bitch herself. But he’d done it. And why do I feel this way? Because I’d gone and gotten stupid. Oh, I told myself I was being smart, but the second I gave in, the very moment I spread my legs, deep down, I’d known. I’d up and drank the dumb bitch juice he’d been handing out.
Had it been obvious? I wonder. Had I just not seen the signs? I didn’t think it was fucking possible for a girl like me to be dickmatized, but I’m not stupid enough to believe that doesn’t have any bearing on the betrayal I now feel. God, I can’t fucking breathe!
The sex had been amazing. It’d been filthy and rotten and for some fucking reason, when I’d been in his arms, I hadn’t been Avalon Manning, the girl from the wrong side of the tracks. I’d just been me without all of the past shit to ruin it. And he’d just been a guy—as annoying as he could be, as controlling and as much of an asshole as he was—that I liked.
Liked—as in past tense. Because, the fact is, I’m not in love with him. To love him would be to ruin everything that I am. Because I’m not a girl that loves. I’m a girl that fucking destroys and oh, Dean doesn’t know it yet, but he’s made one of the biggest fucking mistakes of his life with me. The snake of pure, unfiltered wrath breaks free and slithers up and around my throat. It blurs my reality as I lift my foot off the gas and just let the stolen ride be.
Eventually, the Mustang comes to a slow stop in the middle of the road. Darkness in front of me and darkness behind—much like my past and my probable future.
Here I am … sitting in a stolen car in the middle of nowhere with blood and tears on my face. I laugh. It’s fucking funny as shit. Stupidly funny.
I laugh so loud and long and hard that my stomach begins to cramp. Something feels loose in my brain. Like whatever had been keeping me semi-sane has snapped and broken. The barrier is gone now and it. Feels. Fucking. Satisfying.
My eyes slide to the side and I reach for the seatbelt as they land on the glove box. I unbuckle myself, moving slowly as if my limbs have a mind of their own. I press the button and it opens. My fingers find the handle of the gun I’d seen stashed in here the first time I rode in this car. It’s easy to pick it up—too easy—and though the gun feels heavy in my grasp, it feels right too. I lift it and point towards the windshield. I picture the guys. One by one. Standing in a line in front of the twin beams of light pouring from the Mustang’s headlights.
What would I do if given the chance to kill him? Could I do it? Could I pull the trigger?
Right now, I feel like it’d be all too easy to blow not just his but each of their fucking brains out—because if it wasn’t for the other two, I might never have met Dean Carter in the first place. My finger finds the trigger in question and smooths over it, but I don’t press down. Instead, I lower the weapon, and after a moment, I put the gun back in the glove compartment, close it, and snap my seatbelt back into place.
No, I’m not going to kill them. I’ve got better things planned for them. More torturous things. What I am going to do, however, is go back. Not to Eastpoint, but to the place where it all began. There have been far too many people in my life who seem to think they have power over me, and it all starts there.
First the past. Then the present. Only then can I finally face the fucking future.
Rules to live by. In order to look forward, I have to go back. Just once. Just this once. I put my foot back on the gas and this time, when I floor it, I know exactly where I’m going.