Page 20 of Every Broken Piece

Chapter twenty

Tess

T he worn, wooden floors are sticky with spilled beer.

The band is loud, the lights keeping time with the beat.

Six of us are scrunched together around a café style table, all of us leaning over our elbows so we can hear each other above the music and even then we still have to shout but we don’t care because we’re all buzzed and living off the high of a fun Saturday night with friends.

I’m glad I came. I’m glad Amelia refused to take no for an answer and for once I truly feel like part of this group. This is what it feels like to belong to people. This is what it feels like to have friends.

Conor appears at my side and deposits a bright green margarita in front of me, the rim crusted in salt with a thick lime slice sliding off the edge.

I smile my thanks instead of trying to shout it.

He smiles back and elbows his way between me and Josh, one of the other guys in the friend group.

Without missing a beat Josh slides to the left to make room, keeping up a conversation with Bella, Amelia’s other friend.

The table is littered with empty beer bottles and margarita glasses, condensation rings, and spilled alcohol. A red plastic basket of popcorn sits in the middle. Josh dips his hand in and pulls out a palmful, shoving it in his mouth as he nods at whatever Bella’s saying.

Amelia’s standing behind Greg, hands in the air as she wiggles her hips to the beat of the music, her eyes half closed. For once I don’t want the peace of my apartment. I want loud country music, line dancing, laughter. Friendship. Belonging.

“Having fun?” Conor shouts close to my ear.

I nod as I sip my margarita and lean back to observe, a half smile tugging at my lips.

“Happy birthday, Tess.” I don’t know how it’s possible since we’re crammed together, but he’s closer now, our shoulders, hips, and even shoes pressed together.

“Thank you,” I yell.

He tilts toward me, his lips at my ear. I try to lean away but Josh is on my other side and there’s no room. Taking advantage of our close proximity, Conor swoops in quickly and plants a kiss to my cheek, then rears back and turns his head away as pink creeps up his neck.

I’m frozen, blinking furiously, the drink halfway to my mouth. I’m thirty years old today and I have no idea what to do with that kiss. Yell thank you? Smile? I don’t want to encourage him, but I don’t want to embarrass him either. What I do know is that I don’t want to kiss him.

All night he’s been super polite, making sure I always have a drink in hand, sticking almost too close.

I’m beginning to think that Amelia’s right.

He might like me. And if this were another life, I might like him back.

He’s slim, with black rimmed glasses, a little on the nerdy side.

I think he works in IT, but I can’t remember.

“Let’s dance!” Amelia holds her beer high and lets out a loud yeeee-haw , then tilts the bottle up and drains the last of it.

A group of men a table over halt their conversation to clap.

Amelia lifts her arm and bows low, almost tipping over until Greg grabs her and hauls her upright, eliciting a laugh from the men.

Conor makes a grab for my hand just as I’m reaching for my drink. The glass tips and we both lunge for it, our hands and arms colliding as the bright green liquid sloshes all over the place.

“Shit,” Conor says, righting the glass, then shaking the wetness off his hand. The pink has crawled from his neck to his cheeks.

“S’okay,” I say, my words slurring. “I didn’t need it anyway.” I think that was my fourth, which is two too many.

“I’ll get you another,” Conor says.

I put my hand on his forearm and squeeze.

“No. Don’t. I’ve had enough. In fact...” I look around the bar, my head on a swivel, causing the lights to swirl.

I have to grab hold of the table to keep the room from spinning.

I turn to Conor and blink because he’s so close our noses bump. “You know where the bathroom is?”

He pulls back. “Oh. Um. Down the hallway beside the bar.”

I nod and take off in that direction, but the crowd is crowd-y and I have to push my way through.

“’Scuse me.”

“So sorry.”

“Can I get by?”

“Oh! Sorry. Didn’t mean to step on you.”

I come upon four girls in pink sparkly dresses that barely cover the important bits, surrounding a girl in a white sparkly dress, a tiara, and a sash that says “bride”.

I turn sideways and suck everything in to make myself as small as possible in order to slide between them. “’Scuse me. Thank you. Congratulations.”

The bride-to-be beams a smile at me. “Thanks!”

I work my way through them until I can see the hallway, but it takes me a good five minutes to get through the rest of the crowd. I swear someone pinches my ass but when I turn around, I can’t find the culprit, so I keep going.

I stumble a little and bump into a guy who’s stepping away from the bar.

“Whoa there.” He grabs my elbow to steady me then smiles wide. “Hey there, sweetheart. Wanna dance?”

“Gotta pee.”

“I’ll be waiting for you.”

I laugh him off as I continue on my trajectory.

I’ve had a few encouraging looks from men tonight, but I stayed in my lane and didn’t flirt.

Not that I’m any good at flirting. It feels weird and not like me at all.

After a lot of debate I settled on a ruffled dress that hits just above my knees, paired with cowboy boots I found at a secondhand shop that fit me perfectly.

My hair was down at the start of the evening, but it’s hot in here so I put it in a high ponytail to keep it off my neck.

