Bound by Rapture (26 page)

He thought my panic would buy Chris, his lover, enough time to finish the deal. To murder Julia. But it didn’t, because my mom was one tough broad who picked the lock and got out of the basement over an hour after I had arrived. I had been interrogating Leon, getting his story. I’d called in men from all over. My mother’s men, my own men. They were all on their way, while I paced and frantically tried to rip Leon’s story apart for clues as to where she was. But then she came out of the basement, sweaty and dirty. Screaming that Leon had done it.  

And then Leon had revealed the truth about everything, about all the things Chris had done, about how he, Leon, had texted Chris and told him about what we did in the swamp. 

My old friend had begged for his life. He’d pleaded with me for forgiveness, saying he did it all out of love, that he knew I would have done the same for Julia. But I hadn’t hesitated in blowing his head off with the gun I brought in from the limo. I hadn’t bothered to think it over or even consider his words. He’d helped someone hurt Julia. Someone who was probably hurting her right at that moment. And for that, the penalty was death. 

It was his blood that was splattered on my hands and face. His blood that drew everyone’s attention now. My lungs burned, but I still pushed harder. I could see her building less than a block away. I was almost there. 

John had called me, letting me know just how bad things were. That Chris had a gun to Julia’s head. The very thought of that made me want to burst out of my skin and rip something apart. The gun was tucked in my waistband. 

I will get there in time.
I had to. There was no other option. I couldn’t even begin to let myself consider the possibility of not getting there. Of what I would do if she was dead. It was unfathomable. 

I stabbed the button on the elevator repeatedly, deciding it would take too long to sprint up the many flights of stairs. Blood smeared on the previously pristine up-arrow. And then I was heading upstairs in the calm of the shiny elevator. Mirrors surrounded me, creating hundreds of bloody, shirtless images of me. I didn’t want to look at myself. But I was everywhere and there was no avoiding it. It took me back to that time. To after I had seen Sandy hanging lifeless from the extension cord. I’d blacked out, but there were little snippets after that blackout that came back to me later. 

I was standing in front of the mirror with blood on my face. My blood and
his
blood. They mingled together until I didn’t know who I was anymore. The person staring back at me was some sort of monster. And that’s who I saw now. A blood-covered monster. A monster who was angry, fucking devastated by the things he had done and the things he was about to do. The
ding
signaling the opening of the elevator doors seemed to last forever, and the doors opening even longer. 

I pressed through them and ran down the hall. Randy and John were both in the half-open doorway with their guns in front of them, pointed into the living room. I had called them as soon as I found out what was going on. 

I got to the door and shoved them out of the way, and then I saw Chris, his stringy blond hair stuck to his face, pressing a gun against Julia’s head. Tears were tracked down her cheeks. Her skin was so pale she was practically a ghost. 

“Don’t come any closer!” Chris yelled. But he didn’t know me. He didn’t know that I didn’t give a shit about his bullshit threats. If he was serious about killing her, he would have already done it, and I wasn’t about to wait around for him to do it now.

The next few seconds dragged on in utter slowness as my legs carried me across the room. Julia moved, twisting in Chris’s grip, until the gun wasn’t at her head anymore. Vic was up and running toward them, and Chris fought to keep control of Julia. I saw it the moment he realized he couldn’t, that he had lost his chance. He let her go. Resignation painted on his features. 

“I love you.” He aimed the gun at Vic and pulled the trigger. Someone screamed. I heard it louder than the gunshot. It was ear piercing, ripping through the air as Vic collapsed. 

My gun was already in my hand, the metal warm from being pressed against the skin of my waist. Before Chris could even think about turning the gun to me or Julia, I had mine aimed at his head. And for the second time that day, I didn’t hesitate in pulling the trigger. 

TWENTY-THREE

Julia.

One week later

“You must hate me,” he said.

I gave Vic a small smile and shook my head, rubbing my hand over his. “I could never hate you.” 

He laid propped up on a hospital bed, on the road to healing after the bullet had pierced his shoulder. The doctors said he would be free to go home in the next day or two if he stayed on track. 

“You
should
hate me,” he said quietly. 

“But I don’t. It’s not your fault.”

“I should have known what he was capable of.” Vic had said the same thing over and over since I first came to visit him the day after the shooting.

“How were you supposed to know? No one knew. I spent as much time with him as you did, before y’all moved.” And it was the truth. I’d had no idea. In fact, I was still in shock, perplexed over the whole thing. 

“I should have known,” he repeated, appearing lost. “Are you okay?” 

I nodded slowly, though I didn’t know if
okay
was the right word. “I’m still here.” Nightmares had awoken me every night this week. Visions of Mandi’s body, of my bleeding neck, the sensation of a gun pressed against my temple and Chris’s body behind me. I’d awoken terrified, sweaty, clinging to Cole desperately. 

Chris was gone. The bullet Cole had put in his head had ended his life instantly, but it didn’t change the images of him in my mind. He was very much alive there. 

“Thank God. I don’t know what I would have done…” A tear slid down his cheek. 

“I’m just glad you’re okay.” I squeezed his hand, feeling an ache I was certain he was feeling, at the thought of him dying. Tears pressed at the back of my eyes, a feeling that had become all too familiar. “I almost wore my old Stars sweatshirt up here, but I thought that would give you heart failure,” I said teasingly, trying to keep from crying. 

