by C. R. Jane
“It’s okay, LyLy. I’m here. I’ll never let anything happen to you again.”
He gently pulled my underwear and pants back up my legs, and then his arms wrapped around me and pulled me off the car bench, and I was hoisted into his arms.
I could hear his familiar heartbeat as I leaned into his chest, his scent washing over me and trying to stir a thousand memories.
His heartbeat sounded like heartbreak. But I couldn’t even move my head to get away from it.
What was Caiden doing here?
I was gone into the numbness before I could process another thought.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I leaned over and threw up, faintly aware of soft hands holding my hair back and whispering sweet nothings as I wretched over and over again into what looked like a pink bin.
I peeked open my eyes, a difficult venture since my eyes felt like they had been glued together by concrete, and a spark of pain crashed into me. I let out a silent scream, or at least I think it was silent, since I didn’t hear the sound of glass breaking around me from the shrill sound.
I tried to breathe through my nose as nausea continued to hit me hard.
What had happened to me?
The night’s events filtered slowly through my brain. We were at a club for Lane’s birthday. Lane was shit-faced. Landry had shown up. We had taken shots.
What had happened after that? I remembered chugging water at some point. Had I drunk so much that I blacked out? That wasn’t really like me.
There were bits and pieces slowly appearing in my memory. But it was like what I was seeing had happened to someone else.
And why did my skin feel like it was covered in a thousand ant bites it was so itchy?
I heard murmured voices, but I’d given up on trying to open my eyes because the concrete glue on them felt too heavy.
But then I heard Caiden’s voice murmuring to someone else in the room, and wouldn’t you know…my eyes ripped right through that concrete.
Caiden was standing at the foot of my unfamiliar bed, talking to a woman dressed in scrubs.
I was at the hospital. And Caiden was here.
I wanted to cry, run away, do something.
I needed Jackson.
Caiden must have seen my distress, because he turned his attention away from the nurse and held up his hands cajolingly like I was a wild animal about to attack.
My whole body was trembling, and I started looking around the room for my purse so I could call someone…anyone.
Jackson.
The nurse finally moved her eyes from devouring Caiden’s face and came over to me.
“Hey, sweetheart, glad you’ve woken up. You gave us all a scare.”
Sweetheart.
The word spiked a thousand memories that I would pay anything to not remember. I wanted to think that the flashes I was seeing weren’t real, but he’d touched me. I could feel his touch. And I didn’t know why I’d acted like that. How had I drunk so much?
I began to weep, gut wrenching sobs, like I hadn’t done since…well, since Caiden actually.
Was something wrong with me that I just didn’t see things coming? Never in a million years would I have thought that Landry would do that. Never in a million years had I thought that Caiden would do that.
It was official, there was something terribly wrong with me.
But it still didn’t explain how everything had happened tonight.
I didn’t remember drinking so much.
“You were drugged,” Caiden said quietly to me. He’d been watching me silently. I’d felt his hot gaze on me, and it made me want to tear off my skin.
“Drugged?” I repeated numbly, the words failing to register properly in my brain.
The nurse patted my hand. “A mixture of molly, Rohypnol, and ketamine. You’re lucky to be alive, sweetie. Any stronger doses, and you would have been dead. It was the perfect combination.”
I stared at the nurse in disgust. She sounded almost…impressed.
I started to cry again, because man, did it fucking suck that I didn’t have a mom who I could call to help me right now.
I looked at Caiden through my tears. He looked devastated, like he could feel what I was feeling.
“Did Landry… How did you…?” I didn’t know what questions to ask first. Everything was a tangled, jumbled mess, and I just wondered when I was going to catch a break, because honestly, it didn’t feel like I could handle this.
He rubbed his forehead, like he always did when he was stressed, and I leaned towards the familiarity. “I was there with some guys from the team. It took me a little bit to connect the dots, but I saw him slip your waitress some money when he went to the bathroom just a few feet away from our table. I thought he was just tipping her or hell, paying her for sex later or something. But then when the tray of shots came to your table, he picked up a shot and kind of turned away from the group for a second, looking down at it. It was the one he gave you.”
He took a deep breath, and I could almost hear the shame and regret in that breath. I braced myself for what he was going to say next.
“But again, I’m an idiot and I was a little bit drunk, so I didn’t connect anything. Until you started acting so weird on the dance floor. I’d never seen you so…”
“So sexual?” I asked, my face flushing. Because I could remember now how good Landry’s skin had felt against mine, how much I’d wanted him. How much that hadn’t made sense.
“Yeah, that,” he responded, shifting uncomfortably as his gaze flickered away from me briefly in embarrassment before returning. “When he walked you off the dance floor and then picked you up to take you out of the club, I finally came to my senses and knew something was wrong. I drove after you guys and reached you right before he was about to…”
“About to rape me,” I finished for him in a whisper.
I felt…so dirty.
“I need to shower. And maybe call…Lane.” I wanted to call Jackson, but I didn’t feel like I could say that in front of Caiden. “Have you seen my phone?”
