CHAPTER 41
JACKIE
“You look amazing,” I whispered over Tara’s shoulder. She turned to me, a billowy tornado of orange organza ruffles that sent a breeze through the air. Her smile lit up the room.
She squealed when she saw me, a loud, unapologetic, ear-shattering scream, that broke through the sound of the band and sent eyes scattering our way.
“That dress is insane!” she cried, eyeing me up and down, instantly making me nervous. Maybe it was too much. There was a lot of cleavage and it left nothing to the imagination.
I was being brave. Bold, even.
“Too much?” I asked.
“Not if you want to get laid,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows.
What I’d wanted to do was impress Fury. I wanted to make him want me the way I wanted him. Not that he hadn’t been convincing me of that every day for the last week. Sex with him had left me breathless and amazed at his stamina.
Men like him didn’t come along that often.
Which is why I wanted tonight to be special.
I couldn’t put my finger on it, but something told me my time with Fury was limited. In fact — that little voice in the back of my head? You know the one, the one that won’t shut the hell up no matter how much you try to convince yourself that someone’s real but they aren’t?
Yeah, that one.
It kept repeating the same phrase over and over, ripping through my good time and beating in the back of my head like an incessant, pounding funeral dirge.
He’s only temporary. This won’t last. He’ll be gone soon.
Maybe it was the fact that everything else in my life was temporary. Hank didn’t stay, not that I wanted him to. Jared was practically a ghost. Why should Fury be any different?
He was too good to be true. And a future?
My goodness, he’d even hesitated giving me his real name.
He told me other things, though. Things that melted away any desire to slow this ride. He told me he’d never felt this way before. That he’d never had this much fun. That he loved being with me.
But, as if each moment was plucked from the air randomly, there was no talk of time. Each time I tried to talk to him about the past, he clammed up. The future seemed to not even exist at all.
Spending the evenings together as if it was expected, we’d fall into bed together in a silent little bubble each night.
I mean, it was a really fucking good bubble, but still…
I knew it wasn’t going to last. A man like him would never stay in a place like Greenville. That just didn’t happen.
Fury was better than Greenville.
I’d come to the realization that enjoying this — whatever this was — was something meant to be done in the moment and that at some time, I would be expected to let it all slip away.
Easy come, easy go, right?
Sure, I could do that — what else did I know anyway?
“Where is he?” Tara asked.
“Talking to Green in the corner,” I said. “Will you come to the bathroom with me?”
“Sure,” she said, turning to Jimmy, who was wearing the same brown suit he wore last year, and kissing his cheek. “Be right back.”
We were almost to the doors of the gym when they opened and Hank walked in.
“Shit,” I muttered, looking for a way to avoid him. There was only one way in and out of the gym — the door that led out to the hallway, the one Hank, dressed in jeans and a black leather jacket, stood blocking.
He spotted us right away and closed the distance between us.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” Tara muttered, moving in front of me. I shook my head, my gaze darting around quickly. The last thing I wanted was to make a scene. I pushed Tara out of the way.
“I got this,” I whispered to her as I squared up in front of Hank. He was tall, towering over me as he raked his gaze across my body. On the rare occasions when he wasn’t angry, Hank could be quite handsome in a frail, lanky kind of way. He pushed his hand through his hair in frustration, shaking his head.
“Hello, Hank,” I nodded. I figured he’d be here tonight. My big plan was to ignore him completely, and if that didn’t work, then this was Plan B. Be polite in greeting him, then ignore him.
“Jackie, you look amazing,” he said.
I smiled and nodded and then moved to step around him. He took a step sideways and blocked my way.
“Hank, please move out of my way,” I said.
“Not until you hear me out,” he said.
“That’s not necessary,” I said, lowering my voice to a seething whisper. “I told you. It’s over.”
He shook his head and reached for my arm, his skinny fingers snaking around my bicep and making my skin crawl. I tried to pull away but he gripped me tighter.
“Hank!” I insisted. “Let me go!”
“Why, so you can go throw yourself at that freaky tattooed dude?”
“It’s none of your business,” Tara said, stepping in between us quickly. “Jackie can do as she pleases. Let her go, Hank.”
