The Wrong Path_Smashwords (10 page)

“Well they’re all so small they don’t need much food anyway,” Trevor pointed out, smiling warmly down at Annabelle. She smiled up at his compliment, squeezing his leg under the table as he ran a hand through her hair. He looked back at the others. “So, what’s the plan for tomorrow?”

Claire lightly smacked Parker’s hand away from her, giggling, and addressed Annabelle. “Tomorrow we’re going to get ready at Claudia’s,” she told her. “I’ll swing by and pick you up around 5:00.”

Annabelle nodded appropriately. Claire turned to Trevor. “You guys are going to pick us up at 9:30.” She looked around the table at the other guys, as if waiting for confirmation.

“We’ll be there,” Zach assured her flirtatiously, winking. Claire giggled and rolled her eyes.

Annabelle was desperate to ask what the plan was if one of them was turned away at the door for having a fake ID, but she didn’t want to bring down everyone’s good mood, so she kept her mouth shut.

They began talking about the new club and how cool it was supposed to be, so Annabelle tuned out, stirring the milkshake the waitress set in front of her. Her friends were laughing loudly, drawing the attention and stares of other patrons, but she felt strangely conspicuous in the mass of it. Normally she reveled in being part of the crowd that drew so many looks of admiration, but tonight she just wanted to be sitting at home in her game room with Trevor, watching a movie.

She darted a look up at him. He was reclined back in the booth, his arm stretched out behind her, laughing and looking completely relaxed and comfortable. She grinned when he looked down at her, and he grinned back before returning to the conversation.

Annabelle tried not to sigh. Trevor was having a great time, and she would just bring him down if she continued acting the way she was. She needed to cheer up. So what if she really just wanted to be somewhere alone with him? Trevor was having fun, and he had sacrificed his evening to go to a movie he had probably hated just for her—the least she could do was stop pouting.

In the corner, Annabelle spied a boy and girl, maybe thirteen or fourteen, having dinner with their parents. They looked embarrassed and uncomfortable to be with their parents, and kept shooting longing looks at Annabelle and her friends.

The sight made her heart ache. She wanted to tell them they were lucky their parents were still healthy and able to take them out to spend time with them, because it wasn’t a luxury everyone had. She wanted to tell them to enjoy being young, because in a few years pressures they couldn’t even comprehend would become daily occurrences. She wanted to tell them she would be willing to trade places with them for the evening in exchange for their cheeseburgers.

Instead she lowered her head and stirred her milkshake.

She had to hide how subdued she felt through the rest of the meal. When Trevor drove her home, he walked her to her door, and all her melancholy feelings vanished as he leaned down. Standing on her front porch, the moonlight overhead casting a silver glow everywhere, Annabelle received her first kiss.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said, almost shyly.

She swallowed the squeal in her throat and nodded. “Tomorrow,” she agreed, grinning up at him.

Trevor Scarlett had just kissed her.

Trevor Scarlett, who she had loved since she was a child, had just kissed her.

As soon as she was in her room, she threw herself on the bed and let out an excited screech. No matter how difficult it was to be in her crowd at times, there were definitely benefits… and being able to be with Trevor Scarlett was the biggest of all.

Chapter Seven

Annabelle stared at Trevor, passed out in the passenger seat, then looked into the backseat of the SUV at the pile of unconscious bodies that made up her friends, dismayed. Out of the twelve people crammed into the SUV, only Parker remained awake. He sat in the backseat squished between Erin and Mary, belligerently talking about how gorgeous Annabelle was and all the things he could do to her.

Tears of helplessness welled up in her eyes as she stared at the dashboard. The night had started out well enough—they had gotten together as planned at Claudia’s, packed into Trevor’s SUV, and had successfully managed to get into the club. But then her friends had started drinking copious amounts of alcohol, growing increasingly rowdy and dancing wildly on tables. When Mary had passed out mid-sentence onto Zach’s shoulder and the others had just laughed hysterically, Annabelle had decided it was time to leave. It had taken almost an hour to gather everyone together to get them out to the SUV, but she had managed.

