Kidnapped By My Hero

Til I Collapse

Chapter Fifteen

Til I Collapse

The first guy I ever slept with, was Bryce Harris.

Maybe I should start further back.

When mom and I moved to California, and we stayed in the studio whilst renting out the bigger apartment downstairs, our first tenant was Mrs Harris.

She stayed with us for a year, after her husband cheated on her. She had two kids, Bryce was two years older, and Luke was my age.

Luke and I became the best of friends, we did everything together, and though we were both young, we talked about the scary times in our lives, like when his mom left his dad, or the fact my dad was dead.

Even when his mom gave his dad another chance, and they moved back into their family home, and we got a new tenant, we remained close friends. We went to the same schools, and we spent every day together afterwards.

Luke and I were like siblings, we were so close. But Bryce was older, cooler. He was on the football team and he rode a bike. Every girl in school was obsessed with him.

It was the summer before my sixteenth birthday, before he left for college, that we started fooling around. Luke never had any idea.

Though Bryce had never really looked at me before, I'd filled out. He was the first guy I ever really fell for. He had the body of a footballer, but his soul was purely artistic. He loved photography. Everything, from landscapes, to animals, to making me pose a million times because the light was 'just right'.

You can imagine my surprise to see one of those pictures in Jayden's hands.

"Where did you get that?"

My voice is barely audible, and I can't even remember why I came in search of them. My eyes are incapable of leaving the picture of me smiling in Bryce's football jersey.

"We were sent it," Rex tells me, "Does it mean something to you?"

I can feel Jayden's eyes burning into me, but I can't speak. When he'd asked me if I were a murderer, there was only one instance that had sprung to mind, but I'd convinced myself it couldn't possibly be related.

But it was.

There was no way of denying it any more, because there was only one person the world who could have sent that picture.

Bryce.

"Brooklyn?"

I close my eyes, trying not to let the memories escape the box taped closed in the back of my mind, but it's hard. I can already hear the squealing, the glass shattering, the screaming.

I shake my head, feeling the tears escaping my eyes. Though I can't see, I can feel the room spinning around me, so I crouch down, holding my head in my hands.

Warm hands pull mine away, and I feel my chin being tilted up. I open my eyes to see Jayden's blue ones piercing into me. I look away.

You're no different.

I don't want to tell him. I don't want them to look at me differently. It was inevitable, it was the whole reason I'd moved back to Brooklyn.

"Do you know who wants to hurt you?"

Jayden's voice is calm, but I can hear the underlying pressure in it. He's trying not to loose his temper, and I'm grateful for that. I nod my head.

"Who?"

Nope.

I know I can't. He'd want to hurt him. Kill him, even. I can see it from the look on his face. And even though Bryce wants me dead... I can't blame him. And he doesn't deserve to die for that.