By the Pale Moonlight (Book One of the Moonlight Series) (19 page)

BOOK: By the Pale Moonlight (Book One of the Moonlight Series)
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Tired and pulverized, the attackers started
to retreat one at a time. David's blond head tried to dart toward
his car, but Ty tackled him from behind. A strangled cry escaped my
throat as Ty continued his assault.

He clutched David by the scruff of the collar
and pummeled him in the face, over and over, each hit muffling what
little sounds of protest David made. Soon his features were a
bloody mess, one particularly solid strike sending a wet spray
across the pavement.

"Do something," I pleaded with Caleb.

Caleb flicked his eyes over the scene, but
didn't budge from his spot.

"You bastard."

I rushed over to Ty and gripped his right
arm, mid-swing. It was slick and he easily shrugged me away and
continued his attack.

"Ty, stop! You're going to kill him!"

A deep growl radiated from his chest when I
latched on again. He rounded on me, seemingly unable to tell friend
from foe.

His backhand across my cheek rang out like a
gunshot, the force of it knocking me to the ground. My jaw slammed
closed, and I tasted blood. Small pebbles and bits of debris cut
into my palms at the impact, and my eyes watered as a thousand
pinpricks of pain spread from temple to chin, expanding and
intense. When I finally managed to straighten up, he stood frozen
above me, statute-like and magnificent. A God of war.

He lunged at me.

I scurried backward, a small whimper of
protest the only sound I could muster.

He froze, the color slowly draining from his
face, muscles slackening as he came back to himself.

My fingers inched up to cover my cheek, as
though to conceal his crime.

His feverish eyes cleared. "Oh God," he
muttered to himself, slowly backing away.

I shook my head vehemently. "No. It was an
accident."

He turned and ran.

Chapter 16

 

 

David stirred a few feet from where I sat, my
mind unable to comprehend all that had just transpired. I crawled
to where he lay, blood running from his nose, lips split, eyes
bruised.

"Don't move," I said. "I'll get you
help."

He moaned a response, legs flailing as he
squirmed on his back, shoes scraping along the pavement.

Vince and the others began to straggle into
the light, each looking like they had been in a car accident. A
thin stream of blood was flowing from a cut above Vince's right
eye, and he scowled at me.

"Get away from him," he said.

Jenna and Mike hobbled into the light, his
arm draped over her shoulders for support. "You should keep that
asshole in a cage. He could've killed someone," Jenna said.

Oh, how they forget. If I thought it would
help to remind her that
they
had attacked
us
, I
would've been more than happy to clarify the point. But it was
clear they'd believe what they wanted to.

A hand grasped my arm and tried to pull me to
my feet. I flinched away, but the person held firm.

"We need to go," Caleb said. He sounded bored
and irritated.

I scowled, immediately regretting it when
shoots of pain erupted across my face.

He let out a sigh of exasperation. "Now."

"Wait," I said. I turned toward Vince who
stood guard above David while the other guys were trying to help
their fallen friend sit up. He glowered at me. I mustered my
remaining energy to glare back.

"This never happened," I said.

"Who the hell do you think you're trying to
threaten, bitch?" Vince spat.

I smiled then, and he seemed to shrink back a
little at the sight. I must have been ghastly to behold.

"It's not a threat. If word gets out about
tonight, I guarantee the police will find me a most cooperative
witness. I'm sure they'll be interested in hearing
all
about
tonight."

Vince tried to appear unimpressed, but his
telltale Adam's apple bobbed up and down with his deep swallow. He
cast a quick glance at David, who was sitting up now, his face
looking like it'd had a run-in with a sledgehammer and lost. Big
time.

"If we go down, your boyfriend goes down,
too." Vince didn't sound so sure of himself anymore.

"Sure. Guys get in trouble all the time for
trying to defend their girlfriends from a would-be rapist and the
pack of dipshits that follow him around."

Vince paled.

"Glad we're in agreement." I tried to stand,
but my legs wobbled beneath me. Caleb grabbed hold, steadying
me.

