Rika held up a large yellow envelope, her other hand fanning over a pile of little boxes. Were those matches?
“We don’t know this is from him,” she told Kai.
“Who else would it be from?”
“Look at the postmark!” she burst out, sounding angry as she tossed the envelope at him across the table. “It’s from Mexico City. He’s not here.”
“Look at the matchbooks!” he growled back. “He could’ve had anyone mail this from anywhere he wanted. And he addressed it to you. This is a message. He’s not just threatening me anymore.”
He grabbed the envelope and flung it back at her.
Matchbooks. I studied the pile of small boxes and books on the table that had obviously come in the envelope, seeing a silver box that I recognized right away as being from Realm, a nightclub the guys frequented here in Meridian City. Were they all from this area? Was that why Kai was worried?
Michael ran his hands through his hair and down over his face.
“So, what are you going do?” she challenged Kai. “Lose your minds running around in circles while he laughs at us? Damon is playing games. He won’t do anything.”
“How do you know?”
“Because he had a dozen chances with me last year, and he stopped! Every time!” She rose from her seat, pushing it in. “He enjoys fucking with our heads. That’s all. Just leave it alone.”
“Why do you always say that?”
Rika hesitated, staring at him. “What?”
Kai lowered his voice to normal and approached, challenging her. “Every time we want to deal with him, you tell us to leave him alone,” he bit out. “He has shit on me. He tried to kill Will. What the hell is the matter with you? Why are you protecting him?”
Her mouth fell open, and my heart sped up. She looked affronted at the accusation.
Her eyes shot to Michael and then Will, who all stared at her the same as Kai. Protecting him? Why would they think that?
No one said anything, and then she blinked, scoffing as she grabbed her plate and walked away from all of them, toward me and the doorway.
I stepped out from behind the wall, out of her way, and she charged past me without a glance.
Kai noticed me, and his expression softened. “Are you hungry?” he asked. “There’s breakfast.”
I looked at the spread on the buffet table, nodding. “Yeah, in a minute.”
I turned and walked past the stairs, into the study, and saw Rika disappear with her plate out into the garden.
After last night, I didn’t think we were friends, but I was curious. If my brother sent her a package to scare her, why wasn’t she more concerned? It wasn’t only Kai picking up on her signals, either. The way Michael and Will had looked at her…
I followed her outside, thankful for the clouds blocking out the bright morning sun. She settled herself on the ground, leaning up against a tree. Resting her head back, she placed her plate of food at her side but didn’t eat.
I walked over to her.
“Hey,” I said as I crouched down and laid on the ground.
She nodded, still looking preoccupied.
“Damon sent you matchbooks?” I asked, not hesitating. “Why?”
She shrugged. “I collect them,” she answered. “My father used to bring some back from his travels, and I started hoarding them. Michael carried on the tradition, bringing me back ones he finds on trips out of town I don’t join him on.”
So, Damon knew she liked them. “And he sent you ones from Meridian City,” I figured. He wanted her to know he’d been here. Or that he was here now.
She was quiet for a while, and I wanted to ask more—ask why she wasn’t angry—but we weren’t friends, and I knew she didn’t trust me. After what happened last night, though, I hoped we could talk a little easier.
“You grew up with Damon?” she asked.
“For a while.”
She opened her mouth to speak but then stopped, hesitating.
“Did you ever… see anything?” she asked, picking at her thumbs in her lap. “Things that might’ve happened to him?”
What?
She knew?
“Did Damon tell you something?” I questioned.
“No, of course not.” She shook her head. “Michael’s brother, Trevor, did, though, once. I had no reason to trust him, but I can’t imagine why he’d make up a story like that. It made sense, given the way Damon is.”
She finally looked up, and I was afraid of what she’d say. Damon didn’t want anyone to know about anything that happened at home. I couldn’t talk about this.
“He said Damon’s mother…” she said, looking like she was struggling to get the words out, “that she started hurting him when he was twelve.” And then she closed her eyes, lowering her voice. “Raping him.”
So, she knew. Had she told Michael?
“God, it makes me sick just thinking about it.” She sucked in a breath, looking away.
But then she just shrugged, waving me off. “Never mind. It’s still no excuse. I just think if he wanted to act he would’ve a long time ago, and we should just leave well-enough alone. Maybe he’s suffered, and while I’ll never forgive him, let him try to find what peace he can. He’s sick, and no good comes from poking a sleeping bear.”
I agreed with her. It was still no excuse. Plenty of people had it rough and behaved just fine.
In theory.
But when you’re in the thick of abuse and still live with the torment in your head every day, it’s a little different. No one handles it. They just fake it better. How else do you cope with the terrible shit you’ve been through?
“He never cried,” I told her, my voice quiet. “I’ve never seen him cry.”
She remained quiet, and I turned my eyes up to the sky.
“When she’d come in, he’d make me hide,” I continued, my pulse echoing in my ears. “In the closet with his headphones on. And after it was done, he would let me out, and then he’d go take a shower. Sometimes he was in there for an hour. Sometimes three or four.”
Tears sprang up, and I closed my eyes.
The creaks of the bed would breach the music in my ears sometimes. I could still hear it.
“He’d stay in the shower for however long it took to get himself straight again,” I told her. “Sometimes the cuts were on his arms or his chest. Depending on the season and what his clothes would cover.” Silent tears streamed down my temples. “When he was fifteen, he started slicing the bottom of his feet, so he would feel it every time he walked. I didn’t understand how he could run on the basketball court with the pain. His socks were soaked in blood sometimes.” I looked over at her, the blue of her eyes shimmering like a pool. “And there were other things he’d do. Ways he’d make me hurt him…” I paused and then continued. “Until the night it was time to hurt her.”
Damon had beat his mother bloody one night, and we thought that was the last we’d ever see of her. That was the night he stopped hurting himself, because he learned how good it felt for him to hurt others. He didn’t need to suffer anymore.
“Damon eats pain,” I told her. “He will find some way to take it and twist it and fit it down his throat, so he can swallow it. He’s made of it. You all can endure it until you overcome it, but Damon…he wants to be in hell.”
It’s where he shines.
I turned my eyes back up to the sky, sliding an arm under my head. “But still…he never cried.”
Kai
Present
A feathery touch caressed my face, and I stirred, realizing I’d been asleep. My head was like dead weight, and I couldn’t lift it.
Blinking, I saw light pour into the room and Banks lying next to me. I grinned. I’d always hated sleeping with other people—like actual sleep, in the same bed.
She was so quiet, though. And I liked seeing her the moment I woke up.
Reaching out, I snaked an arm round her waist and pulled her in close.
But she was stiff, and something was off. I closed my fingers around her skin, but it wasn’t skin I was feeling. It was clothing.