The hall where the bathrooms are located is the kind of sudden quiet that makes your ears feel stuffed with cotton after being around a live band. I breathe a sigh of relief.

Just as I put my hand on the bathroom door to push it open, someone grabs my elbow in a tight hold.

“Theresa.”

I turn with a ready smile, thinking it’s Conor, or Josh, or Greg, or maybe the man who asked me to dance although I dunno why he’d know my name.

But I don’t recognize the guy standing so close to me that his chest is almost pressed into my back.

He looks like all the other guys at the bar in jeans, a black Henley shirt, cowboy boots.

A black baseball hat hides the upper part of his face so I can’t see his eyes and I can’t tell the color of his hair.

Unlike the harmless flirting of the man who asked me to dance, this one puts me on edge.

“Yes?” The floor feels like its tilting. Definitely shouldn’t have had that last margarita.

His fingers dig into the skin around my elbow and he tugs, making me fall into him. I press my hands against his chest to push away but his arms go around me in a tight bear hug. A hand wraps around my ponytail, wrenching my head back.

“Ow! What are you doing? Let go of me.” I struggle to break free, but his arms are like bands of steel as he pulls me deeper into the shadows of the back hallway. I open my mouth to scream, and he slams his mouth on mine. I’m so stunned that I stop struggling as cold panic drenches me.

We’re moving in tandem, him picking me up just enough that my toes barely touch the ground as he backs up, still pressing his lips to mine. If anyone were to look into the shadows they’d think we were making out.

I start to gag, but that doesn’t make him pull away.

I hear a door schnick open.

He thrusts me away from him so hard that I fall into what looks like a supply closet filled with red plastic cups, napkins, a mop and a mop bucket.

My shoulder hits the edge of a metal shelving unit, and a tower of cups fall, scattering everywhere.

The sound of so much plastic hitting the concrete floor is loud but I doubt anyone outside can hear it.

He slams the door closed, muting the music and laughter. My heart accelerates into dangerous territory as I slide away from him, but there’s no room to maneuver and my back hits the shelves. I reach behind me, searching for anything I can use as a weapon, but I only come up with more plastic cups.

“I need that twenty grand, Theresa.”

Oh, God. This is him. The man who called me two weeks ago. I’m such a fool thinking this would go away. “I-I don’t have that kind of money.”

He takes a step closer. I look around, twisting my head right then left, looking for an escape. But there is none. He’s between me and the only door in a windowless room.

“That’s too bad, Theresa. Sandra’s creditors won’t like to hear that.”

“Please,” I whisper. “I don’t have any contact with Sandra anymore. I don’t know why she gave you my name.” I do. I do know why, and I hate her for it. I hate her with a passion that one person should never feel for another.

His hand whips out so fast that I barely have time to flinch before he’s jerking on my ponytail.

I cry out, bending my neck back to ease the pain but he keeps a steady pressure on my hair, slowly dragging me down until my knees buckle and I slide to the floor.

I’m kneeling before him; eyes level with his zipper as I heave in one terrified breath after another.

“Sandra says you’re good for the money. I’m here to collect. I don’t get it, bad things happen, Theresa.”

“I don’t care what you do to her.” God help me but I don’t care. I’d probably thank him for permanently taking this woman out of my life.

“That’s not how it works, honey. You owe us the money or you pay another way.

” He’s staring down at me. My neck is cranked back and to the side, forcing me to look up.

I can barely see his eyes, just an occasional glitter as it rakes over my body, taking in the dress I thought was so cute and the boots that fit perfectly even though they were second hand.

His lips tip up. “You’ll bring a good amount of money in, but not twenty grand worth. ”

I’ll bring...

Is he talking about selling me ? Like human trafficking selling me?

I whimper.

“Still don’t have that money?”

I try to shake my head, but any movement feels like he’s tearing hunks of hair out.

I have no way of getting the money. If I had the money, I’d like to say I wouldn’t give it to him, but I know this is just the beginning of the pain I’m going to feel, so yes.

Yes, I would give him anything he asks for as long as I don’t disappear like all those girls you hear about in the news.

I think of Gabe and my promise to him to be safe tonight and that I’d text him when I got home. I think of the cat I wanted to badly and will never get. I think of possibilities and dreams that will never come true.

But mostly I think of Gabe sitting at home waiting for my text.

My captor leans down until our faces are close. Mint. I smell mint toothpaste and somehow that makes all of this so much worse. Like he actually brushed his teeth before leaving the house to terrorize me.

Using my hair like a joystick to control me, he yanks up and I scramble to my feet, my head following the direction of his hand.

He releases my hair, and I barely have time to breathe a sigh of relief from the sudden cessation of pain when he punches me in the stomach.

It’s so unexpected that I barely make a sound. The air rushes out of me and nothing comes back to replace it.

I can’t breathe. I can’t think.

I can only double over and wretch, desperate for a sip of air.

From my peripheral I see a fist before pain explodes in my cheek. I fall, landing on my wrist and crying out. I curl into a tight ball as a brown cowboy boot aims for my head.