Six
R I V E R
I’M FAIRLY CERTAIN I’VE died and wandered into Hell. I don’t know what I was thinking—last time I checked I wasn’t starring in Dante’s fucking Inferno.
My psych class ends in five minutes, and all I can think about is how Ryan hasn’t answered any of my texts yet. He came to bed late last night after our fight. It didn’t matter that I rested a tentative hand on his shoulder, seeking his reassurance. He turned away and refused to touch me all night.
I cried myself asleep. I cried myself awake. I cried myself to class.
Now, I’ve reached the end of class and the sunglasses haven’t come off once. My puffy eyes will attract unwanted attention and the last thing I need is a bunch of petty bitches judging my relationship.
Plenty of girls in my year knew Ryan and have even gotten a taste of him. Ryan’s reputation was large, which means now mine is, too.
They watch me, waiting for any opportunity to gossip and pick apart our relationship. Fuck giving any of those bitches the satisfaction. Even if wearing sunglasses inside a building is a red flag.
I have no choice, hoping they’ll assume I’m hungover after partying all night or something.
Anything to avoid causing issues with Ryan. I’ve already done enough of that lately. If Ryan is worried about his image, surely a distraught girlfriend will tarnish that. I can’t do that to him. He’s worked too hard to get to where he is, despite his father’s reputation.
“Class dismissed,” Professor Trumbling announces. The body of students jumps up at once, rushing out of the room. I take my time, gathering my books and slowly making my way down towards the door. My hip is still sore from last night, and it takes everything in me to keep the limp out of my gait.
“Ms. McAllister, can I speak to you for a moment?” Professor Trumbling says from behind me. I pause, and then sigh with resignation. This is exactly what I was trying to avoid. You’d think keeping your head down would keep the attention away.
I force a smile and make my way over to him, already dreading this conversation.
“I just wanted to touch base with you. You seemed awfully distracted today. Need I remind you finals are coming up soon? Getting an A in this class is vital to your career.”
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Save yourself the energy and keep the condescension to yourself, old man.
“I’m sorry, Professor Trumbling. It won’t happen again,” I respond robotically. I’m pleased by how steady my voice was, even if it did make me sound insincere.
He studies me closely, and I shift under his attention, making sure to tuck my cut-up knuckles behind my back. They’re superficial cuts and hardly noticeable. Unless someone goes looking for them. His stare doesn’t feel perverted, but it makes me uncomfortable anyway. Ryan would say he’s checking me out. I’d say that he can see something is clearly wrong.
What gave it away? The dark sunglasses in a dim room? This is the picture you see in any film.
If he asks me to take my glasses off, he won’t find black eyes, though. Just red, puffy eyes from crying
too much.
I’ll tell him my dog died. That should work.
“You may go, Ms. McAllister.”
Thanks for your permission, asshole.
Surely, I just made the strain in my hip worse with how fast I just rushed out of that classroom, but I find it worth it if it means escaping the professor’s probing gaze.
That was my last class of the week. Amelia’s been asking to grab coffee, but I don’t dare face her right now. She knows me too well and would sniff out my predicament in a heartbeat.
But I don’t want to go home, either. Ryan’s not home yet—or at least he shouldn’t be—but the empty house would just make me feel worse.
I’m standing in the quickly emptying parking lot when I feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise.
I know who’s standing behind me before he even utters a word. Why the hell is he following me? I chalked the first time up to a weird fluke, but now it’s obvious he’s seeking me out. Our first interaction, he was cold and distant. It just doesn’t make sense.
“Why are you following me?” I ask, not bothering to turn around.
“Why are you standing in the middle of a parking lot?” he counters, his deep voice sliding over my battered nerve-endings.
My mental state is fragile today. Normally, I can roll with Ryan’s punches—literally—but I’m just so disappointed in myself.
