Page 13 of Blood Ties
Chapter Four
Kai
Istare up at the ceilingand pick at the skin around my fingernails until it bleeds. My music now drowns out the sounds from Knox’s room on the other side of our shared wall, but it can’t erase the memory from my head. I know exactly what I heard, and who’s in there with him.
If only I had the guts — and the knowledge—I could’ve been the one making Riley sound like that.
It doesn’t matter, I tell myself. I barely know the girl. So what if I thought we shared a moment out on the porch? Clearly I was wrong. Or I fucked it up worse than I thought when I pushed her away.
And straight onto my brother’s dick, apparently.
I won’t deny that jealousy is lighting a fire in my chest, but cold dread is enough to douse it. Because I know what happens to the girls my brother likes. I still remember his silent question:Keep her?
I imagine her blue eyes pleading at me from above a duct-taped mouth. Those eyes rolling back in her head as blood runs down her face. Stuck wide-open as she lies on the butcher table—
I groan, roll over, pull my pillow over my head. That’s not gonna happen. Riley and her friends are going to leave in the morning. Knox won’t risk doing anything while Dad’s gone. He knows he’ll be in a fuckload of trouble if the old man realizes he had people here, let alone made another mess for him to deal with.
Anxiety claws at me anyway. I’m tempted to reach for my lighter, to add to the collection of scars on my body and let pain chase away my thoughts. But if Dad smells smoke in my room, it’ll mean a worse kind of pain. And if I leave my room, I might run into somebody. Just thinking about awkwardly encountering Riley makes my stomach roil.
So, like a thousand other times, I drift off to the sound of Radiohead, and pretend that nothing exists beyond the walls of my room.
*
IWAKE UP TO A GUNSHOT.
I’m on the floor before I’m conscious, throwing myself out of the way. It takes me a moment to realize the sound was outside, and another to lurch to my feet.
Knox.
I fling my door open and stumble into the hall, only to come face-to-face with my brother. He’s shirtless and bleary-eyed, and looks as startled as me. We both freeze, eyeing each other.
My breath catches. If it wasn’t Knox, then...
The front door slams open downstairs. Familiar, heavy footsteps thud down the hallway. My stomach sinks lower with each thump of worn boots — and further still as I recognize the sound of something being dragged behind him.
“Boys,” Dad’s voice thunders. “Get down here.Now.”
Knox lurches toward the stairs. We both know he’s only rushing toward pain, but it’ll be even worse if we delay it. Yet when I force myself to take a step forward, my eyes catch on movement, and I pause.
Riley peers through the doorway to Knox’s room. Her clothes are rumpled and her hair a mess, her eyes huge in her pale face. She’s only wearing a crop top and her lacy black panties. “Kai? What’s going on?”
I hesitate, rocking back on my heels. I shouldn’t get involved. It’s too late, way too late, but— “Climb out the window,” I say. “Run.”
She stares at me. “What are you talking about?”
“Kai!” Dad roars from downstairs, and pure fear licks up my spine. I run down the stairs without another glance back, and hope that Riley is smart enough to follow my advice.
Dad waits in the kitchen.The easiest room to clean, he likes to say. He’s rigid, his face stone. I’m only an inch shorter than him, but it’s hard to believe sometimes, with the way he fills the room, all broad shoulders and thick beard. I can feel the anger radiating out of him, see it in the depths of his dark eyes, the way his lip peels back over his crooked, yellowing teeth.
The way he looks at me scares me even more than his shotgun, aimed at one of Riley’s friends. The skinny guy. Caleb. His glasses have been knocked askew and there’s blood running down his temple. He stays on his knees with his hands raised, terrified and disoriented.
Knox stands a few paces away. I come to a stop beside him. Shoulder to shoulder, both facing down Dad’s rage. It doesn’t matter that Knox brought them here. In Dad’s eyes, we’ll both be guilty.
Caleb is babbling apologies. Outside, that blonde girl — May — is screaming. Uncle Frank must be out there with her.
But Knox and I keep our attention locked on Dad. He lifts his gaze from Caleb to me, his grizzled face pulled into a snarl.
“What the fuck is going on here?” he asks, looking from me, to Knox, and back again. It’s hard not to shiver under the weight of his stare. My body is taut with the memory of pain. “What are these kids doing on my property?”
