Keep From Falling (Markson Grove Series Book 1) (35 page)

I began to scream, finally finding my voice again. I begged for my life as he dragged me through the sand behind the large rock where Keegan and I used to sit and look out into the water. I managed to let out one last high-pitched scream before the man punched me in the face to shut me up. My face hit the ground and I gasped for breath, clutching my chest.

In the distance, I could hear Parker yell out to me and then threaten his captors with their lives if they were to hurt me. He hollered obscenities when they told him something he didn’t want to hear.

A few moments later, his voice faded away and I couldn’t hear him any longer. I’m not sure if this was because of something happening over there, or because of something happening inside of me, but everything around me began to move in slow motion. My body didn’t seem to be functioning anymore. I think I was going into shock.

I lay there, unable to function, unable to hear, unable to think. I lay there for what felt like hours but was probably only seconds. My captor began tugging at my clothes, pulling piece by piece away from my body as I continued to lie there silently staring at the starry night sky.

I heard a gunshot. It sounded so far away, but I was certain that’s what it was. I began to cry, thinking it must have been Parker who was shot and I would be next.

Suddenly, I heard another gunshot and this time it was close. Very close. My ears began to ring, as the man who was about to force himself on me hit the ground with a thud and blood began to pool out of a messy wound in his head. I stared at the pool of blood and in mute shock, watched it seep into the multicolored sand beside me. I couldn’t stop staring at it.

I gasped, letting the knowledge of what I was looking at in, and then a cry finally escaped my lips. I brought my hands to my face and began to tremble the minute I brought them back down and saw the bright red liquid smeared all over them.

I looked up then and saw Parker crouched beside me telling me to run and hide; gun still in his hand, blood splattered on his face, neck and shirt. I nodded, and then half crawled and half ran in the direction he was pointing.

There was a beach house ahead of me, about forty yards away, surrounded by a white picket fence. I kept pushing toward that fence, telling myself not to look back until I was safely behind it.

When I finally reached it and allowed myself to look back for Parker, I saw that the other two men had tackled him to the ground and had fought the gun away from his hand.

I stayed there and watched in horror as one of the men yanked the dead body of my attacker away toward their van. The other man picked up Parker’s now limp body and did the same.

Parker’s head was hanging down, his feet were dragging in the sand, and I was certain that he was dead.

The memory of that night still hurts to think about. I cringe and shake it out of my mind.

“I don’t know if I even want to know the answer to this,” I say finally breaking the silence. “But what happened after I got away? I know they got you, I thought you were dead until you tried to call me a few days later.”

He hesitates. I can tell he’s trying to decide if he should tell me the truth and risk scaring me off again, or keep his past vague so that I’ll never have the urge to run. He doesn’t trust that I will stay this time. I don’t blame him really, I’ve been a horrible person to him. I don’t deserve his forgiveness.

“They beat me till I was nearly dead I think,” he tells me finally. “I don’t remember much of it. I woke up in the hospital three days later. I asked my dad what had happened even though I remembered very well what I had done. I needed to know if he knew anything about it, though, him being a cop and all. But all he said was that I had been jumped and left for dead on his doorstep. He suspected it was someone that he had been investigating sending him a message, but I knew better. I knew that the guy I work for had covered up the murder and that from that moment on, I belonged to him for life.”

I blink a few times, his revelation and my vivid memory seeming to have sobered me up immensely. “Parker,” I say, placing my hand on top of his in an attempt to comfort his sadness.

He shrugs. “He let me live, I guess I should be grateful.”

Every part of myself feels like a complete asshole for not realizing that I wasn’t the only victim that night. Yes, Parker’s alive, but he lost a part of himself that night and he will never be able to get it back. He lost the last ounce of innocence he had left inside of him. He killed a man and then in turn was beaten nearly to death as a punishment for it. And he did it all for me!

“So, now what? You belong to him?” I manage, my stomach feeling unsettled.

“I work for him,” he replies. “And other people work for me.”

I don’t say anything for a moment because I’m tossing the words back and forth in my head trying to figure out exactly what they mean. “What does this job entail?” I ask wearily.

He frowns.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I say, attempting to calm the worry I know is going through his mind. He seems relieved to hear the words. I know he needed to hear them, even though he won’t ever admit it.

“A lot of things,” he tells me finally. “My fights at the mansion, those aren’t for fun. He sets them up and makes big bucks off of me if I win. If I lose, he has his people do to me what they did to me the night I killed one of his guys. If I win, I rack in my own share of the wealth and live to see another day. I distribute for him in this district now too. The guy I killed, it was his job before, and he needed a replacement. I guess, for whatever reason, he thought I was good enough for the job. Markson Grove is mine now, and I have my own dealers that answer only to me. If any of them do wrong, it’s me that they have to answer to. If their clients don’t pay up or they cause problems, it’s me they have to worry about.”

“So people must hate you,” I say in a small voice, a hint of worry simmering through.

“People fear me,” he returns, sensing the worry and giving me the only comfort that he can. Comfort that isn’t really comfort at all, but it’s all he has.

