Vigilante

  The two of them exchanged a glance. “I’d better get you home,” Mom said. “Detective Davies, is it okay if I take her?”

  Diane nodded. When had I started thinking of her as “Diane” rather than “Detective”? Just today—when she proved she was someone I could depend on. “I’ve taken her statement, photographed her injuries and the doctor has looked at her. I don’t see any reason why you can’t take her home. If I have any other questions, is it all right if I come by?”

  My mother nodded. “Of course. If you could give me a little notice, I can make sure that I’m home and that Hadley is awake. I plan to let her sleep as much as possible the next few days.”

  “I have school tomorrow,” I reminded her. My head was starting to spin a little.

  “No,” she informed me. “You don’t. And you won’t have school until I’m certain you’re healed enough to attend. And until I’m certain that those boys are not a threat to your safety. I will be paying a visit to your principal tomorrow.”

  Diane handed my mother one of her business cards. I was going to have a collection of the damn things. “If you don’t mind letting me know when you’re going to the school, I would like to meet you there. The principal might take this a bit more seriously if you have police backup.”

  Mom put the card in her purse. “I will. Thank you.” Then she turned to me. “Can you walk, sweetie? Or do you want a wheelchair?”

  I was sore and fuzzy. I just wanted to go to bed and wake up in a world where none of this had happened, and Magda was still alive. “A ride would be nice.”

  Diane found us an orderly who said he would get me a wheelchair. Of course we had to wait what felt like hours for him to return with one, but then he took me straight down to the exit and waited with me while Mom went to get the car.

  “What happened?” he asked. “Did you bang into something?”

  I glanced up at him—both of him. “Yeah,” I slurred. “A fist.”

  I think he looked horrified. It was hard to tell when his face kept shifting, blurring in and out of focus. He didn’t speak again until my mother thanked him for bringing me out to the car.

  I slumped into the passenger seat of Mom’s car. I was asleep before we even made it out of the parking lot.

  God, drugs were awesome.

  * * *

  “Oh my God, are you okay?” Zoe’s eyes were huge as she looked down at me.

  It was Sunday evening. I’d slept until dinnertime, and was now sitting on the sofa covered in a fuzzy blanket and drinking a cup of tea Mom had made. She came from old English stock who believed that tea could fix just about anything.

  “Sit down. It hurts to look up.”

  She sat on the other end of the couch. “They broke your nose?”

  I nodded as I lifted my teacup to my mouth. The steam from the tea was apparently good for the fracture. Something about blood boogers, or something equally disgusting.

  “They would’ve broken more than that if you hadn’t come along.” I reached over and clumsily patted her hand with mine. Shit, these pills were powerful. “Thank you.”

  She smiled a little. “I have to admit I was almost a little bummed that Detective Davies came when she did. I was hoping to at least land a couple of punches to Drew’s face.”

  “Yes,” I said, “but our fabulous detective—and the Rape Squad—saw the Pink Vigilante come to my rescue. I saw the look on Drew’s face when he saw you. God, it was fucking perfect. He’s not so sure the PV is me anymore. I owe you for that.”

  Her eyes widened. “Is that why they came after you?”

  I nodded. “Drew’s smarter than I gave him credit for. To be honest, I can’t believe more people didn’t figure me out before this. I was being stupid taking chances.”

  “Are you going to go after Drew?”

  I thought about it. Maybe it was the pills again, but I shrugged. “Diane thinks he might actually do jail time. I figure we’ll be lucky if he gets a slap on the wrist and probation. At least he’s facing some kind of consequences.”

  Zoe looked at me. “That’s it?”

  “Dude, I’m stoned out of my head, my nose is broken, and I’m aware of just how fucking lucky I am that’s all the damage they did. Do you know how many times I’ve been hit in the last month? Adam stabbed me. Yeah, that’s it for now.”

  “I’m sorry.” She leaned her elbow on the back of the couch. “It’s just that you’re a symbol for the rest of us.”