And then they had all promptly fallen asleep, including Trevor, who Parker had practically carried out of the club.

Annabelle choked on a sob. She didn’t know how to drive a manual car. How was she going to get everyone home when she was the only sober one and she couldn’t drive? If she called her parents to come get them her friends would never forgive her. But every other person she could call was crammed into Trevor’s SUV.

She held a hand to her head to try and calm down as she mentally went over every person she knew. She had a cousin who could have come to get them, but he was away at college in another state. She had only had a few acquaintances at her private school, and she hadn’t spoken to them since she had transferred, so it wasn’t like she could just call them up randomly and ask for a ride. And she just didn’t know anyone else. She had tried to drive the SUV, but she kept killing the engine, growing more flustered when Parker had started screaming incoherent instructions at her. Finally, even though she hated to admit defeat, she had given up.

Most of her friends were only children, or the oldest, so it wasn’t going to be possible for someone’s sibling to come out and…

Annabelle straightened, swiped the tears from her eyes, and quickly reached over to the passenger seat to rummage through Trevor’s pockets.

“Oooh, baby, why not me?” Parker taunted. She felt more tears in her eyes as her fingers closed around the cell phone in Trevor’s jeans. “At least I’m awake. I can show you a good time.”

She cried out when she felt his hand on her neck and lunged back to the safety of the driver’s side door, Trevor’s cell phone in her hand. She scrolled through the numbers while Parker started singing at the top of his lungs, pausing occasionally to interject a nasty comment about what he wanted to do to her.

Fear set in and she reached for her purse, closing her hand around her pepper spray. She twisted in the seat to lean sideways against the steering wheel, facing the back of the car to prevent any surprises. Then, to her vast relief, she finally found Will’s number.

She just prayed that he would answer.

Her fingers trembled as she hit the call button. She listened to it ring once, twice, three times… then voice mail. She nervously looked around the packed parking lot, hoping a security guard wouldn’t show up and ask to see their IDs. Parker was certainly going out of his way to draw attention to them—people walking by the SUV were staring into its tinted windows, making puzzled, annoyed faces at the noise.

“Parker, shut up!” Annabelle hissed as she called Will’s phone again.

“Oooh, she’s got a mouth on her!” Parker taunted, as Annabelle desperately listened to the phone ring. Suddenly, a hand clamped around her jaw in a vice-like grip. She cried out in terror, Parker’s face only inches from hers. “I don’t like it when my girls talk back to me.”

“Get away from me!” Annabelle shrieked, trying to push herself further into the corner of the SUV.

“What the hell is your problem?” Parker laughed coldly, his dark eyes glassy. “I’m offering to show you a good time. Your boyfriend’s too messed up to do it right now. Shouldn’t you take what you can get?” His voice lowered. “And you’ve got such a body on you…”

“I swear, Parker, I will use this pepper spray on you if you don’t
back off now
!” Annabelle all-but screamed at him, brandishing the bottle inches from his face.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Parker objected, holding up his hands. She felt hot, heavy tears stream down her cheeks as he fell back into his seat. “I was just offering, sweetheart. No need to get so angry.”

She sniffled, and then, to her complete disbelief, heard through the cell phone, “Belle? Where are you?”

She let out a sob of relief. Will. Will had answered his phone. She hadn’t heard the click or heard him say hello, but he must have answered while she and Parker had been fighting. She had never been so happy to hear another person’s voice before. “The-the new club that opened. Rainstorm.”

“How far is it?”

“I-I don’t know… Twenty minutes?”

“Where are you parked?”

He sounded so calm and in control… So reassuring. She choked on another sob and tried to compose herself. She could hear his feet through the phone, moving quickly, and then the jangle of keys. “We’re… we’re facing the right wall of the building. We’re in the first row.”