“Not today, Mako,” I murmur. I walk forward—away from him. Now more than ever, I try to walk without the limp. He’d never let it go if he saw. He follows immediately. I already knew he would, but it makes me angry anyway. I whip around, gritting my teeth against the pain and glare at him. “Stop following me.”
He doesn’t answer. Instead, his concerned gaze studies me much like Professor Trumbling’s just did.
“I don’t need this,” I mutter, turning back around. A gentle hand stops me. I flinch away from his touch, not liking how the wrong kind of shivers race up my spine. The kind of shivers Ryan’s supposed to make me feel. It makes my skin crawl.
“What did he do?”
“What makes you think he did anything?” I snap.
Mako doesn’t answer right away. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, as if he needs to physically restrain them from doing something. Like from touching me.
“Then who did?” he asks softly. I’m not fooled. Dark fury is on the precipice of his voice, threatening to overtake his gentleness. It’s like a tidal wave crashing into a toy boat.
I shake my head, and once again, turn to walk away. He lets me this time, but he still follows.
Damn it.
I painstakingly make my way out of campus and down the busy street. I’ll come back for my car later. All I need right now is to walk off the restless energy polluting my body.
I’m sweating in a matter of minutes, but it’s good to focus on something else aside from my hip.
We walk in silence. Five minutes pass. And then ten. I take back roads, avoiding any areas Ryan could possibly drive by on. The entire walk, I replay last night in my head, going over every painstaking detail and obsessing over what I could’ve said or done differently. There’s so many things I wish I could change, starting from wearing something more conservative to not arguing with him so much when he said something I didn’t like. I always have to argue with everything he says instead of just picking my battles. Not everything is worth fighting over.
Eventually, I make my way up a small hill and towards an abandoned library. Graffiti taints the brick walls, vulgar words and pictures colored across the surface. The door is hanging off the hinges.
I push it away slightly and walk through the opening.
The library may be creepy to most, but it’s home to me.
I spent a lot of time here when I was younger and was able to escape Shallow Hill. It closed a few years ago, and it took my heart with it. I’ve never been able to let it go, even as mongrels slowly started destroying it.
Mako dutifully follows me. For some unknown reason, he’s intent on stalking me, and I’m too exhausted to fight it right now.
“Where are we?” His voice shatters the fragile film of silence that blanketed over us. Ryan doesn’t even know about this place. It makes me itchy that Mako is witnessing such an intimate part of my life. Truthfully, I hadn’t even realized this is where I was heading until I arrived. My body seemed to know where to go naturally—a place that soothes something inside of me that nothing else can.
“Home,” I answer shortly.
Surprisingly, he doesn’t question me further. Just follows in silence as I make my way down the empty rows where books once slept. I run my fingertips across the dusty surfaces, trailing wavy lines across the shelves and coating my fingers with a thick film of dust. If I close my eyes, I can feel the phantom binders brushing across my fingertips.
And if I keep them closed, I can remember the feel of opening a book and watch the pages awaken from its slumber and show me their story. I’d get so lost in them when I was younger, I’d stay long after the library closed.
The librarian, and my mentor growing up, Camilla, would let me stay for as long as she could before she had to get home to her own family. She never asked, and I never told, but I think she knew I had a bad homelife. Which is why I think she worked so hard to give me something good to hold onto.
Every day, I’d walk into enough snacks to keep my belly full for the rest of the night. Sometimes she’d even buy me a new outfit and shoes when I’d start growing out of my clothes. Barbie never noticed long enough to question where I got them from.
Camilla is the one who taught me about periods and bought me my first pads. She taught me about sex and the reproductive system. I’ll never forget that day—learning that sex is supposed to be between two people who respect each other, and it’s supposed to be consensual. That was also when I realized that the men taking advantage of my body could get me pregnant. At only thirteen years old, I begged Camilla to help me get on birth control. She probed and asked if I was being touched, but I just lied and said the cramping from periods was awful—which it was.
The old librarian took care of me and loved me in a way that I had never experienced before.
