When Perfect Meets Crazy

Chapter 31: 30 – Kill him loudly and painfully

Contrary to how crazy yesterday had been with the car scare and the prom committee debacle, today

was shaping up to be quite peaceful. School passed by uneventfully. The prom committee even did

some ass kissing since the caterer ended up calling with a change of heart half an hour after I left. And

Olly, thankfully, hadn’t tried to give me another heart attack so far. In fact, she had been almost angelic

which under normal circumstances would’ve been suspicious but yesterday already happened which

meant she was also cozying up to me for having saved her ass.

She retired to her room for the night a while ago. Our dad wasn’t home yet. Everything was as I liked it,

quiet and peaceful. I was curled up on my window seat, reading a novel on my phone with my afghan

wrapped around me. The plan was to finish the book before my dad got home, then go to bed.

I had only a few chapters left and it seemed like the guy I wanted to get the girl was actually going to

get the girl. I, unfortunately, had a penchant for second leads so the characters I root for rarely end up

together but this time, it seemed like they would.

I smiled to myself, pulling the afghan tighter around my shoulders as a cool breeze filtered in through

the open window. I absently reached for my cup of tea while waiting for the next page to load.

My gaze flitted out the window, taking in the clear night sky and scenic two-way street. I sighed, a quiet

satisfaction filling up my chest.

Well, until I spotted Ian clumsily staggering up the street.

I almost spilled hot tea on myself in shock. What the...? He made it to my backyard before

unexpectedly crashing to his knees.

I frowned, gently setting the cup down when he didn’t immediately get to his feet. I got to mine and

reluctantly went down to find out what the problem was.

“Ian?” I called from the safety of the doorway.

A groan was all the reply I got.

“You good? What are you doing here?” I tried again.

I watched, worry beginning to gnaw at me as he slowly rose to his feet, limping the distance between

us until like me, he was standing in the illuminated part of the doorway.

I gasped, my hands flying to my mouth.

His face was more red, blue and purple than his normal skin color and was liberally stained with blood.

He was sporting a split eyebrow, an swollen shut left eye and what I hoped to God wasn’t a bullet

wound in his right arm.

“The fuck...?” I rushed over to him.

He groaned.

“Are you...? What the fuck happened? You need a doctor!” I hissed, hooking his good arm over my

shoulder to support his weight.

I wasn’t sure what was wrong with his left leg but a huge part of me really did not want to find out.

“Yell at me inside the house. I think I shook them off but I’m not sure,” he managed before slipping into

a coughing fit.

I paused, all sense of sympathy fleeing from my mind. 'I think I shook them off...'

“You think?” My tone was all ice and frost. “You think?” I repeated. “Meaning, you might have led

them...”

I clenched my jaw, swallowing the rest of my statement in favor of helping him inside. He was right. If

he had in fact led a group of criminals to my house, standing outside where we could easily get caught

was the worst idea.

I could just as well yell inside as I could outside. My dad wasn’t home yet and Olly could sleep through

a tornado. I could kill him as loudly and painfully as I pleased inside.

I locked the back door behind us and helped him up to my room just in case my dad chose this

inopportune moment to show up. A bleeding boy in the living room at midnight was just not something I

could explain away.

I sat him on my bed, drew my blackout curtains close, and then switched on the lights.

I helped him take off his authentic leather boots -I couldn’t help noticing, sue me- before sitting him

down more comfortably, with his back propped against my headboard, a pillow cushioning him and his

legs stretched out on the bed.

“Don’t touch anything,” I ordered before heading downstairs to get everything I’d need to tend his

wounds.

I returned armed with supplies. I laid them at the foot of the bed before going back to lock my room

door just in case. Olly could suddenly wake up and need something from me. I wasn't willing to take

any chances.

I faced him, meeting his unbruised eye.

“Explain yourself,” I ordered.

A part of me was impressed by how calm I sounded, especially given the fact that my heart was racing

a mile a minute and I was lightheaded with fear.

His eye drifted shut, a sigh leaving his lips.

“I had match this evening and then--”

“Not there, idiot.” I glared. “From the beginning.”

A frown marred the parts of his face that weren’t immovably swollen.

“Okay,” he acquiesced, confusion coating his tone. “This morning, I got--”

“Not. There.” I ground out. “The beginning beginning. Where all this started. How you got involved in all

this. If I’m going to risk my family’s and my safety, I think it’s only fair I have all the details. Start talking.”

