Reclaim - Aly Martinez Page 0,51

of the dirt road, and Ramsey slowed, squinting and searching each one. He flipped on the brights, but they were useless against the thick cloud of dust.

What the hell was he doing?

“Watch out!” I screamed when, out of nowhere, a shadowy figure appeared in the middle of the road.

Ramsey skidded to a stop inches away from him. I should have been relieved, but the pair of blue eyes that haunted my nightmares appeared in the headlights on the other side of the windshield.

Bile burned a path up my throat, and I peered at my brother, finding a sinister smile pulling at his lips.

“Stay in the car,” he ordered.

Panic hit me so hard my head swirled. “Oh, God, why? What are you doing?”

He got out without replying.

Shit. He knew. He’d found out about what Josh had done to me. He was going to kill him. That was the look on his face. Pain. Rage. Disgust. All the things that lived and breathed inside me daily.

I scrambled into the driver’s seat and frantically rolled the window down. “Ramsey!”

He never looked back.

Using his hand to block the headlights, Josh swayed on his feet and slurred, “What the hell, dude? You almost hit me.”

Ramsey gave him no warning as he wrapped his hand in the front of his shirt and then buried his fist in Josh’s face.

“You motherfucker!” Ramsey thundered, hitting him again. “You think it’s okay to fucking touch a girl?”

Oh, God.

Oh, God.

Oh, God.

He landed a crushing punch to his eye and Josh stumbled back, but Ramsey yanked him forward again before roaring in his face, “My girl!”

Josh shoved at his shoulders. “Get the fuck off me. I didn’t do shit to Thea that she didn’t want.”

My heart stopped.

Thea?

No. Oh, no. He’d done it to Thea. This wasn’t about me.

Suddenly, the memories of Josh’s hands on my body weren’t the deepest gash in my soul anymore.

Thea—my sister.

Thea—the only friend.

Thea—the love of my brother’s life.

And by not telling anyone about Josh, I’d all but held her down and let him do it.

Holding him by the throat, Ramsey continued to hit him, and I felt each and every pulverizing blow as if they had landed in my gut instead.

“Stay the fuck away from her,” Ramsey finally said, throwing him to the ground and landing a swift kick to his midsection.

Josh rolled to the side, coughing and spitting out blood, and let out a laugh. “If it’s any consolation, she wasn’t nearly as good as your sister.”

All rational thought abandoned me. A guttural scream tore from my throat, so loud it felt like razor blades exiting my body. Years of anger and frustration all tied up in one ear-piercing note. I slapped my hands over my mouth, one stacked over the other as if it could somehow silence the cry, but it just kept coming.

All the drawers in my head blasted open at once, a war of emotions battling to be the first to escape.

Choices. Everyone makes them.

And when my brother stumbled back, shock contorting his face, I made mine.

Throwing the car into drive, I slammed on the accelerator and ended Josh Caskey’s reign of abuse once and for all.

Ramsey never came home that night.

I waited until the sun broke the horizon before waking my dad up. He’d never helped me before, but if Ramsey had been arrested, surely he’d do something. I didn’t get the chance to tell him any of the details before he mumbled some variation of, “Ramsey deserves whatever he gets,” before passing back out.

The only other person I could think of was Thea, but when I looked out the window, two police cars were parked in her driveway.

Peeking through the blinds while my heart raced a million miles a minute, I waited for them to leave. When they finally came out, Thea was wrapped in a blanket, tears rolling down her face as they escorted her to her dad’s car. Together, they all drove away, leaving me more terrified and alone than ever.

I had no idea what to do. Ramsey had assured me that it would be okay, but nothing felt okay.

Josh was dead.

It was my fault.

And my brother was in police custody.

I spent the afternoon alternating between pacing and dry-heaving, like I was in a gas chamber, suffocating on poison and waiting to die.

My worst fear was confirmed that afternoon when the channel six news broke the story of Josh’s death, airing it alongside Ramsey’s mug shot with a headline reading Murderer Confessed.

Utterly dumbfounded, I stared at my brother’s picture.