MY CHEST FEELS HEAVY AS I straddle my motorcycle and head toward Tessa’s house, hoping like hell Alexandra is safe and that Jasper didn’t send those motherfuckers after me as a diversion to get to her.
I know Jasper well enough to know that fucker always has an agenda. He didn’t send his men with James for his benefit. He just made James believe that when he most likely had plans of his own. He’s a selfish fuck.
Every thought makes me dizzy as I rush through stops, barely taking the time to look for vehicles. Nothing else matters to me at the moment except getting to her. If anything has happened to her, or if she was threatened in the slightest, I’ll kill Jasper and there will be nothing that can stop me.
It feels a hell of a lot longer than it should when I pull my bike up in front of Tessa’s to see my truck parked in the driveway. A part of me is relieved to get to Alexandra, while the other part is terrified I’ll walk into something that will fucking break me.
Climbing off my bike, I crack my neck, preparing for shit to go down, before I rush to the door and push it open.
The living room is dark, the only light in the house coming from the hallway where Alexandra’s old room is.
“Lex!” I take off toward the room, not waiting for a response from her, but my heart sinks when I find the room empty. “Goddammit. I’ll put a bullet in this fucker’s head, I swear.” I grip the doorframe and squeeze it, before turning around, heading back to the living room.
It’s too dark to see shit, so I make my way over to the couch to turn on the floor lamp, pausing for a split second when I hear something crunch under my boot. Whatever it is there seems to be a lot, because there’s some more crunches beneath my feet as I continue my way to the lamp.
As soon as light fills the room, I look down at the ground, my stomach twisting into knots when I see pills scattered on the floor and what looks to be residue of cocaine. “Fucking shit!”
I flex my jaw, prepared to lose my shit as I look away from the mess on the floor to find Alexandra slumped against the back wall, her red hair covering her face. It takes me right back to the first time I laid eyes on her when she was just eight, except then she was curled up with her knees to her chest, a wave of white-blonde hair surrounding her.
“Lex . . .” I barely get her name out, because the air gets sucked straight from my lungs when I get close enough to see blood staining her gray shirt.
I immediately fall to my knees in front of her, everything around me spinning as I reach for her face and lift it. “Fuck! Fuck! Look at me, Lex. Look at me.” My gaze scans her face, everything inside of me close to exploding when I see it’s swollen and bloodied. She’s not responding to me which has more panic setting in.
It takes me a few seconds to remember the pills on the floor, which has me pulling her into my arms and shoving my fingers down her throat.
Tears fall down my face as I desperately try to force the pills out of her system. The scary part is that I don’t know how long she’s been like this. She feels lifeless in my arms. “Let it out, Lex. Fucking let it out! Please, just listen to me! Let it out, dammit!”
I shove my fingers further into her throat and turn her over to her side as puke begins running down my hand. “Wake up! Fucking wake up.” I plead with her to wake up, but even after puking some of the pills out, she doesn’t come to.
The door swings open, and on instinct I reach for my pistol and aim it toward the door, ready to put a bullet in someone.
“Whoa! It’s me. It’s me.” Blaine throws his arms up. “What the fuck happened to your–? He stops, his eyes widening once they lower from my face to see Alexandra in my arms. “Holy fuck!” His eyes raise to meet my wet ones and he loses it, breaking the closest thing to him before he rushes over and grabs my shoulder. “Get her up now! Are the keys in the truck?”
“I don’t fucking know! I don’t . . .” I run my hand over my wet face and Blaine rushes out the door, most likely to see if the keys are outside.
My mind is on autopilot as I pick Alexandra up and carry her toward the door.
“The keys are out here!” Blaine screams, running over to open the passenger door when he sees us step outside.
I place Alexandra into the truck before I climb in and pull her into my lap, burying my face into her neck. The door slams closed behind us and within seconds Blaine is backing out of the driveway and we’re headed to the hospital.
Blaine is talking, screaming shit, but I don’t understand a word that leaves his mouth, because the only thing I’m focused on is her.
I can’t lose her.
I can’t.
I won’t survive without her again. Not after knowing what it feels like to have her back.
Everything happens so fast. We made it in record time, pulling up out front of the emergency room. I’m so distraught that I barely remember carrying her inside and screaming for someone to help us.
I remember fighting to go back with her and then standing here frozen, my face wet with tears as they take her away from me.
I haven’t slept in over twenty-four hours and neither has Blaine. He’s been at my side the entire time, keeping me calm the best he can as Alexandra comes in and out of it.
She had enough drugs in her system that she should’ve died. If I hadn’t gotten to her when I did, and if Blaine hadn’t shown up and rushed us to the emergency room, then she would’ve.
