Center Stage: Magnolia Steele Mystery #1 (19 page)

I kicked his leg hard enough for my bare toes to throb, but at least it had some effect on him, based on the grunt he forced out. He dropped me in a heap and knelt down beside me. Grabbing a handful of my hair, he shoved the right side of my head into the metal pole. Bright lights filled my vision, quickly replaced by blackness, leaving me only vaguely conscious as he tied my wrists to the pole. I tried to open my eyes, but they refused to cooperate.

He leaned in close, his warm breath on my cheek as he said, “Well, I’ll be damned. It’s Magnolia Steele. Too bad for you fate can be a fickle bitch.”

He knew my name.

He knew who I was.

I knew I should care, that I should run, but my body refused to cooperate. The black fog of unconsciousness was already rolling in.

“Be a good girl, Magnolia, and I’ll let you walk away from this.” There was a smile in his voice.

I heard sobbing, but in my semi-conscious state, I couldn’t be sure if it was mine or the woman’s.

“I didn’t do it,” her voice pleaded.

“Wrong answer.”

Her screams faded to whimpers, and I struggled to lift my weighted eyelids. I could see work boots and jeans. They paced back and forth. The exertion was too much, though, and my eyes fluttered shut. I started to drift off.

The woman’s screams kept me awake even though my head felt blurry. I felt lost inside myself, like I was in the bottom of a long, long tunnel. But then I felt my dress being lifted to my lap.

He’s going to rape me.
I told myself to fight, but I was too far inside myself to care.

My head drooped forward. I didn’t have the strength to lift it, but I could see him from the chest down. He left my panties where they were, but he hefted the knife toward my flesh.

This is how I die.

In a damp, dark torture chamber, with a bleeding woman’s cries ringing in my ears.

The fog in my head was beginning to clear, and I wondered if my mother would ever know what happened to me. If I would become one more loved one who’d disappeared from her life.

When the knife tip touched my leg, my first instinct was to scream, but some inner strength rose up inside me.
Don’t give him the satisfaction.
I couldn’t fight him off, but I wouldn’t give him what he wanted.

The blade made its first cut, and I gritted my teeth to keep from uttering a sound.

“Oh, Magnolia, what a brave girl you are,” he cooed as the knife glided a slow path across my skin.

Tears slid down my cheeks, but I only allowed myself to whimper as hot pain dug into my leg.

When he finished, he grabbed my hair and jerked it toward my leg, sending a shooting pain through my head. “Look at it, Magnolia. This your reminder. Speak of this night, and I will kill your mother and your brother. I will make you watch. And then I will kill you.”

The woman was sobbing across the room. She started crying harder as the man stood and walked toward her.

I stared down at the C with a line through it, watching the blood drip down my leg to the floor.

This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.

The pain brought back the fog in my head, and I welcomed it, desperate for escape.

“I’m sorry,” the woman cried.

“And so am I,” he said. Her terrified screams ripped through the air, and then . . . nothing. In my semi-conscious state, I wondered if I’d passed out, but I realized I was still looking at my leg, the mark barely visible through the blood. I lifted my head only enough to see the puddle of blood on the floor under the woman’s feet. My eyes slammed closed, but as my mind retreated, I registered the drip, drip, drip of her blood.

M
y hands shook so violently
that I considered putting the gun on the kitchen counter. Instead my grip tightened around the handle. I waited for tears, but they didn’t come. Maybe I was cried out. I knew I was in shock.

I trained the flashlight beam on the door to the basement. Part of me wanted to go down there and completely confront my past, but I couldn’t do it. Not in the dark. This was enough.

Heading for the kitchen door I had never gotten to open that night, I walked outside and breathed in the night air, equally relieved to know the truth and horrified by it.

That’s when the tears fell, in a gush of anguish. Someone had been killed in that basement. I’d been there. Somehow I’d survived, but survive was the key word. I’d struggled to live after—without really understanding why.

After I turned the safety back on, I stowed the gun in my messenger bag. Then I practically ran home, unsure of what to do. Did I go to the police? I barely remembered any important details, and it had happened nearly ten years ago.

When I got close to the edge of the woods, new memories edged forward.

W
hen I woke up
, I was outside, beneath an awning of trees. Rain beat down on my face, and my leg screamed with pain.

My eyes flew open in horror—of what, I wasn’t sure—and I struggled to get up. The sudden motion sent a sharp pain through my head, followed by a wave of vertigo. I rolled to my side and vomited.