"Now you better get him out of..." I swayed,
my thoughts scattering like the globe of a dandelion in a strong
wind. A dark curtain descended over my eyes. I reached out for a
hand that wasn't there. "Ty..."

The last thing I heard was the high-pitched
wail of an approaching siren.

 

o0o

 

Oh God, I hurt.

I struggled to open my eyes, but they refused
to cooperate, reflexively clenching tight at the bright light I
glimpsed through slitted lids. My head felt as though someone had
taken a pickaxe to my skull, and my face felt even worse. I moaned
when a ripple of pain spread through the area.

"Hold still," a male voice said. It sounded
familiar, but I couldn't place it.

Something probed along my skin, and then an
immense cold pressed down on me.

"Holy shit!" I smacked the offending object
away.

There was a long pause and then an
exasperated sigh.

"Personally I could care less if your face
swells. Your choice."

Oh God, not him.

I grimaced when I locked eyes with Caleb, who
hovered above me with a bag of ice wrapped in a kitchen towel. He
was frowning, a look of immense irritation on his face.

I was lying on a shabby tan couch that had
seen much better days. Yellow foam poked out of several small tears
in the upholstery. That's where my eyes stopped. Exploring my
surroundings any further wasn't an option because my head refused
to budge.

"Where am I?"

"
We
are in my apartment. You decided
to take a nosedive into the pavement out there, but I didn't think
you'd want to wait around for the police to show." He lifted my
hand and slapped the icepack into my palm.

"Oh," I said, unable to manage anything
else.

He moved away from the couch, and I focused
on trying to position the compress against my cheek. My fingers
were sore and stiff, and I belatedly realized my hand was wrapped
in gauze. I raised the other; it was bandaged in a similar
fashion.

"What happened to my hands?"

"My front door ran into them." It was the
first bit of humor he'd ever displayed, but his words made no sense
to me.

"What?"

I heard running water and then he was back
with a glass that he dangled in front of my face. "You're lucky you
didn't break the window. I'd make you clean up your own bloody
mess, but you'd probably make it worse."

He shook the glass impatiently. "Take these.
They'll help." He dropped two oval shaped pills in my hand.

"What are they?"

He ignored me. I hesitated for a moment, but
decided I didn't really care what they were. All that mattered was
whether they would take the pain away. I struggled into a sitting
position and swallowed them down with the water. They tasted bitter
to my tongue.

When I finished, he placed the glass on a
crate beside the couch. Apparently it served as his end table.

"What happened...to the others?" At the last
moment I bit back the name I was about to lay on David and his
friends.

Caleb leaned against the opposite wall,
studying me like I was an annoying bug problem he wished to rid
himself of.

"They split before the cops showed up," he
said finally.

"What about—"

"He didn't come back."

"Oh." I pressed the icepack to my face and
tried to ignore the rush of emotions coursing through me. Ty had
left me. No matter how I tried to frame that particular fact, there
was no getting away from the hollow ache it left inside my chest.
The only thing worse than being abandoned was having Caleb witness
my personal nightmare.

"You don't live with your parents?" I asked,
desperate to put the focus on someone else.

From my new vantage point, I got a chance to
study his apartment—if that's what you could call it. The entire
place was no bigger than my bedroom at home. Besides the couch,
there wasn't much else in the room. His one form of entertainment
seemed to be the books overflowing from several shelves held up
with cinderblocks. No TV, no stereo. A small sink and fridge with a
hotplate atop it barely passed as a kitchen. The only positive
thing about the hovel was that it appeared to be immaculate,
despite the rather shabby furnishings.

He ignored my question, his face blank as he
watched me take in the rest, from the shabby brown carpet to the
small curtainless window above the sink. The bright sign of the gas
station blazed outside, the corner of it visible from where I
sat.

"I didn't realize you lived here," I said
finally, the extent of his situation sinking in.

"Not exactly the American dream, is it?"

"No, I guess not."

