Page 134 of Unspoken Truths

The weather is sunny and perfect, as if it wanted to show off for my girl. While I’m wearing shorts and a tank top, Rachelle is wearing cargo pants that are rolled up at the ankle so they don’t get wet and a long sleeved top to hide the ink staining her skin still. Yesterday at her house, we spent hours attempting to get the permanent ink off her face and arms, and her skin was red for hours afterward.

At least the words are off her face now. I want to murder the boys. Mr. Emil said he’d ensure they couldn’t follow us, and then handed me a huge wad of cash. I’m not allowed to use my card while we’re gone, to make it more difficult for Theo to track us down.

Seems about right to me.

Rachelle and I are pretending to be different people today since we checked into a cute Airbnb under one of Emil’s employee’s names. It’s just us, exploring the seaside town and enjoying each other. I’m still making sure she’s taking hydration tablets in her water and antibiotics, but she said she’d much rather be here than stuck as a patient at home.

“It’s so different from Florida, but gorgeous,” Rachelle murmurs, in awe of the powerful waves. There’s nothing like the Pacific Ocean, but laying on a towel being a bum in Florida has its own charm too, I bet.

“It is,” I agree. “How are you feeling?”

We’re here for a week and a half, because she needs a complete break from the bullshit the Kings insist on bringing to her. No drama, the trip we should have just taken for her birthday. I feel awful insisting that we’d be fine with the guys on a deserted trail.

They’re not the same people I grew up with anymore. They’re the ruthless monsters they believe they need to be to get ahead in life.

“Really good,” she says, giving me this goofy, soft smile. It’s one that says she had two orgasms this morning before breakfast. I’m pretty proud of that.

Her dark, long hair is now cut into an angled bob. We found a salon with good ratings and she decided to take the plunge. The new style is adorable on her. Rachelle shed a few tears when the hairstylist made the first few cuts, but she explained they were cathartic.

A new haircut isn’t going to fix all of her problems, but it did help release some of the trauma stored away in her hair. I expect the time away, a break from everything is also going to be helpful too.

Mr. Emil thought of everything, and even gave me a burner phone so we can’t be tracked. It was eye opening when he mentioned to me that he has a tracker inserted under his son’s skin in an effort to know where he is at all times. If he’s ever kidnapped, Mr. Emil will be able to find him.

Similarly, Ignacio knows not to look for Rachelle against his father’s wishes.

Glancing at the matching bracelets she and I have, it makes me feel a little less guilty not to have told her about the tracker inside of the both of them. When I fell asleep at her house months ago and forgot to tell my father, he came up with a solution. It wasn’t enough for him to be able to track me through my phone.

Instead, he suggested the bracelet I have around my wrist now. I’m not the best at remembering to wear it, as evident in how I didn’t wear it on our hike. If I had, maybe my dad would have realized I’d been in the woods for too long and come find me.

I was dumb and reckless in my belief that I could protect her from the guys. I won’t do that ever again. Now, my bracelet is on my wrist, and Rachelle thinks it’s adorable that we match.

She doesn’t need to know how possessive, obsessive, and stalkerish I truly am because I gave her a bracelet with a built-in tracker that I can access from anywhere.

I shall live in denial on this hill forever.

“Do you want to take a drive to the next town over to check out the cute shops there?” I ask her. “I heard they’re having music outside too.”

“Mmm, that sounds like fun,” she agrees. “Possibility of food on this little trip?”

Giving the ocean one last lingering look, she turns with me to walk back up to the parking lot. She’s right, it really is gorgeous. In a few days, I plan to run the beach with her. It’s actually more difficult to run on the sand, so tomorrow we are going to begin running in the little neighborhood where our rental is located.

Day by day, she’s getting stronger. Rachelle isn’t a quitter, and neither am I. I’m terrified of what the future holds, knowing the Kings Society has very stringent standards for the lifespan of their bets.

Getting the guys to care about her backfired. Maybe I need to start working just on Ignacio instead. Though, I wouldn’t blame Rachelle if she wants to stab him the next time she sees him. I’ll even provide the knife.

* * *

JARED

Sleep hasn’t come easily the last few days. I keep dreaming that we killed Rachelle and that Calvin actually shed tears for a girl who did one nice thing for him once at her funeral. How dare he, when he practically raised me?

Rachelle has been on this trip with Lili for the last four days, and the guys and I have all been twitchy as fuck. I don’t know how badly she was hurt. I need to know what we did.

It seems sadistic to need this, however, the gnawing guilt inside of me is imagining wild things. If she can fuck off on a trip with her girlfriend, then she’s totally fine, right? Are the words we wrote still on her skin?

I can only imagine the looks she must be getting with the word “fail” across her forehead.

Ignacio is sleeping in my pool house for now, because Rachelle’s mother is still on a rampage. I can understand why, if I had a kid this was happening to, I would probably be very upset as well. That’s the issue with our world, you never know when you’ll be marked for a game, a plaything for someone who is bigger than you are.

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