tiny & vicious || h.s ✔️

~32~

Song: Gangsta by Kehlani

Aria's POV

"I'm here for Jordyn"

Immediately the tension in the room sparked like a fire. The match had been lit. And now we all sat in the embers waiting to burn. My chest caved with each slow breath. The sound of her name rolling off his tongue made my heartbeat slow. I had avoided her name for the last 24 hours. The most painful and slow 24 hours of my life.

Ever since I watched the life drained from her eyes. The colour in her skin fade. The coldness of her cheeks. I was lost. Lost in the pain which ignited my veins. But after a little while, the pain died down and was replaced by numbness. The type of numbness that would drive you mad. Drive you insane and to the brink of ending it all. I urged to feel something. Even if it was pain. I wanted to feel something. Something but the consuming grief and hurt and loss. Something but the death of my best friend. My sister. I wanted to feel something. But the sound of her name lit the scorching burn in my veins again. It intensified my grief by tenfold and I found myself gasping for air. I internally begged to escape the pain. To escape the tears which threatened to spill and the demonic voices in my head, telling me that I had murdered her child. That it was my fault. I condemned her to this life of grief and loss of a child and in the end, I drove her to her death. The sound of her name ignited the pain and fury and left the shell of myself in loose threads.

"I would watch where I use that name." Niall growled. My eyes barely flitted to his before I closed them. I heard the sheer anger in his voice laced with his immeasurable grief. He loved her. More than the rest of us. For 9 years I watched their secret affection for each other grow and bloom into something beautiful. Something worth time. But they didn't have time. He never had the chance to tell her and for that, I would always feel guilty. I took away his chance to show her the real him. To express his true feelings and profess his love to her. As cliché and disgustingly romantic it sounds, I wanted them to ride off into the sunset together. They deserved to. They deserved to take the time to build a relationship and be together. To potentially get married and start a family. That was all I ever wished for her. And I had taken it away before it even began.

Her death brought immense grief to us all. But it was Niall who felt the most. His heart had been ripped out of his chest and thrown on the ground. His heart had been cut in more ways than one and left as roadkill. His heart had been stabbed repeatedly and broken. All because of her death. The one woman he loved was gone and she was never coming back. My thoughts bounced around until I came face to face with Harry. The sorrow in his eyes, stabbed me in the heart. I felt it. I felt how Niall felt. The pain, the loss. The knowing that your one true love was in pain and there was a chance that they could be gone. Drew could easily press his finger against the trigger and rip the life from Harry's eyes. Rip the life from his soul and drain him off all he is until we are left with an empty corpse of my husband. It was that simple, and I had never realised it until now.

I mouthed those important three words and his lips lifted into a faint smile. He returned the expression and I smiled lovingly before turning to Niall.

"Who knows? Someone might kill you for it." He numbly shrugged his shoulders, not caring that he had just threatened the man who held his life in his bare hands. Niall's eyes were blank with emotion. They were bleak. Bright blue orbs had transformed into dull, grey ones. The light in his soul had been robbed by her death. The grief cut through his goofy smile and enlightening optimism. He was a shell. Carved by the dreadful pain he felt.

Drew lifted his eyebrows in surprise.

"That's sweet" He chortled and lifted an expensive, crystal glass to his lips. Where he got the bourbon was beyond me, but he sipped it confidently and cockily while we watched thirstily and eager for a sip. His throat bobbed with each swallow and I heard my stomach growl.

Evil blue eyes flicked to mine and he chuckled before letting the glass slip from his mouth. He stared into my soul with a playful twinkle in his orbs. After a few moments he adjusted his leg so he could inch closer to me. He lifted the glass to my lips.

"Would you like some, my Muppet?" I engaged in a harsh glaring battle with him. I made no movement as he shockingly grasped my throat tightly. I sputtered and shook my head violently. He growled and pressed the glass to my lips, forcing me to drink. The dark liquid slipped into my mouth and I choked, spitting the bourbon back at him. The substance mixed with my spit and stained his bleach white cufflinks. His hand flinched back gingerly as if I was fire, and he scoffed.

"You Bitch" My head violently snapped to the side, a scorching feeling burning my right cheek. This mother fucker slapped me. The ground shook with the protest from my gang. They gnashed their teeth angrily and sputtered violent threats. Drew's face went red like a tomato as he gazed angrily at the rest of them. I chuckled quietly before wiping my stinging cheek on my shoulder. I glared into his orbs with all the strength I could muster. The guards surrounding us, roughly nudged the back of their heads with guns. A silent but deadly threat which told them to be quiet or they would die. I looked across the room and stared at them all. By the dangerous but calm look in my eyes, they all quietly piped down and sat idly in their ropes. I smiled in thanks at them.

Drew sat back in his seat silently. Too silently.

In a split second, the glass in his fingers was crushed on the wall behind me. Small shards of glass sliced the skin of my bare shoulder. I growled in pain. I felt the tiny, icy pieces sink into my skin and wedge themselves between my nerves. Fuck, that hurt.

A familiar warm liquid oozed down my left arm and I flinched at the hot feeling. I was freezing and the feeling of my own blood oddly gave me a sense of warmth and comfort. With my blood slowly seeping out of my injured shoulder and into the carpet, Drew glanced away from me obviously proud of himself.

Wow. Injuring a defenceless woman bound in ropes. Real manly of you.

I rolled my eyes discreetly.

"As I'm sure you all know. I was Jordyn's first love."

I choked on my breath as the words flitted through the quiet room. My eyes shot around the room. Like a punch in the face, realisation passed through our features. All our features but one. Niall's face went flushed red. Unknowingly, his nails dug into the thick brown ropes which bound him, and he visibly shook with anger. Blood poured out of the lengthy cuts on his wrist, but he didn't care. I don't even think he noticed. He was so livid.

"What the fuck are you talking about" Niall's voice was heavily laced with disgust. Disgust for the man his love was formerly involved with.

Drew clambered out of his seat and slowly paced down the hallway between us. The air was silent which illuminated the deadly sound of his expensive shoes walking tauntingly towards Niall. Niall glared up at Drew as he clutched his jaw painfully. Anger vibrated through the room. Niall was pissed.

"Yes, that's right little boy. I was her first." Drew twisted Niall's head painfully. Niall grunted at the pain, still refusing to break eye contact.

"I was the father of her baby. The baby you all killed."