“Okay. Don’t. Move. If Parker gives you any trouble at all, spray him until he screams. I’ll be right there.”

She watched Parker reach around and start groping under Erin’s unconscious body. “Hurry,” she pleaded. She ended the call and looked around for something… anything… to throw at Parker to stop him. His hand was under Erin’s shirt, now, and he didn’t look ready to stop.

Her eyes landed on a half-full bottle of water in the cup holder. Bracing herself, she held the pepper spray in one hand with her finger on the button, and with her other hand took the top off of the bottle, reaching over and dumping it on Parker’s head.

He let out a litany of curses and started to lunge at her. She scrambled against the driver’s side door and kicked at him, trying frantically to keep him at bay. He grabbed her ankles and she cried out, kicking harder, keeping her grip firmly on the pepper spray. She screamed and pleaded with him to stop, but he just continued to swear at her, rage emanating from him.

Her heel caught him along the side of his cheek and he let out a horrible yelp, leaping at her angrily. She kicked again, the sole of her shoe landing squarely against his forehead. He fell back, looking dazed.

 For a small eternity they sat there, Parker swearing and holding his bleeding cheek, and Annabelle crouched in her corner of the car, trying to keep herself from crying.

The knock on her window made her scream. She whirled to the side, a sob of relief choking her as she recognized the person staring back at her. She flung open the door and threw herself desperately into Will’s arms, burying her face in his shoulder.

“Are you okay?” he asked, his voice calm but urgent. His embrace was warm and safe, and for the first time since the group had stepped into the club, she felt like she could relax. She trembled so hard that she could feel him shaking and tried to take deep breaths, forcing herself to recompose.

Reluctantly, not wanting to leave the protective circle of his arms, she stepped away and nodded. “I’m okay,” she confirmed. “Thank you for coming. I-I’m sorry… I didn’t know who else to call.”

He didn’t say anything as he leaned into the car through the driver’s side door, surveying its occupants. She held onto his arm, too afraid to let him go, and watched as his eyes settled on his older brother, slumped unconscious in the passenger seat.

“I’m sure you didn’t,” he said finally, straightening and looking down at her. “Looks like every one of your friends somehow crammed into this car.”

She nodded, wiping tears from her eyes. “I can’t drive a stick,” she told him, shaking.

From the backseat, there were giggles. “I can teach you, sweetheart,” Parker offered, slumping forward into the driver’s seat.

Annabelle cried out as Will suddenly surged forward, grabbed Parker by the shirt, and
hauled
him out of the car through the door. Once out, with lightning-fast reflexes, Will threw a punch that had Parker on the ground, his lip split, moaning in pain. Annabelle held her hands over her mouth as Parker lay there, spitting blood, looking stunned. Will stood over him menacingly, his jaw clenched.

“Will!” she pleaded, when it looked like Will was going to pick him up and do it again. He paused and looked up at her, his eyes dark. Then he looked back down at Parker and gave him a little shove with his shoe.

“You can find your own way home,” Will told him flatly.

“What? You can’t just leave me here—“ Parker objected.

“I can,” Will corrected. He crouched down and spoke lowly. “And if you ever try to force yourself on Annabelle or any other girl again, I will do much, much worse. Do you understand?”

Parker tried to protest, but he could only split blood.

Looking satisfied, Will stood and gestured for Annabelle to get into the car. “Let’s go.”

She hesitated. “What about your car?” she asked. “It’s an automatic, right? I can drive it.”

“People leave their cars at clubs all the time for this very reason. I’ll come get it tomorrow.” She felt a gentle pressure against her back as he stepped toward her and guided her to the car. “Come on.”

She cast one last look down at Parker, who sat on the ground, blood pouring from his lip, and climbed into the car.

They drove mostly in silence, except for the occasional direction Annabelle gave to Will. She figured Claire’s house was the best place to take everyone, including Trevor, since that was where they always went after a wild night of partying.