Broken Pieces

Chapter sixty

Life without Caden was bleak until it got scary. The messages and threats had been getting old and boring until the last one that morning — the one I ended up breaking for — by replying out of fear.

Unknown number: In exactly the next seventy-two hours, I would release the evidences. Prepare your friends and family.

In a panic, I had replied after the initial shock passed.

Me: Please don't do this to me. What do you gain from this?

Unknown number: I have to and your father needs to know.  Other people that have been hurt over the years, both knowingly and unknowingly also deserve to know.

Me: I would tell you those secrets by text as you want.

Unknown number: I don't want that from you. I want that from Xander and Kyle. They have the same hours as you too so it may never happen if they deliver but I doubt it.

In the next minute, I'd called Kyle and he'd attested to him and Xander receiving a similar message. We'd all met at Kyle's again and he and Xander said they had sent everything they remembered ever doing but the ‘texter’ still wasn't satisfied.

They had both been more panicked than me because they had more to lose and we all had no idea what the ‘texter’ would say or what he'd leave out.

He was too … inconsistent. Like when he told me he'd make me regret telling Kyle and Xander. Although, the pain from Caden's breakup overshadowed the worry in my heart, it still plagued me that he might hurt my loved ones as he promised.

However, nothing had been done to me or anyone I cared about since that text and now, I suspected he never would. That's why I described him as inconsistent, he was too contrary. Not that I didn't appreciate it, I just didn't understand him not hurting anyone and a lot of other things he'd said. Kyle, Xander and their investigator didn't either.

The investigator and hacker Kyle and Xander hired had tried but he said he was someone who counteracted every move they made like he anticipated them and was one step ahead.

Kyle and Xander promised to put in more effort and keep on trying but I wasn't comforted by their promise.

My fashion show was in less than two weeks now and I was only half ready. The ready half was that only because of Mathilda, Jericho and Mia who had been helping me. They all thought it was nervousness at my first event but I knew better.

Later in the evening of the morning I received that text, I was sitting on my bed while folding laundry when Andrea bursted into my room. “You're going to Lucca's with me today. I don't care if you're no longer dating Caden and besides I made sure he wouldn't be there.”

I blinked at her dumbly, confused at what she was rambling about though the name she called still made it past the fog in my head and pierced my heart.

Everyone of my friends knew we were no longer together. I knew it was a short time before even the public guessed it.

Just seven days without him and I felt like my world had ended. It probably had.

Before the breakup, I'd skipped out on seeing all of my friends together at Lucca's with different excuses but now I felt a little like going and seeing them before they knew the truth about me and I began righteously avoiding them.

“I wasn't going to say that. I'm going with you, just give me a few minutes to finish my laundry.”

Andrea’s eyes widened in surprise and pleasure. She eyed my clothes and snickered. “Only you does laundry in the evening.”