“Should’ve known you’d bring me heartache.”
I’d worried about this song for the entirely wrong reason. I should have known that Dylan didn’t stand a chance in my mind when Emmett was around. His darkness consumed me.
I wanted the song to be about Dylan… for Dylan. I wanted to give into my pain for just one night and he stole that from me—and not in a good way. He stole it from me while he groped someone else. He knew my body wanted him; he knew that he was making the ache between my thighs worse. He knew I was fighting to stop myself from rubbing my legs together to make sure my desire wasn’t dripping down my thighs. And he enjoyed rubbing it in my denial-driven face.
I hated the way he looked at me.
I hated the way he knew exactly what I felt.
And I hated the way he crudely threw it back in my face.
If I hadn’t been singing, everyone would have been able to hear the moans I saw leaving from CC’s mouth.
“Should’ve known you’d bring me heartache, almost lovers always do.”
I flipped the mic off, letting it drop from my hand as I ripped my gaze away—like a Band-Aid off of a wound. It stung and I was left open and raw. But continuing to watch would have suffocated me.
This was all my fault. Shame on me. I knew he was trouble the second he walked into my life.
“That was beautiful, Ally!” Tammy exclaimed as I joined them, her bright smile enough to jump start a similar one from me.
“Seriously, you smoked it girl!” Jessa cheered me with her glass, chugging the rest of the clear liquid. That girl could hold her liquor.
“Wow. I don’t even know what to say. Incredible…” Tim trailed off. There was an eighty-five percent chance he was still talking about my body and not my voice, but hey, I was no longer opposed to finding out.
Surprisingly, a few people came up to me as they walked by the table to tell me how much they enjoyed my performance. I flushed slightly and thanked them.
“We’re going to head out.” Tammy said as she and Jessa stood and we all hugged goodbye like I wouldn’t be texting them the first thing in the morning.
“Ally, you want to get going soon?” My sister looked like she’d been ready to go as soon as I finished singing.
I swayed slightly, the alcohol really starting to soak in and the sudden fall in adrenaline only exacerbating its effects. “I… ahh…”
I felt an arm wrap around my shoulders and my head turned to look up right into Tim’s face. “If you want to stay, I can take you home.” My head was spinning; he offered more than just a ride back home, I knew that much.
“That would be great!” I exclaimed, too hurt—not drunk—to think about how not smart it was.
My sister’s less-than-enthused borderline concerned face stuck out in my periphery. I couldn’t care right now though. Right now, I wanted to forget that I ever knew how to care about anyone. Still, I expected her dissent, but the voice that said the words wasn’t hers.
“Absolutely fucking not.”
The cold voice would have frozen most. I was not most. My gaze—and everyone else’s—shifted to the King of the Assholes who’d snuck up on our group and acted like he ruled me. I was a fine frenzy until he showed up and his presumptuous cruelty now fragmented me into a fired fury.
Why couldn’t he just let me be?
Three months ago—Halloween
THERE WAS A BETTER FUCKING chance that I’d let a yeti take her home than the dickbag who had just offered. Fucking tool dressed as a preppy vampire. I was tempted to smash his face in for that alone. But the fact that he was touching her… My whole body vibrated with the urge to lay him flat and ram those fake fangs into the back of his throat.
“Who do you think you are?” she ranted, crossing her arms over her chest, making my dick twitch as those breasts of hers rose against the fabric.
Ally Ryder was going to be the death of me. And as soon as she walked into Louie’s tonight, I knew my slow and painful demise was beginning.
I thought costumes were stupid, but I enjoyed Halloween. I enjoyed the danger and darkness. I enjoyed how for one day out of the year every other fucking person was wearing a mask just as fake and sometimes, just as menacing, as mine.
“Emmett—“ Channing began, trying like always to diffuse the situation.
I didn’t let her finish. She had no idea what was going on here. She had no idea just what dangerous games her little sister was playing. “Lil, Frost will take you home,” I informed her decisively.
“Do whatever you want, sis. I’m leaving with Tim,” the little pirate said casually as though my demand never existed. Her hand rested on the plastic sword attached to a skirt that was far too short like she was about to stab me if I tried to stop her. Then, she turned and smiled at the dead man walking. Wrapping her arm around his waist and turning him towards the door, she sealed his fate.
Her eyes flicked to mine one last time, fire meeting ice.
I told myself that I came tonight to enjoy the show. Then, Lil told me that they would be here. And so, I texted Holly—figuring it had been a few months since our last fuck, I was safe to proposition her again. She brought her friend—Jill… Jane… I forget what the fuck her name was, but I knew that she’d sucked my cock pretty well the last time we’d all gotten together so here she was. They were cool; they had no expectations except for a good screw; I only took from people who wanted to be used—who enjoyed mindless sex and no strings attached.
I’d had a good two drinks before she arrived—and so did my company. It affected them more than it had me. They’d both chosen costumes that made it easy– a skirt, a sheet—both not even needing to be removed for what was going to be quick and dirty. I wanted to fuck them, yes; I did not, however, plan on letting them make a show of it in Big Louie’s.