That year, when I was only thirteen, she looked into adopting me. It had been the happiest I had ever been. I was sure Barbie would’ve loved to hand me over. But before she could, she suffered from a severe stroke and passed away.
That was the saddest I had ever been. It’s also when I started prostituting myself for basic needs to keep me alive.
My body sways as memories rush over me. I’m so lost in them; I don’t register the soft touch of a hand on my hip at first.
I still, and reality comes rushing back. I jerk away from his touch, and hiss in pain when the pain
in my hip flares hot.
“It’s purple.”
I don’t ask, and he doesn’t explain. We both know what he means. My university t-shirt rode up,
exposing the deep purple bruise on my hip. I knew I should’ve worn an oversized shirt today. This one is loose-fitting and up to my neck but it’s not big enough to fall past my hips. I fix it hastily, my cheeks running hot from embarrassment. The last thing I need is judgment from Mako. He has no idea what he’s talking about when it comes to mine and Ryan’s relationship.
“I fell.”
His face flattens.
It’s not a lie.
“I know. Typical answer. But it’s true, honestly.”
“You fell,” he repeats dryly. “But were you pushed?”
“No.”
Now I’m a liar, liar.
I don’t know why I’m trying to convince him. Mako’s eyes drop back down to my hip. Now that he knows it’s there, he stares as if he has x-ray vision and can see through the soft cotton. The silence grows uncomfortable.
“Can I show you something?” My voice raises his darkened green eyes back to mine. They’re nearly black with rage. His large hands are curled tightly into fists, and the muscle in his jaw is pulsing, like a wild horse trapped in a cage.
He nods once, sharply. I’ll never know what possessed me, but I grab his hand and lead him to my favorite spot in the far corner of the library. It’s not a big building, but it had a lot of gem alcoves.
Camilla trusted me with the library’s biggest secret.
The rare books, so old, they would crumble if they hadn’t been taken care of so well.
They’re no longer here, but the room is. The door is triggered by a trap in one of the shelves. A book didn’t trigger the lock, but a shelf. If lifted just high enough to engage the mechanism and unlock the door.
It’s one room that’s been kept safe from the squatters and shitty teenagers. I lift the shelf and open the bookcase.
No amount of dust could keep from my lungs from inhaling deeply. The room is small, and smells of moth balls and musk, but it brings me peace anyway. There are two small windows in here, allowing sunlight to stream through. Dust mites dance in the rays as I make my way in.
Mako has to hunch down a little to get through, and I have the insane urge to giggle at watching him finesse his body through the opening. I turn away before I give in to that urge.
“Where are we?” Mako questions, wonderment in his voice as he looks around the small room.
“Where childhood dreams live,” I reply cryptically.
This is where I made my plans on how to get out of Shallow Hill. I was twelve years old with a pack of crayons and a piece of paper and a shoddy outline of my future. I did the math on what my paychecks would look like making minimum wage, planned my savings, what age I’d be eligible for a better job and a credit card, and adjusted accordingly. Camilla would help me with a lot of it, explaining all the adult-things like credit and how important it is.
I didn’t have typical childhood dreams of meeting Prince Charming and falling in love. Or becoming an astronaut or discovering the cure for cancer.
I just wanted out of Shallow Hill. Everything after that would come later when I accomplished my goal—one that seemed so impossible at the time.
“Do yours still live here? he asks, wandering around the room.
“No, they’ve come true already.” His eyes slide to mine. I feel pinned to the spot, like invisible hands are holding me in place. He looks away, and I can breathe again.
“What were they?”
I shrug a shoulder, attempting to appear casual. “Survival.”
Another glance. “That’s all?”
“Pretty much,” I quip, turning away. I don’t want to talk about that anymore. Frankly, I don’t want to talk about me. “What about you? What were your dreams?”
