Page 52 of Hate So Deep

Of course, my eyes are immediately drawn to the unmarked police cruiser parked in front of the door when we pull up to the house and I mentally wince.

Why are they here and today of all days?

While Dirk parks behind the cruiser, I ring my hands in my lap, only to snap out of my daze when he says, “You gonna be, okay?”

“Sure,” I mumble through numb lips before opening the door.

“Lauren?”

“Yeah?”

Looking back, I meet his dark gaze while he searches my features before he shakes his head and says, “What’s the last thing you remember?”

He doesn’t have to say it for me to know that he’s speaking of that night. Perhaps seeing the cop car in the drive inspired the question, I don’t know but as I turn away, I mumble, “You.”

The sad pathetic truth is, he’s always the last thing I remember, and I wish I could erase that from my memory when I push through the door of my home.

Dirk

Although I’m not fucking surprised, I am enraged that both her parents left her while she said her peace with her brother.

Do either of them think about anything else but their rotten fucking selves?

Not for the first time, I wish Celia would get a clue and leave that asshole, but I don’t think that would solve the problem.

Just like me, Colt, Cat and even Lauren are stuck with their father for-fucking-ever and nothing can change that, not even time.

I don’t know what inspired me to drive across the city during rush hour traffic to attend a funeral, especially when I didn’t fucking like Buck and can’t be sorry that he’s gone but I know if I analyze it too closely, it will all come back to Lauren and the lost look that I hate to see in her eyes.

Is she broken up over Buck’s death? Was he a better human being to her than the rest of the world?

Who knows? I sure as shit don’t because to my shame, I realize I never asked.

All I really know about Lauren beyond that she shares a shitty dad with my best friend is that she lives in a posh house that my father would kill to own.

I know her mother is a stone-cold bitch, her father an asshole and her brother a fucking psycho but that’s it.

Lauren may be a free spirit and a spunky girl who goes her own way but what else drives her? The need to belong?

Hatred for the trappings of wealth that suck your soul from your body and leave you a monster always slavering for more?

It’s clear that her mother doesn’t care for her but is that because she’s grieving or something new.

Lauren implied it’s a long-standing thing but what does it mean that she was forced to pay for her own pedicures?

In my world, that’s a fucking reality, which means, as usual she sounds like a spoiled fucking princess.

Still, I know there’s more that beats below her skin and while the stupid, selfish part of me yearns to understand, the sensible asshole knows it doesn't matter.

With a sigh, I leave her home, eyeing the police cruiser with unease. Rather than being resigned to another discussion about her brother or even hopeful for news, Lauren seemed uneasy about their presence.

Why? What is she not saying?

Fuck me, I wish I hadn’t pushed her away because now she may be hiding shit that I need to know.

Chapter 22

NOW

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