But what scared me was how honest he was. He wanted Eva to pay and he didn’t even try to hide it. He said what he thought, and he didn’t try to be reasonable. It made everything feel very easy, as if I could get away with anything as long as he was on board.
By the time I looked up, the sky had turned dark and evening was settling. The tables around us had turned over at least twice and our waitress had gone home.
“We should probably wrap this up,” I said.
He stretched his arms over his head and yawned. “Yeah, we’ve been at it for a while.”
I grabbed my bag and checked the time.
“Don’t look now,” he said. “But I think we’ve been spotted.”
“Really? By who?” I resisted the urge to duck and cover my head.
“Your ex. I wonder how long he’s been here?”
I was instantly annoyed. It felt like no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t escape him.
“The last time he saw us together he was pretty upset. Let’s just get out of here. I don’t want a repeat of last time,” I said.
“Really?” A devious grin spread across his face. “Because I’m thinking…maybe we should linger a little longer.”
Damon casually draped an arm across my shoulders and pulled me a little closer to him.
“You are so bad,” I chuckled, snuggling closer. Because yes, right then, I wanted to be bad too. After all, I was still a little salty over the fist sized hickey Angelique left on Adam’s neck. It wasn’t that I was going to fuck Damon. It’s just that I wanted Adam to think that maybe I already had. I wanted Adam to hurt the way I had hurt. Just for a little bit.
“Horrible. The absolute worst. We should be punished.”
“Right, no ice cream for a week.”
We shared a laugh and before I knew what was happening I was staring back into those bottomless eyes of his. I could definitely understand how Eva could have fallen so deeply for Damon. Shit. He was positively magnetic. Shit. Even I was beginning to wonder if there wasn’t something more behind his eyes. Triple SHIT. Something warmer than the friendship and comradery that we shared.
“Hey!”
We both jumped and looked up to see a very flustered Adam standing over us both.
“Adam. Hello.” I tried unsuccessfully to pull myself out of Damon’s casual embrace, but his easy going appearance hid a quiet strength and the last thing I wanted was to get involved in a power struggle in front of Adam. So I sat still and gave him an awkward smile.
“Damon.” Adam nodded curtly.
“Adam.” Damon returned the greeting, but it was more of a grunt.
“I didn’t expect to see you two here. I figured I should come over and say hello.” Adam shoved his hands in his back pockets.
“That’s very nice of you.”
“Damon, can I talk to you? Outside?” Adam gestured over his shoulder with his thumb.
I pressed my lips together and bobbed my head from side to side. “I don’t think so.” I was acting a heck of a lot cooler and calmer than I felt.
Truth be told, the look in Adam’s eyes spelled murder, even though his posture fought for calm and composed. He backed away and held his hands up. “Just a word,” he said. “Harmless. I promise.”
I stood up. “You need to leave, Adam.” Anybody who’d missed the tension building over at our table was now watching.
Damon stood up and rested his large, warm hands on my shoulders.
“It’s cool Harper, I got this,” he said, calling me by my nickname. I looked at him and he winked at me. Maybe this was what he’d been waiting for all along. Still waters run deep, after all. I shrugged, turned back to Adam and smiled.
“Whatever you say, Mac,” I said, using the codename he’d chosen. I took my seat without taking my eyes off of Adam. He looked more agitated than I’d ever seen him.
“Who the fuck is Harper?”
Adam looked confused. Damon and I looked at each other and giggled, adding to Adam’s irritation and perhaps cementing in his mind that we were a real couple. And then Damon slid past me and into the aisle, following Adam out of the front door and into the parking lot. I could only imagine what they were going to talk about.
“Hey Adam, how’s your sister? Still an evil spawn from hell?”
“Yeah, but I still love her. She lies and manipulates people, but that’s just the price you pay for having such a great sister.”
“I hear yah, bro. By the way, still banging the love of my life?”
“Every chance I get, twice on Sundays. And you and Anna, huh? She’s a real wild cat in the sack, am I right?”
I shook my head. How in the hell did that devolve into a sketch from the 1970s?
I tapped my foot as I waited for the two of them to finish talking “man to man”. Almost everybody had turned their attention back to their ice cream, but a few sympathetic looks and accusatory glares still lingered.
After a whole twenty minutes, the two boys walked back in. I know. I checked my watch way too many times. Every minute, to be precise.
