Page 1 of Possessed By Knox
Chapter One
Ruth
Call me jaded, but the city looks even uglier than I remember. It’s all strong lines and concrete, sharp angles and gray skies. When the Chicago skyline comes into view, it feels like the buildings are mocking me for coming back, when I swore to never set foot in this place again.
I thought I had escaped for good, that I was free. [KB1]
But here I am four years later, and the city remains unchanged, indifferent to my pain just as it was when I left. It’s a slap in the face, really. That everything could stay the same and life could continue with or without me.
No, I never wanted to come back here, and I intend to leave this goddamn city as soon as possible.
I grip the steering wheel tightly and try to focus on the road ahead, to navigate without acknowledging the ghosts that haunt me. But the buildings…God, all those familiar landmarks. They stand like sentinels, each a painful reminder of what I left behind. I try to control myself, stay detached as I drive past them, but my eyes wander, and it’s like a visceral pull.
“Get a hold of yourself, Ruth!” I hiss, running an impatient hand through my hair. “You’re not the same girl you were when you left.”
No, I left that girl behind when I started college in Springfield a few hours away. Now, I just feel pity and resentment toward that girl. Her sole purpose in life was to make her parents happy. She was pushed to perfection and she darn near lost herself trying to achieve it. She was a “good girl from a good family,” according to her mother, and a straight-A student with anxiety from trying to please everyone else all the time. She was never allowed to make a mistake or slip for even a moment.
At fifteen, the majority of my time was spent buried in textbooks. And when my eyes were bleeding and my brain was too overloaded to consume anything else, I was pushed into the music room, practicing piano until my fingers were numb and ears ringing. All so I could entertain my parents’ friends when they came over.
I had myself convinced that they just wanted what was best for me, but even that delusion waned at some point.
So, I started to plan my escape, applying for scholarships without my parents knowing. [KB2]
The second I got a full ride to study aerospace engineering, I packed everything I owned and left home. I barely glanced at the rearview mirror as Chicago and its monstrous buildings disappeared behind me. I didn’t truly believe I was free of the city—of my family—until I arrived at the University of Illinois in Springfield, [KB3]and only then was I able to draw my first deep breath. It felt like my life was just starting, and I swore I would never come back.
And yet, here I am.
Last night, when I got the call from my parents asking me to come back, I brushed them off as I often do. In the past, they’ve tried pleading, then bullying, and even threatened to disown me if I didn’t come back, but it all fell on deaf ears. I didn’t need them. I haven’t needed them in a while.
But this time, they knew just the right trigger to get me to drop everything and rush back.
My little sister.
The one who chose to stay.
Unlike me, Abby didn’t have much reason to leave. Our parents weren’t as hard on her as they were on me. They never pressured her to study until her eyes bled, or play piano until her wrists hurt. If anything, they ignored her. I was the heir and she was the spare.She had options, free will…everything I was denied as I child. [KB4]
But I never could hate her. I glance down at the rosebud on my wrist, remembering when Abby and I decided to get matching tattoos. We were close once. It isn’t her fault that I was born first. And it’s not her fault that I was forced into perfection while she was allowed to have a childhood.
When I left, I naively believed that our parents would continue to treat her as they always had, but I was wrong.
And now she’s in trouble.
I replay my last phone call with my mother over again in my mind. It took half an hour of her frantic sobs before I was able to make sense of what she was crying about. But once I understood what she was saying…her claims that my little sister had been kidnapped and brainwashed by a dangerous gang were enough to send chills racing down my back. I considered that it could be a ploy to get me to come home, until she mentioned the name of the gang that had taken Abby.
The Steel Rebels Motorcycle Club.
Even thinking that name now sends fear climbing up my throat. The Steel Rebels are one of the most dangerous groups in the city. Maybe the most dangerous. I knew of the Rebels even before I skipped town. Everyone did.
Abby’s phone was disconnected, and I panicked when I couldn’t reach her. How the hell did my sister get tangled upwith such an infamous group? Even a sheltered girl like me had heard of them, always on the news being linked to murder and weapons trafficking. Heck, even the cops were scared of them, and I don’t imagine that’s changed in the four years I’ve been away.
Kidnapped? Brainwashed?
I run a hand through my hair anxiously. Fear for my sister’s safety has me forcing back my own uncertainty. And there’s a little bit of guilt that I try not to acknowledge. Guilt about my selfish decision to save my own skin and leave my little sister alone to deal with our parents.
Does she hate me?Resent me for not staying and protecting her as older sisters are supposed to?
God, I bet she wouldn’t even recognize me now. I chopped my waist-long, jet-black hair into a bob, and I got bangs that would horrify my vain mother. I sometimes wear glasses so I won’t see the blue-gray eyes I got from our father. And I even use a little makeup to hide the stupid freckles scattered all over my nose, in an attempt to look nothing like the girl who left.
