The two friends started to argue in quiet voices so I turned to Lukas, cradling his left side. His nose was bleeding and his right eye was swollen shut.
The anger caught in my throat again and I glanced up across the parking lot to the security cameras. Those bastards were going down. Without saying a word, I grabbed Lukas’s bag and held his arm, gently asking him to follow me. He did, his head bowed in humiliation.
“You have nothing to feel embarrassed about, Luke. They’re bigger and older than you and it was two against one. They’re the pathetic ones.”
“Where are we going?” he sucked in his breath as he tripped on the curb. I winced in sympathy.
“To see Sheriff Muir.”
“Uh, why?” he stopped.
“Because if we report it to the school, the likelihood is that Coach will try and talk the principal into letting Damien and Jackson get away with it. I tell Sheriff Muir and also give him the heads-up that the school security cameras caught the whole thing, he’ll make sure Principal Watts does something about it.”
“It’s fine, Charley.”
“It’s not fine, Lukas,” I snapped. “Jake gets dragged through the mud and he’s completely innocent while those ass**les are the biggest bullies I’ve ever seen and they get away with it. Even now … Brett is the one who pulled the knife. It’s tragic what happened but he did it to himself. Not Jake. And I won’t have Damien and Trenton Thomas try to say any different, or bullying people into believing different. Not in my town.”
Luke cocked his head to the side, giving me a small, weary smile. “You’re hot when you’re mad, Charley Redford.”
Affection and tenderness and anger for what had been done to him warred within me. “I’m sorry that they did this to you, Luke.”
He winced and hobbled beside me. “Don’t. You’ve got nothing to be sorry for. You’re, like, one of the best people I know.”
And that just made me want to go back and smash Damien’s face into the ground.
Instead I settled for getting Lukas to the station. Sheriff Muir took our statements and called Mr. C. out. I insisted on going with them to the nearest hospital a half hour outside Lanton. The doctor had just finished telling us that Luke had probably fractured a rib or two when I felt him enter the room.
I turned, my breath catching as Jake strode in with his mom, his hard eyes on Luke. They flickered to me for a second before moving quickly back to his little brother.
As he took in the mess of Luke, Jake’s fists curled around the foot of the hospital bed.
Mr. C. saw. He shook his head at his eldest. “Don’t even think about doing anything stupid. Charley saw to it that those boys will pay for attacking your brother. Don’t make your situation worse by demanding your own retribution.”
“They can’t get away with this, Dad. They should leave us alone.”
“They won’t get away with this. I told you Charley saw to it.”
“She was awesome,” Luke grinned up at Jake, his eye now completely swollen shut. “She jumped in front of me and told them that if they wanted me, they had to go through her. If it hadn’t been so emasculating, it would’ve been hot.”
I smirked at him. “It wasn’t emasculating.”
“Dude.”
I took that to mean he disagreed.
Jake’s head whipped to me and I flinched at the blaze in his eyes. “You were going to take a beating?”
“I knew they wouldn’t hit me.”
“Uh, I don’t know. I think Damien definitely would’ve swung for you if Alex hadn’t stopped him,” Luke grimaced.
The muscle ticked in Jake’s jaw, a sure sign he was ready to lose it.
Jake kept silent as the doctor finished up with Lukas. It wasn’t until we were out in the hospital parking lot that Jake finally spoke. “Can you guys wait in the car? I need to talk to Charley.”
His family nodded hesitantly and slowly walked away, shooting us concerned looks over their shoulders.
Feeling ill, I glanced up at Jake. He gestured for me to follow him. We moved far away from the entrance, giving us a modicum of privacy.
“I know you’re mad at me,” I started, “but—”
“Just be quiet, Charley.” He sighed, his expression blank again.
I tried to swallow my annoyance over his tone, over his attitude, but I couldn’t. “Jake, I know you’re going through a lot but I would really appreciate it if you’d stop speaking to me like that. And stop shutting me out,” I hissed.
“Our front window got smashed in yesterday,” he answered flatly. “Our phone keeps ringing and then the callers hang up. Trenton and his goons are getting restless,” he muttered.
I closed my eyes, resenting Trenton. The man was going through a lot, but he did it mostly to himself. “Jake, I’m sorry. But it’s just Trenton. Everyone else knows you didn’t attack Brett. They know it was an accident.”
“I should’ve walked away, called his bluff.” He shook his head, his eyes hollow. “He died because I wasn’t smart enough to walk away from a drunk. I didn’t put the knife in him but I’ve still got blood on my hands.”
“Jake, he swung at you. If you’d walked away, turned your back, he was drunk enough … he might have hurt you …” I reached for his hand and squeezed it but he gave me nothing back. “We’ll get through this.”
He stared silently at me in answer and I felt that horrific weight settle in my stomach again.
“Jake?”
“I have to get through this on my own.”
“What?”
“I can’t do it with you around me.”
I shook my head, panic pressing down on my chest. “Are you … breaking up with me?”
He looked away, unable to meet me eyes as he replied, “Yeah. I’m breaking up with you.”
I couldn’t catch my breath. “And everything between us … everything you promised … that’s just gone?”
He tensed and then shook his head. “I’m not sticking around to listen to this.”
“Don’t walk away from me!” I cried, anger thankfully breaking the panic into pieces. “You owe me!”
And suddenly the fury was back in his face when he stopped and whirled to face me. “I owe you? I owe you? I played a part in a kid’s death. Do you know how f**ked up that is? How f**ked up I feel right now? Can you think of someone other than yourself for just a second?”