“To be a race car driver,” he deadpans. I snort, and then slap my hand over my mouth in embarrassment. That wasn’t very lady like. Ryan hates when I snort.
It doesn’t feel so bad when he gives me a full smile in return though. In fact, it makes me want to start snorting like a pig. He’s got beautiful white teeth, and sharp canines. Staring at his mouth makes me wonder what it’s capable of.
God, I’m being weird. I turn away quickly. That smile is a fucking weapon capable of complete annihilation on my resolve. I still don’t like him, nor do I want to start.
“What about when you got older?” I push.
“A detective.”
“And how’d that work out for you?”
“I succeeded.”
I pause and turn back to him. “You’re a detective?” I ask incredulously.
He nods and turns back to a dusty shelf. There’s nothing to see there. I’d like to think I’m much more interesting to look at than a dusty shelf.
I don’t know why I’m shocked by his career. Considering he found what class I’m in. And when… it makes complete sense.
“Is that how you found out where I go to college? And what class I’m taking?”
He has the nerve to look a little sheepish. “I may have utilized my position for nefarious purposes,” he admits, flashing me a sinful smile.
Fuck. Stop that.
“Why did you seek me out?”
“If I say I’m concerned about you, would you believe me?”
I scoff. “Absolutely not. You don’t even know me. And you were pretty rude the first time we met.”
He stuffs his hands into his pockets again. “I don’t know you. But I know my brother. And that’s enough.” He scuffs the thinly carpeted floor with the tip of his worn black boot, staring down as he contemplates something else. “As for the way I treated you, you took Ryan’s side and treated me with hostility after saying two words to me. I reacted accordingly.” He glances up at me, those emerald green eyes pinning me to the spot. The corner of his eyes crinkle as a smirk slides across his face.
“You’re still hostile,” he tacks on. I cross my arms, unimpressed with his assessment—and only proving his point. I am hostile. “I hope Ryan didn’t say too many horrible things about me. I’m curious what kind of story he spun this time to make him out to be the victim.”
“I don’t want to talk about him,” I bite out, annoyed with the fact that Ryan didn’t even bother to spin a story for me. I came in here to be peaceful. This isn’t peaceful.
He nods and walks over to a corner with a dusty bench. He plops down on it, not giving a single shit about the dust coating the wood. Ryan would never. Matter of fact, I don’t think he would’ve even stepped foot inside this building.
Hesitantly, I sit next to him, as far away from him on the bench as it allows. Which is admittedly not very much space when his body takes up three quarters of it.
Fucking mammoth.
A slow smirk slides across his face, but he doesn’t comment. Can’t be sure if he can tell what I’m thinking, but sometimes it feels like it. I want to do something with that smirk. Slap it off, or… something. I don’t know what, but I know I shouldn’t be feeling it.
“Are you going to arrest me for breaking and entering, Detective?” I ask mockingly.
He snickers, a wicked smile stretching across his face. He’s too goddamn good-looking. I’m tempted to take a knife to his face. “If you end up in my handcuffs, it won’t be because I’m arresting you.”
Explosions of hot lava course through my veins and straight between my legs. I squeeze my thighs and shift uncomfortably. Asshole.
Again, I turn away.
WE’VE BEEN SITTING HERE for hours, talking about everything and nothing, all except for the obvious elephant in the room.
Ryan’s going to kill me. I’ve avoided looking at the time but based off the angle of the sun through the windows, it’s going to set in a couple hours. Which means Ryan is home by now.
He’s already texted me thirteen times and called six, but the oppositional side of me is too pissed at him to care. Maybe I need to show more anger? Maybe he takes advantage of me because I’m weak to him. Maybe if I’m stronger, he’ll start treating me like it.
What’s that saying? If you want to be treated like an adult, then act like one. If I want to be treated like a strong woman, then I should act like one. I pick up my phone and skim the increasingly
angry messages, asking where I am.
Delete.
Ryan can go fuck himself. I was wrong for dressing like that, but he was wrong for pushing me down. Right?
