Rise (The Phoenix Series Book 1) Read online

  “Easton, would you like to join us for lunch? I was getting ready to make BLT’s.” He would eat anything that was placed in front of him. If he didn’t have to make it, he didn’t care.

  “Hell yes baby girl! You don’t have to ask me twice.” He smiles at me and turns around to shut the car off. Very gently, he closes the door and starts walking to the house. He takes one more glance back at the machine, that car means everything to him.

  As the three of us are seated at the marble countertop, eating our BLT’s, I couldn’t stop staring at Summer. She has changed so much since I meant her. Her family was well to do but, her father was a dick and took his anger out on her. I taught her how to defend herself if she ever needed to again.

  “Hey, you're spacing out again.” She smiles at me then takes a big mouth full of food.

  “Sorry, can’t help it, my mind wonders.” I lean in and bump her shoulder for a brief second before pulling it away.

  Clearing his throat to interrupt us, which causes both of us to look at him, “So tonight, you fine ladies got any plans?” Easton raises both of his eyebrows up and down multiple times which causes me to laugh at him, “My cousin is coming back into town and is throwing this massive bonfire.” Raising both of his hands in our direction and pointing at us, “You two should make an appearance.” He is excited about the party, and so is Summer.

  Easton looks at me with his big puppy dog eyes. “Greer, you need to come and get out every now and then.” He knows why I’m not much for the party scene but still pushes the topic anyways.

  Summer leans into me and starts begging. She hates going to parties alone, and Easton is never a help because he is usually plastered before everyone arrives. I don’t see a way out of this, seems I was ambushed by these two.

  Pointing my finger at both, “Fine, I’ll go. If I find out that you are trying to set me up in any way, I’m out. No more parties. I won’t go through with any more relationships, I can’t, I’m done.” Tears begin to threaten my eyes, but I push them back in fear that both will see them. The last thing I want is a pity party.

  Between Summer and Easton, they threw men in my direction, anywhere I went, knowing I wanted nothing to do with them. It was getting old and frustrating. I haven’t been with a guy in three years, and that wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

  Holding his right hand up in defeat, “Honestly, I had no one lined up for this party. I just found out about it this morning, in the car, as I was heading here. I’m good but not that good.” He is laughing his ass off now. Easton is continuously calling himself a God because he has women swooning over him all the time. His guy friends constantly wish they were him if only they weren’t such dicks to every woman that came in their direction.

  After lunch, Easton took off to head to the airport to pick his cousin up. Summer and I made our way to the pool to lounge for the rest of the afternoon.

  ***

  It is six o’clock when Summer and I start to get ready for the party. I’m in my walk-in closet searching for my favorite outfit when Summer walks in.

  “Greer, does this look alright?” I turn around to see Summer standing in the doorway. She has on dark straight legged jeans, a white tank top, a red leather jacket, black boots and her gold cross necklace that was her mothers. She left her hair down and curled.

  “Summer, I love that outfit. It’s you and not someone you're trying to be.” I hated that she had low self-esteem and thought she had to please everybody around her. Summer’s piece-of-shit dad did a real number on her in High School. He’d beat the shit out of her just because, no real particular reason. Most of the time she happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, which was pretty much all the time.

  “Thanks, girl. I wanted to wear something relaxing but says “hey, I’m here to mingle.” Walking away, she smiles but it never makes its way to her eyes.

  I pull out my light blue, skinny, low waisted jeans that are pencil ripped from the calves to thighs and grab my plain olive drab t-shirt that clings to my body. As I’m heading out the door, I throw on my light brown leather jacket and matching boots. I decide to leave my long, burgundy hair down and push my bangs off to the side.

  Summer is already outside standing next to the motorcycle. She could have taken the 2015 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited, but she doesn’t. As much as Summer hates the suction cup seat, she loves to ride.

