Series: Webs We Weave Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 167
Estimated words: 162520 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 813(@200wpm)___ 650(@250wpm)___ 542(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 162520 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 813(@200wpm)___ 650(@250wpm)___ 542(@300wpm)
I’m not in control.
Do I even care?
Before I answer that question in my head, someone plunges into the water. Hands grab at my shoulder, my ribs, and then yank me off Trent. I don’t fight them.
Trent kicks toward the surface, battling for his last breath.
When I breach the water and suck in air, I seize the pool’s edge and heave myself out onto the stone. I turn my head left and see Jake.
He’s pulling himself out, too, and he’s drenched. I honestly thought it’d been Nova…It wasn’t Nova. Jake was the one who jumped in after me.
The weight of this bears down on my chest. Now I feel like I can’t fucking breathe. Hilarious.
Trent hangs on to the edge and stays partially submerged in the pool, not having the strength to bring himself to land. He coughs up water, hacks up a lung.
I pay only partial attention to the shocked, inebriated crowd. These aren’t the older prim and proper socialites who frequent Victoria Country Club; these are their thirtysomething and college-aged children.
“Holy shit!” A drunk exclamation fills the tense silence.
“Is that Grey?”
“Wait, Grey and Trent are fighting? Aren’t they, like, best friends?”
Two social climbers try to help Trent out of the pool. He shoves off the guys, not wanting to appear weak, even as he wheezes.
I push my wet hair back and intake bigger lungfuls of air.
There’s a chance Phoebe never consumed the spiked drink. There’s a chance Howie never slipped GHB in her cup. It doesn’t change the fact that Trent premeditated this, but it changes the outcome of tonight.
Though, if she did get drugged…
It slams into me.
Suddenly, unbearably.
I move so fast, shooting toward Trent—I can’t see even two feet in front of my face now. All I imagine is stepping on his hand, hearing the bones crack, and then shoving his head beneath the water again.
Jake slips his arms beneath my armpits, gripping me from behind and wrenching me backward. He fucking lifts me off the ground to keep me from reaching his brother. “Stop,” he says in the pit of my ear, a lot less hostile, a lot more consoling than I’d be. “Stop, Brayden.”
Him saying my birth name—yeah, that does it.
I suck in the rage, containing it with one harsh inhale. Jake releases his hold on me while Trent catches his breath enough to snarl, “What the absolute fuck?” The venom in his face is tangible.
There is a way back from this. A way to convince him it was a simple misunderstanding. But do I even want him to believe that?
No.
I want to force-feed him the truth until he fucking chokes. “You think you’re a god to this fucking town?” Heat expels off my rough voice. “You’re a tumor.”
“Fuck—”
“No, fuck you,” I grit between my teeth. “What’s mine isn’t yours; you don’t fucking own me. You never did, you never will.” I feed off his disturbed expression as he sees me, sees the real me and what I am. I’ve never been his friend. “If it’s not fucking clear, TK”—I spit out his nickname—“I think you’re a repulsive piece of shit. I’ve chosen a side. And it’ll never be yours.” My harsh gaze flits around the stunned audience, Solo cups crushed in hands and mouths agape. “You all should do the same.”
Trent blinks through the mindfuckery of my abrupt betrayal. “Get out of my house,” he says coldly.
“With pleasure.” I leave the patio with a hot, forceful stride. People back away from me, giving me a wide berth like I might catch them on fire.
I feel someone at my side.
Trevor. He’s here. He’s been here for I don’t know how long. Like a shadow passing unseen through the crowds.
He keeps my hurried pace now. Quickly, I hand him my waterlogged phones. All dead. Useless. But if anyone can bring them back to life, it’d be him.
He pockets them. “You went feral. You said to never go feral.”
“It wasn’t planned.”
This stuns him, then he faces forward. “She’s going to be okay, Rock. PG is the strongest girl I know.”
A ball lodges in my throat. Did someone…? Is she…? “Where is she?” Right as I ask, Jake reaches my other side.
“Follow me,” he says, catching my elbow and tugging me in a new direction.
As Trevor falls back behind us, I say under my breath to Jake, “You could’ve let me drown him. It would’ve solved all your problems.” He’s wished for his brother’s death. Well, it was right there.
And he stopped it.
Jake’s jaw muscle tenses, then he meets my gaze. There is something crushing in his eyes, something that reaches too far inside me. “I wasn’t saving him.”
He was saving me.
From prison.
Every tormenting thing about tonight piles onto me, and an onslaught of emotion rams into my chest, making it harder to breathe, and I see water, a dark river. I picture the family I lost. I think about Evan Wolfe, my older brother, who likely saved me as we went under, and I can’t even look at Jake.