“You’re back. I hope you guys enjoyed your dick swinging contest. Let’s go,” I grabbed my bag and stood up to leave. Damon stepped in front of Adam and grabbed my hand.
“Adam has something he wants to say, and I think you should hear him out.”
I looked at my wrist, where Damon’s grasp was firm. Then, I looked back and forth between the two men, unsure of what the hell to think.
“Please, Anna,” Adam said.
“Hear him out.” Damon nodded gently.
“Okay, I’ll hear you out?” Looking at Adam was almost painful. He had dark circles under his eyes. He wasn’t sleeping well. I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for him. I was still angry at him, yes. But I couldn’t turn my feelings off that easily.
“Can we talk privately?”
I crossed my arms and cocked my head to the side. The last time that happened, he made it so that my heart hurt so damn much I was close to ripping it out of my chest.
“Why? Anything you want to say to me you can say right here.”
“Cut him some slack, Anna,” Damon said. “He’s an idiot, but I think you should hear this.”
“Fine,” I grunted, folding my arms over my chest.
I shoved past both of them and walked out into the parking lot. Adam followed close behind. Perhaps out of reflex, I marched over to his car and stood, leaning on the passenger side door.
“I just wanted to say that I was sorry about what happened the last time you and I were together. I was out of line. I don’t have the right to say anything about who you date or who you hang out with or...What I’m trying to say, is that I was wrong, okay?”
“Go on.”
“And, I want to know if maybe we can be friends.”
I snorted and rolled my eyes.
“Friends?”
“Yeah, listen, I know we aren’t going to get back together. It’s mostly my fault. I fucked it up.”
“Mostly?”
“I shouldn’t have slept with you that night. Especially not after I was with somebody else. And...I should have believed you.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather. I didn’t realize how much I needed to hear those words until he’d actually said them. It didn’t erase the pain or the humiliation of what happened, but I felt like an iron ring that had been squeezing my chest had finally been removed.
I took what felt like the first deep breath since the night of the accident. My vision swam and I turned away quickly.
“Thank you,” I said.
“Thank Damon,” he countered. “I wasn’t sure you would want to hear anything I had to say.”
“I didn’t.” I tipped my head back and blinked into the night sky. I wasn’t going to cry. Seriously, I wasn’t.
“Yeah, he said I should try anyway. He’s a lot smarter than I thought he was,” he chuckled.
“Yeah, he is.”
“Look, I understand.”
> “What do you understand?”
“I understand why you two got close. After everything from last year and me and Angelique….and he’s not all bad, I guess. I understand why you would run to him. And as long as he treats you better than he treated Eva, I won’t say anything about it. But I’m hoping that you and I can be friends.”
He was obviously still operating under the assumption that I was dating Damon. Since Damon hadn’t bothered to clear up that misconception I just ignored it. Damon had his reasons, and partners in crime had to be able to trust each other.
“What about Eva?”
He frowned and blew out a tired breath.
“Things with Eva are...different. She’s just ...not the way she was,” he stammered. I found myself itching to hug him and smooth away the lines on his face.
He was worried. Something told me that maybe he was finally seeing Eva’s real face. If I was angered by her deception, he must have been devastated. He was her twin, after all. How could he not have known who she really was?
My mom used to say that sometimes we can’t bear to see people for who they really are because we are afraid of what that would say about us. Of course, she was talking about my dad at the time. But I finally began to understand. Adam and Eva were twins. If she was a manipulative bitch then what did that say about him for loving her and being so close to her? Not that he had a choice. Despite the manipulations, I loved my dad. Despite the lies, I loved my dad. And sometimes, you just can’t help loving people despite their flaws. I wanted to tell Adam that I understood, too, but I didn’t.
Instead I mumbled something about getting home before my mom freaked out and promised I’d send him a text message as soon as I got home. I left the parking lot and walked back into the ice cream parlor where Damon was still waiting. He opened his arms without hesitation, and I stepped into his embrace and buried my face in his chest.
“You’re okay,” he whispered and patted my head.
“Thank you for making me do that,” I blubbered.
“You’d do the same thing for me.” He said it like he truly believed that. Only I wasn’t so sure. Not that I didn’t want him to get some closure about his relationship with Angelique. I wasn’t sure that I would know how to make that happen for him. But if anybody deserved to have that ugly chapter permanently closed, it was Damon.