I take in a deep an unsteady breath. This is a lot.

“Does this change things?” he asks. “For us.”

I shake my head. “No. I’m not going anywhere, Parker. I’ve already told you.”

“I wouldn’t blame you if you did, though. You know that, right?”

“I know,” I say to him reassuringly. “But I’m not.”

He kisses me softly on the cheek. “I love you,” he barely whispers.

I bring my lips to his and kiss him with a mixture of love and comfort so that he knows that what we have, what we’ve always had, is deep and I’m not going to take off running again. But I don’t tell him that I love him. I’ve never told Parker that I loved him before.

But he is so patient when it comes to us. He met me and fell for me the minute he looked my way, yet he never made a move until he was sure that I wanted him to. He needed me to know his intentions before he acted on them, for whatever reason that was important to him.

He even waited well over a year after our falling out before trying to make things right between us again. Not that I really know why that is. I’m sure it was horrible for him to have gone from being perfectly in love to suddenly being shunned by a heartless bitch. But I still can’t be sure why he didn’t try harder to get me to see the truth.

“After all this time, you come back into my life and your feelings for me haven’t changed. Why did you wait a year and a half before you tried to fix us?”

“Honestly?”

“No lie to me,” I say with a sarcastic smile.

He chuckles for a moment and then his voice gets serious once again. “When you didn’t answer my calls or texts the week after I woke up I already knew that we were done. What happened scared the shit out of you and I didn’t blame you for running, not even then. It scared the shit out of me too. But I figured I could fix it as soon as I got to talk to you in person, so I tried not to let it bother me.

“Then when I got back to school a month later, Bree nearly assaulted me when I confronted you. That’s when I knew that everything we had was completely gone for good. I wasn’t sure what you had told her, but whatever it was made me the enemy, and I knew I didn’t have a chance after that.

“Eventually, I talked myself into thinking it was better that way. I was even deeper in the drug world than I had been when we first met. My life was scarier, even to me. At least away from me you were safe. I knew you weren’t dating any new guys because I was checking, and you weren’t going to the mansion anymore either. I honestly felt like I’d be able to live without you as long as no one else had you, you know?”

I don’t reply because I know where this is going and I feel horrible about it.

He continues on, “So, when I saw you two at school last month holding hands, I actually panicked. I didn't even consider Bree as someone you’d fall into. And then your kiss in the hallway with her… I’m not going to lie, it fucking hurt like hell. Even after all of this time, it killed me to see it.

“After that day I knew I shouldn’t have stayed away. I knew I fucked up. I never stopped loving you, not for a second.”

“I’m so sorry,” I say moving away slightly in order to look up into his eyes.

“Don’t worry about it. I fixed us now,” he says with a weak smile. I see the relief in his eyes knowing that I’ve finally come back to him. It’s like he’s been holding his breath this whole time and can finally breathe once again.

I drink up the last of the water in the glass he filled for me and put it down on the table again. He grabs the glass and heads over to the sink in the kitchen to fill it up once more. As soon as he turns on the tap, the apartment door opens and in walks Cecelia.

Parker stops what he’s doing and turns to face her, still holding the glass. He doesn’t say a word, just stands there looking like a kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. I hold back a smile. He’s just too adorable for words. It occurs to me in this moment, that I can’t even understand why I had been running from him for all of this time. It’s clear to me now, there is nothing that this guy wouldn’t do for me.

Cecelia’s eyebrows raise and she looks over at me on the couch. “I’m seeing an awful lot of him these days.”

I roll my eyes. “Cecelia, you remember Parker.”

“Oh, how can I forget? Finding him in your bedroom early one morning was a pleasant surprise. And then, of course, our little visit this afternoon. Parker and I are old friends now, aren’t we, Parker?”

He smiles, unfreezing himself from where he’s standing in front of the sink and regaining his composure. “Always a pleasure, Cecelia,” he says, walking over to me and handing me the glass. He sits back down on the couch, draping his arm around my shoulder once again. He does it with such ease, as if it’s something he’s been doing with me every day for years even though tonight is the first night in a long time that we’ve sat together like this.

Cecelia smirks. “I take it she finally saw things your way?”

“More or less,” he replies and I hit his shoulder playfully.

“Don’t think you get to take all the credit for this.
I
kissed
you
tonight, not the other way around,” I say.

“Yeah, but I kissed you last week
and
this afternoon. It was all a part of my master plan and you fell for it.”

“I’ve missed this,” I say, hugging close to him and laying my head on his shoulder. Cecelia is still watching us, confusion present on her face, but she doesn’t pry. And for whatever reason I wouldn’t care if she would. It’s like Parker’s presence calms me.

“Me too,” he sighs happily.

Cecelia just shakes her head and walks away to her room.

Evan

Parker is an asshole. It’s official, as of right now, I hate him more than I hate Tris Gallagher. I am pissed and annoyed, and feeling like a complete idiot for even going to the mansion to try to ‘save’ Skylar from Parker in the first place. I knew better. Derrick told me everything and I knew there was no way it was going down the way Spencer thought it was going down. But I’m an idiot and I went anyway.