fuck.” My head jerked back at his fucking audacity. “You want something over here? And I don’t mean her.” I pointed to Aivery. “I mean me. You want something over here?”
I didn’t see the bat he brought back with him until he lifted it into the air. “Either leave the fuck now, or I’mma bust your shit up.”
“Oh!” I laughed. You need a bat to do that?”
“Benji,” Aivery cried. “You’ll be arrested. He’s not worth it.”
He nodded. “Like I said, leave the fuck now!”
I pretended to walk off, then turned around and caught him in the face with a jab. His head bounced back and I went in again, hitting him in the eye. Benjamin stumbled backward, falling against the wall. Aivery and Karmen, screaming riotously, grabbed me by the arms thinking I was going to finish him. Little did they know, I wanted to take my time. With fucking anger on overload, I needed this. I had to get his ass back for the fucking evil he had toward me since I stepped foot on this campus. Now, I was violent beyond reason.
I yanked back, attempting to get out of their grips. Karm lost her balance and, right away, I was able to pivot and catch her fall. Seconds later, I felt a flash of coldness in my leg. Then another on my shoulder.
Then another.
That motherfucker caught me with the bat.
The phone rang long and loud as my pulse beat in my throat and mouth felt like a bag of sand. Andrea stood over me, waiting to confirm what she’d just come to my room to share. I couldn’t believe Ashton had gotten into another fight with the Pettiford guy, and this time over me. The cops and ambulance were called to the Winnie dorm room about twenty minutes ago.
I stopped breathing when there was a pickup.
My eyes jumped to Andrea, then I desperately cried, “Ashton!”
There was so much noise in the background I didn’t hear at first from being impatient. “It’s Al, Tori. I’m in the ambulance with him.”
It was Ashton who needed the ambulance!
Both Andrea and my eyes mushroomed.
“Can I speak to him?” My heart bled with anticipation…longing for him.
He hesitated, leaving room for me to hear the paramedics talking about what had to be Ashton’s injuries. How serious was this fight?
“He’s—” Again, Al hesitated. “I don’t think—” Then I heard him mumbling something.
“No!” I heard a new, nasally voice. Al said something more I couldn’t make out, but I did recognize my name. “YOU HEARD WHAT THE FUCK I SAID!” I leaped back on the bed, feeling a physical blow from his words. Andrea pulled in a deep breath and covered her mouth. “FUCK WHOEVER IT IS!”
“Please calm down, Mr. Spencer.” That must have been one of the paramedics.
Yes, he was in an ambulance, an inconvenient time and place. But I’d never, in a million years, thought I’d get a fuck you from Ashton Spencer. Why wouldn’t I? Me, the campus whore. Why would he want to speak to me?
“Look, Tori—”
“I get it.” I interrupted Al’s incoming apology with hot tears pouring down my face and in my voice. “Bye.”
I hung up the phone feeling the biggest hole in my chest.
Like Samantha, I left Blakewood early. I had to wait a few days for my travel allowance to be approved by a disappointed Trisha and the athletic department, but I was happy to. I didn’t hear from Ashton at all. Aivery couldn’t be found either, but that could have been because I stayed in my dorm, only leaving to get food. I didn’t want to be seen and when I was, it was met with nasty and/or curious stares. The whole campus, including the staff, knew about Ashton and me.
But no one knew about the pregnancy. That had been the only thing keeping me from totally breaking before boarding the plane. I had less than a couple of hundred dollars in cash when I landed in Philadelphia. A cab ride home ate into that. Instead of stressing over it, I decided right away that I’d be strong. Blakewood State University would be buried in the back of my mind, like other dark memories.
I would not be the Tori that left Millville. I had to be a new person returning. No, there wasn’t much here, but I had to make the most out of what I could for my baby. A baby. Something I’d been wanting for a long time, but never thought would be because of