Page 46 of Look What You Made Me Do

She stared at Roger’s hand on her arm, not really seeing it for the hundreds of memories that clawed at her gut. His touch was like the brush of a tarantula’s legs against her skin and she could smell the rum on his breath but she couldn’t move, a strange sense of paralysis rendering her incapable.

Rosie however, was not.

Keenly attuned to Ella’s state of mind as always, she prodded Roger in the chest. “Hey pin-dick,” she growled. “Take your hands off her.”

Roger, very stupidly, laughed. That was when another voice joined the fray. “If you want to leave here with both your balls intact, Rog, I suggest you let her go.”

Ella started as Jake’s voice, right near her ear, sliced through her paralysis. She glanced at him briefly, noting that Pete and Simon were there too before Jake’s grimness took up all the space. His green eyes were cold – reptilian almost.

She’d seen that face before. Once. At Trently High School, during recess, just before he’d taken a swing at some kid three years older than him who’d called Jake’s father a stupid drunk.

Coming to her senses, Ella took advantage of Roger’s distraction and wrenched her arm free, her heart rate kicking in to overdrive.

“Heyyyy, it’s The Prince.” Roger clapped Jake on the back, not reading the situation well at all. “Look who it is. It’s little Ella Lucas. You know, Rachel’s daughter. Come on, Jake, you remember Rachel, right?”

“Okay.” Jake grabbed Roger by his lapels and hauled him closer until they were nose to nose. “Get out of my bar.”

“Hey,” Roger protested, his feet barely touching the ground. “It’s okay. You want her, you can have her.”

Ella felt as if she’d left her body as Roger’s sickening implication sunk in. She could see Jake’s fists tighten in Roger’s shirt, the murderous look on Rosie’s face. Could feel the steely band of Rosie’s arm wrapped around her shoulders.

Yet, somehow, she wasn’t in her body.

“Shut. Your. Face.”

The unspoken threat in Jake’s ground-out words had Pete leaping into action. “Help me,” he barked at Simon before inserting himself between the two men.

Grabbing Roger by one arm, he indicated to Simon to grab the other. “Out!” he snapped.

“I’m fine, Pete,” Jake growled.

“Sure, boss. But Ella’s not.” He indicated with his head. “Leave him to us and go take care of her.”

“Don’t ever show your face in here again,” Jake spat before shoving Roger at Pete.

Still pulled tight to Rosie, Ella absently watched Pete and Simon hustle a loudly complaining Roger to the door. When they disappeared from view, she turned her attention to Jake who was looking at her like he wanted to burn the whole world down.

Instead, he said, “I’ve got some dry clothes in my office.”

It was quiet and gentle and Ella nodded. “Thanks.”

He turned to Rosie. “You guys go home, I’ll take care of her.”

It was a testament to just how outside her body Ella still was that she didn’t protest Jake’s decree or Rosie’s easy acquiescence.

“Make sure you do,” she said, her voice flinty. “Or you’ll have to answer to me.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

10

Roger Hillman’s words still dripped their venom into Ella’s system as she sat on Jake’s couch. She tried to recoil from them, from the ugliness of them, but they persisted.

“Put these on.”

Ella looked up to find Jake holding something and it took a couple of moments to realize it was clothes. The air-con in the office blew on her wet T-shirt and she felt cold all over. Her nipples were pebbled, her brain function sluggish and she was rubbing at the raised goose flesh on her arms.

Relieving him of the items, she kicked off her shoes then stood, grabbing the hem of her shirt. Pulling it over her head, she absently registered the surprise on Jake’s face before he turned his back and headed to his desk.

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