Ex-Factor (Diamond Girls) (31 page)

BOOK: Ex-Factor (Diamond Girls)

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Only, every time I closed my eyes, I saw the absolute look of terror scrawled across Reid’s face. The fear, the hurt—they both made me want to hurl.

I glanced at my window, thankful I was lying down and couldn’t see the Tates’s backyard. Why had I left the curtains open? Ah yes, daylight was better for shooting video. Looking at my window reminded me how I could see into the Tates’s backyard from my room, and I didn’t want to think about anything.

To be honest, it hurt to think about the abuse I’d witnessed. Yelling and screaming was an everyday occurrence with the Tate family. I couldn’t speak for any of the neighbors, but I knew my mom had instructed me and Nev to avoid them at all costs and walk in the opposite direction if they ever came our way. What kind of person did that make my mother? What did that say about me that I’d listened to her? Maybe if I had said something about the fighting and the yelling before, tonight’s episode of
The Whacked And The Crazy
wouldn’t have taken place.

Buzz.

“Ah! Fudge Pop!”
J.P.

I scrambled into a sitting position and dug my cell out of my pocket, inwardly cursing myself for not calling him sooner. “Hey, babe. I’m sorry I—”

“What the hell, Liv? Where have you been? I freaking blew up your phone. Why haven’t you answered any of my calls? I’ve been climbing the walls over here, worried that P.O.S. tin can you call a car broke down and left you stranded on the road somewhere. Are you okay, baby?”

My shoulders fell. I didn’t think it was possible to feel any worse, but I did. My chest constricted, the knowledge I’d disappointed my guy a heavy weight on my already mangled heart.

“God, J.P., I’m so sorry. I meant to call you when I got home, but things got… uncomfortable.” That was putting things mildly.

Body aching, I blew out a ragged breath and fell sideways onto my beckoning pillow. Half of me wanted to tell J.P. everything I’d seen, share the burden, remove the heavy weight crushing my chest. But my other half clamped down on my jabber-jaws and kept my trap shut. I couldn’t speak for Reid, but if it had been me that had been abused, and my neighbor saw it, I wouldn’t want him sharing my crappy secret with anyone, much less one of Grant High’s elite.

So I lied. Through my teeth. “Coach Shea was super hard on me tonight at practice. I took a couple of hard falls, but I finally nailed my Arabian, so that’s good. I’m pretty sore, so I came home, took some ibuprofen, and sat in a hot bath.”
God.
I was totally going to burn. The devil was gonna dance across my face. Right after he torched Joseph Tate.

“You put me off for a bath?” His deep voice held a mix of shock and annoyance.

“Um, yeah. I was, I mean, I
am
really sore.”
Total truth
. A bath actually sounded heavenly. Too bad I was too tired to move.

“Well,” he started with a small chuckle. “I guess I could cut you some slack since you told me you got naked. I’ve got a nice visual goin’ on right now, babe. Thanks.”

I blushed scarlet in spite of my crappy mood. J.P. had never seen my goods, but he liked to embarrass me just the same. Total guy response.

“Whoa,” he shouted into the phone. “Damn, baby. Looks like you’re sitting in the middle of a war zone.”

He didn’t know how right he was.

“Some heavy shit went down at the Tates’s not too long ago. They live behind you. Did you hear anything?”

A ripple of something, dread, I thought, ghosted across my skin. I heard something, all right. A whole lot of yuck I didn’t want any part of. “Um, no. I didn’t hear anything.” God was going to smite me where I lay. Singe my lying tongue and render me mute. “How do you know something happened?”

“It’s all over my newsfeed. People are saying the cops were camped out in front of Reid’s house. I bet you he either tweaked out, lost his shit and went after his stepdad with a knife, or a jealous husband caught him sticking it to his cougar wife and went postal on his ass.”

My stomach rolled. “God, J.P. Those are horrible things to say. What if something serious happened? What if someone was hurt?” What was wrong with people? The stories they’d come up with made my head spin and my heart hurt. They also couldn’t be further from the truth.

J.P. swore beneath his breath. “I don’t know, babe. This might make me sound like a jerk, but people like Reid Tate, most of the time, they get what they deserve. If he or his whacked out mom got hurt, ten to one, it’s because they brought it on themselves.”

I sucked in a shocked breath, surprised by the insensitivity of his comment. Yes, J.P. had access to a lot of things the rest of us didn’t due to his father’s success and their family name, but I’d never once pegged him for a callous jerk. That last little bit made him sound like an elitist snob. “J.P., I can’t believe you just said that.”

A deep sigh sounded over the phone. “They’re losers, Liv. Freaks. We all know that Reid is a hardcore pothead. That shit runs in the family. They’re not good people, babe. Promise me you’ll stay away from them.

“Promise me,” he said again when I didn’t answer.

“Yeah, okay, okay. I promise.” The dull throbbing that had begun at the start of our conversation had grown into a full on Headbangers Ball. I needed to down some aspirin, wash my face, and go to sleep. “Listen, I’m really tired, and I’m not feeling all that great. I’m gonna go to sleep, ‘kay?”

“Yeah, all right. Sweet dreams, babe. Love you.”

“Love you too.”

I chucked the phone toward the foot of my bed, suddenly too tired for things like washing my face or popping aspirin. With a groan, I rolled onto my stomach and buried my head beneath my pillow, because yeah, I was also too tired to get up and turn off the light.

END OF SAMPLE

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