“Thanks, Lay. I honestly don’t know what I would’ve done without you.”
“No hugging.” She lifts her hands up in the air and runs away before I can do just that.
I touch my watch and shake my head, which fills with a thousand scenarios.
Layla is right about the part where Jonathan is reacting. He didn’t like that I somehow coerced him to share the same bed with me, and his knee-jerk reaction was to punish and slam me back in the place he thinks I belong to. I could either back down or push further — which will cost me his wrath.
Unlucky for him, I don’t lie down and take people’s anger. Especially the unwarranted kind.
My phone vibrates. Unknown Number.
Is this perhaps Ethan? I need to apologise about not being able to take him up on his offer. Though it’d be a nice ‘fuck you’ to Jonathan if I did.
“Aurora Harper speaking.”
“Miss Harper. This is Stephan Wayne.”
My muscles tighten and my hand shakes, causing droplets of my iced coffee to spill on the sofa.
Air comes in and out of my lungs, but it’s like I don’t breathe. Or, rather, I can’t.
Will I always react this way whenever Dad’s presence is brought up?
It’s been eleven years, damn it. Eleven fucking years, so how come it always feels as if it happened only yesterday?
Why do I feel trapped in that forest, pedalling down a dirt path but finding no way out?
“I told you not to contact me anymore.” I’m about to end the call.
“Miss, please. There’s crucial information that I think you should be aware of.”
My knuckles tighten around the phone. “What?”
“Are you certain about not being able to participate in the parole hearing? It will be in a few weeks.”
“No. If you have nothing else to say —”
“Very well. I understand your choice, Miss Harper. I would like to relay a message from my client. Mr Griffin says that if you don’t help him out this time, it’ll be like traps and hunting all over again. That will be all. Have a nice day.”
My phone clatters from my hand and hits the carpet at my feet.
It’ll be like traps and hunting all over again.
A long time ago, when Dad and I went hunting, he used to set traps for the small animals. I asked him why he did so, considering they’re put in so much pain for a long time.
Then Dad made me watch him skin a live rabbit and he told me that’s what so much pain could actually feel like.
After that, I never questioned Dad about anything he did.
After that, I kind of knew in the deepest recesses of my brain that my father wasn’t normal.
His message is clear. If I don’t bend to his will, he’ll do something worse to make me stop questioning him.
Not that he can do anything from prison.
Right?
That night, I go home late.