  “I didn’t ask for that. All I wanted was justice for my friend.”

  “I know you didn’t ask, but you got it all the same. You’re a hero, Had.”

  Invisible weights tugged at my eyelids. “No, I’m not. I’m a mess, Zoe. An angry, violent mess. When I started this, it was an accident. I found Jason passed out and took advantage of the situation. I didn’t care what happened to me, but then I met someone who made me start to feel like a person again.”

  She smiled. “Gabe.”

  I met her gaze, forcing my eyes to focus on hers. “I already knew Gabe. I meant you.”

  Her smile drooped as her eyes went round. “Me?”

  I nodded, wincing as the movement made my nose throb. “Magda was my only friend for years. When she left me, I felt so alone. God, I hated her for that. Then, you and Caitlin and Anna walked into class. You kept my secret, and you covered for me. You put yourself at risk for me. You’re my best friend, Zoe.”

  She looked like she was going to cry. If it weren’t for the drugs, I might get my bawl on too. “This is the point where you tell me how much you love me,” I joked.

  Zoe laughed—crisis averted. “You are stoned.”

  I smiled. My lips were like rubber. “Told you.”

  She chattered on for the next half hour, telling me that Anna and Jenny had gone to the movies earlier. Apparently Jenny texted Anna after the pit party to ask her out.

  “Jenny seemed nice. Do you like her?”

  “Sure. As long as she’s good to her I don’t care.” An impish gleam lit her eyes. “Speaking of good, how’s Gabe?”

  My eyes flew open. “Oh, shit!”

  She looked scared. “What? Are you okay? Is it your nose? Should I get your mom?”

  “No, my nose is fine.” As fine as it could be. “Gabe doesn’t know. I haven’t talked to him since this morning.”

  “He won’t be mad at you, will he?”

  “It’s not me I’m worried about. He’s going to lose it when he finds out Drew broke my nose...”

  Zoe went pale. “Give me your phone. I’ll text him and ask him to come over. You don’t want him to hear it from someone else.”

  It was at that exact moment that my mother came into the room. She looked concerned. “Hadley, sweetie, there’s someone to see you.”

  Gabe walked into the room behind her. He looked ready to kill someone. I glanced at Zoe.

  “Too late.”

  CHAPTER 23

  Mom had to work on Monday, so Gabe came over to stay with me.

  “I don’t need to be babysat,” I said. I was glad to see him, but it pissed me off that everyone seemed to think I needed to be looked after.

  “I know you don’t,” he replied, bending down to kiss me. “I’m here so I won’t go beat the shit out of Drew.”

  Ah. “Nice to know where I rank in your priorities.”

  He sat on the couch beside me and took my hand in his. “You’re number one, or I wouldn’t be here. Now, come here and give me a hug.”

  I did what he said, because I really needed a hug. “How can you stand to even be in the same room with me? I’m ugly and a bitch.”

  He laughed. “I think you’re beautiful, and I’ve seen you in a bad mood before.”

  I lifted my head from his shoulder. “You think I
’m beautiful?” God, my voice sounded so deep and nasal.

  Gabe smiled. Speaking of beautiful...it was no wonder his mother named him after an angel. “Yeah, I do.” Then his smile faded, replaced by something darker. “If Drew Carson doesn’t go to jail for this, I’m going to kill him.”

  A shiver ran down my spine. “Don’t say that. Your mother and Teresa need you too much. I need you too much. We can’t lose Magda and you.”

  “I feel so useless. Powerless. I hate it.”

  “I know.”

  We fell silent. Gabe turned on the TV, and we watched part of an eighties horror movie marathon on one of the movie channels. It was only three weeks till Halloween—one of my favorite times of year. Magda and I used to plan our costumes together. This would be my first year without her. Gabe’s too. The three of us always took Teresa out trick or treating before going on to whatever else we had planned for the evening.

  “Are we taking Teresa out this year?” I asked, glancing up.

  “Yeah,” Gabe replied. His gaze was warm as it met mine. “If you want.”

