The room falls silent, and their eyes bore into me. This is why I didn’t want to say anything.
“You’re related to that asshat?” Owen asks, pausing as he prepares the sutures.
“By flesh and blood,” I mutter, staring up at the ceiling and contemplating just how far down I want to dive into the rabbit hole. “That’s about it though. Blood isn’t what makes family, is it?” I lift my head off the headrest built-in the couch and stare all of my friends in the eye, telling them that they are my family now.
“Aw, we love you too, Heaven,” Quinn chokes up, and I start to worry Jaxon is going to beat the hell out of me when he shakes his head behind her, yet stares at me, telling me it’s okay. “And I know the twins do too. I’m sorry. I’m so emotional.”
Jaxon lays his hand on her shoulder, bends down, and kisses the top of her head. He loves her more than anything in this world. Even money, which says a lot considering we steal a lot of it to live this luxurious life we have.
“So, what happened? I know why you went to prison, but I don’t know what happened,” she says.
A bit of pressure has me looking down to see Owen at work, and then I decide it is best if I focus on something else in the room. I bend my neck back and decide to stare at the ceiling again and think about the night that changed my life. “I was seventeen. I was at the Governor’s ball, which is a fancy event where all the rich people gather, donate, gossip, cheat on their husbands and wives; it was always a good time.”
“I bet you had fun with their daughters,” Finley snickers.
“I sure did,” I wink. “Anyway, I strolled in wearing another tuxedo, and I saw Heather there. I always found her first at the party, but we never talked much. She gave me the cold shoulder because of my…reputation.”
“Cause you were a whore,” Dillon says from out of nowhere. Dillon is Grayson’s son from the woman who accused him of rape. He just beat cancer, and the kid surprisingly does a lot of sleeping. I think it’s because he’s been fighting for so long, and now he can have a goodnight’s rest instead of one that has him struggling to breathe his breath.
“Dillon! Where did you learn that word?” Grayson scolds, and I hold back a laugh.
“Mommy’s boyfriends called her that all the time,” he shrugs, then yawns.
“Oh…” Finley giggles, which has everyone else snorting from holding back their own laughter.
“Go to your room. I’ll be there in a minute to explain why you can’t use that word, even if you were right about Uncle Heaven.”
“Hey,” I pretend offense.
“Meh, shoe fits, wear it,” Gabriella slaps my knee as she sits on the floor. She leans back on her hands and crosses her ankles. “What happened in the story next?”
“I looked for her sister, Grace. Grace and I never had—” I check to see if Dillon is still there, but the space he was sitting in is empty. I bet anything he is hiding in the hallway, eavesdropping. All kids do it. “We never had sex,” I finish my statement since I don’t see him. “She was my friend. One of the people I trusted. I could talk to her, you know? Which for a seventeen-year-old kid is a big deal because I wasn’t expected to make friends. I had to be perfect because our image was everything. My parents hated one another. They slept in different rooms, had affairs, but once we stepped out of the car and into the public light, we were the perfect family. It gets tiring pretending to be something you aren’t. My go-to friend was Grace. She…uh…” My eyes burn suddenly when a flash of her beaten body enters my mind. I press my palms against them to lighten the burn. I hate thinking about that night. “She wasn’t downstairs with her sister, Heather, so I walked around and looked for her. I climbed up the steps, and one of her friends said they saw her go to the bathroom but hadn’t been back out in a few minutes. I got worried, so I checked on her, only to find the restroom empty.” I exhale a long deep breath and slap my hands on my thigh. “I heard a door close behind me, and when it turned around, I saw a guy, my height, brown hair, but that’s all I saw. I didn’t recognize anything else. I was curious, of course, and headed toward the door he came out of when I saw blood on it. Just…” I swipe my fingers through the air to try and give a visual of what the red smear looked like. “I opened the door and followed moaning sounds, and that’s when I saw Grace. She was on the side of the bed and had been beaten. There was so much blood. I…panicked. I had no idea what to do. Pieces of her…” I swallow when bile works its way up my throat. “Pieces of her scalp laid on the floor because he took her shoe and bashed her head in. She was black and blue all over, and she recognized me, somehow, through the pain. She called out for me right before she stopped breathing, so I did CPR. I brought her back, and I thought it was all over.”
“Oh no,” Finley starts to put two and two together.
“Yeah. Sirens were wailing outside, and I hadn’t even called the cops yet; someone else had. The cops busted into the room, cuffed me, and as I was getting dragged out of the room with Grace’s blood all over me, Heather saw me.” I wince when Owen places the last stitch, but I’m too upset at remembering the story to give him a hard time about it. “She thought I did it, and then three days later, Grace died from her injuries, and Heather believed I did that too. She hates me; she kind of always has. She testified against me, but they couldn’t bring the charge of Grace’s death on me because there wasn’t enough evidence, but yeah, that’s it. That’s what happened.”
I expect silence, but Quinn hurries with a question. “But if your family is so well-known, why didn’t they get you a lesser sentence? I mean, aren’t wealthy families known for getting their kids out of trouble?”
“Yeah, but my parents only cared that their name was sullied. They didn’t care about me. They didn’t come to see me, they didn’t write, I only ever got one letter and it was from Heather.”
“What did it say?”
“I don’t know, Quinn. I never opened it.”
“What? Why?”
“I don’t want to see her handwriting telling me how much she wishes I were dead. I’m not strong enough to read something like that, and you guys know that.” I give them a half-smile in reassurance, but they seem shocked at my statement. Jaxon’s hairline has disappeared from how high his brows are now. “Come on; you guys don’t think I know I’m the young, emotional one of the group? I know I am. I don’t have a problem with it. I know what it’s like to live in freezing temperatures and a world where feelings were banned. I was never capable of living like that. I am who I am. I used to be ashamed about it, but I’m not now.”
“Do you still have the letter?”
“Yeah, I do. It’s in a safe place.” It’s in my underwear drawer, right under my favorite pair of boxer briefs, but no one needs to know that. “I won’t ever open it, so don’t ask.”
“I’m glad you’re with us,” Quinn says, bringing me a cute baby to cheer me up.
“Nope. No more baby holding. You’re pushing yourself. You aren’t ready for that kind of weight against your chest even though they are only six pounds. So don’t argue.”