  She can’t stand that I don’t have a windshield and always complains about the bugs and the fact that she has to sit on an uncomfortable seat. I refuse to buy a two-seated motorcycle, and we seem to still disagree when it comes to this discussion. I love both of my vehicles but cherish my bike, it's my prized possession.

  We were ten miles from my place when we spotted the small, white, triangular shaped flag hanging from a tree branch. That was my cue to take a right and follow it all the way until we found the tree line to where the road ended. We walk about half a mile into the woods before spotting the party while the whole time Summer is behind me complaining about getting her boots filthy from all the mud on the ground.

  “Greer! Summer!” Easton comes running to us with an opened-up beer in his hand. He spills more from it than he can drink. Slurring his words, “I’m soooooo glad you made it girls!” He was wasted and screaming everything. All I could do was laugh at him.

  I step past him and pat his back a few times. “Nice to see you too. Looks like you started early.” I walk away to find the beer, as Easton spots two girls leaning against a tree, and Summer went in the opposite direction looking for what I can assume are men.

  After walking around for five minutes, I spotted a crowd huddled around the keg. Matt is leaning against a tree with a beer in his hand, not taking his eyes off me. He looks like shit from the fight last night. The bridge of his nose has butterfly stitches, and his left eye is black and blue.

  “Greer, over here!” he yells and waves in his direction.

  Hesitant, I decide to walk over to him and get my beer afterward that way I’ve got a reason to leave the conversation. “Hey.”

  I stand a few feet in front of him. Matt still seems to be pissed at me, and I assume it was because he didn’t win his match.

  “That was some moves you pulled last night.” He was staring at me with a crooked smile on his face that made me lower my brows.

  Crossing my arms and arching my eyebrow, “Yeah, ditto Matt. Choking your new thing now?” He didn’t seem to like that I questioned him.

  Walking toward me, he gets inches from my face and smirks. Looking up and behind me, he nods his head. As I turn around to see what it is, I get a fist to my face and blackout.

  ***

  “You think you’re going to fall asleep cookie? You had better think again.”

  He took his nasty smelling cigar and placed it on my hip bone. “STOP!”

  The smell of burning flesh was horrible. He wouldn’t stop, and every time I begged, he would press it deeper into my skin until my flesh put the cigar out.

  I passed out from the pain every time.

  I wake with a slap on my left cheek. Matt is standing in front of me, grinning, with his arms crossed. I try to talk, but he duct taped my mouth while I was passed out. I’m on my knees, kneeling when I look up to find my wrists are bound and hanging from a branch above. I have a mild headache forming from the fist that made contact with my face earlier, and panic is setting in.

  I peer around trying to see if I can spot anybody for help. From the looks of it, Matt has transported me to a different location, I was fucked. We seem to be more buried in the woods and no sign of anybody. The only thing I can see around me is what the full moon lights up.

  I stand up to relieve the discomfort in my arms, but my feet are immediately kicked from under me. My knees are in agonizing pain, and my arms become numb from the snap of the rope. Tears are forming in my eyes, and I have no idea what is about to happen.

  This cannot be happening. How could I get stuck in this position again? I am terrif
ied.

  “Aww, is big bad Greer going to cry?” Matt comes walking up to me, dropping his arms to his side. He kneels and grabs my chin, looking into my eyes. “How does it feel to be defenseless?” He releases my chin and his fist, once again, thrust into the left side of my stomach.

  “Mmmmm!!!” is all I can scream under the duct tape. I have tears flowing out of my eyes by now. There is no way in hell I am making it out of here alive. Matt has one thing on his agenda, that isn’t me coming out of this breathing.

  Ripping off the duct tape, “What was that? I couldn’t understand you. One more time Greer.”

  “Please.” My voice is barely heard, and Matt leans in closer. “Please, let me go.”

  Standing up and looking behind me, “Aww, shucks boys, she’s begging.”

  I can hear two men behind me laughing. I turn my head as far to the left as I can without the adjustment sending more profound pain to my ribs.