Then she walked in with her bright smile, not even knowing how she drew the attention of everyone into her orbit.
From the knee-high boots to the fishnets to her corset. I was as hard as the fucking plank she’d probably like to throw me off of from the second that I saw her. It was like this every time I saw her, which is why I avoided it as much as possible. Especially because it didn’t matter who I fucked afterward, it never quenched my need for her.
It had been so much easier until Chance went and goddamn disappeared.
That motherfucker left and more irritating than the fact that we weren’t the SnowmassHoles without him was the painful reality that I was the one who felt fucking responsible for both his sisters. Hell, Channing was like a sister to me and she could handle herself for the most part, but Ally… She was a fucking daisy and a disaster all rolled into one. She was hurting and make no mistake, I wasn’t going to be the one to fix her; I was the asshole in her happily-ever-after. But just because I was the asshole didn’t mean I wasn’t willing to do anything to keep her safe.
She was hiding something and that something made her reckless. I would know.
That was the thing about living behind a mask—it was easy to recognize the falseness of a façade that hid something horribly fractured beneath.
And then she recklessly started talking to the dickbag smirking at me right now and I lost a little bit of my shit. I let Holly and Jill do what they wanted to my body because I knew she was watching. I wanted her focused on me and not on him. Even when I touched them, I only saw her—it was only for her.
Until she sang.
Her voice reached right in and pried from my grasp the last sharp, hard pieces of my heart. The way the words left her mouth… she sung a truth that she would never speak. The song was picked for someone else even though every word was meant for me—even though every word crushed those last few pieces of my soul.
So I gave her a show of my own—I touched Holly as I watched her. As she watched me. My lips tasted the chemically-sweet perfume that would be all over me by morning. My body took what it had available and wished for what it didn’t.
Lil walked around the table to me.
“What are you going to do? I don’t even know who that guy is or what is going on with her. Besides the fact that she’s drunk.”
“So are you,” I added.
Her eyes were glazed. Neither of them were as proficient at drinking as the rest of us. “Nick will take you home and I’ll bring her in your Jeep.”
“What about your car?”
“Frost can wait for me at your house and bring me back.” I didn’t even look to my friend to make sure he was cool with it; he had no choice.
She chewed on her lower lip and I knew her hesitation.
Huffing with annoyance, I ground out, “You can talk to her tomorrow and figure out what dumb shit she has going on in her brain. Let me handle her right now because I’m the only fucking one who won’t just let her go.”
And if that wasn’t the goddamn truth, I didn’t know what was.
“Alice Daisy Ryder!” I roared, not caring if the remaining patrons were staring. “Take one more fucking step and you will regret it.”
And then, I waited. Oh, and what happened next was so worth it.
“Look, man, obviously the girl—“
No, ‘man,’ obviously my fist landed in your face.
Ally gasped as the Tim-the-tool toppled right over, hands cupping his nose as the red stain of victory seeped through his fingers.
“What the fuck…” he groaned and I smiled because it made me so fucking happy. That was just for touching her. He deserved so much more for what he’d thought about doing to her.
“What is the matter with you!” she shrieked.
God, she was so beautiful when she was fuming.
“Hey!” A loud voice boomed, an unwelcome entrant into my arena. “What is going on here, Ally?”
“I-I’m sorry, Louie. He… he…” She stuck her finger out at me and I just casually shrugged.
“Sorry, Lou, but I caught this douchebag buying drinks for an underage customer and then he tried to take advantage of her.”
The words rolled easily off my tongue. That was the thing about lying—it was done best when made up of only half-truths. Which was why I was so good at it; I was a fucking half-truth.
“Ally, is this true?” Louie stared down at her shocked face. No matter how much a dive this place could turn into, the one thing Big Lou wouldn’t tolerate was fights or kids trying to drink illegally.
I watched as she fought for an answer—fought against the truth. The dickbag bleeding on the floor had bought her a drink.
“I… H-he did,” she admitted with a visible gulp.
Big Louie’s mouth thinned as he glanced down at the still-moaning sack of shit. “I’ll handle him, but unfortunately, Ally, I can’t let you continue to work here if you were drinking. I’m sorry.” And with no more fuss, he picked up the kid off of the floor and hauled him to the back of the room, leaving me and my pirate prey.
Her body beautifully walked the line between falling apart there and then—and fighting. Her whole body tensed as tonight, she chose to fight. Her eyes narrowed on me, thinking that I’d taken something from her—whether it was that dickbag or her job; what she had yet to realize was that I was giving her what she needed; she just didn’t know it yet.
“You are an asshole, you know that? Why would you do that? You didn’t have to hit him!” There was no one left in the bar to hear her yell; no one that mattered at least.
“It wasn’t a question, Ally, when I said that you weren’t leaving with him. I. Am. Taking. You. Home. Do I need to translate that into Pirate for you?” I sneered.
She glared at me and if she could have, I knew she would have turned her fake sword into a real one.
“And I said, ‘I. Am. Not. Leaving. With. You.’ Do you need me to translate that into asshole for you?” She returned with the same mocking tone.
My blood boiled when she threw my own fucking words back in my face; I loved it. I used her body against her. She used my words against me.
