Altering Authority by Ashley Dooley Read Free Book Online Page B

beach. He walked over and sat with his guys. Bobo was polluted and pretending to dry-hump a pool toy in the shape of a whale. The guys laughed, drank, and ate. Someone threw Sugar in the pool. Phil hadn’t remembered a time when he saw Jager laugh so much. He decided to leave his conversation about Tatum until later.
    A girl ran up the stairs then. She was friends with Tatum and she looked frantic. “You need to come down here now and get your girl Jessica.” Jager calmly took a sip of his drink; he hated Jessica and didn’t really care if she was in trouble. “What’s the matter?” he asked. “She’s saying shit and Tatum’s getting pissed off. When she gets pissed off she’s dangerous. Seriously, if you want her to go home whole, you need to come and get her or Tatum is going to destroy her.”
    When no one made an attempt to move, the girl began growing panicky. Phil and Jager stood, taking their time, bringing their beers with them with no real intention of stopping what was supposedly going to happen. Tatum looked fine. She was sitting next to Ava while Jessica was saying something.
    “Seriously, I know Tatum. She’s brewing right now. It’s coming. Go and take Jessica away.”
    Phil was about to say that everything looks fine when Tatum stood slowly, walked over to a cooler on the table behind the circle of women and grabbed the lid. She turned it slowly in her hands, as if judging the durability of it.
    “Oh my God,” the friend began to say.
    Tatum looked over at the group of girls and then at Jessica’s back. She took three slow steps toward her and swung the lid, nailing Jessica in the back of the head and sending her flying off her chair. The girls all stood, screaming, tripping over tipped chairs as Tatum launched herself on top of Jessica and began pounding her fists into her face.
    All Phil and Jager could do was stare at them, their mouths hanging open, eyes wide. Some of the girls were yelling at them to stop and the guys who were up on the top patio came running down to see the cat fight. It wasn’t a cat fight though. Tatum was a better fighter than most of the guys here. She dragged Jessica, screaming, by the hair towards the ocean and pushed her head into the water, holding it there with her foot while the other girl thrashed widely.
    “Fuck! Go stop her before she kills her right here in the open in front of everyone!” the girl pleaded.
    The two men looked at each other, thought about it. They didn’t want Tatum to get arrested. Just as they took two steps forward, Tatum removed her foot. It appeared then that she would stop. She stepped off Jessica and began to walk away.
    Jessica spit and spluttered and stood up, wiping the hair and water out of her eyes. “You crazy fucking bitch!” she yelled at Tatum’s back.
    Tatum turned then to face her, looking serene and calm. She walked back slowly towards Jessica and smiled, noticing her eye was beginning to swell. She took a couple steps closer to her. Jessica was stubborn and refused to back away. She regretted not running when Tatum cocked back and struck her in the mouth. Falling back into the water, Tatum straddled her and began wailing on her face. Eventually Jager and Phil knew they had to stop her. Jessica was barely conscious.
    Grabbing her by the waist, Phil pulled his daughter off the girl. She didn’t really resist him. Just smiled towards Jessica and it was then, at that point, that Phil saw himself in her. He couldn’t help but laugh. She realized then, with the sound of her father’s laughter, what she’d done. She turned to look at him, pushing his arms away from her waist. “Shit, I’m sorry Phil.”
    His laughter grew even louder. “If I’d seen this before the paternity test, I wouldn’t have even bothered with it. This is the proof right here that you’re mine.” He kissed her on the forehead, “go on and put some ice on those,” he nodded toward her knuckles which were busted and covered in blood and