Black Promises (Blackwoods College)

“That’s enough,” Dad said sharply. “I don’t want to hear about this again. You two, get upstairs and stop laughing about the poor man.”

Mom stared between me and Dad with her customary quiet acquiescence. Even if she disagreed with him—which I really doubted—she wouldn’t say it out loud.

No reason to make things worse. She didn’t want to start a fight.

I stood and held a hand out for Sam. He took it, still convulsing slightly with mirthful aftershocks.

“We’ll celebrate upstairs,” I said to him, forcing myself to smile despite the earth-shaking rage I felt. His expression softened when he saw how angry I felt.

“It’s fine, we don’t have to.”

“Come on.” I stomped to the stairs.

“If I hear either of you celebrating this man’s death, we’ll have words.” Dad’s voice echoed after me as I headed to my room with Sam in tow.

I pushed my door open and stormed inside. He lingered on the threshold. “You okay?”

“After all this time, they still don’t believe me.” I whirled to face him. “What kind of people wouldn’t believe their own daughter?”

“You know them. They’d do anything to avoid conflict.”

“The guy’s dead. There can’t be any conflict.”

He sighed and shook his head. “I know that, but even still.”

“It’s fucked up. You know that, right?”

“There’s a reason I never told them.” His eyes met mine. “If I were you, I’d let it go.”

“Can you?” I asked, trying not to let the tears that threatened to swamp me roll down my cheeks. Sam was in a bad place and he needed me to be strong for him.

He didn’t answer right away. He stared toward the window, thinking, before shaking his head. “I’m trying.”

“Trying isn’t the same thing. Now that he’s gone, can you move on?”

“I don’t know. You know what’s fucked up? I’m afraid the world will never know how much of a sick bastard he was. He’s gone so they’ll all move on, but what he did will always be with me.”

My guts rumbled and twisted. Fuck, I hadn’t thought of that. By killing Dr. Silver, I robbed his victims of their day in court.

And yet I didn’t know what else to do. I could wait for someone to arrest him—but in the meantime, the sick fuck might molest more kids. I couldn’t let him do that, even if it meant giving him an escape from the truth getting out.

Dr. Silver got it easy. He deserved a lot worse.

“Maybe it’ll come out. We can’t be the only ones, right?”

He shrugged. “You ever try to find anyone else?”

“No, never.”

“My neither. And I doubt I’ll start now.” He forced another smile and knocked on the doorframe. “Anyway, hey, it’s a happy day. The sick doctor got what he deserved, right?”

“Yeah, totally.” I wanted to go to him, to hug him and say I was sorry, but we both had too much of our parents to do that.

Sam only waved and left. He disappeared into his room and blasted his music.

I closed my door then collapsed onto my bed. The tears that wanted to wrench themselves up from my throat finally burst out, and I screamed into my pillow as anger and sadness and self-loathing retched out of me in a torrent of emotion. I hated my parents, hated myself, and hated Dr. Silver most of all for doing this to me—for taking something away and leaving me this broken shell of a girl that might never, ever, ever come back to herself.

13

Jarrod

The news of Dannis Silver’s death broke faster than I anticipated.

I knew it would happen. We left his body out in the open for anyone to find. I figured it would’ve taken longer though, given that he was in the middle of the woods a fair distance from his house or the closest neighborhoods.

This didn’t change much. It moved up my timeline, but even still. I planned for this.

I texted Cora that night around nine.

Jarrod: I got something I need your help with.

Cora: Tonight?

Jarrod: I’ll pick you up in an hour.

Cora: Wait, come later. I’ll have to sneak out.

Jarrod: Midnight then. See you soon.

I paced my tight room and tried to calm my anxious nerves.

I felt like this before big games. Football was meaningless—I didn’t attach any emotional significance to winning or losing.

But I still felt a twist in my guts when we charged out onto the field. So many people expected great things: my teammates needed my ruthless drive and reckless violence; my coached wanted big plays; the fans screamed for the monster of Blackwoods College.

I wasn’t immune to pressure, although I hated myself for it.

I felt the pressure of Silver’s death as I drove to pick up Cora. I worried about her ability to push through what was to come. None of this would be easy, but I wouldn’t let her end up in prison for the rest of her life, not before I had a chance to taste her and take her every way I wanted.