Page 45 of Fourth Wheel
“Do I just click on it to make it play?”
I can’t hold back my smile at that one. He really does act like he’s forty-seven instead of twenty-seven sometimes. I lean toward him, my shoulder grazing his, and click one I’ve already watched so I know what to expect. Still. It doesn’t make the sounds of fist against flesh any easier to stomach. Dempsey tenses beside me every time someone lands a punch, almost as if he can feel his brother’s pain.
I cringe when I hear myself scream “Stop!” for the first time, my recorded voice tinny. He pulls the device closer to his face and studies it as I pick at the corner of the duvet rumpled beneath me.
“You,” he whispers, forcing me to look up and meet his gaze. “You stopped them,” he states matter-of-factly.
I resist rolling my eyes. Fielding and I explained what happened last night. But I guess witnessing it rather than just hearing about it secondhand garners a different reaction.
His eyes widen as he focuses on the screen, watching me take on a pack of frat boys like I’m Russell Crowe inGladiator.
“Show me another one.”
I want to argue that if he’s seen one, he’s seen them all. But something about the harrowed expression on his face tells me he needs to see it to believe it. That he needs to know everything he can about what happened last night.
I lean over and scroll through the options, clicking on a video that starts before I arrived.
After a minute, Dempsey hisses under his breath. “Fuck…”
“What?” I peer over his shoulder at the screen, then yelp as he grabs my legs and pulls them across his lap.
“Your ankle,” he murmurs as he pushes up my left pant leg and massages the tender spot. “This one shows you stumbling before you even bust into the circle.”
I sigh at his touch, leaning back on my elbows and sinking into the ministrations of his big, strong hands. He keeps circling and pressing into the muscle as he watches. I’m so relaxed, I let myself close my eyes and lie back completely, my legs draped over his lap. When he starts up another video without my help, I smile. He’s figured it out on his own.
We lie like that for five or six more videos, the repetitive sound of my voice and the crowd’s reaction easy to tune out as the scene plays out over and over again. When the room goes quiet, I exhale, relieved that we’re done playing last night’s trauma on a loop.
I don’t need to be reminded of what it felt like to stand on trembling legs and fight like hell to make it out of that circle unharmed. I lived it.
Dempsey sets the phone down by my side. “Will the videos cause problems for you?” he asks, using both hands to massage my feet now.
I sigh in response to his touch, desperate to keep my eyes closed and live in this moment for as long as he’ll let me. He’s quiet for nearly a minute before he pushes.
“Maddie… answer me.”
I open my eyes and curl up to sit, straightening my legs out on his lap in the process. “No. I’ll be fine,” I answer honestly. “Some of the stuff I threatened them with isn’t entirely true, and any lawyer worth their snuff would know that. But I always assumed I’d have to delete my social media accounts once I graduate from college. More than anything, it’ll just be annoying to keep getting tagged in posts until this blows over. But it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
He nods, that adorable wrinkle between his brows deeper than I’ve ever seen it. Wordlessly, he continues to rub my feet and ankles, so I lean back again and let him work through it on his own.
“Adley,” he says softly, freezing when I stiffen in his grasp. “What did Andrew Adley say to you before he called everyone off? I could see your reaction in some of the videos. But I couldn’t hear what he said.”
I pull my knees to my chest, locking my arms around them and glancing out toward the French doors. The view really is pretty, with the sun rising over the canopy of trees in the Cuyahoga Valley National Forest. I guess I hadn’t realized how far east we were when Dempsey drove us home last night.
“Maddie,” he reprimands, one hand tilting my chin toward him. “Answer me,” he insists.
I nod but stay silent. Not because I don’t remember. Or because I want to keep it from Dempsey. But I can’t repeat it and trust my voice not to tremble.
I lean over his lap, pick up my phone, and open the video I took last night. I hand it to him and hit play, then curl up into his side. Without hesitation, he wraps one arm around me. I close my eyes but listen intently as the video starts with me explaining assault charges to all those douche bags.
Dempsey tenses beside me at the threat Adley made when he approached me, then he squeezes the shit out of my shoulder when Adley addresses the crowd and tells them we’ve reached an agreement.
“Ow, Dem…” I mutter.
He loosens his grip, but I can still feel him seething beside me.
When Adley tells me to tell my friends I won’t need a ride home and that he’ll find me later, Dempsey pushes to his feet.
He paces the length of the bed: an animal trapped in an invisible cage. He’s holding my phone ridiculously close to his face, but I had forgotten I was still recording at that point, so there can’t be much to see on the screen.
