Beautifully Broken

“I see this. You’re practically glowing.”

I roll my eyes so hard I’m surprised they don’t fall out of my head. “Bite me.”

“Tell me when.” He grins but that smile falls as quickly as it came. “Bad news, Love.”

Bane’s a grizzly bear and about as scary as they get around here. At five-foot-eleven, the guy is stout. All muscle and covered with more tattoos than Travis Barker. But it’s not his appearance that people fear. His dad is Gerald, the dealer Monica sold my virginity to, the most dangerous, heartless man in the tri-county area.

Bane lived with his mom until she overdosed five years ago. Since then, he’s been under the protection of his dad’s crew, living in one of the man’s apartments, but not affiliated with the business. However, if Bane says to leave the area, anyone related to the crew scatters or they die. I don’t think he would actually kill anyone, but with his dad’s reputation lingering people don’t stick around to find out.

We take the stairs, one step at a time, enjoying each other’s company even if our conversation is weighted. “There’s a bounty on your head. Fifty-thousand to the person that brings you to Gerald alive when he gets out.”

I stop dead in my tracks, two steps from the bottom, my heart fluttering faster than a cheetah on crack. Fuck. I assumed Gerald was making some effort to find me but hearing Bane’s words validates my fears. I look around again. There are no eyes that I can see, but that doesn’t mean someone we don’t know isn’t watching. “Is that why you’re at my mom’s apartment, to collect me?”

I already know the answer. Bane wouldn’t betray me like that. Our history goes back to before I got picked up by CPS. We lived in the same apartment building back in the day. His mamma used to feed me when mine was too busy to remember I existed. Flash forward to when I moved back across the tracks almost four years ago. Monica moved to a new building, much to my disappointment, but somehow Bane knew I’d returned. He came to my door and pulled me into a hug the moment I opened it. Before I had a chance to speak. Before I could ask who he was, not that I needed to. He found me and has been my guardian on this side of the tracks ever since.

“Never, Pipes,” Bane takes a step closer and smiles down at me. His shoulders round, fingers clenching and unclenching at his sides. He wants to touch me, and assure me that he’s got my back, but he won’t. “I knew you’d come for the check. I wanted to warn you.”

I relax, but only a little. My life’s still on the line. Even under the protection of Bane, every second I waste in this shitty neighborhood brings me that much closer to my demise. “I’m a dead girl walking. Got it.”

He sits on the bottom step, his broad frame filling most of the space. “May tenth.”

I feel the color drain from my face. No.

“No,” I whine, falling to the ground beside him, my dreams and plans crumbling all at once. It can’t be the tenth. If I don’t walk, any hope I had at a semi-decent paying job after high school goes out the window.

Once again, Life’s fucked me.

“Graduation?”

“Yeah, it’s May fifteenth.”

Bane pulls a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He slips one slender stick between his lips and holds the pack out for me. I shake my head. I don’t smoke, hardly ever drink, and damn sure don’t do drugs. Covering the end with his hand, he flicks the spinner on his lighter and sucks in a breath. “Fuck,” he says on an exhale. “Can you still get your diploma if you skip it?”

I shake my head. My heart’s about to burst out of my chest and run across town to find out without me. I take Bane’s lighter and play with the spinner. “Don’t know, but I can find out.”

“Do it. I’ve got a guy on the inside, I’ve heard what Gerald’s got planned for you,” Bane pauses. He rests his hand on mine. My gaze drifts upward, meeting his. Green eyes brimmed with worry stare into mine. “He can’t have you, Piper.”

“I’ve waited a long time for this,” his deep voice purrs.

My eyes flutter open to the sound of a door clicking shut. The room’s spinning like an amusement park ride, only it’s far from enjoyable, and everything’s blurry. I shouldn’t have drunk so much, but a girl only turns eighteen once. I start to sit up until a hand pushes me back down.

“Shhhh,” he says.

The bed dips as someone sits on top of me. Adrenaline kicks in and my brain begins to work again. My vision clears, the room stops spinning and what’s left of my drunken-hangover is gone. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Get off me!” I scream. My fists beat against a mass of blubber, sticking to a sweat stained shirt.

Gerald, my mom’s dealer, laughs and unbuckles his duck-taped belt. “I paid a pretty penny to have you, Piper. You’re finally a woman tonight.”

I suck in a breath, frozen underneath his weight. Monica couldn’t have sold my virgi

nity. She wouldn’t. But deep down, I know that's a lie. Monica doesn’t have a motherly bone in her body. If not for the government benefits—food stamps, housing assistance, and a monthly stipend—I would have been out on the street the week Child Services moved me back in.

“Two hundred dollars for one night with Monica’s pretty little girl.” Gerald runs a cold, fat finger down my cheek. “Mommy dearest wouldn’t budge at first, but when I cut off her supply she caved. Desperate for it like a cat in heat.”

I won’t let this happen. I refuse to lose my virginity to an obese drug dealer with a god complex. Adrenaline pumps through my veins, freeing my body from its statue like state. I beat my fists against Gerald’s chest. Try to wiggle and push him off me. He shifts his body, maybe because of me or maybe by his own doing, either way the change in his weight distribution is killing my legs. “I’ll pay whatever you want, just get off me, Gerald!”

“Quit your fussing.”

I lift my knees a fraction of an inch, wiggle my hips, press my hands against the mattress to pull myself from underneath him, but Gerald’s too heavy. So, I try something else. I scream, “Heeelll—”