Page 81 of Levee

The only thing I could think to ask wasIs she alive?As my stomach cramped, as my heart dropped.

As soon as I had that information, I was running.

Out of my room, down the stairs, into the kitchen, where several heads turned to me in unison.

“What’s—“ Eddie started.

“Call Cato and Seeley. Tell ‘em to meet me at my uncle’s place.”

With that, I was out of the house, on my bike, and speeding like fucking hell to my old neighborhood. The whole drive, my mind raced with a million possibilities of what kind of trouble she could have gotten herself involved with, what could have happened to her.

Whatever it was, I knew it couldn’t be good if my uncle, of all people, came to her rescue.

I mean, I once saw him look the other way while a group of men street harassed a girl who couldn’t have been older than fifteen.

Sure, that was back when I was around that age too. Maybe the years had softened him a bit. Even if I hadn’t seen any signs of that myself.

He probably just had a soft side for Jade.

Who wouldn’t?

Except, of course, whatever fuck had put his hands on her.

Rage burned in my gut, made its way up my chest and throat.

By the time I pulled up at my old apartment building, I’d swear there was a hole in my esophagus from the heat of my anger.

Sure, I’d seen proof of someone putting their hands on her once already. I’d seen part of the nasty message on her whiteboard.

But it didn’t make it any more fathomable that anyone could put their hands on someone like her. Someone full of sweetness and sunshine. Someone who always wanted to do good for everyone else.

Whoever this person was, they were a fucking monster.

The time of night didn’t matter, there were always people milling around. I recognized that one tall, skinny kid I’d seen Jade talking to. His gaze, especially, was on me as I jumped off my bike and literally ran in the fucking building.

My heartbeat was hammering in my chest as I rushed down the hallway toward her apartment, pounding my fist on the door.

“Jade!” I yelled when the door didn’t immediately open.

There was the buzzing sound of my uncle’s electric wheelchair as he moved out of the way to open the door.

I noticed the shotgun next to his foot as I moved into the apartment.

“Seems like you two got a lot of shit to tell each other,” he said.

I ignored that.

Talking, that could come later.

I made my way over toward Jade who was sitting on the couch, just barely holding it together.

I dropped my ass down on the coffee table, reaching out to place one hand on her knee and the other went to her chin, lifting it, trying to get a good look at her.

I’d expected her to be beat to shit or bloodied with the way my uncle had described her as barely alive.

It wasn’t until I saw the bruises starting to darken her neck that I understood his meaning.

Someone had strangled her.

---