He glared at me, his nostrils flaring and his eyes boring into mine. “You want to talk, then talk,” he said. “Say what you have to say, then get the fuck out. I don’t have time for you.”
“Make it,” I shot back.
He curled his fists. “You’re really getting on my last nerve, Jenni,” he said through clenched teeth. “What do you want?”
“That little piece of shit downstairs,” I said.
“Heath?”
“Yeah, him. I want you to stop standing up for him. You haven’t seen Samuel. You haven’t seen what that asshole did to him.”
Garth shook his head in confusion. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“You went to Sheriff Blake today,” I shouted at him. “You made it seem like Samuel was some raving dog and Heath needed to protect himself. You lied to the police to cover for that bastard you call a friend. I want you to stop!”
Garth began to laugh. “Is that what this is about?” he asked. “What? Are you trying to help your new boyfriend, or does Alex need a girl to fight his battles for him?”
“I’m not joking, Garth,” I said, pointing a finger in his face. “Turn Heath over and stop acting like a prick.”
“Get that fucking finger out of my face.” Garth slapped my hand away, hard, then grabbed me by the neck, choking me. I gasped in surprise, scratching at his hands as I fought for breath. He pushed me back against the wall.
“Who do you think you are?” he hissed, pushing up against me, his cock pressed against my thigh. I felt a wave of disgust wash over me. “I don’t know what Alex’s convinced you of, what he’s made you think you can do, but I know you. I know everything there is to know about you. Does he know about us? Does he know how you screamed my name when I shoved my cock in that pussy?”
He grabbed me between my legs, and I squirmed, trying to break free. I felt his hand tighten around my neck. My head began to swim.
“Does he know he’s getting sloppy seconds?” Garth said, his lips against my neck, making my skin crawl. “And you’re here for him? Really? Maybe I should take you right here, right now. Fuck you hard the way you like it, fill your pussy my sperm so you can go back to him with it dripping down your thighs. Who knows? Maybe that turns him on?”
I kicked at him, but he was pressed up tight against me, and my efforts were useless.
“Let me say this as slowly, and as clearly as I possibly can, so you get it through that thick head of yours,” he said. He pressed up against me harder, his lips against my ear. “Come here again, and I’ll fucking kill you. Then I’ll kill him. Then I’ll take that little girl of his and show her a good time before I toss her to the others just for fun. Then I’ll kill her, too.”
He let go of me, and I fell onto my knees, gasping for breath. He took a few steps back and looked down at me with a smug smile on his face.
“Now get the fuck out.”
* * *
I got into the parked car just outside the compound gates and broke into tears. I could still feel Garth’s hand around my neck, and I shuddered at the thought of how close he had come to choking me to death.
That went horribly wrong.
I tried to calm down, but my mind spun, and I began to worry that I had just made things worse. I had come here with the belief that I could solve all this just by standing up to Garth, but he had proven that he had no problems killing me if I got in his way. I had always known he could be aggressive, but this was a new side to him that scared the shit out of me.
And he threatened Kelly, too. You really fucked this up.
I slammed my hands against the steering wheel and screamed as loud as I could.
It took me another ten minutes before I was calm enough to drive back home.
Chapter 18: Alex
“Her car’s here.”
The day was quickly coming to an end, the sun setting behind us as I rolled the car to a stop in front of the house and looked at where Kelly was pointing. Sure enough, Jenni’s car was parked a bit down the road, almost out of view behind a large maple.
I had gone directly to the hospital after my disappointing encounter with Sheriff Blake, and although my nerves were wrecked and I had the urge to punch my fist through a wall, the fact that my father was awake immediately turned that all around.
They had rolled him out of the ICU into his own