Filthy 4 (Filthy #4)

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  End Note

  Filthy 4

  Filthy: A Serial Novel

  Book Four

  Megan D. Martin

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Filthy 4, Filthy Book Four: A Serial Novel

  Copyright © 2014 Megan D. Martin

  Cover by Najla Qamber Designs

  Chapter Header Design by JN Sheats-Illustrator

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  www.MeganDMartin.blogspot.com

  First Printing, 2014

  For anyone who has struggled with a toxic form of love, the kind that threatens to eat you from the inside out.

  The darkness swallows her

  Until there’s nothing left

  Until she begs for mercy

  Until she’s screaming, clawing to breathe

  Until she’s gone.

  ONE

  Rhett.

  I stared at him. My father. He stood before me in his kitchen, shirtless—his body nearly in as good shape as mine. I tried to wrap my head around what I just walked in on a few minutes ago. My father standing over Faye’s naked body. Her skin ravaged by hundreds of superficial cuts. There were dark circles under her eyes, her skin as white as a ghost. But not as white as the powder that had been lying in the crease between his thumb and forefinger.

  That didn’t just happen.

  But it had. And I wanted to punch something. Him. I wanted to wail on him. I wanted to beat his face in. Destroy him. She was in his bedroom. Why is she in his bedroom? He said he came home and found her there. He found her lying there, ready to fuck him, for cocaine. Ready to do anything he wanted.

  I didn’t want it to be true. Was that wrong? Was it so wrong that I wanted Faye for my own? That I’d had to force myself to stay away this last month. That I had to physically restrain myself from driving over to check on her. She was a problem for me. She made me want things I could never have. And that was bad.

  I knew Dad would take care of her. He loved her. There was no question in that. He had been more heartbroken about her leaving than Jessica, her own mother.

  “Explain what happened.” I heard myself say, but I sounded far away, even in my own head.

  “I already told you son.” Dad laid his hands out on the dark granite counter, spreading his fingers apart. “I came home and she was in there. She has a bad drug problem.”

  “Then why didn’t you fucking tell me?” I squeezed my fists hard to keep from running at him, punching him. “You were supposed to take care of her. If you knew she had this problem why didn’t you tell me? She needs help and giving her more of what’s hurting her, isn’t going to help her!”

  “I know that, but I didn’t want to see her suffer.” His eyes pleaded with me, begged me to understand his position. We looked nothing alike, not really. I looked like my mom, at least that’s what he said. I couldn’t really remember what she looked like. His eyes were blue with dark hair, while mine were green with light hair.

  “So you just let her go back to the streets.”

  “I didn’t know that’s where she was going.” He let out a deep breath. “Why didn’t you tell me she was a prostitute?” His words were laced with anger.

  “It wasn’t any of your business.”

  “It damn-well is my business.”

  I frowned. “It doesn’t matter now. She needs help.” I dug my phone out of my pocket. Seeing the little illuminated screen calmed me. I knew about some local rehab places in Dallas. I could get her checked into one today. It didn’t matter the price. I would go into fucking debt to get her the help she needed.

  “She doesn’t need your help.”

  I glanced up, surprised to hear the venom in Dad’s voice. “Yes, she needs someone’s help. I’m going to get her checked into a clinic.”

  “No you aren’t.” Dad shook his head vehemently. “I am very capable of helping her here at home.”

  “Really? You’ve done a bang up job of it so far, Dad. Not only is she upstairs naked in your bed willing to fuck you for more cocaine, but her body is mutilated beyond belief. I’m taking her and getting her some help.” I shoved my phone in my pocket, deciding I would figure out the number along the way, and moved back toward the stairs.

  “No.” Dad stepped in front of me. “I can handle this.”

  I stared at him with wide eyes. “Are you kidding me right now? You’re fucking lucky all you got was that split under your eye when I punched you earlier.” Blood still dripped from the superficial wound and a dark purple bruise was already starting to set in beneath his left eye.

  The urge to punch him again multiplied underneath my skin like a virus. He knew she had a problem and he didn’t tell you. Even all those times you called him, he assured you she was fine. He lied to you.

  “Why did you lie to me?”

  “Lie to you? What are you—”

  “When I called, you said she was fine. Doing good. Those were your exact words. Why did you lie to me?” I took a threatening step toward him.

  “She didn’t want you to know. She was afraid you would be mad at her, disappointed. She begged me not to tell you,” he said quickly. “I was only respecting her wishes.”

  “Since when do you respect anyone?” Dad was a joke, sure, I loved him because he was my dad, but people all over respected him because they feared him. He came off as this understanding, good person on the outside, but I had known him long enough to know that he was far from that. He was conniving. He didn’t do anything unless it served him well, and he sure as hell didn’t protect anyone out of the goodness of his heart. It was how he got to be so big in the contracting business. He took back doors that led to dirty hands, but none of them were as dirty as his own.

