Home > Lust (The Elite Seven #1)(2)

Lust (The Elite Seven #1)(2)
Author: Ker Dukey

Going around the fire truck, I cut through the trees. The wind howls, tossing the branches around violently. They whip me across the face, scraping holes into my flesh. My feet sink into the ground with each determined step, submerging me in more than one puddle, flooding my boots.

By the time I make it through the brush, I’m a mess. Mud cakes my boots and jeans, and I may as well not be wearing a shirt. My dark hair flops over my eyes, blinding me.

Mom’s going to owe me for this shit.

I cross the street, and my stomach knots when I don’t see Robbie’s silhouette under the lamppost where he’s supposed to wait.

Shit.

Scanning the parking lot, I look for any sheltered areas he might have taken refuge, but there’s nowhere he could be.

Jogging over to the building, I grab the handle on the door and give it a tug, but it’s locked and there are no lights coming from inside.

Mom had warned me this was the last class of the night and they lock the building up so Robbie would be outside with no way of getting back in.

I’m a cunt.

There’s a pounding in my chest—a vibrating, nervous energy trying to rip from under my skin with each passing second he’s not materialising in front of me.

Where are you?

The sky darkens with each fleeting breath I take, my body jolting with the thunder as it rips through the night.

Unease settles in my chest, and panic races up my throat as I call out for him.

“Robbie!” I shout, water spraying from my lips.

Nothing.

“Robbie,” I try again, my tone more urgent. I pat down my pockets for my cell, but already know I left it in the car. Fuck. Fuck.

The lights from the emergency vehicles taunt me through the trees, then someone emerging through the same brush I just came from catches my eye and I take off in their direction.

I come to a slow walk when I see the silhouette is too large to be Robbie.

It’s the officer from before.

What the hell?

My car’s not even in anyone’s way, and finding my brother is more important. Let the jerk give me a ticket.

“What’s your name, son?” he asks, coming to a stop in front of me.

“Rhett. Rhett Masters, why?” I bark, anger and fear eating away at me.

He looks around me to the building where Robbie should be, then back to me.

“He’s not here,” I tell him before he gets suspicious that I was making shit up.

Where are you, Robbie?

“Ok, I need you to listen to me and prepare yourself for what I’m going to tell you.” His eyes hold mine with an intensity that makes every hair on my body rise.

Thud.

My head swims, and there’s this knowledge taking over my mind I can’t possibly predict, but my head turns to the emergency chaos happening through the trees and I stagger backwards.

Robbie.

“Wait. Wait, no, no.” I shake my head, holding out my arm to him. I’m not prepared to hear what I know he’s going to tell me.

I just fucking know he’s going to say something bad.

The darkness of the impending night wraps its angry fist around my throat and begins to squeeze.

“The accident…a truck swerved off the road and hit a boy.”

Stop.

Don’t fucking say it.

“We believe him to be around eleven or twelve years old.”

Shut up. I can’t hear this.

“He’s wearing a Karate Gi.”

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Robbie.

Thick fog begins stirring inside my mind, making me woozy. My stomach clenches, and I dry heave.

It’s not Robbie. This isn’t real.

No.

No fucking way.

I try to tell my mind it’s not factual, but I feel the truth constricting my heart.

Robbie tried to walk because I left him here and now he’s pinned by a truck to a tree.

“He didn’t make it,” the officer says, placing a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, son.”

No.

My head shakes back and forth manically, and I bat his hand off me.

“He died on impact. He wouldn’t have felt a thing.”

Take that back.

It’s not Robbie.

“Can you come with me? We need to contact your parents.” He makes a move with his hand, but I step away.

No.

Shut the fuck up. Stop touching me.

My legs steady themselves, becoming solid once more beneath me instead of jelly, and I run.

Before I even realize it, I’ve cleared the trees and I’m at the truck.

Thud… Thud….

“Whoa, what the hell? Move away now,” someone barks, but my knees fail me.

“Robbie,” I yell, tears clogging my throat and acid burning in my chest.

It’s then I see it—his backpack peeking up just over the bumper—his brown hair soaked to his head that’s slumped to the side.

Robbie. My baby brother…

Arms and hands grab at me, but I pull away, stumbling back and falling on my ass to the muddy ground beneath me. My heart is going to burst through my chest, tears burn my eyes, and vomit chases my soul, vacating my body.

