Cold State Line

Matt held onto me as he led me into my house. I could tell he was apprehensive as was I. I didn’t really want to go into that house. So much bad shit had happened there. I hated that house now. I hated Texas now. Texas was my home, and Clay had made me hate it. I wanted him to rot in jail for what he did. I wanted him to die.

“Are you okay?” Matt stopped me outside of my front door. “I can take you to the hotel instead. I really don’t want you to be here.” He looked me in the eyes. I could see the worry plain as day.

Nodding, I turned away from the house. It wasn’t my home anymore; Clay had ruined that too. Clay had ruined everything. He always found a way. He had ruined my body years ago by damaging it beyond repair. He had ruined barrel racing my scaring Snap and destroying Vegas for me. Now, he had ruined my face and my house, so that even I couldn’t see the good in things anymore. He had finally ruined me.

Matt helped me into the car. I think he could sense that I needed silence. I was too anger, too bitter to think about anything except the man who had hurt me. If Clay thought he was getting away from this, he was in for a rude goddamn awakening. No matter how long it took, I was going to bring him and his father down.

“Haylee, we’re at the hotel,” Matt said as he turned off his truck. “We can just relax or do whatever you want.”

I looked at him. “I want a lawyer, Matt. I want to make Clay and his family pay.”

Matt shot me a glance. He had never heard me like this. He usually saw me as the quiet and sweet one. Today, I wasn’t feeling that. The Haylee Matt knew was gone. In fact, the Haylee Matt had never met was back. The old Haylee had been filled with some bitterness because of family shit, but Clay had restored my hope. Now, he had brought out the old me. And I wasn’t happy she was back.

“There’s a lawyer here with us.” He helped me walk inside, pressing my face against his chest. Matt knew I was self-conscious about it.

“Why?”

“I just had a feeling you would want to hurt Clay like he had hurt you. We all want him to pay, Haylee. We just want to do it as legally as possible. I tried to find him yesterday.”

I heard the ding of the elevator and took that moment to meet his gorgeous hazel eyes. “Why? Why would you do that?”

Matt stared at me, an emotion I had never seen before clear in them. “Because I wanted to kill him. I was close to it too.”

I gripped his hand as he guided me to his hotel room. We entered and I was tackled into a group hug by all the men. Tears filled my eyes as I felt overcome with love from people I had only met a few times. I guess if you were a part of the Avenged family, they would love you.

“So what’s the plan?” Brian asked, avoiding staring at me. I noticed all the guys were.

“You can look at my face, guys. I know it’s bad, but just make me feel as normal as possible.
The plan is to bury Clay. Matt said y’all brought a lawyer.”

That was when I noticed the older gentleman in the room. He kind of looked like my grandfather with a salt and pepper mustache and goatee and a slight beer belly. He dressed like a dapper metal man with suspenders and a Megadeth shirt.

“Hello, Ms. Lewis, my name is Alvin.” He shook my hand and gently kissed it. I could detect a slight southern accent that I’m sure the guys hadn’t. “What exactly do you want to bury him with?”

“This isn’t the first time he hurt me, and I have proof of every time he did it. I may not have originally recognized the signs, but I always documented it.” I pulled out my phone. Lately, I had backed up all the data about Clay to several places, including my phone.

Alvin took the phone and looked at the contents. Inside of the phone was a file labelled simply Clay. It had dozens of photos of me in various poses showcasing my bruises. There were a few where I was naked and I could tell those made the lawyer tense up. They were hard to view. Some of the other files were voice recordings of the things he said to me.

“Can I take this to examine for a bit?”

I nodded and turned to Matt. Now that all my bravado was gone, I just wanted him to hold me. Matt obliged and held me in his arms. I felt safe again. I had long ago made a promise to myself to not rely on men, but Matt made it feel like it was okay to rely on him. He was a good one. And I wanted to hold onto him.

Notes