1
Leon
A loud bang jolts my body awake but I don’t respond. I just lie there unmoving, my eyes tightly closed.
“Come on, let’s go,” a deep unfamiliar voice booms, echoing off the bare walls around me.
Blowing out a long breath, I remain immobile.
“Dunn,” he barks. “Let’s fucking go. You’ve got people waiting on you.”
It’s those words which force me to react.
My pulse increases, my heart slamming against my ribs as I crack an eye open.
The pain in my head makes me wince as the bright light assaults me.
The officer standing in the opening of the cell stares at me in impatience.
“I don’t need anyone,” I complain, my voice rough, my throat burning with each word.
“Well, unlucky for you, they’re here.”
“Fucking hell,” I mutter, pushing myself up until I’m sitting on the rock hard bed in the cell I was thrown into last night.
Probably not the finest night of my life but the less I think about the events of yesterday, it’s probably for the better.
“I’m free to go?” I ask, shoving my feet into my sneakers and refusing to look up at him again.
“Yeah. So long as we don’t find you drunk on one of our beaches again.”
“Trust me, I’ve got no intention of coming back to Miami ever again. Only bad shit happens here.”
He’s silent as I push to stand. My head spins, the pounding at my temples almost unbearable as my stomach turns over. Sucking in a deep breath, I will the need to puke away, not really wanting to piss this guy off more by leaving the cell with the contents of my stomach on the floor.
I lift my arm for the frame of the opening the second it’s in reaching distance to steady myself.
“Nothing less than you deserve,” the officer mutters.
“Don’t judge me,” I snap, pissed off with his attitude. “If you’d been through what I have then you’d have reached for the bottle too.” He looks back at me, a little pity edging it’s way into his expression and making me instantly regret saying anything.
I sign some paperwork when we get to the desk and after a few words of warning about my behaviour he allows me to leave out of the double doors.
My steps immediately falter when my eyes land on the two people who instantly stand from the chairs, the words of the officer about people being here to collect me come to the forefront of my mind.
Peyton’s face is twisted in concern, whereas my brother looks murderous.
His teeth grind and his jaw pops as he stares at me. His entire body is locked up with tension that’s radiating off him in waves, and if it weren’t for the fact we were standing in a police station, I’m sure he’d be on me, taking his frustration out on me through his fists.
The air is heavy and thick between us like you can cut it with a knife. Even when Peyton places her hand on Luca’s chest and whispers something in his ear, he still doesn’t relax.
“Let’s go,” he spits, turning his back on me and storming through the double doors.
We both watch him go as my legs finally start to work again, taking me to Peyton.
“I haven’t seen him this angry in a while,” she mutters sadly, staring at the door he just stormed through.
My lips part to respond but I quickly find that I have no words.
Ripping her eyes from the door, Peyton turns her silver eyes on me.
“Are you okay, Lee?”
“I… uh…”
She reaches for my hand, squeezing it in support.
Pulling on my mask and finding the strength I’ve used to get me through the past ten years, I force a smile onto my lips.
“I’m good. I’m sorry I dragged you down here to bail me out.”
“Anytime. But—” I suck in a breath, knowing what’s coming next. “You’re going to need to explain what’s been going with you. You’re not brushing this one under the rug.”
“I know,” I say sadly. I think I realized last night that my days of hiding my dark past are over.
Macie knows the truth now so it won’t be long until everyone else does.
My chest aches as I think of her. Images of our final minutes together flicking through my mind. Regret floods me as I remember her cowering in the corner of the room as I took my frustrations out on everything inside her uncle’s house. The memory of the tears tracking down her face as she watched me. The horror of our reality is so clear in her eyes.
She really had no idea. But she does now.
She knows exactly who I am. She’s also discovered that everything she feared about our relationship was true. I didn’t go into it for her, not in the way I made it out like I did. I just wanted revenge. I wanted her pain. I wanted to teach her a lesson so she would know the mistake she made that day.
Peyton lacing her arm through mine drags me from my nightmare and I come back to the here and now.
Together we walk out of the station, with the sun searing my eyeballs the second I step out of the building and look up.
“You okay?” Peyton asks, clearly noticing my reaction.
I grunt a response and head toward where Luca is leaning against his car with his hands curled into fists at his sides.
“Just take me to my car and I’ll get out of your hair,” I say, needing to get away from the both of them and their probing stares.
“Fuck off, Lee,” he barks, pushing off from his car and stepping up to me.
“Can we not?” I ask, although I already know what his answer is going to be.
“No,” he snaps, his palms landing solidly on my chest and making me back up.
I don’t have the energy or the strength right now to fight him.
“No, we’re fucking doing this. Why the fuck are we here, Lee? Why did I get a call from Mom at the break of dawn to tell me that you’d been fucking arrested and needed bailing out from jail in fucking Miami of all places.”
“I’m not talking about this right now,” I mutter, trying to step around him.
“You don’t have a fucking choice, asshole,” he seethes.
“Luca, give him a break,” Peyton says softly, coming to stand beside him.
“A break? A fucking break? He’s had a long enough break. He’s been lying to me for years. We’ve bailed on classes to come and get his drunk ass. He owes us an explanation.”
“I don’t owe you anything.”
“I need the fucking truth,” he says, fisting my shirt and slamming me back against his car. “Why the fuck are you here? Who do you know in Miami?”
Our green eyes hold, both of our chests heaving. Him begging me to talk and me desperately trying to come up with a way to get out of this.
I don’t see Peyton move to our sides once more, but I sure hear her words.
“It’s her, isn’t it? It’s Macie.”
Luca’s brows pinch at her words.
“You came with her.” Peyton says matter-of-factly.
“Why?” Luca asks, clearly assuming that his girl is right.
“We’re not doing this here.”
“No? Then where are we doing it?”
“Not in a fucking parking lot when I can barely see straight.”