“I think you might have left it at the club because I haven’t seen it. I didn’t know who to call or have any numbers of my own to call.”
“They’re probably all freaking out.”
“Jackson,” Caiden commented, watching me intensely in that way that he always did since he’d come back.
“Lane,” I corrected, although Jackson was probably freaking out as well. Maybe. We still had yet to have a conversation that didn’t involve our bodies taking over.
But I couldn’t ignore that the only person I wanted with me right now was him.
“I texted Jackson since that’s one number I did have, but I haven’t heard from him. For all I know, he blocked my number after everything though.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. Tearing them apart was something I’d actively tried to avoid from the beginning, but I couldn’t deny that it felt good for the truth to be out there. I didn’t know what I would have done if Jackson had found out the truth…and done nothing. It felt right for someone to fight for me for once, like I was a person who deserved to be fought for.
“How do you feel right now?” Caiden asked, approaching the chair next to me slowly, even though I could tell by how close it was to the bed that he’d already been sitting in it at some point.
“Terrible,” I croaked. “And I just can’t believe that Landry… I knew something was off with how I was acting, but it was like I was watching someone else, like I was existing outside my body.” I started to cry again, my shoulders trembling. He reached a tentative hand out and took my hand in his, squeezing mine gently. Some of my tears fell on his skin, and his hand jumped like they’d burned him.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
“I’d forgotten how sweet your tears were,” he whispered under his breath, almost like the comment hadn’t been meant for me. And it shouldn’t have been meant for me.
It was fucking creepy.
“Y
ou certainly saw enough of my tears over the years.” I let go of his hand like it was poison and folded my arms, trying to hug myself and give myself the comfort that I needed right now, since there was no one else to give it to me.
Just like always.
“Is there something wrong with me? Am I just doomed for bad shit to happen to me over and over again?” I looked at Caiden, still watching me, like he could provide answers for the bad luck that seemed to follow me everywhere.
Caiden was mercifully silent.
I’d always wanted to believe that we were in charge of our own fate. My father had chosen to steal from all the people that had trusted him. He’d chosen to kill himself. My mother had chosen to be a selfish harpy, holding on to her past riches above all else.
But now I wasn’t so sure about that.
I hadn’t chosen to love Jackson and Caiden. My brain hadn’t been an active participant in the journey. It was like there had been an invisible string connecting me to them all the time, leaving me with no choice. And then when my soul had changed the story, deciding that Jackson was the only one who could complete it…well, I hadn’t had a choice in that either.
I wasn’t so sure that I had a choice in my life anymore. And I was beginning to think that I’d done something wrong in a past life, because fate had been a total bitch to me lately.
The memory of Landry stroking my most intimate parts had me wanting to throw up again. I felt ruined.
“You’re not ruined, LyLy. Nothing could diminish your perfection,” Caiden said firmly, and I realized I’d spoken the words out loud.
“Where’s Landry now?” I asked, my gaze jumping to the door like I expected him to appear there at any minute.
“Hopefully hiding in a dark cave somewhere, because if I ever see him again, he’ll regret the day he was born. I was so worried about getting you to the hospital that he didn’t get what he deserved.” He looked at me apologetically, like he’d done something wrong by choosing to save my life over seeking retribution.
I studied him, my gaze drifting over his features that I thought I might know better than I knew my own. The Caiden sitting here…he reminded me of the old him. The one I’d loved with all my soul…like a brother.
I wanted to fall into old habits, wrap myself around him and ask him to make everything all right. And for a second, I allowed myself to think about what would happen if I gave into the temptation. If I allowed myself to feel the warmth of his hug, to bask in his laughter, to look at him like he was the sun.
“Thank you for saving me,” I told him, trying to hold onto that feeling that I knew so well, just for a minute longer. And I was grateful. If Landry had gone one step further, it might have been the end of me, the straw that broke my proverbial back. Who would have thought that Caiden would be the one to do that for me?
And so when he put his arm around me, I didn’t lean away, even though my head was begging me to get out of the bed and run away as fast as I could. I allowed my heart to have a second to savor the feeling of someone whose embrace was almost as familiar as my own.
But then I pulled away and I saw the hunger in his eyes, and I was reminded once again how important it was for me to stay away, to keep up the walls that I’d spent the last two years building.
Because I’d once been the girl who’d believed in him, and there wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t curse myself for being so blind with my trust.
A knock sounded on the door, and I cringed, because Jackson was standing at the door, a fierce and distrustful look on his face as he looked at his brother, who was still leaning towards me with a hand on my shoulder.
“Jackson,” I sighed, his name like a prayer from my lips.
And then I burst into a fresh wave of tears. Jackson rushed over to me and pulled me into his embrace, and I buried my head in that spot between Jackson’s neck and shoulder that I loved so much.
He let me cry for a long minute, softly stroking my hair like I was something fragile and breakable. I finally pulled away and realized that I was sitting in between Caiden and Jackson, something that hadn’t happened for a really long time.