There’s a fine line between love and hate, between love and war. That’s why all’s fair in both; because the line is so fine it’s practically impossible to distinguish.
She groaned and spun on her heel, whipping around like an angry hurricane with that delicious ass of hers sashaying in angry retreat; I couldn’t help but watch for a few seconds before I lazily followed in those footsteps of fortitude.
“Where are you going?” I chuckled, cracking a smile as I watched her stomp through the empty lot.
“Home!”
Jesus Christ. “You’re not walking home,” I ground out, following behind her.
“Yes. I am. Because there is no way I’m going home with you. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”
I easily caught up to her and blocked her path, my body tingling to prove her wrong.
“Is that what you think?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Move,” she replied with drunken aggravation.
With a smirk, I bent and tossed her over my shoulder.
“Emmett!” she screeched.
My arms locked around her legs that managed to get one good plant into my stomach before I subdued them. There was nothing I could do about her arms though as her fists pounded into my back. “Put me down! How dare you! I hate you!”
I set her down by the passenger side of Channing’s Jeep, her fists striking my back losing much of their force. As soon as her feet touched the ground, she backed up against the side of the car and pulled the sword from her belt, holding the tip out to my throat. Like she could actually harm me.
“Don’t.” The word was more air than sound as she tried to recover her breath.
I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. My beautiful, feisty, pirate princess looked at me as though she wanted to run me through.
Well, Sunshine, I want to run you through too—with my own sword.
But that wasn’t going to happen.
I grabbed the cheap plastic and pulled myself up against her—and into what was the most dangerous moment of my life. The bright, beautiful woman, soft and strong in all the right places, pressed against me was the deadliest weapon I’d ever known.
And then it dropped, just like her shoulders, as though she were Atlas instead of Ally and the world had just slipped from her support.
“Why are you doing this to me?” Not ‘why wouldn’t you let me leave with dickbag?’ Not ‘why did you punch him in the face?’ No, I heard what she asked. I heard the words that weren’t spoken. ‘Why was I tormenting her with what could never be?’
Because I couldn’t stop myself from wanting her. Because I liked to punish myself with what I could never have.
Still, I answered the question that she didn’t ask. “Hell could freeze over and I still wouldn’t have let you leave with him.”
“He was fine.”
“No. He wanted to fuck you and he didn’t care what you had to say about it,” I bit out angrily.
How did I know? Because Holly and that big mouth of hers—that was good at so many things—enjoyed telling me how she overheard him brag to his buddies that he was going to get some pirate’s booty tonight.
She looked up at me, seeing the truth in my words and letting me spare her the sordid details. Her head dropped—whether it was a nod or because it was just too heavy to hold up anymore, I wasn’t sure.
Silence reigned between us. We were barely touching—my knee lightly against her thigh. Her chest grazing mine only when she breathed in. Barely touching—and I could barely fucking contain myself. She stared straight in front of her into my chest as though I were a black hole waiting to suck her in.
I was.
And it took everything I had not to cross that line. “Let’s get you home.”
Her head wavered and I saw a tear slip down her cheek. “It hurts.”
“What hurts, Sunshine?” I shouldn’t have asked and I definitely shouldn’t have reached up to wipe the lone drop of despair from her soft cheek. And when she turned her face into my hand, it fit perfectly in my palm.
“Life,” she answered, her lips brushing against my hand. My fucked-up mind immediately imagined how they would feel on other parts of my body. “I just wanted to not feel for one night.”
“Feel what?” I rasped. Her pain was breaking my heart—breaking me.
“Alone.” Christ. Those stormy-blue eyes finally rose to mine, glazed over with tears and brimming with hope. Fuck. “Can you do that?”
I was so fucked.
I hated him. I needed him.
Something had snapped inside of me. Maybe when he strolled over and ordered me around like he owned me. Maybe when he punched Todd or Tony or whatever Creepy Cullen’s name was. Maybe when he hoisted me over his shoulder like I and my misguided desires weighed nothing. But I think it was the second I realized that the song I’d picked because of Dylan, had really been for him.
The irony was that it was only Emmett who let me completely escape the world—the problem was that I then couldn’t escape him.
“Can you just let me forget…” Everything but you. “…for just one night?”
I saw the war inside of him. Good versus evil. Light versus dark. Hero vs. villain. He didn’t understand that tonight I wanted to lose myself in the darkness. And it wasn’t because of the rum.
There are many types of inebriation, of which alcohol is one. However, what I’ve found to be a far more potent drug is need. The kind of need that is so desperate to be fulfilled that the oxygen in my lungs was up for barter.
“Ally…” he rasped hoarsely, like I’d asked him to pull the sun from the sky.
I stared at those lips that said my name. I remembered them all over the woman from earlier—but I wasn’t angry. At least not enough to bother with. I knew it was all part of what was between us; I knew that it was only so that I would see. And I did—and now, I wanted to feel those lips like I felt the hoarseness of his voice—on my lips, on my chest, my aching nipples, and between my thighs.
“Please, Emmett,” I whispered, the alcohol serving one purpose well—to make me bold, “don’t you want me?”
The Winter Games Page 49