  I nodded. “I do.”

  “That will mean a lot to Reesy. And me.” He kissed me then. I would have let him kiss me forever if breathing weren’t an issue. The swelling in my nose didn’t prevent me from breathing, but it felt like I had a cold.

  “Is that it?” I asked teasingly when he lifted his head. I was breathing fast, and not just because of my nose. We were totally alone in the house. We could do whatever we wanted...

  “Yes,” he replied. “For now. I wouldn’t feel right, taking advantage of you while you’re on painkillers and hurt.”

  I arched a brow. “Seriously?”

  He laughed. My expression must have been hilarious. “Seriously.”

  Fabulous. My shoulders slumped. “Yeah, I guess it’s hard to find this—” I gestured to my face “—sexy.”

  “Hey.” He lifted my chin with his finger. “You’re sexy as hell, and trust me—I want you. I just don’t want to hurt you, so we’re going to wait.”

  God, he was so good. “Okay.”

  He grinned and kissed me again. Then he asked, “Is Zoe getting your homework?”

  “No, I think the office is keeping it for me. Mom was going to pick it up on her way home.”

  He looked at his watch. “Feel like going to the school?”

  I frowned. “Why?”

  His eyes darkened to the edge of blackness. “I want everyone to see what he did to you. They won’t think he’s so awesome when they see your face.”

  He was right. I’d been so caught up in how much my broken nose affected me that I hadn’t thought what it would do for Drew’s reputation. If he’d successfully outed me as PV, people wouldn’t be half as sympathetic, but my secret identity was still protected, and the bruising did look pretty ugly.

  “Let’s go,” I said, tossing my blanket aside.

  “You might want to change,” he suggested, gesturing to my pajamas.

  I blushed. “You’re right.”

  “Do you need help?”

  Tempting. “I thought you didn’t want to take my clothes off.”

  He shrugged. “I’m only human.”

  I laughed, but inside me a little thrill blossomed. I knew, despite his protests, that if we went to my room we’d never make it to school. There would be time to make out later, but this was probably the worst my nose was going to look, and doing damage to Drew’s reputation was more important at that moment than my hormones.

  A few minutes later, my hair and teeth brushed, I came downstairs in jeans and a pink lightweight sweater. When I looked at myself in the mirror, I’d been so tempted to at least try to cover some of the bruising with makeup, but there wasn’t enough concealer in the world to do the job.

  Gabe smiled when he saw me. “I picked out that sweater.”

  His mother had given it to me for Christmas last year. “Why didn’t you tell me it was from you?”

  He shrugged. “You were my little sister’s best friend, and I didn’t know if you liked me the same way I was starting to like you.”

  You know that thing, where people talk about their insides turning to mush? Getting all melty? That’s how I felt at that moment. “It’s my favorite sweater.”

  He looked pleased. “Get a coat. It’s cold out.”

  Once we got to the school, we waited a few minutes in the parking lot before going inside. We timed it so that we would be walking through the hall when classes changed. It was the best way to make sure as many people saw me as possible. This was the one time when I wanted to be gossiped about.

  We walked through the doors at the opposite end of the school from the office—again to ensure maximum visibility. I wasn’t disappointed; the moment the bell rang and the hall began to fill up, I felt the weight of countless curious stares. As I walked, staring straight ahead, Gabe’s hand clasped in mine, I heard horrified gasps and whispers. And I don’t know how many times I heard someone say, “Oh my God.”

  We ran into Anna and Caitlin outside the classroom. I stopped long enough to give them both a hug and talk for a few minutes. They hadn’t seen me since Saturday night. Poor Anna cried when she saw me. She had such a sweet heart.

  And a vicious temper. “I’d like to bash his head in with a brick,” she announced.

  Gabe gave her a grim smile. “The line starts here.”

  “Mom’s making me stay home a few days,” I told them. “I’d love some company if you want to drop by someday after school.”

