Believe (True Believers #3)(49)
Author: Erin McCarthy

“Hey, Robin was there when I f**ked her. I kept it a secret. She could have kept her mouth shut.” Nathan sneered. “But maybe she’s so used to having a c**k in it, she doesn’t know how.”

And that was my fist in his face.

There was no conscious thought. Just a reaction, a lightning-quick move, my head a haze of burning hot anger, adrenaline lending me enough power to drop him to the floor with one hit. Nathan went down hard, and the sound was satisfying, but not nearly enough to clear the cloud of anger distorting my thoughts. I kicked him on the foot. “Get up!”

Riley tried to grab my arm, but I shook him off. He and Tyler were both speaking but I didn’t hear what they were saying. My entire focus was on the piece of shit scrambling to his feet, wiping at his mouth, which was bleeding. The sight of that red smear excited me, made me pleased. I wanted more of it. I wanted his face distorted and swollen, eyes shut, a bloody pulp. He thought he was so f**king sexy, wait until I was done with him. Wait until he understood what happened when someone called my girlfriend a whore.

He was moving too slow for me, so I punched him again without waiting for him to fully stand. He grunted and fell backward with the impact, right into the door. Zeke opened it, and Nathan spilled out onto the sidewalk. Bouncing on the balls of my feet, I followed.

“I’m calling the cops,” Zeke said, shaking his bald head at us.

I didn’t care. I didn’t give two shits. By the time they got there Nathan would look like raw ground beef.

But Riley came at me from the side with a football move, plowing me down the sidewalk about three feet like I was a tackle dummy and screaming, “Knock it off! You don’t want to do this, man.”

“Let me go! Yes, I do!” I scrambled, going down low to dart out of his reach. “Don’t make me hit you, Riley.”

“You want to go back to jail? You’ll get three years this time!”

I knew that logically, but anger was propelling me. Wild, uncontrollable anger, but by the time I escaped Riley’s grip, Tyler had dragged Nathan to his feet and was shoving him in the back of his car on the street. Riley pulled the back of my shirt. I swatted at him.

“Fucking stop it!” I yelled. “Fine. I’ll let him go.” I knew where he lived. Taking a deep breath, I paced back and forth on the sidewalk. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

“Walk, ass**le,” Riley shoved me in the direction of home. “I don’t think Zeke actually called the cops, but just in case.”

I raked my hands through my hair. “Did you hear what he said about her?” I asked, my voice hoarse and raw. God. The pain I knew she must be feeling, it was my pain. I pulled out my phone and tried to call her, but there was no answer. It went right to voice mail, so her phone was probably turned off.

“That was pretty shitty,” Riley admitted. “I am not saying I blame you. If someone had said that about Jess I would have lost it.”

“Can you try calling Jessica?” I asked. “Robin isn’t answering. If Kylie knows she and Nathan hooked up, then she must be furious with Robin, too. I’m worried about her.”

“You knew, didn’t you?”

Nodding, I walked faster. “Yeah. She told me a few weeks ago. She was drunk, blacked out, woke up with Nathan back at the beginning of the summer. It’s why she quit drinking. It’s been eating her alive, the guilt over Kylie.”

“Damn.” Riley shook his head. “What a f**king mess.” He put his phone to his ear. “Hey, babe, what’s going on there? Shit hit the fan here.”

Trying Robin again, I cursed. Of course it was still turned off.

“So where are you girls? Uh-huh. And Robin? What time was that? Okay. Yeah, I love you, I’ll call you back. Bye.”

Riley looked at me. “Rory and Kylie and Jess are all at my place. They left Robin back at the apartment.”

“But then why isn’t she answering?”

“I don’t know. She’s probably upset. She’s probably taking a shower or something.”

It didn’t make sense. Robin would reach out to me when she was upset, I was sure of it. So what was she doing, alone? The thought terrified me.

“I need a car.”

We were cutting down his street, and I suddenly realized as we came up to the house that Nathan’s car was in front of the house.

“No. No, Phoenix, don’t.” Riley already knew where my thoughts were going. “That’s grand theft auto.”

“Then I’ll borrow your car,” I said, bending over and picking up a good size rock off the tree lawn. I smashed it into Nathan’s window with a beautiful crash, sending glass shattering all over me and the grass.

“Ah, f**k, seriously?”

“Look away if you don’t want to be a part of it,” I told him as I leaned in through busted glass and popped the trunk.

Going around the back of the car I lifted the trunk and found what I was looking for—a tire iron. Then I took it to Nathan’s car, feeling the pulse and vibration up through my arms as the metal and fiberglass clashed together with each ferocious blow. Steadily making my way around the car, I hit it over and over, sweating and furious, the jarring contact rattling my teeth, the crunch of glass beneath my shoes feverishly satisfying. Vaguely in the background I was aware of the front door to the house opening and voices, but it didn’t matter. I saw my reflection in the passenger window, but I pictured Nathan’s sneer as I hit so hard the iron left my grip and went sailing straight through to the backseat.

Panting, I turned and walked away, spitting on the ground by the back tire, trying to rid my mouth of the foul taste that coated my tongue, the back of my throat.

There was a whole crowd staring at me in shock. Jessica, Rory, Kylie, Jayden, Easton. Riley was shaking his head.

“That’s what I think of a guy who cheats on his girlfriend,” I said to my audience. “That’s what I think of a guy who has sex with a girl who is so drunk she doesn’t even know where she is or who she’s with.”

Wiping the sweat off my forehead, I walked past them to the house, my new tattoo burning and itching as the healing skin pulled. “I need your keys!” I yelled to Riley over my shoulder.

But then I stopped and turned around. I locked eyes with Kylie. “I’m sorry.” Not for the car, but for the hurt she was feeling.

She just stared at me in shock, face swollen from crying. After a second, she nodded, and I thought she understood.