Red

Monsters

The party was in full swing when I finally noticed the Evan had indeed brought a date. I couldn't tame the green-eyed monster even if I'd tried. I started drinking, braking orders at the poor bartender as soon as my eyes found the liquor. The unlucky bastard gave up and just handed a bottle of whisky to get me to leave him alone.

I was standing alone against the house watching him dance with the clingy blonde, whose hands I wanted to chop off, when someone to my left cleared their throat. I threw the bottle back again, finally breaking my gaze from Evan to look at Zachary who looked ravishing in a suit and tie. Sadly, he did nothing for me anymore.

"What do you want, Zach?" I tipped the bottle back again and groaned when I noticed the bottle was empty. I was nowhere near as drunk as I wanted to be.

"You don't look surprised to see me."

"I knew you were coming." I sighed and started my trek back to the bar. I hit the top of the bar impatiently, earning a glare from the man next to me. The bartender looked at me, exasperatingly and let his eyes fall behind me, most likely to Zach who followed me over.

"This is the last I'm giving and then you're cut off, Hannah." I didn't even recognize the guy, but he apparently knew who I was. I shrugged and eagerly grabbed for the bottle he gave me.

"What's with you, Val?"

"Geez, I wish you would stop crawling me that." I stopped and thought over my words and realized I had slurred over the word 'calling'. I burst out in laughter, gaining the attention of the guy I'd been trying to attract all night.

Evan's mouth set in a grim line when he spotted Zachary next to me. He probably didn't know who he was as he'd never seen him before, but I could imagine what he saw through his eyes. Me, laughing and flirting, having a good time with another man. He turned his face back to the blonde, whispering something in her ear, angering me further.

"Isn't that your new step-brother?"

"Gee, Zach, you're nosey, aren't you?"

"Why are you staring at him like you want to murder him already? I mean I've heard of sibling rivalry but, this is pretty fast."

"Mind your business, Zachary."

"You are my business, Val. I want you to come back with me. We can go elope; we don't need to do the traditional thing. I just want you, baby." He moved in front of me, his hands on my hips, demanding my full and undivided attention.

I could see Evan approaching from behind Zach and braced myself for a fight. I pulled out of Zach's embrace and moved away. Setting the bottle of whisky down, I moved over to Evan, pressing my hands on his chest to keep him from causing a scene.

"Evan, don't."

He didn't look at me, just brushed my hands off of him and stalked up to Zachary. "Zach, right?"

Zach looked to me for answers as I just tried but failed to pull Evan away. He kept pulling his arms out of my grip. "Yeah?"

Evan just stood with his hands in his pants pockets, looking the very depiction of eerie calmness. He looked down at his shoes, nodded his head and in the next second, his fist was in Zach's face.

"God dammit, Evan!"

"What the fuck?" Zachary shielded his face with his hands as I finally succeeded in pulling Evan away from him.

"Evan! What the hell are you doing?"

His furious gaze dropped to me, "I could ask you the fucking same thing, Hannah! What the fuck are you doing with him?"

"I wasn't doing anything with him!"

"Oh, right, so the laughing and flirting was just nothing then?"

Zachary chose this moment to speak up with suspicion in his voice, "Wait a minute. I thought you two were step-siblings?"

I looked at him, too exhausted to even acknowledge his accusatory tone. "And I told you that you were being too nosey."

"God, how much have you had to drink, Red?" Evan's hand gripped my chin and forced me to look at him.

Pulling my face from his grasp, "None of your fucking business, Tarzan."

He brought his face closer to mine, gripping it once more, "You better watch that pretty little mouth unless you want that attitude fucked out of you."

I squinted my eyes at him, ready to tell him to back and fuck the blonde he came with when I heard Zachary gasp.

Evan looked over to him, annoyance written all over his face, "Why are you still here?"

Zach just looked at me, mouth agape, "I can't believe it! You're fucking your step-brother!"

"God, Zach, can't mind your fucking business?" I pulled away from Evan to push Zach into the house, away from everyone else before everyone heard his big mouth. "Go home, Zach!"

"My flight isn't until tomorrow and I was invited. Are you really hooking up with him, Val?"

"I don't have to answer your questions. It's none of your business."

"Right, so I guess that means I came here for no reason then. You're obviously not mine anymore."

"Keep your mouth shut, Zach. I mean it. If you still care about me at all, you will keep quiet about what you heard today."

He ran a hand through his hair, wincing when his fingers grazed the now bruising side of his face. "Christ, Val. What the fuck? He's your brother!"

"Shut up!"

"What? Is he packing? Is he better than me?"

"Oh my god, I'm not doing this with you." I turned around to head back to calm down Evan, leaving Zach behind. I half expected him to follow and was pleasantly surprised when he didn't. He must have decided to leave, after all.

I stepped outside and glanced over the wedding party, looking for Evan, growling to myself when I spotted him sitting at a table with that blonde behind him, rubbing her hands down his chest and whispering in his ear.

"No, please stop. I don't want to do this here." A familiar female voice crept to my ears from around the corner of the house. Lacey? "Oh, please, let me go!"

I rushed to the sound of her voice in urgency, feeling the need to help her and what I found shook me to the core. In the small gangway between my mom's house and the neighbor's fence, Lacey was pressed up against the siding with an older man forcing himself on her. The man's pants were down to his knees while his hands were holding her wrists to the side of the house. Tears streamed down her face as the man, whose face was resting on her shoulder, kept thrusting into her over and over.

"Hey! Get off her!" I rushed at the man and pushed him to the side and watched as he fell to the ground with his pants around his ankles. He was so drunk he couldn't even stand back up. Lacey clung to me as if I'd saved her life and I rubbed a hand on top of her head, attempting to calm her, my eyes never leaving the man's face.

"Who the fuck 'er yew?" His words slurred out at me.

"Your worst fucking nightmare, you piece of shit!" I looked down to the shaking Lacey whose hands were wrapped in my dress. I needed to tend to her first. I wanted to call the police but needed to talk to Evan and Patrick first. I walked away from the scene of the crime with Lacey shaking like a leaf in the crook of my arm.

Evan noticed us walking toward the house and jumped up to run after us. "What the fuck happened to her?" He attempted to pull Lacey from me to look at her, but her fists just dug deeper into my dress as she shook harder, and her sobs came out louder. He looked up at me lost as I wrapped my arms around her. I wanted to get her inside and away from other people.

I sighed and gestured to the side of the house where I found her and where the culprit was finally emerging, messing with his belt buckle. Evan didn't need much else information to know what had happened and stalked over to the man as I walked back inside with our sister.