Part 81
On Howie’s bus, Sarah stripped out of her clothes quickly and got in the shower. Turning on the water, she got it as hot as she could stand it and just stood with the water running over her. Her mind raced over the events that had just transpired and again the thought of what Howie was going to do popped into her mind. She knew he was going to be mad as hell and for once, she was glad. She had NO intentions of stopping him from going after AJ this time. For that matter, she wasn’t going to stop ANY of them if they all decided to beat the hell out of AJ. She had NEVER imagined AJ was capable of this.
After almost fifteen minutes, the limit of hot water on the buses, Sarah got out of the shower and went to find some clothes to wear. She found a pair of jeans that were loose fitting and a sweatshirt that would cover the bruises on her neck where AJ had bitten her. Before getting dressed though, she looked in the mirror at the marks. Carefully, she applied make-up in an attempt to cover them and then pulled on the shirt.
Sarah grabbed the clothes she’d been wearing earlier and found a trash bag. Shoving them in it, she carried them with her and exited the bus. She ran into Raoul who was on his way out to find her.
"Sarah, D’s looking for you. You changed!"
Stifling a sob, Sarah said, "Yeah..do me a favor? Get rid of this."
Raoul took the bag and looked at her quizzically. He could tell it was her clothes and asked, "What’s going on?"
Sarah looked up at Raoul as the tears welled up in her eyes. "You have GOT to promise you won’t say anything."
"You know I won’t!"
Sarah choked out, "AJ raped me."
Anger flashed over Raoul’s face. "I’m gonna kill the little prick! Where the hell was Marcus?"
"At the door! Raoul…don’t! It’s gonna be bad enough when Howie finds out!"
"You're damn straight!" he growled and then realized how upset Sarah was. He put his arms around her and hugged her. "Are you okay?"
"Just keep AJ away from me."
"Not a problem. Come on. I’ll go back with you."
"No…get rid of those clothes! I don’t EVER want to see them again!"
"I can do it on the way back in. I’m not letting you go back
alone."
Raoul and Sarah walked together inside and made their way to where Howie and the others were waiting. It was obvious that Sarah had changed and AJ started to say something but Raoul’s look shut him down quickly.
Howie took Sarah in his arms kissing her tenderly. "Why did you change, Angel? You looked hot in your mini skirt!"
Smiling weakly, Sarah whispered, "I’ll explain later, Howard."
That tipped Howie that something was seriously wrong but before he could say
anything, Billy was calling to Sarah and Becca to hurry up so the guys could go
onstage. Sarah pulled away from Howie, letting her hand slip slowly from his.
Howie watched as she went with Raoul, Becca, and Billy to the seats reserved in
the pits for them, and couldn’t help wondering what had happened between AJ
and Sarah.
Kevin nudged Howie out of his daze and asked quietly, "Is everything okay?"
Howie shrugged, "I don’t know. Come on…let’s get on with the show!"
Becca had seen the look of terror in Sarah’s eyes when she had joined them and knew something was wrong. Now, as they took their seats out front, she leaned to her best friend and asked, "Need to talk?"
Sarah was in a daze. "Huh….what?"
"I asked…do you need to talk?"
Sarah looked at Becca as tears spilled over. "Yeah…but it has to be
with Howie first."
"Something happened with the fans, didn’t it?"
"No, I’ll tell you later…I promise," was all Sarah would say.
Thankfully, the show began and Sarah didn’t have to go into any more detail. Unfortunately, all through the show, Sarah’s thoughts were on what AJ had done and how Howie was going to react. She decided there was no way she was going to face Howie alone so she decided to ask Kevin to ride with them to the next town. She did not enjoy the show and it was obvious to everyone who saw her.