  “I respect Faye, because she’s my daughter. I protect her because of that. Because I love her. Something you wouldn’t understand.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. We’ll hash this out later. For now, I’m getting Faye and taking her to get help.”

  I pushed past him and headed back up the stairs.

  “She stays here.” He followed me.

  Why is he fighting me on this?

  I ignored him and took the steps two at a time, moving quickly into the bedroom.

  “I’m telling you son. She stays. I’m not gonna have her go to some clinic where people can put her down and potentially hurt her worse. She needs to be with me. With the person who loves her.”

  She wasn’t in the bedroom where I’d last seen her, cowering on the floor tears in her eyes. The very image made my heart jump in my chest. It made me ache in ways that didn’t make sense. I didn’t want her to hurt. I wanted her to be happy. I wanted her to see all the good things life had to offer, rather than all the fucked up shit she dealt with once she ran away. But I couldn’t keep it together when I saw her like that. Willing to fuck anyone, even the man who had raised her. It made my stomach churn, made red cover my gaze. It made me want to lash out at her and destroy her. Ruin her, before she had the chance to ruin me.

  I moved immediately to the bathroom
door and tapped on it with my knuckles. Knuckles that still ached from punching my dad in the face. “Faye, it’s Rhett. Come out okay? I just wanna talk to you.”

  There was no answer.

  “Now look, you’ve gone and upset her. You’re not helping anyone by being here.”

  I tossed a glare over my shoulder before jiggling the knob. To my surprise it gave way, unlocked.

  “Faye…” But as I pushed the door open, the rest of my words were sucked from my chest, like someone had turned on a vacuum. Faye was on the floor, her body twisted at an awkward angle. Vomit leaked from her parted lips onto the white tile and blood was smeared around her, dripping from a thick slice on her wrist.

  She’s dying.

  “No! No!” I fell to my knees and pressed my hand to the wound. “Call the ambulance!” I shouted to Dad, but I kept my eyes on her. On Faye. Her eyes were open, glassy, empty. She stared at me, but she didn’t see me. I knew she didn’t. Not the way I saw her.

  She can’t die.

  The very thought of that possibility made something in me crack. I couldn’t say what it was. I couldn’t focus on anything. All I could see were her eyes, those vacant, unseeing eyes. I could remember looking into them, into their dark brown pools and seeing something there. Something that made me want more than the stupid pathetic version of my life I was living.

  She was trying to leave again. To run. To hide. Like she did after that summer. The summer where she begged me to have sex with her. To make love to her. At the time I’d been shocked, sitting there on the couch across from her. My step-sister who was on a fast track to being a woman. A girl who had laughed at all my corny jokes and made the summer worth it. Made me not miss my new girlfriend so much, Sarah. I didn’t sleep with Faye when she asked, but I had left instead and told myself that one day, things would be different. She wouldn’t be underage. She would be a woman. And if she still felt the same. If she still thought my stupid jokes were funny, then things would be different. But only then.

  But that never happened. She was gone before I could blink an eye. That innocent girl. And when I found her again, she wasn’t the same. She was someone else.

  Someone who made my blood boil. Who made me want things I didn’t think I’d ever want again. Things that tried to permeate my safe, perfect existence and made me want to step out of my box even though I was disgusted by them. I wanted them. I wanted her.

  And here we were. On the floor in my father’s bathroom. Those innocent eyes vacant and lost, blood cooling on the tile floor. How did we get here?

  I pulled her into my arms. Her body limp, her breathing slow. Vomit and blood dripped onto my suit, but I didn’t care. I pressed my forehead to hers and looked into those vacant eyes and did something I hadn’t done in years.

  I prayed.

  TWO

  Faye.

  There were noises. A soft murmuring of voices. They fluttered around me. Permeating my ears with their soft lilting notes, cocooning me in something warm. I liked the noise. I wanted to keep it, to bask in the moments of it forever. But then there was something else.

  Pain.

  The soft warmth of the murmuring voices was blasted away by the pain. It didn’t seep into me, but slammed into me all at once, the intensity of it all making me cry out. Until I wasn’t just crying out, I was convulsing, gagging. Blinking my eyes against dim lights I saw the blood. A mist of it splattered over me as I continued to retch.

  “Oh my God, run! Hurry! Get the nurse!”

  I knew that voice, but I couldn’t look up at him. At Rhett. All I could seem to do was gag and heave up blood from my stomach. The pain was too much. Too intense. And I couldn’t stop.

  There were more hands, more people. People talking loudly. Their voices pressing against the inside of my skull until I wanted claw my ears off and make the noises go away. I wanted them to disappear and be gone forever.

  Why is there so much pain?

  But then I remembered. Even through the pain I could see it. The reflection I’d looked at in the mirror. The fractured poisonous woman who’d looked back at me. Me.

  I’m dead.

  The thought came to me, ripping through my head. And then I heard his voice. Taylor’s voice. And I knew it was true. Before I blacked out, before I let the pain and the blood carry me back into darkness, I came to realize where I was.

  Hell.

