Chapter 36: Jake

I was trying hard not to lose my shit, but it was proving difficult.

My knuckles ache from the throttling I’d given Jason earlier, but even the physical pain isn’t enough to forgive him for what he’s done to Renee. I want to kill him. We all do. But instead, we wait. We wait because we all know that if we actually killed Jason, Renee probably wouldn’t be pleased.

She looked pale lying there on our couch, too pale like she was on the verge of death, and I almost told Matt and Aaron that we should take her to the ER, but I didn't.

We could take care of her now.

Aaron is sitting to the left of me, his eyes on Renee. Every few minutes, he rubs a hand over his face in agitation, foot tapping warp speed against the carpet. Across from us, Matt is leaned back in the chair, sitting stiffly like a statue.

“What if she wakes up and screams at us?” Aaron asks finally. “What if she thinks it was something we did and not Jason?”

“She won’t think that,” Matt whispers, his voice so low that I almost didn't register the words. “She knows who did this.”

“I wanted to kill him,” I said, not for the first time that night. “I should have finished the job.”

“We’re not murderers,” Aaron says. He sounds unconvinced, and I was not surprised. Aaron walloped Jason so hard he broke open two knuckles and bled all over my car. Still, I didn’t care. None of us did. I was still willing to go back to that party and finish this shit.

On the couch, Renee stirs with a moan, and her eyelids flicker. We all lean forward in our chairs, eyes pinned on Renee, holding our breath, waiting.

“Ren?” Matt says softly. His voice stirs her further, and she pushes her lids open, gazing blearily over at us.

“What happened?”

My hands folded into a fist again, but I forced myself to breathe and relax.

“You were drugged.” Aaron reaches for the cup of water he grabbed earlier from the kitchen and hands it to her. Renee started to try and sit up, but she was struggling, and before she could ask for help, Matt, Aaron, and I reached out to steady her. She didn’t say anything, I was not sure she could find the words, but she didn’t resist the offer.

Renee took a long drink of the water, then shakily set it back on the table. She was a real mess with her hair in loose tendrils around her tear-stained face, but God, she was beautiful. So beautiful.

“I was with Jason,” she says weakly, her eyes working their way around the room. “I went to the bathroom, and then …” she trails off, rubbing her head with the palm of her hand. “He attacked me.” She swallows, allowing her hand to fall into her lap, and shakes her head slowly. “He tried to rape me.”

“Yes,” Matt said. “He tried.”

“But then—-”

“I broke the door down,” Matt confirms.

“And Aaron and I took Jason outside,” I add.

“To kick his ass,” Aaron clarifies.

Renee is still looking between the three of us as she pulls her bottom lip between her teeth and begins to chew anxiously. It was something she had always done, but fuck if my dick didn’t start to harden against my pants, wanting her.

We all wanted her, though. That’s precisely the problem.

“So, he didn’t …?” Renee hesitates, choking on her next question.

“He tried,” Matt says again. “He failed.”

“And you guys didn’t …?”

“Do you really think we would do that to you, Ren?” Aaron asks with a frown. “We care about you.”

“We would never take advantage of you,” adds Matt. “That’s for scum like Jason.”

Renee nodded like she knew that all along, but I couldn't blame her for being scared. She’d almost been raped and couldn't even remember it all.

Fuck Jason.

“How long have I been out?”

“Over an hour,” I tell her. “Which is pretty good considering he slipped you roofies.”

“That would explain the migraine.” Renee leans forward, reaching for the water again, and Aaron offers her the aspirin he took from the medicine cabinet. Renee nods thanks at him and takes it, coughing, but she doesn’t try to rise from the couch.

“Why were you at that party alone?” asks Matt, and Aaron and I lean forward to hear her answer. We wanted to know what she was thinking, too.

“I wasn’t alone,” Renee insists. “I was with Jason.”

“Where’s Jami? Shouldn’t you women always have a buddy in case of something like this?”

“Do you guys have a buddy when you go to the bar?” asked Renee, shaking her head, and I almost laughed.

“We’re men. No one is going to fuck with us.”

“I didn’t think anyone was going to fuck with me, either,” admitted Renee. “But I also didn’t expect to be drugged by someone I liked.”

“You didn’t like him,” Matt said from his place on the chair. “You were angry at us, so you went out with him.”

“Are you saying this was my fault?”

“No, baby, that’s not what he’s saying,” Aaron soothes her, and Renee doesn’t even bother punching him in the face for calling her baby.

“We just didn’t want to imagine what would have happened if we hadn’t been there,” I add. “He could have really hurt you.”