He sighed wearily then winced almost immediately, reminding me that he required medical attention.

“I’ll fix you up while you talk. Don’t even think about holding out on me or I’ll hand you over to the

wolves myself.”

The contents of my stomach were quickly turning into butterflies as I took in his wounds. The I-might-

puke kind. Thankfully, he was in too much pain to notice.

“Fine,” he breathed.

I gestured for him to go on as I got started on his injuries.

“I’m a rich kid like you guessed.” He winced, sucking air in through his teeth as I helped him get his

jacket and T-shirt off. “Old money rich. You were right about that too.”

I refrained from rolling my eyes. That part had been too obvious. I hadn’t even felt that much of a sense

of satisfaction from uncovering it.

“My family has been rich for generations. My grandmother handed the business down to my father not

long after my older sister was born.”

He paused for a deep breath, his shoulders rising and falling laboriously.

“I found out last year that not only has my dad been evading taxes for years, he’s been cutting shady

deals too. Also, we own an insurance company which he uses to skirt the law and swindle people out

of their money. There were a bunch of other things too but the highest on the list was that he was

suspected of being in bed with some drug network.” He stopped, hissing in pain as I prodded his chest

for broken ribs.

He really was lucky I used to be a devout follower of Residents and Grey’s Anatomy.

Thankfully, nothing was broken -that I knew of anyway- and what I had thought was a bullet wound was

actually just a nasty graze from a chain-link fence apparently. The bleeding was completely out of

proportion and I would have told to him to have himself checked for bleeding disorders at his earliest

convenience but I didn’t want to interrupt his storytelling.

“Go on,” I encouraged, keeping the knowledge that his arm would need stitches to myself for the time

being.

“It was the... drug thing that got the FBI involved.” He heaved, exertion worsening his pallor. “I think.

But they couldn’t pin anything on him. Not a single thing. My dad doesn’t just think he’s the smartest in

the room. He usually is. He came out clean. He’s very good at skirting the law. There wasn’t a single

shred of evidence to pin him down but I just... knew he did it. I just knew and I couldn’t...”

He sighed wearily, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.

“Whatever. He was cleared but my grandmother found out. She’s the only one who can call him out on

stuff so she went back to being active in the company to monitor him, thank God. But I felt like I had to

do something at least.”

He tried to shrug and quickly learnt it was a bad idea. I, on other hand, kept my thoughts on how stupid

becoming a criminal to spite his father was. It was really hard but I managed it.

“So I started sniffing around the drug thing. I even asked him one time. I know he’d never incriminate

himself. He’s too smart for that but I had to try. It paid off. He told me they approached him and he

turned them down.”

He tried to smile. Keyword; tried.

“I’m not sure I believe him.”

To save him some dignity and also because I didn’t have the bandwidth to so much as try to comfort

him, I pretended not to hear the desperation in his voice that made it glaringly obvious he really wanted

to believe his father.

Something in my chest twisted. That desperation was a little too close to home.

“Anyway, he slipped up and I got the address to the arena. Lucky for me, another Carrington family

tradition is kickboxing.”

Thankfully, that little nugget slipped out right when I needed something else to focus on.

“Hang on,” I held up a disinfectant coated cotton bud, “Carrington as in Carrington Global? As in Amina

Corp?”

My eyes felt like they would pop out of their sockets.

“Yes.”

“Jesus Christ.” I blinked.

I knew he was rich. Really rich. But not Carrington level reach. Definitely not Carrington level. The

Carringtons were on list of the top fifty richest families in the country. Number seven or so. They were

obscenely rich. It was just not the kind of rich you’d expect from someone you actually know personally.

Like how you wouldn't expect yourself to know Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos. It was urban legend level rich.

“So I came down here.”

I had half the mind to tell him to wait for me to finish processing the fact that I had mistaken a billionaire

for a poor down-on-his-luck petty criminal at some point in my life. I might have if I wasn’t worried it

would make him stop talking completely and since I was almost done patching him up, he could decide

he wanted to leave.

“Came from where?” I inquired, forcing myself to file away the shock for later.

“I lied before.”

I froze, fingers stilling in the act of wiping his split brow. My mind instantly jumped from from reluctant

but honest Fed to family dynasties built on blood and betrayal.

My eyes narrowed.

“Lied about what?” My voice could’ve easily cut glass.

He flinched.