“Get him away,” voices shout, but everything is threatening to fade out.

Mother Nature tears the sky apart above, mourning along with me for what I’ve lost.

My arms reach out, grasping air. “Robbie,” I choke.

It’s my fault.

It’s my fucking fault.

Nothing is real.

Nothing feels solid anymore.

The casket is too small.

This shouldn’t be happening.

“In the Arms of the Angels” croons through the cemetery from invisible speakers, and the air feels toxic.

Like I’m breathing in poison and it’s constricting my lungs, choking me. I wish it would crawl up my throat and strangle me so I don’t have to be here to feel this mourning.

My father sits, controlled and composed next to me, but his knuckles are white as he squeezes his gloves in his palm. Dark shades frame his face, hiding his sorrow behind them.

Flower arrangements formed into words mock me from the space separating us from his casket.

Son.

Brother.

I don’t even recognize half the people here. Sobs and sniffles sound all around me, and I want to block them out—claw at the mud to fill my own ears so I don’t have to witness their pain. Hear their grief.

It’s all too fucking much.

It’s all because of me.

When the casket begins to lower into the ground, a sound like I’ve never heard before rips from my mother’s lips, shattering the air and causing every hair follicle on my body to rise.

If death had a sound, it would be the broken wails of my mother. She’s dying, her broken heart ripping her to shreds for all to witness.

A chill races over my body, dampening my skin in a sheen of frost.

“No, no, no! Not my baby! Please! I’m sorry! I’m so sorry Robbie…” she howls, grief wrapping her in its tormenting grip and squeezing the air from her lungs.

Chest pains signal the cracking of my own ribcage as my heart spills free at her feet.

This is my fault.

I’m sorry, Mom.

The sky darkens as grey clouds roll in as If summoned by her pain. Rain pelts down, throwing my mind back to that night.

“He didn’t make it, son.”

Tears burn my eyes as I get to my feet and reach out for my mother, but she slaps my hands away, and any soul left inside me dissipates.

“Don’t touch me,” she chokes out. “I can’t look at you.”

I stumble away from her, ignoring the voices of my best friend and family members as they try to console me.

My feet move, and before I even realize it, I’m running.

Echoes of people shouting at me fade into the distance as rain pours over their words.

My legs burn, carrying me in the direction of the main road.

I don’t know how long I’m pounding the asphalt, but my lungs scream for relief. My boots have torn my feet to shreds, and the pain washes out the reality of why I’m running.

Focusing on the burn of my limbs, I will the images of my dead brother to vacate my mind.

The casket lowering into a dirt hole.

I want to feel numb, please, God.

The rhythm of my heart is erratic and labored by the time I reach the parking lot of where Robbie took Karate.

I don’t know why I’m here or how long it took me to get here, but the day is turning to night and the rain is dousing me in its memory of his death.

I’m choking on the downpour coating my lips as I gasp at the air to cool the lava in my lungs.

Everything feels suspended in time, like slow motion. My steps become heavy and sluggish as I approach the trees and push through the branches, twigs snapping underfoot.

When I clear the treeline, my body solidifies.

The tree is still there. It looks unmarked.

Tall and flourishing like nothing happened.

My brother’s life ended, and the world keeps turning, life goes on.

Water cascades down all around me just like that night, and my mind spins and churns. But it’s not just rain staining cheeks. Sobs wreck and ravage me, buckling my knees and bringing me to the ground.

Everything fucking hurts. My heart wants to flee, but as punishment for what I’ve done, it can’t escape. It’s trapped inside me to suffer in agony.

“Rhett?”

“Rhett?”

I hear my name, but I can’t tell what’s real and what’s not anymore.

My features pinch in confusion when lights flash and a car pulls up behind me.

The headlights illuminate the scene, lighting up everything I want kept in the dark.

“Robbie.” I heave his name, my stomach roiling, and body losing all ability to hold me upright. The darkness opens its arms to me, and I fall to meet it.

One Month Later…

Alcohol and coke burns in my bloodstream, giving me a false sense of courage.

Cheers ring out from the partygoers below, and the pool blurs my eyesight.

Holding up the bottle of Jack Daniels I have a brief recollection of being handed by my best friend, Baxter Goddard, aka God, I shout, “One!”

   
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