Silence settles over the living room, enveloping us in a thick blanket of anxiety, fear, and worry. Renee doesn’t look at any of us now. She just stared at the floor, her expression neutral, and I wish we knew what she was thinking … feeling.

“I guess … I guess I owe you guys a thank you,” she says after a moment of silence, breaking the tension in the air. She looks up from the floor and glances between all three of us, and my chest tightens with pain when I see the tears fighting to escape from her eyes. I want to hold her, to reach out and hold her close and tell her that I’ll protect her—-we’ll protect her—-for the rest of her life, given a chance.

But I can’t. Not yet.

“You don’t have to thank us,” Aaron said, forcing a smile. He had a friendly smile that immediately put Renee at ease. Aaron has always been the more sensitive of the three of us, and I guess it isn’t so bad in a situation like this. I didn’t even have the urge to reach out and tap him for being such a sissy.

“I have to thank you, though,” Renee insists gently. “All of you.” She sighs and shakes her head, then wipes a tear that slides down her face. “I have done nothing to deserve your help, not from any of you. I betrayed you guys, I betrayed my roommate, and I trusted the wrong people. Honestly, I wouldn’t blame you for a second if you guys hate me forever.”

I catch Matt’s eye over Renee’s head. He doesn’t say anything, just stares back, but I know he’s thinking the same thing as me: at this point, we couldn’t hate Renee if someone held a gun to our heads.

“No one in this room is blaming you for anything,” I try to comfort her. “We all had a part in it.”

“It’s true,” Aaron adds. “Jake especially is to blame, you know, with that whole Carly situation and all.”

I ball up my fist, ready to break his nose, but Renee laughs that beautiful laugh, and the air in the room becomes lighter suddenly. Easier. I want to trap that laugh in a jar and keep it for every bad day.

“How did you guys know I’d be there?” Renee asks. Her eyes meet mine briefly, then travel to Matt and Aaron. “Were you following me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Matt said, but under his gruff exterior, his tone was teasing. “Jami texted me. She said Jason had approached you guys earlier and asked you to go with him. Told me she was worried about it.”

“Oh.” Renee’s face falls, and she nods. “So it was a favor for Jami.”

“No, sweetheart.” I scoot forward in my seat and reach for Renee’s hand, and I think it surprises all of us when she takes it and doesn’t let go. “We went to the party because you were there. It was no favor for anybody. We … we wanted to protect you if anything happened.”

“I guess it was good that you guys showed up then, huh?” Renee says with a small smile, dropping my hand to nibble anxiously at a fingernail.

“Eh, you could have taken him,” Aaron says, and Renee giggles. God, what a beautiful sound.

“Probably not, but thanks for the vote of confidence.” She slides to the edge of the couch to try and stand up, and three pairs of hands shoot out to steady her again. Matt secures her left, I get her right, and Aaron stays in front of her. We look ridiculous, I imagine, flocking around Renee like she was an invalid, but none of us make any move to back away.

“Honestly, you guys, I’m okay now,” she insists, but her cheeks' waxy, pale complexion tells us otherwise. Her hands tremble as she stands, but she grips me with one of them and Matt with the other.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Matt asks. “You should stay sitting down for a while.”

Renee swallows and glances down at Aaron’s arm, where a wristwatch is secured.

“It’s almost two in the morning,” she mumbles, glancing at it. “I need to go home. Jami is probably worried sick.”

“I’ve already spoken with Jami,” Matt says. “She knows you’re here and that you’re safe. Besides, didn’t you ride to the party with Jason?”

“Yeah, so?”

“So,” Aaron cuts in. “How are you going to drive home right now?”

Renee furrows her brow, gaze switching between each of us. “Are you holding me hostage here?”

“No.”

“Of course not.”

“Why?” I ask. “Do you feel like a hostage?”

Renee sways where she stands and closes her eyes, looking like she might throw up. The bit of color that was left drains from her face, and Matt and I gently help her lower her body back onto the couch where she’s in no danger of careening face-first into the coffee table.

“You could sleep here tonight,” Matt says. “You need to rest.”

“I should be at home,” Renee mumbles, but her voice is far away as exhaustion overtakes her. She flung an arm over her eyes and took a deep breath. Aaron goes down the hallway for a moment and comes back with an extra blanket and one of his pillows. He hands them over, and Matt and I gently lift Renee’s head to rest it on the pillow, then cover her with the blanket. She was already asleep, her chest rising and falling gently with each breath she took. I wanted to touch her, to feel her beneath my fingers, but it was not the time. Not now. Not after tonight.

“Well,” Matt says, leaning back into his chair with a slight shrug. “This has been an interesting night, wouldn’t you both say?”