Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 87152 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87152 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
“I wouldn’t? And you know me so well all of a sudden?” This is almost fun. Giving it right back to them. Let’s see them squirm.
“You vile little bitch,” Easton whispers, teeth gritted, shoulders rising and falling with every ragged breath.
“That’s right, go ahead,” I reply calmly, slowly. “Keep talking. Keep reminding me of every little detail of what I saw that night. And how the two of you went back to beating him up even after I stopped you. You can’t claim it was all in the moment, temporary insanity, or whatever. You made the deliberate choice to go back to beating him. Maybe the cops would want to hear about that.”
I’m talking out of my ass. There’s no way I’m helping that guy. Not even if it means these complete pigs ending up in jail. He can’t win.
But it’s kind of fun to let them think I would do it.
That is, until Preston lowers his brow and mutters, “Do you think what we’ve done to you so far is bad? You have no idea what we’re capable of, pearls.”
The thing is, I believe him, no matter how I laugh it off. “Okay. I’ll keep that in mind.”
“We can make having your wig ripped off look like nothing,” Easton mutters nastily.
“Fuck you,” I whisper, shaking at the memory. He didn’t even bring it up earlier today. He wasn’t low enough to do it. I guess all bets are off now.
I slip between them, ready to leave them behind, only that’s not good enough.
“We’re not finished with you yet.” It’s Preston who reaches out. It’s Preston who grabs for my shoulder.
It’s Preston who instead snags the pearls around my neck.
It’s Preston who breaks the string.
Everything unfolds slowly, like a slow-motion horror movie. I hear the pop. The coffee drops to the ground at my feet because now all that matters is grabbing hold of the pearls before they fall, but it’s already too late. One pearl after another drops from the string and bounces off the sidewalk, scattering in all directions.
Mom’s pearls. Her greatest treasure.
They were all I had left.
The shock drops away, and I drop to my knees, scrambling around, grabbing pearls at random and shoving them in my pocket with trembling hands. There are so many, and they’re so small, and people are walking by and what am I supposed to do?
“Hey. Let me—” Easton’s arm is visible in the corner of my eye—he reaches down, grabbing for one of the pearls that landed in a crack in the sidewalk.
“Don’t you dare!” It’s a scream, and it comes straight from the bottom of my soul. It’s loud enough that he stands up straight again, gaping at me. “Both of you! You’re broken, and you’re diseased, and you’re evil! This was all I had! It was all… it was…”
So much for not letting them see me cry, but I don’t have it in me to be strong anymore. It turns out I have a breaking point after all, and this is it.
“Come on. Let’s go.” I hear Preston talking to his brother, but don’t care to look up. I’m still searching for the pearls, knowing I’ll probably never find all of them, but trying like hell anyway. Scrambling around on my hands and knees, blinded by tears, shaking with rage. They walk away at some point, but I don’t know when, exactly.
If only they would walk out of my life for good. Before they break what little is left of me.
11
EASTON
“Whose idea was it to work six hours tonight instead of three?” I swear, I feel like I’ve aged twenty years at least in the past week. Standing outside the hospital doors, I press my hands to my lower back and groan while stretching. Not that it helps. I’m still tight, sore after spending hours helping people into wheelchairs so they could go down and get tests run and stuff. I even had to maneuver a couple of beds in and out of rooms, which was not easy.
“Hey. You’ll be glad when we don’t have to come back on Thursday.” Preston scrubs a hand over his head with a weary sigh. “We only have to do a certain number of hours every week. There’s nothing written down about which days we absolutely have to be here.”
If there’s one thing he’s good at, it’s finding loopholes.
All I care about right now is getting a shower and washing the stench of the hospital off me. I don’t know what the smell is, exactly. A special blend of sadness and despair and cleaning products and piss. Not exactly something I hope they turn into a scented candle. Let’s put it that way.
“Do you want to order a pizza when we get home?” It’s going on seven o’clock now, and I know my stomach will be roaring by the time I’m showered and dressed. “We could order it when we get home, and it’ll be there by the time we’re cleaned up.”