“Fuck off, Tara,” he spat. “She’s fucking mine.”
“Hank,” I warned, as I began to lift my knee to his crotch.
Tara reached out and tried to pull his hand away. He pulled back, letting go and swinging his elbow out, his arm striking her in the face.
The rest was a blur.
Out of nowhere, Fury appeared in a buzz of heat and with the speed of a jaguar, he jumped out of the shadows like a wild animal. His fist slammed into Hank’s jaw and he fell to the floor with a heavy thud.
“Ho-ly shit,” Tara whispered. I stared at Fury with my mouth open.
“Are you two ladies alright?” Fury asked, looking at us with concern.
“We are now,” Tara said, nodding.
My eyes broke from Fury and I gazed around the room. The band stopped playing and everyone was watching us, from Dottie on one side to a wide-eyed and grinning Molly and Benji in the corner.
Suddenly, I realized I was the sole reason their night had been interrupted. Hank flailed like a fly with a broken wing on the floor, blood pouring from his probably broken nose.
“Jackie?” Fury said, an apologetic look starting to cross his face. “I’m sorry, I thought he was hurting you.”
I looked at him and blinked, shaking my head.
“It’s okay,” I whispered. “He’s an asshole. I gotta go…”
The urge to flee ripped through me, the need to escape all those prying eyes, the lips that would momentarily begin to move, spewing rumors of massive proportions that would spread like wildfire throughout the gym and out into the town.
I’d be the talk of the town tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that…
Fury punching Hank to defend me would be all anyone talked about for weeks. I know how all this works. And in that moment, I was mortified.
Fury had done something nobody else ever had.
This wasn’t the first time Hank had laid his hands on me in public. The first time we were at the Homecoming dance, held in this same gymnasium, in fact. Hank was being crowned Homecoming King onstage. He’d come off stage and saw me in the corner, talking and laughing with Shane and Henry, two of his friends. Instantly filled with jealous rage, he’d roughly pulled me out by my elbow and everyone had watched and done nothing, just as they were watching now.
Of course, I was the talk of the town — they talked about it for weeks and somehow, in the end, it was all my fault for knowingly doing something that would cause Hank to get upset. As if in every innocent act of daily life, I should consider Hank’s jealousy before doing anything.
In the end, Hank was the victim.
I was just a source of endless gossip.
A near exact incident occurred in Jack’s bar a few years later and ended with the same results.
This time, though? Tonight? Someone had stepped up.
Fury.
Fury — who’d seen Hank put his hands on me for the very first time and came forward to do something about it. He didn’t know Hank, he barely knew me, he knew nothing of our history, and yet, he saw something was wrong and he acted.
I’d never been more in awe of a human being.
And still, I had to leave. I had to get away from those judgmental stares, the whispers bubbling up in the corner, the knowing smiles. I ran out of the room, leaving Fury and Tara and Hank and all the rest of them behind.
“Jackie!” Tara called.
“I’m fine!” I yelled, throwing a hand out to stop her from following me.
She stopped and I ran out of the door, down the hallway that held my old locker from senior year and into the very same bathroom that I’d gone into to fix my makeup from crying after Hank hauled me out of the Homecoming dance that night.
I stared at myself in the mirror, shaking my head.
This time, there were no tears. Outside of a little redness popping up on my arm in the shape of Hank’s fingers, there was nothing to indicate that Hank had done anything. No tears, no blood, no bruises.
Tonight, Hank was the one bleeding.
I couldn’t help but smile. The bastard finally got what he deserved.
Maybe now he’d never touch another woman like that. Maybe now he’d think twice about thinking he had any kind of control over me or my body. Maybe now, he’d mercifully leave me alone.
And maybe now, this time, I wouldn’t be the one the entire town blamed.
Maybe they’d actually blame Hank.
Still trembling, I took a deep breath and then another, steeling myself for leaving the bathroom. I shouldn’t have left Fury alone out there, even though I knew he was perfectly capable of handling himself.
But he deserved to have me standing by his side, showing the entire town that I supported what he’d done for me.
Later, privately, I’d show him just how deep my appreciation went.