  The two tall, white, buzzed cut men behind me are wearing expensive suits. They both appear to be twins, but I recognize the one that knocked me out earlier, he has a scar across his forehead that I remember seeing.

  Matt grabs a handful of my hair, to turn my head back around, to face him. He proceeds to punch me in the face multiple times without letting up. My vision becomes blurry, and I’m having troubles breathing through my nose. I can feel the blood start to pour from both my nose and mouth.

  Everything was going black around me, I begin to pass out. Before I know it, Matt slaps my face again to get me to stay awake. My head is hanging down, and I barely have any energy left in me to look up to see what he is about to do next.

  Matt kneels and bends his head to the side to look into my eyes. “How does that feel? It’s got to hurt like a son of a bitch.”

  I look up at him, long enough, to spit the mound of blood from my mouth into his face. The twins are on me in a matter of seconds, kneeing the shit out of both of my sides. I try to get a yell out, but the only sound is me choking on my own blood.

  Before I know it, Matt is putting the duct tape across my mouth again. I can’t breathe out of my nose as it is, and my face starts to heat up and turn red, I’m being deprived of oxygen.

  As I’m being hoisted in the air, by the rope tied around my wrists, I can feel my right shoulder dislocate. They have me off the ground by at least a couple feet. My wrists are starting to burn, with the weight of my body, they feel like they are being torn apart.

  The twin, with the scar above his forehead, comes to stand in front of me. He looks up at me and peers into my eyes, “I am going to miss hearing that pretty voice of yours.”

  Out of nowhere, he pulls a large blade from his vest pocket and quickly jabs me in the gut.

  The pain is so intense I can no longer keep my eyes open, and I begin to fade into the darkness.

  Chapter TWO

  THANE

  L aying on sharp, cold rocks under the hood of my truck, “Rem, I can’t believe this. I’ve had this truck for sixteen fricking years.”

  I sounded like a crazy person talking to my dog. She just sat there staring at me, with her tongue sticking out and tail wagging.

  I slide out from underneath the truck and sit there looking at her for a bit. She is a gorgeous dog, black, full blood, long-haired, German Shepard. I had found her four and a half years ago, abandoned on the side of the road, heading home. Some stupid ass left her in a cardboard box, next to the road, in the rain. Her fur was matted, and she had been laying in her own feces for quite a while. She’s five now, and I hope she never recalls it.

  I get up and scratch my head, “I can’t see a thing. Got to head to the garage and get the lamp.” I look at her like she knows what I’m talking about.

  Walking a few feet from my truck, to the garage, Rem stands up on all fours, with her ears pointed up, staring off into the distance. She only does this when something is out and about making noise.

  “Rem…ignore it. Come on.” She looks at me and then back into woods. She is antsy and wanting to run. I turn around and give her a look, the one she knows well, and she follows behind me.

  “Ha! Found it.” I look at Rem with a big grin on my face and the lamp hanging high in the air, in my hand. I need to get some friends. I had just moved here a few weeks ago and can’t seem to connect with the locals.

  Heading back to the truck, not only did Rem hear it, I heard it. I’m looking off to the West, hoping I can see anything out there, nothing.

  I race inside to my study and pull the G43 Single Stack 9mm Glock from under the desk. Rem is at the screen door waiting for me, whining. Whatever that scream was, didn’t sound too promising. On my way, out the door, I grab the keys to the 2008 Grizzly 700. There is no way I am going to get my truck to move.

  I get on the four-wheeler and start it up. Rem is in front of me waiting for the cue.

  Whistling loudly, “Get’em, girl!” She runs off, and I follow behind her.

  The deeper I drive into the woods, the more the trees start to get closer to each other. I have to stop where I am and run from there. Rem had gone ahead, never waiting. I am now in search of my dog in the direction of the scream.

  “REM!! REEMMM!!” I have my hands cupping my mouth calling for her. The four-wheeler is too far back to give me any kind of light, so I depend on the full moon to guide me.