“Thank God. I would have gone into cardiac arrest for sure.” He chuckled, his green eyes sparkling. “This isn’t a good time…I know that…but I meant those things I said, that night.”

I blinked and glanced away from him. “Vic…”

“I know, Jewel. I know. You don’t love me like that. Fuck…” He squeezed my hand. “Maybe I don’t love you like I think I do. I just know I want you in my life. I don’t want to lose what we have. I want our friendship. I want that back, please. I’m sorry. I’m so…so sorry this happened…so sorry…” His chest started to shake as he sobbed. He clutched my hand, but with the other he held his injured shoulder.

“No, Vic, don’t cry. Please.” I stood up and patted the hand on his shoulder. “This isn’t your fault.” 

“Excuse me.” The door of his hospital room opened, revealing a nurse. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Victor’s heart rate has sky-rocketed in the last minute and he needs to calm down.”

I swallowed, biting my tongue to keep from crying. “I’ll be back to visit you. I’ll always be in your life, okay?” I let go of his hand. “I don’t want to live without you either, best friend.”

Vic nodded, taking a deep breath, but the tears continued to roll down his face. I turned on my heel and hightailed it out of there before I started blubbering myself and made everything worse. 

Cole stood as soon as I walked out and wrapped his arms around me. He didn’t ask what happened. He didn’t need to. It was how I acted every time I came to visit Vic. I was just a ball of emotion, frazzled nerves and an aching heart. I still had trouble accepting it was over, that all of it had even happened to begin with. 

My biggest fear in the last week was that Cole would go to jail. He had killed Chris and Leon both. Things were still under investigation, but his lawyer promised there wasn’t any jail time in his future. 

Outside, we climbed into his truck, the same truck he had picked me up in on our first date. The limo formality had been cut this last week and I was glad. There was something nice about riding in the car one-on-one that calmed me and made me think of simpler times. 

“What do you want to do tonight?” he asked as he pulled onto the service road.

“I don’t know.” I stared out at the night sky, taking in the sparkling lights of Reunion Tower, a sphere shaped restaurant that characterized the Dallas skyline. I’d looked at the building hundreds of times. I could see it from my bedroom window, but as I looked at it now, I was reminded of that night when Cole took me on our first date. I’d stared at it, feeling nervous and a little lost at the time, with excitement pulsing under my skin just from being in the car with Cole. 

That excitement was still there, though I didn’t feel lost, as crazy as that sounded. I didn’t really know where I was supposed to go after this tragedy, but I knew I wanted Cole to be there, wherever life took me. 

I glanced at the clock, which gleamed eight-thirty. “I want to see Gran and Dad, but it’s too late.” 

“Tomorrow,” he said, putting on his blinker to switch lanes. “We’ll go in the morning. Does that sound okay?”

I let a smile twist my lips. “Yeah, that’s perfect.”

He glanced over at me. “You all right?”

I nodded slowly. “I think so. I just can’t believe it’s really over.”

“I know.” He stared out at the road. He had his hair pulled back in a loose ponytail at the nape of his neck and wore a white v-neck with blue jeans. “But it is over. Every day will get easier.”

“Will you be there?” I don’t know why I asked; my heart believed he would be there, that it wasn’t just this tragedy that held us together.

“What?” He jerked the truck over to the shoulder and threw it into park. Cars zoomed past us.

“What are you doing?”

He turned to me and grasped my hands in his. The streetlights lit up the left side of his face, making his eyes look like dark, never-ending pools. “I’m yours, Julia. And I’m not going anywhere, not unless you’re there by my side.” 

My heart skipped a beat.

“But Elaine and your mom…they said you do this. You go from woman to—”

“I did. Before I saw you. But not now. Not since I saw you at the first Rapture X party.”

“You promise?” I whispered.

“With everything I have. I promise.” 

“I’m yours, too.”

“As if you have a choice.” He winked.

I giggled and smacked his hand, just as he pulled me in for a kiss. An utterly life-altering kiss, making my toes curl and my cunt drip. I was breathless when he pulled back. 

“You never asked me what I wanted to do tonight.” He turned and put the car into drive, leaving me feeling desperate for him.

“What do you want to do?” I asked breathlessly. 

“You.” 

I squirmed in my seat, rubbing my thighs together.

“On my desk.”

“At Rapture?” I bit my lip.

“No. At my corporate office.”

“But that’s in New York.”

His lips twitched into a smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “I know.”

“But we’re going to see Gran—”

“Yes, we are. Tomorrow. But tonight,” he glanced at me, a wicked gleam in his eyes, “I want you on
my
desk.” 

And I wanted that, too, more than anything else. 

EPILOGUE

Julia.

Three years later

I stood at the end of the end of an aisle. The aisle I was about to walk down with my father. The aisle that would take me to the man I loved. The man who had stalked me, taken control of my body, and murdered his brother. 

He’d
saved
me. 

Not just from Chris. His love gave me new light. Those days, months after it had ended, when the nightmares controlled my nights and fear ruled my day, Cole had saved me then, too.

His love surrounded me and protected me from all the things I feared. He had stood by me, helped me find my path. I was a college student now with more than two years down toward my degree. I would be that English teacher I had always wanted to be. And in my moments of doubt, before and during school, Cole had been right there, cheering me on.