How We Were | ✔️ (Complete)

57. Charlotte's Web

Should I go get someone? Have them come back with me? No, no one has time for your drama.

Taking a deep breath, I pushed forward, relaxing only when Satan came into view, looking as handsome as always. He even greeted me with a soft nudge that made me smile.

"Never fear, Layla is here. And she brought... apples!" I produced them from behind my back and presented them to him, one in each hand.

"Be good today, okay?" I lifted the stall door and stepped in, just in time to see a pair of boots disappearing over the side wall.

"Charlotte!"

No one else around here wore English riding boots.

By the time I'd scrambled out after her, she was nonchalantly heading toward the door, as if she didn't have a single care in the world.

"Charlotte!"

She turned with the most ridiculous expression on her face: pleasant surprise. "Oh, hi Layla! I didn't see you there."

Since the funeral, Peyton had been keeping her under lock and key, so it was jarring to see her out and about. As she stood there smiling at me, memories of Peyton's bruised and battered flesh flooded my brain. Hatred bloomed in my chest, indignant rage on his behalf surging through my veins.

"Bullshit! What were you doing in Satan's stall?"

Her composure never faltered. She just shrugged one shoulder. "Nothing."

"Don't lie to me, I saw you going over the wall."

And it was fucking athletic. Who knew?

"You stay right there," I said. If she'd hurt Satan, I'd have her drawn and quartered if it was the last thing I did. I went back into his stall. 

It didn't take me very long to figure out what she'd done. The billet straps to his saddle had been filed down, the leather sliced through and frayed.

It wouldn't have held for the day.

The anger stemming from a threat to your life was primal. The world around me warped, all my senses zeroing in on the source of the danger: Charlotte.

Powered by bloodlust, I lunged at her, blindly grabbing fistfuls of her hair. I shoved her up against the wall and shook her until her teeth rattled. And then I punched her, over and over again, for me, for Peyton, for Electra.

Just kidding.

If I had that in me, I wouldn't have found myself in this position to begin with. I was too petrified to react. This was so serious, so far beyond the scope of anything I could imagine handling that I couldn't even bear to turn around and look at her face.

And this is why everybody dumps everything on Peyton's shoulders, isn't it?

"I want to apologize. I'm sorry. Truly. I don't know what came over me, I was upset and-"  Her voice inched closer.

Mine shook as I struggled to get the words out. "Don't come near me! Please!"

She stopped.

"Charlotte," I said, my voice barely a whisper. "This could've killed me."

"I know! I know!" she cried, and by the sound of things, she'd burst into tears.

I steeled my spine, wrapped my arms around my torso and turned.

She stood about five feet from me, her face buried into her hands. And when she started to weep in earnest, her thin little shoulders hunching forward and shuddering as she gasped for breath, my heart softened for her. She looked so fragile, so breakable right then, as if she'd shatter in the blink of an eye. And when all was said and done, if she were truly sick, she deserved compassion.