There’s nothing I want more than to get to Jasper. He fucked up in the worst way possible, and now he’s going to pay the ultimate price. But I can’t and won’t leave Alexandra’s side.
Every time I look at her beautiful face and see the cuts and bruises Jasper left behind, I can’t breathe. I’m surprised I’ve survived the last twenty-four hours from my lack of oxygen.
“We’ll get that piece of shit back.” Blaine stands up from the chair he’s been sitting in and begins pacing the hospital room. He’s been doing this off and on since we arrived.
“I know,” is all I can manage at the moment. All my fucking energy was drained the moment I saw her helpless on the ground.
“I should’ve stayed there.” Blaine runs a tattooed hand through his hair, his nerves as shot as mine. “If I had been there this shit never would’ve happened.”
“You had no reason to,” I say for the fifth time. “Tessa wasn’t there. This is not on you.”
He stops pacing and looks at the door when it opens. Everyone has been in and out to check on her whenever they can. I’m not sure who it is this time and I don’t want to look away from Alexandra to see.
“Hey.” Mark’s voice is quiet as he steps into the room. “Any updates?” he asks Blaine.
Blaine called Mark right after we got to the hospital and explained to him that we don’t want to give up Jasper’s name, because this is something we have to handle ourselves.
He nodded, knowing exactly what that meant. He may be a cop, but he’s a loyal-as-fuck one. He knows when to keep shit on the down low.
“She’s still drugged up and will be in pain for a while, but she’ll be okay . . .”
I phaseout their conversation and crawl back into bed with Alexandra, pulling her into my arms.
Over the next ten hours she wakes up every so often and cries into my arms. It kills me over and over again, and I don’t give a shit who’s in the room with us. I cry with her and hold her to my chest, letting her know I’ll never let anyone hurt her again.
The crew is in the cafeteria getting something to eat, but eating isn’t something I can do right now, and with all the bad thoughts running through my head I haven’t been able to stand still.
It’s torture, because seeing Alexandra this way tears my fucking insides out, yet the thought of leaving her here in this bed, so I don’t have to look at her beaten to hell hurts just as much.
“Jax.” Alexandra’s scratchy voice has me turning away from the wall and rushing over to her side. “I need to tell you what happened. Keeping it from you hurts and I don’t want to keep anything from you ever again.”
I run my hand over her head and kiss her forehead, feeling torn up inside as tears well up in her eyes. “Fuck, baby. I hate seeing you cry.” It’s the worst thing in the world and I’ve seen it too much over the last few days since she woke up in this bed.
My heart races when she looks up into my eyes and I know right then that it’s going to take a lot of strength not to destroy everything in this hospital room when I hear the shit that asshole put her through.
Sitting on the bed, I cup her face in my hands and place my forehead against hers, letting her know I’m here to comfort her through this, whatever it is. “Are you sure you’re ready?”
She shakes her head and places her hands over mine. “I don’t know, but I need to tell you, Jax. It’s eating me up inside.” She swallows nervously, her hands shaking on top of mine. “He punched me and threw me around as if I was garbage. But that’s nothing I’m not used to. I could’ve handled that just fine, Jax. But . . .”
I run my thumbs over her wet cheeks when she pauses. “Dammit, I’m going to kill him. I hate with everything in me that this happened.” My heart slams against my ribcage as I wait for her to continue, because I know that’s not the worst part.
“He said his drugs weren’t good enough for me just like they weren’t good enough for your mother. He forced a handful of pills into my mouth to prove a point. He kept hitting me and throwing me around, not caring that it was hurting me. I thought he was going to rape me, Jax. He yanked my pants down and shoved his fingers inside of me and said he’d be back for me. I felt disgusting and dirty. I blacked out after that, so I don’t know what else he did to me. I don’t know . . .”
She begins shaking and tears fall heavier down her face as I hold her against me, rage coursing through me. After a few minutes, I can’t hold my anger in any longer, so I walk away from her, knocking shit over as I make my way to the wall and punch it over and over again.
Someone opens the door and yells out for help, but I keep swinging out, unable to gain control.
I don’t stop until Royal runs into the room and struggles to hold my arms back. “Save it for that dead motherfucker.” He growls beside my ear. “Let that hate you feel build up inside you and then use that explosion to destroy him.”
I push Royal back and walk away, needing some room to breathe. How the fuck am I supposed to keep everything in when I can picture that motherfucker on top of her, violating her? I can’t.
I grip my hair with both hands and kneel down in front of the wall to take a few breaths in hopes it will calm me down and help me think, but it doesn’t.
The only thing on my mind is getting to Jasper and killing him. He deserves a slow, painful death, but every second he’s on this earth is a second too long.
He has to die now. He’s done too much damage over the years and what he just did to Alexandra—he signed his death warrant.