  They both promised they would, and after another hug they went on to the next class. Gabe and I continued to the office. By the time I got there, I felt like Lady Godiva sitting naked on her horse—vulnerable, exposed and strangely defiant.

  The office administrator looked up as we approached the desk. “Oh, my goodness.”

  I attempted a smile. “Hi, Mrs. Kent.” I wanted to tell her that it looked worse than it felt, but frankly that would be a lie. And the fact that it did look so awful made Drew come off just as bad. “I think you probably have some homework for me?”

  The older woman got up from her desk. “Yes, I do. A couple of your teachers haven’t handed anything in yet, so you may want to come by again tomorrow, but your morning classes have provided homework as well as a brief syllabus for the rest of the week, just in case.” She approached the counter with a thick file folder and handed it to me.

  “Did that Carson boy really do this to you?” she asked, her voice low. It probably wasn’t considered proper for the staff to discuss students.

  “Yes. It was Drew.” By the end of day, I suspected every teacher in the school would know that I’d confirmed the rumor.

  Mrs. Kent was a nice woman, and she had this round face that always seemed kind and gentle. At that moment she didn’t look kind, and she certainly didn’t look gentle. “Monster.”

  I just smiled. “Thanks. I’ll come by again tomorrow for the rest.”

  I needed to stop by my locker to pick up some textbooks, so this time we walked through the upstairs hall as students hurried to their next class. More stares. More whispers. Every step seemed to vibrate from my feet, up my legs and torso right to my nose until it throbbed with a dull ache. I was tired, and as satisfying as it was to let everyone see what Drew had done to me, I just wanted to go home.

  We got to my locker. I opened it, and Gabe made me pass him each book that I would need. I could carry my own books, but I wasn’t going to argue with him.

  He was looking down the hall when I closed the locker door. “What?” I asked.

  He nodded down the line of lockers. “Look.”

  I turned my head just as he took my hand and led me down the hall. Drew’s locker wasn’t far from mine on the opposite wall. I stopped dead when I saw it.

&nbsp
; The principal had either gotten lax in her crackdown on vandalism, or what we were looking at had all been done this morning. The entire front of the locker was covered in marker, paint, stickers, pictures and paper.

  I squeezed Gabe’s hand when I saw the photo of Magda. It was her yearbook photo from last year, the one they used at her memorial. Someone had drawn a big pink heart around her face and wrote “You killed her” underneath it. Rapist was the word written most often on the metal. Monster was the second. Someone had stuck on a printout of Faceless’s article. The entire locker door was one huge collage of just how vile Drew Carson really was. If Drew ever returned to the school, he would find that his status had taken a dramatic fall.

  I smiled.

  * * *

  “You’re fucking kidding me.” That was what I said when Diane came by to tell me that not only was Drew out on bail, but that he claimed he hit me because he believed himself to be in danger from me. He thought that I was the Pink Vigilante, and now that he knew the error of his actions, he was “deeply sorry” for breaking my nose.

  My mother didn’t even comment on my language. She looked at the detective with a determined expression. “What can we do to keep that boy away from Hadley?”

  Diane looked pissed too. We were all pissed. Gabe was going to lose it when I told him. God, if he didn’t beat the crap out of Drew, I’d be surprised. Hell, if I didn’t beat the hell out of Drew it would be a surprise. “I don’t believe Drew means Hadley any harm now that he knows she’s not the Vigilante.”

  Maybe I wasn’t in danger, but Drew was. I shouldn’t be surprised that he had gotten away with it. Sure, he might go to court, but he wasn’t going away. His father owned half this town, and had more than enough clout and money to make sure his precious little boy stayed out of jail. I should have known that if his family lawyer could get him out of rape charges, she could get Drew out of an assault case.

  “I want an apology,” I blurted.

  Both women looked at me like I’d started speaking Chinese.

  “From Drew,” I clarified. “I don’t care if he was terrified of big bad me, he broke my damn nose, and I don’t want him to tell the court he’s sorry, I want him to tell me he’s sorry for it.”