I tuck my phone in my pocket, and turn towards my boyfriend’s brother. “So, Mr. I-know-what-a- relationship-should-look-like, if you’re so much better than Ryan, why are you single?” I don’t actually know if he’s single. I shouldn’t care, but I find myself fishing anyway.
He gives me a droll look but relents and shrugs a shoulder. “I’ve been in a few long-term relationships with women. They didn’t work out,” he answers cryptically.
“Why?” I challenge.
A smile quirks on my face. He thinks I care. I don’t. But I still wait for a response.
Another shrug. “Wasn’t happy. Going different directions in life or wanted different things.
Different reasons.”
“Were you in love with any of them?”
“Yes and no. I had immense love for them, and what I felt for them was real, but I don’t think I was truly in love with any of them, no. Not the way you should be when in a relationship. Not the way
I wanted to be.”
I frown. “The way you wanted?” I question.
“I want a love like my parents. Like my partner’s. With my exes, it always felt like something was missing. That’s not true love in my eyes.”
I hum, mulling his response over. Am I in love with Ryan like that? Yes, I believe so. Do I feel
like anything is missing?
Sometimes.
“So, what age did you finally get out of Shallow Hill?” Mako asks, drawing me away from my thoughts.
I sigh and thump my head against the wall behind me. “Eighteen, when I moved into the college dorms. By then, I had the ability to buy out Barbie’s house. Not that it really cost me much. The loan was paid off a year ago.”
He flashes me a sardonic look. “I still think it’s interesting you bought the house.”
I shrug a shoulder. “I finally have something over her. I grew up under her shitty roof for eighteen years, was forced to deal with everything that came my way because of her shitty life choices, and that was my way of getting back. Now it’s my shitty roof.”
“Couldn’t she easily find a place to shack up in, though?”
A laugh bursts out of me. “She could, yeah. But no one will let her stay for more than a night, if that. She was lucky she found places to go when the house first foreclosed. Everyone knows she answers to Billy. They’ll let her around long enough to fuck her, but Barbie knows too many things.
No one wants to keep her around long enough for Barbie to discover their dirty secrets.”
I had told him about Billy, and that he was a bad guy, but I didn’t mention exactly who he was and how bad he is. Billy isn’t his real name. I’m not even sure what his real name is, to be honest. I
suppose I never cared enough to ask.
“Couldn’t she stay with Billy?”
“Barbie’s too scared of him. Besides, Billy would never let Barbie live with him. He’d probably kill her after one night.”
Sadly, I feel nothing at that prospect. If Barbie died, I’d probably sigh in relief. I don’t think I ever felt anything more for Barbie than contempt. Even as a child, it took me only until I was three or four years old to realize Barbie didn’t love me. Nor does she give a fuck about me.
And I think I’ve always kept myself pretty unattached. By then, her clients were already having their fun with my body and she ignored it. Any time I complained, I was being dramatic. Told that it’s a good thing I’m learning young because that’s all I’ll amount to in life. Sucking dirty cock and getting flopped on like a fish would be a great skill to add to my resume.
“Aren’t you technically keeping Barbie in your life that way? Why not let the house foreclose and put her on the streets?”
I’ve asked myself the same question a million times. And I always circle around the same answer.
“Revenge. And I don’t care if that doesn’t make me the bigger person. I have power over her, and she’s forced to pay me rent. After everything I went through in that house, I’d say I’m being pretty fucking considerate.”
“What did you go through?” he asks softly. I brushed over a lot of shit this entire time, but he caught me at a good moment. It feels good to talk about this stuff. Ryan doesn’t ask—or care—and Amelia knows a lot, but she’s dealing with her own shitty past. It never felt right to dump mine on top of hers.
I don’t think I’ve ever been able to freely talk. And that’s what I do with Mako. I purge everything that’s been done to me as a child. The dirty men raping and molesting me since I can remember. I don’t remember kisses from my mother, but from strange men.