Another sob tore out of my mouth because I realized that it had once been my favorite place, and now I wanted to be out of the situation as fast as possible.
“So you guys are together?” Caiden asked at the same time that Jackson asked, “What did you do, fucker?”
“Let me remind you that I was the one who texted you,” Caiden snarled, his upper lip curling with hate.
“He saved me,” I said softly before things could escalate any more. “Landry…” The words got stuck in my throat. I still hadn’t been able to wrap my mind around it. That Landry would do that, my mind just couldn’t comprehend.
“The hockey player drugged her and then tried to rape her. I saw the end of it and drove after them. Luckily, he’d pulled onto a side road to make it happen and I was able to catch up to them.”
“Landry?” Jackson snarled, his eyes widening.
And I realized that this was the kind of event that could set him into another episode.
I couldn’t handle another episode right now. I couldn’t take care of Jackson again right now, not when I needed someone to care for me.
Jackson must have seen the stricken, worried look on my face, and he took a few deep breaths, trying to calm himself down and stay with me.
“You can go now,” Jackson said to Caiden in a much calmer voice, not bothering to look at him as he said it.
I could feel the fury rolling off Caiden in waves. And a little bit of guilt snuck in that he was being so casually dismissed when he’d just done this huge, life changing thing for me.
“Jackson, can you step outside for one moment?” I whispered, resigned to the fact that I was going to have to say thank you to Caiden at least one more time. I could examine closer what this meant a little later when I wasn’t so emotionally…and physically shattered.
Jackson opened his mouth to argue.
“Please,” I asked.
He shot Caiden a look of warning and stood up. “I’ll be just outside,” he threatened, before strolling out of the room. I could see his shadow coming in from the doorway, and it made me feel immeasurably safer.
When did that happen? I wondered. When did Jackson begin to make me feel safe again?
I turned my attention back to Caiden. His face was perfectly blank, and a wave of unease rolled across my skin at how easily Caiden was able to block his emotions. He was the master at it actually.
“I just wanted to thank you again. It means a lot,” I told him. More than I’m comfortable admitting.
He stared at me inscrutably, and then his face broke and I was almost washed away with the depth of his emotions. Maybe it was better that he was able to hide what he was feeling so well, because I didn’t think that I could handle seeing evidence of a love that had already destroyed me once before in my face constantly.
“I would do anything for you,” he said softly…and there was so much affection in his voice that it was literally heartbreaking.
“I don’t need you to do anything else. This was enough, Caiden.” I didn’t know whether I was reminding him that I’d forgiven him for that night two years ago, or if I was telling him that I didn’t want to see him again. Both were equally likely with how I was feeling at the moment.
He nodded, like he’d understood whatever message I was trying to convey to him better than I’d understood it myself.
“I’ll go ahead and get out of here. I desperately need some sleep,” he said with a soft laugh, standing up and brushing his still too-long hair out of his eyes.
He gave me a sad smile and then walked towards the door. He stopped suddenly and turned around, a determined look on his face. “I don’t want you to feel bad about what happened with Landry, Everly. Or think that you acted a certain way that made him do that to you.”
I stared at him numbly. It was like he could read my mind.
“It
’s not anything you do, Everly. There’s just something about you that drives a man to madness. Landry would have never had his fill of you…just like I haven’t. You’re irreplaceable. A man would have to die to ever escape your lure.”
“I would turn it off if I knew how to,” I told him desperately, needing him to know that I didn’t mean to cause him this pain.
He gave me that same mournful, resigned smile once again. “I accepted my fate long ago, Everly.”
And then he left the room.
I was staring blankly at the wall, shaking when Jackson rushed back into the room. “Are you okay? What did he say? Fuck, I shouldn’t have left.”
“I don’t really know what he just said. I’m confused…about everything,” I admitted, eagerly absorbing his beautiful face, even if it was marred by dark circles like he hadn’t slept for days.
“Baby,” he sighed, closing his eyes. “I think I’ve lived five lives since I got Caiden’s text. Can you come back to my place when they release you this afternoon? I need you by me.”
“They’re releasing me this afternoon?” I said happily.
“Yeah, I just heard it from the nurse.”
I rolled my eyes. “You know it’s kind of amazing how easy it is as a Parker to get access to privileged medical information.”
He smiled cockily, the sight making my soul sing.
The atmosphere changed, his eyes transitioning from ferocious to bewildered. “You’re tearing me apart, baby,” he mumbled.
Before I could reply, he leaned in so close our breath mixed. Closing his eyes, his lips found mine, slowly at first, a gentle exploration.
“I’m not broken,” I murmured into him, and then my hands were in his hair. Pulling him from tentative to certain, he became insistent and pushed against me. Soft and firm all at once, he took his time to taste me in long licks, groaning as he did. My head didn’t hurt so much as the empty ache between my thighs. This man, with his wicked tongue and beautiful mouth, one arm propped against the top of my bed so he could arch over me while freeing his other hand to skim the outside of my breast. A featherlight touch that I felt everywhere—a pang in my heart and a tempting pulse down my entire body.