I slowly climbed to my feet, feeling as if everything around me was very far away. I was ten feet into the woods behind my own house. How had I gotten here?

I trudged up the side yard to the front of my house, every part of me aching, but my head hurting the most. I stopped at the corner of my house, clinging to the side as I dry-heaved. When I finished, I righted myself and managed to put one foot in front of the other again. I had to make inside—if I could just get behind the front door, I would be safe.

Safe from what?

T
he memories
of waking up in the woods had always been hazy and indistinct, fully picking back up at my mother’s front door.

When I had walked into the house that night, my mother had been in the living room, talking on the phone. Tilly sat on the sofa wringing her hands, while Tanner and Maddie and several of our friends were gathered in the kitchen. Tanner was shouting at the group to listen to him.

Suddenly everyone stopped; everyone stared. The room fell eerily quiet. All eyes were on me as I stood center stage in my own horror show.

“Never mind,” Momma shouted into the phone. “She’s here.” She tossed the phone onto a chair, then rushed forward and pulled me into a hug.

“Oh, thank God,” Tilly murmured from behind Momma.

Tanner was next to me in an instant, his eyes wide with concern. “What the hell happened, Magnolia?”

I looked at him, feeling very far away, and heard myself say, “I was in the woods.”

“What in the Sam Hill were you doing in the woods?” Momma barked, anger beginning to chase away her fear.

Why was I in the woods? I wasn’t sure. My gaze sought out Blake, who stood in the back, his eyes narrowed. He was the last thing I remembered.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?” Momma shouted. “What the hell kind of answer is ‘you don’t know?’”

“Lila!” Tilly admonished, pulling me into a hug. “Can’t you see the girl is traumatized?”

Momma ignored her. “Why were you in the woods?”

Terror rose up, bringing me to the edge of hysteria. “I don’t know.”

“And you had to go to the woods to do it? You’ve been gone for two hours!”

“Maybe I got lost,” I whispered.

I needed to be alone. I needed to get to bed. I needed something to make the hammer in my head stop pounding.

I pulled loose from Tilly and stared at my mother. “I’m sorry I left.”

“That’s it? You’re sorry you left?”

Embers of frustration and anger ignited in my chest. Something bad had happened, even if I had no idea what, and my mother was shouting at me in front of all my friends while I was struggling to put coherent thoughts together.

“You’ve pulled some self-centered and selfish stunts before, Magnolia, but this one takes the cake.”

My mouth dropped open, and tears welled in my eyes, but I just shook my head in disbelief.

Then her gaze dropped to my legs. “You have completely ruined that dress. Were you rolling around in the mud? And what is that?” She moved closer, bending forward.

I glanced down in confusion. What was the throbbing in my thigh?

I took several steps back. “I’ll pay you back for the dress.”

“You sure as hell will. You can forget that camping trip next weekend. You’ll be helping me with the Fillmore wedding reception. You’re grounded.”

What was happening?

I took a step backward, my head pounding on the side and feeling close to throwing up again. Unable to take any more, I turned toward the stairs.

“Just where do you think you’re going?” Momma demanded.

“To bed,” I said, but my voice was small.

“We’re not done talking about this!” she shouted after me.

But I ignored her—I ignored everyone—and slowly climbed the stairs, each step harder than the last. I passed Roy’s partially open door on the way to my own room. He was lying on his back in bed, but he sat up, bracing himself on his elbows as he glared at me. “I know why you ran off.”

I shook my head, setting off a fresh wave of pain. “What do you know?” Because I couldn’t remember any of it.

“I saw Blake chasing you.”

“Why didn’t you tell Mom?”

His mouth tipped up into a grin, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “We all have secrets, Magnolia. Even me.” He plopped back down. “Now shut the door.”

I did as he’d asked and stumbled into my room, not surprised to see Tanner coming up the stairs after me. If anything, I was surprised he hadn’t come up sooner.

“I’m sorry about the camping trip,” I murmured, my eyes on my bed. I just needed to make it that far.

“I don’t give a fuck about the camping trip. I want to know if it’s true.”

I lay down, not even bothering to pull back the covers, and closed my eyes. “Is
what
true?”

“Were you screwing Jason Mooney in the woods tonight?”

I opened my eyes and looked up at him. Did he really believe that after giving my virginity to him hours ago I had slipped into the woods to fuck a guy I couldn’t even stand?

I started to laugh.