  I blinked my eyes against dim lights. The pain wasn’t as bad now. I’m surprised. I had figured it would only get worse. That was what the stories of hell said, right? I figured I would have been burned in an everlasting fire, but that didn’t seem to be the case either. It made sense really, that hell would be a person’s worst experiences multiplied by a thousand. And that’s what I had felt earlier. However long ago earlier had been.

  “I think she’s waking up.”

  I sucked in a breath at the sound of that voice. Rhett’s voice. I had heard him earlier. Why is he in my hell?

  Probably to make you watch him fuck Sarah for the rest of eternity.

  “Faye?”

  I blinked my eyes several times, trying to force the blurry gray room into focus. But then the room wasn’t gray anymore, because all I could see was Rhett. He stood over me. Something warm touched my hand.

  His green eyes came into focus, his jaw covered with stubble. “You look so real?” My words sounded like a buzzing bee, barely audible.

  He smiled. Yes, he actually smiled. It was a real smile. One of those rare ones I never got to see. Hell is letting me have a real Rhett smile?

  “Here.” Something bumped my lips and I glanced down, realizing it was a white straw in a clear plastic cup. I quickly sucked it into my mouth, practically moaning as the cool liquid ran down my throat.

  “You’re okay,” he said as he pulled the cup away. He sat it on a little table next to my bed.

  My bed? I glanced around, the water bringing some sort of clarity I hadn’t had before. I was in a bed. A bed in a plain gray room. A TV was suspended on the wall across from me, playing some muted show. I glanced at my arm and found one of them bandaged with thick white gauze. The other had tubes running out of it, with clear liquid running through them.

  I’m in the hospital.

  “Rhett’s right. You’re going to be okay.” I glanced up and met gazes with Taylor. He sat in a chair just on the other side of where Rhett stood. He was close. Close enough that if he wanted to reach out and touch my leg he could.

  “I’m alive?”

  Something hard flickered across Taylor’s features before his mask became neutral again. “Yes.”

  Fear swam inside me. It was the same fear she felt. The woman in the mirror. The woman who decided to kill herself. I knew that woman was me. We were connected together, the two of us. The gap between us closing in by the second.

  “I was supposed to die.” My voice cracked on the end.

  “Shhh.” I glanced up at Rhett. He rubbed his hand back and forth over my bandaged arm. “Let’s not talk about that right now.” He looked concerned, worried. I would have been comforted by it, if Taylor wasn’t sitting just feet away. I could feel his eyes zeroed in on Rhett’s hand. On the way he touched me. It was full of hate. Of resentment.

  If I get out of here, he’s going to make me wish I was dead.

  A cold sweat covered my body from head to toe as I stared at him. There was a buzzing sound next to me, but I didn’t pay attention to it. All I could see was Taylor. His blue eyes. The way he stared at me. All of his emotions. All the things he wanted to do to me. He would destroy me. He would break me down into something less than I already was.

  I have nothing left to lose.

  Everything. I have everything.

  An ache started just between my eyes and made me suck in a deep breath, squeezing my eyes shut to try and block out the pain.

  Rhett’s hand rubbed against mine. “You’re okay, you’ve lost a lot of blood, along with everything else…” His voice shook. “But you’re okay now.
”

  I touched my hand to my head trying to rub away the hurt.

  “I’m supposed to be dead.” My words were stronger now. Bitter. Hatred seeped into them. I couldn’t get anything right. I couldn’t even kill myself. I fucked everything up. Everything.

  “But you’re not. And that’s a good thing.” Rhett’s voice was full of emotion, the sound unrecognizable. I glanced up, meeting his eyes. I didn’t see the hate I was accustomed to. It was just him. Just Rhett. The good Rhett. The one I dreamed about.

  The buzzing sounded again and this time I realized it came from Rhett’s pocket. He reached inside and pulled out his cell phone.

  “Dammit, I really need to take this.” He gave me an uncertain look, as if he didn’t really want to leave. “I’m just going to step outside. I’ll be right back, Dad will stay in here with you.” He patted my arm and turned away.

  “No.” The word was out of my mouth before I could think about it. But he didn’t hear me, pressing the phone to his ear and heading out the door. “No.” I said the word again, but he was already gone and I was alone. Alone with him. With Taylor.

  Panic was like a spotlight beneath my skin. It illuminated my fears, highlighting them in its cold glow.

  “No. No. No. No. No. No.” My lips trembled. I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at him. I stared down at my arm. At the bandage. At the tubes running into the other. If I didn’t look at him maybe he would disappear. Maybe this wasn’t real. Yes, that’s what it is! It was the only explanation. It couldn’t be real. Or maybe this is hell.

  A bubble of laughter escaped my lips as I flexed my wrist, pain snaked up my arm.

  “We need to talk, Faye baby.”

  I jumped. He was right next to me. Somehow he had moved without me noticing. He was standing over me. Like Rhett had, only it was different with him. I wasn’t comforted. I wasn’t filled with a longing. The only thing I could feel was fear.