SWNOVELS Twisted Collide: Chapter 1
This is not the best party of the year.
This isn’t even the best party of the month.
Despite the blatant false advertisement, Nick followed through on the endless booze. It leaches from every inch of the living room, wafting up from the couch I’m sulking on.
Coach will kick Nick off the team the minute he finds out about the party—he always does—and he will be out.
It doesn’t help that the “small” gathering spiraled out of control fast. I don’t know half these people.
In front of me, some chick I’ve never seen catches her boyfriend cheating. She winds back her arm, a red Solo cup clutched tight, and launches the stale beer at him.
Of course, she misses.
Of course, it lands on me.
And that’s my cue to leave.
I make my way up the stairs to wash it off. Technically, Nick announced earlier that his room is off-limits. But technically, I don’t give a fuck. I protect him on the ice. If he wants that to continue, he’ll shut the fuck up.
It’s quieter up here and much more tolerable. The hall mutes the music downstairs enough to make out words coming from somewhere nearby.
Nick will lose his shit when he discovers that someone other than me came up here.
I’m about to dip into his room when I hear it.
“Get off me.”
I freeze, wondering if I heard it wrong.
Then, she says it again, and I’m taking off in the direction of the voice. I prowl down the hall, unable to make out who or where she is.
“Get off me!”
The cracked voice sounds too much like fear to ignore.
The thumping bass quakes the floor beneath me. The assholes downstairs are all too drunk to notice anything.
I strain to listen again, but it’s just far enough away that I’m not sure if I’ll be able to.
Eyes narrowed, I peer around the space, but the hazy smoke blurs my vision.
Can’t hear. Can’t see. Just fucking great.
Best guess—it’s coming from a bedroom nearby. The problem is, Nick’s parents are filthy rich, which means there are half a dozen on this floor alone.
My instincts lead me toward the north wing. The closer I get, the more I’m certain the plea wasn’t my imagination. With each step, the telltale signs of a struggle rise. Muffled shrieks. Soft thuds. Heavy grunts.
The second I identify it, I toss open the door.
It takes half a second for the scene to sink in and another half for me to react. I fly across the room faster than I would on skates and land a punch right at the asshole’s elbow.
He releases the fist that’s wrapped around the hair of a girl I don’t recognize. His free hand, working its way beneath her underwear, falls with his shock. She slumps down the wall, free from his hold, and scrambles across the carpet in the opposite direction.
“What the fuck?” the asshole barks, but I don’t answer.
I have him by the throat. He isn’t going anywhere. Now that she’s safe and out of the way, I unleash my anger. All of it. Years and years of pent-up frustration. From being forced to do things I don’t want to do. To being fucked over. To being raised by a shitty father.
I’d never met a piece of shit more worthy of my wrath. A grin dances across my cheeks as I form a fist. With a dark chuckle, I do something I know I shouldn’t.
I throw the first punch.
My hand makes contact with a sickening crack. It isn’t his victim I see. It’s Molly. My little sister. The mere thought is enough to send another surge of protective instinct through me.
I hate bullies. I hate people who pick on others and make them feel small.
And I especially—more than anything—hate any scumbag that would lay a hand on a woman without permission.
It doesn’t matter that this girl isn’t Molly.
I continue to punch, over and over, until he drops to the floor like an anchor. He writhes in place, begging me to stop. I barely register his words, following up my fists with a kick of my feet.
Everything is hazy. I don’t even notice the screams around me. I don’t notice anything. Not the hands pulling me off him. Not the kids yelling that the cops are coming.
All I can do is feel. The chaotic thumps of my heart as adrenaline surges through my veins. The delicious satisfaction each punch and kick brings me. The sight of this handsy fucker on the floor—and the knowledge that I’ll scare him so badly that he’ll never do it again.
“Thank you.”
It’s barely more than a whisper, but it thrusts me back into reality. I turn to the girl this fucker took advantage of, spinning my head away when I notice she’s in the middle of straightening the skirt bunched around her waist.
The situation comes to me piece by piece like a flip book, each flashing at me one after another. The sirens blaring. The footsteps pounding up the steps. And the feel of two cold hands as they jerk my arms around my back and drag me away.
“Thank you,” the girl says again, louder this time.
It’s enough to make the officer pause. I nod once to her as the cop clicks a heavy pair of cuffs around my wrists.
Slowly, the realization begins to settle in.
I might’ve taken down a guy who deserves it, but that doesn’t mean I won’t pay for my good deed.
I can’t believe this is happening.
Actually, I can.