He laughed, the sound flat and humorless. I
could almost believe he hadn't found anything truly funny for a
very long time. "No need to feel sorry for me, Princess. Between
the two of us, it looks like I got the better deal."

A warm flush rose up my neck. "I need to use
the restroom."

"It's through there." He tilted his head at
the only door in the room. "On the right."

He didn't attempt to help me as I struggled
to my feet.

The door led to the main gas station. Rows of
motor oil and wiper fluid lined the space behind a greasy cash
register. It was a far cry from the fancy convenience stores at
bigger stations. A dinged up Coke machine provided the only
concessions.

I closed the restroom door behind me, the
fluorescent lights humming in the small space. I took a deep breath
and looked in the mirror.

The bruising wasn't as extensive as I
expected. The skin on my right cheek was reddened and would most
likely turn into a bruise by morning, but at least my eye hadn't
been affected by the blow. There was dried blood at the side of my
mouth, but it appeared to be coming from a cut on the inside of my
lip.

My blouse was ripped, and my white bra strap
showed. I pulled the ends of the material together just as the
first tear slid down my cheek.

I'm not sure how long I was there, but
eventually Caleb pounded on the door and roused me out of my
stupor.

"You okay?"

I cleared my throat. "Y-yes. I'll be out in a
minute."

There wasn't much I could do other than wipe
away the blood. There would be no hiding the bruises to my
face.

One peek at the split melons that were my
knuckles, and I rewrapped them, knowing my stomach wouldn't be able
to handle the carnage.

I zipped my jacket to hide my torn blouse and
stepped outside.

Caleb leaned against the counter near the
register, his bored expression back in place.

"Will you please take me home?" I asked.

He lifted his hand; keys dangled from his
open palm.

The wind had kicked up outside. I shivered at
the night air. It matched how I felt inside—cold and empty. I
followed Caleb out to his pick-up truck. He thumbed the proper key
from his ring and unlocked the door, holding it open for me. If it
were anyone else, it would've seemed an almost romantic
gesture.

I started to climb inside, but froze, my
senses alert to a shift in the space around us. I knew he was there
before I spied him standing in the deep shadows alongside the gas
station.

"Ty," I whispered.

Caleb wheeled around and watched with
disinterest as Ty stepped into the light.

If he'd been injured in the fight, he no
longer showed any signs of it. Despite that, his face still carried
the scars of the evening's events. Self-loathing rolled off of him
in thick waves, and he fought to return my gaze.

"Good. Saves me a trip," Caleb said, slamming
the car door. Without another word, he went back inside the
station. He flipped the open sign to closed, the bloody smudges on
the small window obscuring the word. A second later, the interior
lights went off.

Ty moved to stand before me, his eyes
drinking in every little detail of my appearance. He raised his
hand, hovering it just above my cheek in a helpless manner. His
brows knit together, and his frown deepened even further when he
spied my bandaged hands. He held them in his palms, treating them
like delicate china he was afraid might break under the
pressure.

"It wasn't your fault," I said. "I shouldn't
have interfered. I don't even know why I did it. I
wanted
you to kill him."

The tenuous hold on my emotions at last
slipped from my grasp. Shaking sobs wracked through my chest, and
he pulled me into his arms as the evening's events flooded out of
me.

He peppered soft kisses along my hairline.
"I'm so sorry," he muttered over and over.

I shook my head and held tight to the safety
line he offered, knowing he would be strong enough to keep us both
afloat.

Chapter 17

 

 

Despite my injuries, it was Ty who suffered
the roughest time over the next couple of days. He sank into
himself, the weight of his guilt an unrelenting force that put a
wedge of distance between us. He still stayed with me through the
nights, but he was restless. We both were, each for our own
reasons. Unable to give voice to our fears, we chose to simply not
speak at all.

Surprisingly, it was Melanie who helped get
us through. Her determination to discover the truth kept us moving
forward, and served as a focal point to distract us from getting
lost to our fears and guilt. While Ty and I drifted through that
first day back at school in a fog, she simply refused to get pulled
into our funk.

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