Page 15 of Whistle

5

Bodhi

Are you wondering what it tastes like to swallow your pride?

I wouldn’t know because I didn’t have any left.

When it came to my ex-best friend, any pride I had left ran for the fucking hills when I was presented with absolute and irrefutable proof that he didn’t kill my sister. When I realized it wasn’t him who wronged me but me who annihilated one of the two best relationships I’d had in my life.

The other one? The one I’d accused him of annihilating.

I was a shit person. Probably deserved to be locked up in this windowless dungeon, but truth?

I was scared. No. Not just scared. Terrified.

The second the bars at Two Towers locked behind me, all my wild bravado fled to wherever my pride already was.

I was born and raised in Malibu. My playground, the beach. My sidekick, a surfboard. I caught waves, gave no fucks, and never imagined the golden spoon I was born with might someday tarnish. I went to the best private school and then enrolled at Pembrook, the most prestigious college on the West Coast, where I swam for the Nobles. Life was stellarly copasetic.

Until it imploded.

And now I was here in a seventy-square-foot closet made of concrete with no window and a fluorescent light overhead that kept my eyes in a constant state of watering. My roommate didn’t just look like a hardened criminal. He was one. The way he stared made my skin crawl, and the more that time went on, the smaller I tried to make myself in hopes he would forget I was here.

My body ached all the way to the bone, and I stared at the walls through blurred eyes, wondering how the hell I got here. If there was any coming back.

I’d burned all my bridges and then swan-dived into the canyon between them. There was literally nothing left to lose, so I called him. The one loss I missed the most.

The one person who would have been my first call in the past but now was the last.

I’ll see what I can do. That’s what Rush had said. The words were grim. Sort of an empty promise.

To me, they were a light at the end of the tunnel. A tiny spark of hope flickered to life inside me. It was painful but would be even more so when he didn’t show up.

It had been over twenty-four hours since I’d called him. What did I expect anyway? He was clear on the other side of the country. He had a whole new life. A new family. A new best friend.

Frustration and anger welled up inside me, filling me so full that my chest ached with the pressure and the walls of this tiny cell felt even closer than before.

Impossible to sit still, I pushed off the top bunk where I’d been sleeping, my feet smacking against the hard floor and stinging in the shit shoes they made us wear. The orange jumpsuit was just as fluorescent as the overhead light, and the fabric was utilitarian and uncomfortable as fuck.

“Where you think you’re going, pretty boy?” my cellmate mused.

Ignoring him, I paced to the bars to look out into the narrow, bleak hall. Pivoting, I turned to pace back and slammed into a hard chest directly behind me.

I bounced off and nearly fell onto my ass. I didn’t know his name. I never asked because it didn’t matter. We all had numbers on our jumpsuits, impersonal identifiers that made us a little less human.

He laughed, the sound amused and low. I hated his eyes and the way he looked at me like I was prey. Like he was just biding his time until he did whatever it was he was planning.

And based on the nickname he’d taken to calling me… whatever it was definitely wasn’t good.

I moved to slide around him, and he threw his arm out, snaking it around my waist. With a hard yank, I fell into his chest, our bodies completely touching.

“You seem restless,” he said. “How about you let me calm you down?”

Bile rose in my throat, and I slammed my hands against his shoulders and shoved.

He went flying back, smacking in the wall. His nostrils flared, and he straightened. “I like it when they fight.”

My stomach clenched and fear had adrenaline pouring into my limbs, but I refused to show it. Narrowing my eyes, I widened my stance and brought my fists up.

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