“What the hell is so funny, Magnolia?” he demanded, standing next to the bed. “So you’re admitting it?”

I laughed so hard I could hardly breathe, the middle of my back aching as if I’d slammed into something, my head pounding so hard it felt like it was about to explode. I just couldn’t stop. “Why would you think that?”

“Blake.”

I blinked, sure I’d heard him wrong. “What?”

“Blake said he followed you into the woods. He found you screwing Jason, but when he confronted you, you took off running.”

Tanner actually believed his loser best friend’s lies. It was obvious he had never really known me at all.

His eyes widened and he pointed to my leg. “What the hell is that?”

My laughter cut off abruptly, and I sat up and pulled my hem down in an overwhelming panic to hide it from him, although I didn’t have a clue why. “None of your business. Now get out.”

“Not until you tell me what that is!” But that wasn’t concern in his voice; it was accusation.

What did he think he was looking at?

I got to my knees, seething with anger. “You’re right, Tanner. I
did
have sex with Jason Mooney in the woods. I was gone for two hours because we were so busy fucking all over the goddamned place. And he was so good, I had a tattoo etched onto my leg to help me remember who was the better lay. Happy now?”

He stared at me, his face pale. “You’re lying.”

I climbed off the bed and got to my feet. “Which is it, Tanner? Either I’m lying or I’m not. You can’t have it both ways, because both versions have me
fucking Jason Mooney
!” My voice was shrill and high-pitched, and it sounded every bit as hysterical as I felt. “The very fact that you would believe that tells me everything I need to know. You and I are
done
.
Now get the hell out
.”

I gave him a shove, but he didn’t move an inch. “Magnolia, I’m sorry. Let’s talk this over.”

I started crying and pushed him harder, but he dug in his feet. When he didn’t relent, I slapped at his chest over and over as I sobbed.

“Magnolia. Stop.” He grabbed my wrists, but he brushed against mud-covered wounds that I didn’t know I had.

I jerked away from him. “Get. Out.”

My mother appeared in the doorway. “What the hell is going on here?”

Tanner gave me a pleading look.

“Nothing,” I forced out past my tears. “Tanner was just leaving.”

“Magnolia,” he said, his face full of contrition. “I’m sorry.”

“Go.”

My mother marched into the room. “You heard her. Get out.”

“Okay.” He held up his hands in surrender. “I’m sorry. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

My mother waited until he left before she asked, “Did he hurt you?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“You look like something the cat dragged in. Take a shower and go to bed. We’ll talk about this in the morning.” She headed for the door, then added, “When you’re sober.”

But I didn’t make it to the shower. I locked my door behind her, overcome by the nearly suffocating fear that someone was coming to get me, and fell onto the bed.

My nightmares were full of pain and screams and blood.

The next morning, my mother burst into my room, the door banging against the wall. “What have I said about locking doors, Magnolia?”

I sat up, disoriented and dizzy. Nausea washed over me in a hot wave, and I jumped out of bed, stumbling a little from vertigo as I rushed to the toilet.

My mother followed and leaned against the doorjamb to watch me vomit.

“How much did you have to drink last night?”

I started to cry. I couldn’t do this. I felt broken and battered and shredded to pieces, inside and out. I wasn’t strong enough to do this, whatever
this
was. I looked up at her. “That’s where your mind goes? You really want to think the worst of me?”

“What else am I supposed to think, Magnolia? I don’t buy your story about going for a walk in the woods for a minute.”

“So you automatically assume I did something wrong?”

“You’re no angel, Magnolia.”

She was right. Me being hungover wasn’t outside the realm of possibility. It wouldn’t have been the first time. But something bad had happened—my jumbled dreams had felt so real—and all I wanted was for my mother to hold me and tell me everything would be okay.

But she wouldn’t. Because my gut told me I could never, ever tell her.

In that instant, I realized I couldn’t stay home. Every minute I was here, I was putting all our lives at risk.

The one thing I knew with certainty was that I had to leave.

Where had that come from? I didn’t know, but I knew I had to go. As far away as I could get. As soon as possible.

After she left for work, I packed two suitcases, gathered all four hundred sixty dollars of my graduation money, and used my mother’s credit card to buy a one-way ticket to New York City for an early afternoon flight.

When the plane took off, I told myself I would never go home again.

But I had. And I’d reawakened a nightmare.

I’d always suspected Blake was the perpetrator that night. Now I knew that was false. But if he hadn’t sent me the texts, who had?