If luck were a spectrum, I’d sit somewhere above Tsutomu Yamaguchi (who survived one atomic bomb only to be killed by another) and below Roy Sullivan (hit by lightning seven times, but at least he survived). Life dealt me a bad hand. So, I barely flinch when the cops shove me into a patrol vehicle to wait as the girl gives her account of what happened.
Ten minutes later, he pulls me out of the car and frees me from the cuffs. I rub my wrists, well aware I’m fortunate to not spend the night in jail.
The guy I beat up agrees not to press charges, a miracle considering I mangled that asshat. I got lucky tonight, that’s for sure. (See? Above Yamaguchi and below Sullivan.)
I can’t even imagine what would have happened if I had been arrested. Coach would bench me, and my father . . . Fuck, I’d never live it down.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t experience my own form of prison.
The cops make me call my father. They ignore every argument I can think of. That I’m eighteen and, legally, am not obligated to call my parents. That I have my phone and am more than capable of finding a ride. That Nick would let me crash here for the night.
None of it passes their litmus test, and who am I to fight it? Alas, small-town politics rear its ugly head yet again.
I make my way to the front, waiting for my father’s arrival and subsequent disapproval. He sounded pretty fucking pissed that he has to pick me up tonight, but I’m sure it has less to do with the errand and more to do with the stain on his image.
I know how I look, standing outside Nick’s house, hands tucked in my pockets, with a police officer babysitting me. That’ll send dear old dad right over the edge.
I purse my lips but don’t speak another word to the cop beside me. Instead, I tap my fingers against my upper thighs as we wait.
I’ll never hear the end of it. Not now. Not ever. Dad has never been one to keep quiet about his plans for me. He expects me to become a hockey legend. Wayne Gretzky, Bobby Orr, and Gordie Howe rolled into one. If I somehow manage to screw that up, I’ll be tossed aside. Disowned. And he’ll absolutely see this as a move that could’ve fucked that future up.
After this, my father will make my life a living hell until I’m finally off to college.
I can’t wait for that day.
It’s the fastest way out of this joint.
I pace back and forth, waiting for his wrath.
It’s wishful thinking to hope that the drive here will cool him off. Nope. On the contrary, it gives him time to simmer in his rage. He’s probably thought up every insult he can possibly throw my way.
Ungrateful.
Incompetent.
Idiot.
Then, the speech will come. Jonathan Sinclair lectures like he’s the keynote speaker of a TedTalk. I expect it to be twice as bad, since I pulled my parents away from a charity event and their important friends. Surprise. Surprise.
There’s always something more important. A reason not to be home with me and my kid sister. It doesn’t really affect me these days since I’m almost out, but Molly is stuck in that house for at least seven more years with that dickhead.
I can see the light at the end of the tunnel because college starts in the fall. But Molly’s only eleven, which means years of neglect are still in her future.
That’s the one thing that makes moving away from Ohio hard.
Leaving her behind.
Knowing that, once I go, no one will be here to take care of her.
I shake my head, pulling my mind away from its usual depressing thoughts. She’ll be okay. I peer up at the night sky and take in the darkness that bathes me from above.
The stars are bright tonight, and if it weren’t for my pissed-off father headed to pick me up right now, I’d give anything to just sit and get lost in the peaceful moment.
Where anything is possible.
A life far from here.
One where my life isn’t controlled.
One where I can just be me.
What I would give not to have my father’s voice in my ear. In my head. Telling me what a failure I am.
The only place I excel is hockey, and even then, I’m still not good enough.
I start to pace.
This is taking too long. Where is he? With each passing second, my anxiety grows.
Time moves slow, though.
It creeps over me like grains of sand.
I’m not sure how much time goes by, but eventually, I see a car heading toward the house. My body tenses as I prepare for what’s to come.
It’s not the car I expected, however.
Nope.
It’s yet another police officer called to the scene to help disperse the crowd of underage drinkers.
Luckily, I’m not one of them, or I’d be in the back of one of the cruisers on the way to the precinct.
The car slows down and parks right in front of where I stand.
Once the officer is out, I expect him to head around back, but instead, he looks over at the officer a few feet away from me and heads in his direction.
I watch them from where I stand. They speak for a minute, both glancing in my direction every other word. They can’t be changing their minds about taking me downtown, right? The two men walk in my direction, and my back straightens.
Maybe I’m less Sullivan and more Yamaguchi. Fuck. I knew better than to celebrate my freedom prematurely. Coach always warns about that. It’s not over until it’s over, he shouts every half.
Still, I’d be shocked if they arrest me, since the girl involved threatened to press her own charges if her attacker goes after me.
The officer removes his cap, holding it between two white-knuckled hands. “Dane Sinclair?”
“Yeah.”
I wait for him to speak.
And when he does, I know my life will never be the same.