Ruined with a Promise

Ruined with a Promise BB Hamel Copyright © 2023 by B. B. Hamel All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Cover design by Coverluv Book Designs Contents Get your free book!Trigger Warning1. Kat2. Kat3. Ford4. Kat5. Kat6. Ford7. Kat8. Kat9. Ford10. Kat11. Kat12. Kat13. Kat14. Ford15. Kat16. Kat17. Ford18. Kat19. Kat20. Ford21. Ford22. Kat23. Ford24. Kat25. Ford26. Kat27. Ford28. Kat29. Kat30. Ford31. KatPreview: Beautiful CorruptionAlso by BB Hamel Get your free book! Sign up for my exclusive readers-only newsletter to download Hunting Gorgeous, and find out about hot releases, giveaways, free books, and more. Plus, get other awesome bonus material! >> Click here Trigger Warning This book contains graphic descriptions of sexual content, explicit violence, drug use, and past trauma. These scenes were written to create a more vivid, in-depth experience, but may be triggering for some readers. Read at your own risk. Chapter 1Kat If my cousin Sara Lynn fell into a vat of boiling Pepsi, I’d stand back and watch her drown. I wouldn’t even feel bad about it. While she begged for my help, I’d remind her about the time she pulled my chair out from under me and I fell straight onto concrete and broke my tailbone, or the time she recorded me sleeping and sent the video to all her friends with the caption ‘Neanderthal Snoring,’ or the time she broke into my room and stole my pillows and refused to give them back until I admitted that I was the ugliest girl in the whole family. I gave in and said it, and she still wouldn’t return them and I slept on an old stuffed bear for a week before Grandpa made her hand them over. Which is why I never should’ve gone with her to this homecoming football game. But the offer was too tempting. She’s a senior and I’m barely in eighth grade and I’d never been to a high school football game before. She said she’d take me in front of the whole family at dinner, which meant it was really happening, and I was too excited to really think through what it meant. That I’d be at her mercy there with no adults to help. At the time I figured her mom and dad made her do it out of pity. Now I’m pretty sure it was another in a long line of torturous practical jokes that aren’t funny and only prove that she’s an actual monster. Sara Lynn’s smirk is vicious. Light and shadows play across her face as people above us on the concrete bleachers move around between plays. “Stop staring at me like that, Kit-Kat. If you wanna get out from under here then you’re gonna have to eat the whole thing, start to finish, and you’d better do it in under ten seconds.” She shoves the mustard-drenched hot dog at me and wiggles it up and down. “Come on, Kit-Kat. Get to it. We all know you love to scarf down food.” She cackles and her friends join in. My jaw works but I don’t answer. Saying anything right now will only make it worse. Sara Lynn knows I hate hot dogs ever since Grandfather loudly informed me that they will made me even chubbier and nobody likes a chubby girl and now the sight of a hot dog repulses me. But Sara Lynn shoves it in my face with a wicked grin while her friends, Laurie and Bronwyn, watch and laugh. Sara Lynn says, “Come on, it’s just food. It’s not like I’m asking you to eat bugs. Although—” She bends down and scoops up some bleacher dirt and sprinkles it on top. A little piece of discarded, ancient popcorn adheres to the mustard. “There we go, now it’s got a little seasoning. Get chewing, Kit-Kat.” I hate that nickname. It’s a dig against my weight, which isn’t my fault, I’m only thirteen and it’s not like I eat too much junk or whatever. Grandfather won’t let me. Tears well up in my eyes, and I blink rapidly to try to stop them from rolling down because crying right now will only make this worse but I’m trapped and cornered and hurt, and I don’t know what to do. Sara Lynn’s not going to let me leave until I eat all that gross food. Even if I do it, she’ll just call me fat and her friends will cackle, and I’ll hate myself just as much as I hate them. Except a voice cuts over the crowd. A guy’s voice, low and loud. “What are you doing?” Everyone looks over as he walks toward us. Bradford Arc. Or just Ford now. He’s big, pushing six feet, with broad shoulders and muscular arms. He’s a star on the lacrosse team or else he’d be out there on the football field right now playing quarterback or something. Ford’s one of the most popular boys at school, and I’ve never been this close to him before, let alone ever heard him talk, but Sara Lynn and her two little witch cronies know him. They hang out in the same social circles, and I used to be so jealous that she’s popular but if this is how the popular kids act then it’s better that I’m a loser. With Ford here, suddenly I’m mortified. Now I can’t stop the tears even if I despise myself for crying in front of him, but at least Sara Lynn isn’t paying attention to me anymore. “We’re just having some fun with my little cousin,” Sara Lynn says and strokes her hair with her free hand. “It’s not a big deal.” “Seriously, Sar? You’re bullying a little kid?” Sara Lynn rolls her eyes. “Whatever, it’s not bullying. She’s just my stupid little cousin. And she’s thirteen,