Then I tell him about Camilla and how for a short period of time, she saved me. And right when I really thought I was going to escape Shallow Hill far before I planned, she was ripped away from me.
Sometimes I wonder if I was a horrible person in my past life, and this life is my punishment. I’m atoning for whatever sins my soul has committed.
I tell him about the countless times I’ve gone hungry and had to beg for food after Camilla died.
Men would only give me food if I performed sexual favors. I did it. It was my way of survival. I became what Barbie always said I would—a whore.
That’s why I know Ryan isn’t wrong. I am a whore. I had sex with men at thirteen years old so I could eat. My only requirement was they wear a condom. I’d rather starve than catch an STD. I was incredibly lucky I hadn’t up until that point.
“Please don’t call yourself that,” he pleads quietly, but gruffly. The soft tone catches me off guard. I look at him with confusion. Not only was I not expecting him to care what I called myself, I certainly wasn’t expecting him to ask so… nicely. Ryan’s always demanding things of me, expecting my compliance and then calling me names when he doesn’t always get it.
“What?”
“You’re not a whore, River. You were repeatedly raped and were forced into those situations because you were slowly dying from hunger.”
Fire blazes from his eyes. I’m not sure how, but I know it’s not directed toward me, but for me.
And I don’t know how I feel about that.
I open my mouth. I almost say the words.
Ryan thinks so.
But I already know what his response will be.
Ryan’s fucking wrong.
Is he? I’ve been called a whore my entire life. For my actions—for what I had to do. For being pretty and dressing in clothes that compliment my body. Men have whispered in my ear countless times that if I didn’t look so sexy in my pajamas, they would’ve been able to resist me. It’s because I’m so beautiful that men just can’t resist me.
And that’s when I was a little girl.
Yesterday, I wore something sexy. And men looked at me. That upset Ryan.
“I don’t believe that.”
Mako turns towards me further. The bench protests under his weight, and I get a little nervous that it’ll collapse.
“You shouldn’t be punished for showing the world that you’re beautiful. Those men are wrong for sexualizing a little girl. That’s sick, River. It’s okay if a man looks at you—as a grown woman— and finds you attractive, but it is not okay if that man assumes that gives him the right to make you uncomfortable in any way. Whether it’s by the way he looks at you, speaks to you or touches you. If you want to walk out of the house in the sexiest thing you own, then that’s your goddamn right because it is your choice to show off your body. Don’t give any man the power to control what you do with it.”
“It’s mine,” I whisper.
“It’s yours,” he repeats. “No one else’s.”
I dig my teeth into my bottom lip. I’ve never had a man give me a choice. It’s always been take, take, take.
But the thought of Mako owning my body… God, I think I’m having a heart attack. It’s too sinful.
Liquid heat runs through my system and straight to my core. I clench my thighs to abate the feeling, but only serves to tighten my nipples into sharp little points.
“What if… what if I want a man to own me?”
He leans closer, and his scent assaults my nose. Pure male with a hint of soap. My eyes want to roll, but I don’t let them. I’m in control of my body, not him.
“Then give that privilege to a man who deserves it. If you want a man to own you, then let him.
But that’s not something he has a right to without your consent,” he says, his voice so, so deep and husky.
Licking my lips, I feel compelled to ask. “Do you want to own a woman?”
My own voice is dangerously husky. My breath too short. Too choppy. My body is too hot, overheating until I’m sure there’s smoke leaking out of my mouth.
“The only way I want to own a woman is by owning her pleasure. I want her body to sing for me —a tune that only I can hear. I want her body to gravitate towards mine like a moth to a flame. And I want her to grow to dislike the feeling of being so empty when my cock isn’t inside of her.”
Too much. Too fast. I want to do the opposite of deny him. I want to give, give, give. Until his hands are full of me, and my body is full of him.
I need out.
“I have to go now.”
