CHAPTER 17
My father’s car races up the side of the curb as I bring it to a screeching halt outside the shitty bar just a few miles from my parents’ mountain mansion. I have to make this quick. The guys would have all caught my grand exit, and considering my phone has been blaring in my pocket for the last ten minutes, I’d dare say that they’re onto me.
They’d all be piled into Carver’s Escalade right now, following the destruction I’ve left behind on the road. Either that or following the fucking tracker that they have on me. I wouldn’t be surprised if those big bastards had a GPS tracker on my phone.
Assholes.
Fuck, they’re going to hate me for this, but I have to do it. Besides, is it not better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission?
I really shouldn’t be driving. I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing behind the wheel of a car, all I know is to steer and hit the gas and somehow, I’ll get myself from A to B. I’ve flown over speed limits, swerved past other cars, and taken out a small garden.
I’m a danger to myself and the other people on the road, but I couldn’t just stand there in that bathroom going over everything that was happening. It was too much. I have too much rage boiling through my blood. I have to release it. I have to let it out. The desperation flooding my system is too much and they’ll never understand. If I stayed there, they would have made me talk, they would have made me face it instead of allowing me to bury my problems in violence.
I need to hit something. I need to release the fury burning through me.
My door flies open and I storm toward the dodgy dive bar, knowing that the boys are going to be less than ten minutes behind me. It was a ten-minute walk from the Escalade up to the house, and the second I broke through that garage door, they would have run.
I need to make this quick.
As I make my way toward the bar, I glance back at my father’s car. It’s a pile of steaming shit now. I’m sure it used to be amazing, but the condition it’s in now is nothing special. I bet he’s looking down on both me and Mom so fucking ashamed.
The thought has the fury igniting all over again and I clench my jaw as I throw myself through the door of the bar.
It’s just after midday and I’m not surprised to find a few men already here, telling me everything I need to know about them. Who in their right mind needs to be drinking at this time of the day anyway? Pathetic.
As I look around, searching out today’s victim, I’m reminded of Kurt and his reckless alcohol addiction. He was a sloppy drunk and I hated him for it, though there’s also a few other reasons why I hated him, but that’s all in the past.
I walk through the bar slowly, taking my time while knowing that once I get my first hit in, it won’t take long to finish the fucker off. I just hope that Carver and the boys don’t get to me first.
A wolf whistle sounds across the bar and my gaze instantly snaps up.
Bingo.
I guess it won’t be hard looking for today’s punching bag after all. It seems that he’s going to beg for it instead.
I zone in on the old fucker sitting across the bar with a sleazy smile across his dirty face. He’s old and gives off a filthy Santa Claus vibe with his big belly, rosy cheeks, and need to please children. Dirt covers the front of his white, holey shirt, and I can see exactly where he’s used it to wipe food from his mouth. He’s the definition of filth. “Come here, sweetheart,” he says through the three missing teeth at the front of his mouth, making me long to knock out a fourth. “Come and let Daddy buy you a drink.”
Fuck. Maybe I didn’t throw up everything in my stomach before because that shit makes me feel sicker than the thought of Sara and London combined.
I strut around the bar, giving an extra sway to my hips as I go and getting longing glances from the other drunk assholes lingering around. “That’s right, baby,” Santa says. “Let me take care of you. You’re a young thing, aren’t ya?. Way too young to be in a place like this.”
I make my way over to him, sneering at the way his eyes drop over my body as though he has the right. He pats his lap, inviting me to take a seat and my stomach churns at the thought of getting anywhere near this asshole, but luck isn’t on my side because to actually beat the shit out of him, I’m going to have to get a shitload closer.