  I had to of been walking for a good five minutes before I heard Rem barking and whining. The more I walked, the louder she got. I could see her about thirty feet away dancing in circles. I couldn’t figure out why she was prancing, nothing was around her that I could see.

  As I approached closer, she looked at me, trying to tell me something. I looked around even harder and still seen nothing. She ran to me and started tugging on my pants, and I followed.

  Walking fifteen more feet, I saw a girl hanging by her wrists from a tree. She had duct tape around her mouth, a big gash in her stomach, swelling and bruising all over her face and body. I followed the rope from her wrists to the tree, down the branch and to the trunk where it was tied off. I ran to untie the rope and slowly lowered her to the ground without causing any more damage than what was already done to her. Once down, I check her throat to see if she was alive.

  Placing two fingers on her carotid artery, I check her lifeless body for a pulse, I find a faint one. Slowly ripping the duct tape off her mouth, she gasped for air and partially opens her eyes. They were swelling shut by the second.

  I picked her up carefully by the upper back and under the knees, placing her head against my chest, and ran back to the four-wheeler. Rem was right behind me keeping up. Getting to the four-wheeler, I threw my left leg over the seat and placed her between me and the handlebars. I reversed it and drove off toward the house, avoiding any significant holes to cause her more pain. Looking down, I could see she was still gasping for air, holding onto whatever she could to stay alive, she was a fighter.

  As we got to the house, I picked her up and ran to the porch, flinging open the screen door, as it hit the side of the house. I climbed the stairs two by two and placed her on the bed, in the spare room. I headed to the bathroom to get my first aid kit. I couldn’t call the ambulance because the house phone hadn’t been installed yet and I left my cell phone at work. Turning around to grab a washcloth out of the drawer, I was nervous as hell. I had no idea what the hell I was doing, but I was going to try my best to save her.

  I had been at it awhile, washing the blood from her face and wounds. I needed to see what I had to stitch but, couldn’t unless I got some of the dried blood off her body. She was pretty messed up and needed stitches and probably surgery, but I’m not a doctor, so I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. After ten minutes and a lot of towels, alcohol, and a few stitches, I finally got all the bleeding to stop. As I reset her dislocated shoulder, she just laid there, letting out a light whimper then passed out again. Once she woke, I knew I’d need to figure out what to give her to ease the pain, and I needed to figure out what to say to her. She
’s going to wake up startled and confused so I must stay vigil.

  Rem stood in the doorway with me, just staring at her. She was out cold, and her breathing was normal again. I wanted to take her to the hospital, but my truck is out of commission, and the four-wheeler wouldn’t make it to the city, thirty minutes North. I closed the door gently and headed downstairs to clean up.

  ***

  Sitting at the kitchen table, exhausted, I began nodding off. Rem had startled me and jumped to her feet. She had that look on her face again, turned around, and ran up the stairs. I panicked and jumped from my chair, tipping it over on the floor.

  As I got to the top of the steps, Rem was standing in front of the door, patiently, waiting for me to open it. Grabbing her by the pink collar, I dragged her to the room behind me and shut her in. I didn’t know what was going to happen when I opened the door and didn’t want her caught in the middle of it.

  Walking to the door, I placed my right hand on the handle, slowly opening it. The room was dark except for the hallway light that crept in, I didn’t see her on the bed and knew she had to be somewhere to the right of the door.

  I knew I had to say something. She was probably panicking, not knowing who had her or where she was. “Listen, I’m not going to hurt you. I found you in the woods in pretty bad shape and brought you to my place.”

  She was silent for some time. I didn’t know if she had passed out or if she was just refusing to talk to me. “I’m coming in, ok? Whatever you have or plan on using, don’t.” I didn’t know if she had gotten ahold of anything and thought it was best if I announced my moves.

  I slowly walked into the bedroom and stopped just inside the doorway. I didn’t proceed to come any closer in case she decided not to follow through with my advice. Looking to the right, I saw her leaning against the dresser, shielding her face. I knew she was terrified.