“Are all vets like you?”
“How’s that?”
“Emotionally intelligent.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“It’s not a criticism, McFury.”
Chapter 27
NOW
Today was the final day. I’d been waiting for some news from Eva. I was hoping that she would keep her end of the bargain. Nobody wants to be a snitch. If she didn’t do what needed to be done, I would have to keep to my end of the bargain and tell mom that she wasn’t taking her pills.
I kept thinking about Anna. Seeing her run to Damon like that, watching him hug her and soothe her pain made me realize how much I had. Because here I was, hurting, with no one to run to. And fuck, I knew I blew my shot. That night at the shack it was me who had fucked up. I’d had her in my arms when I shouldn’t have. Broke her heart even more than I already had. I lost the right to even hold her when she was hurting.
If there was anything good about today it was the fact that I got to see her. She was smiling. She was happy and making jokes. I couldn’t hear what she was saying but she looked excited about it. She looked like the girl she would have been if she hadn’t met me. I was only sorry that I couldn’t take any credit for the peace and happiness on her face.
My phone rang and I pulled it out it of my pocket. It was Angelique. She called every night to talk about nothing in particular. To see how I was doing. She was hurting too. And just like me, she had no one. Tonight, I let her call ring all the way through to voicemail. It wasn’t that I hated talking to her. It’s just that tonight I wasn’t in the mood to talk. I had to keep my emotions in check. I’d already lost the right to Anna’s love, and now I was going to be the bastard who betrayed my sister’s love as well.
The last thing I needed was a distraction.
The phone buzzed in my hand again and this time it was Anna, or Harper as Damon liked to call her. I didn’t know the meaning behind it and that killed me just a little more. They had a ‘thing’. Secrets and nicknames, a language only they understood. All the makings of a cavity sweet romance.
Home safe. G’nite friend
I smiled like an idiot. Even if I couldn’t have her the way I wanted to, this was at least something. The fact that she’d texted like she promised she would – it meant more to me than she would ever know.
“You’re late,” Eva’s voice made my head shoot up. She was standing at the end of the hallway. Though she had her crutches under her arm, she looked a lot more stable than she had been earlier.
“I stopped for some ice cream.”
“In the winter?”
“I had a taste for it,” I said, stepping up to her. I smoothed her hair and kissed her forehead.
She cocked her head to the side and watched me walk into the kitchen.
“Where’s mom?”
“She went out with Miss Joonie. Committee meeting or something like that. I don’t know. I wasn’t really paying attention.”
“Have you had a chance to talk to her?”
Eva looked up at me with wide, innocent eyes. “About what?”
“Don’t play dumb with me Eva. About seeing a counselor.”
She locked eyes with me and lifted her chin in defiance. “No.”
“We made a deal, Eva. You see a shrink and I keep my mouth shut. Please, please don’t make me do it.”
Eva pulled herself up onto a barstool and leaned her crutches on the counter. “Do whatever you want, Adam. I’m not going to see a shrink. There’s nothing wrong with me.”
“Eva, nothing about what you’ve done is normal. Normal people don’t run the risk of crippling themselves out of jealousy.”
“This was YOUR FAULT!” She pointed a delicate finger at me and her face twisted into a mask of rage. “If you weren’t trying to replace me, I would never have had to go so far.”
“Replace you?” I cupped her face in my hands. “Eva, I fell in love. I loved her and she loved me back. And I turned my back on it because of you. I walked away from love because of you.”
“But you didn’t do it for me. You did it because you felt bad. You did it because of this,” she knocked her crutches down onto the ground. “If I wasn’t hurt worse than Anna, you would’ve run right back to her and left me alone.”
The night of the accident smashed through my brain like a migraine. Eva wasn’t wrong. Anna was hurt too, but all my attention went to Eva because Eva was more hurt. I didn’t ask Anna how she was healing. I visited her a total of one point five times while she was at the hospital. Didn’t bring her flowers or send her a card. Not that any of that was wrong. My sister was the one who got the short end of the stick. My sister. My sister who was supposed to understand that me loving someone didn’t mean she lost me. My sister who wasn’t supposed to hold onto me with envy and vengeance because that’s just not what sisters do.
“Eva, if you won’t get help, I have to tell mom. I don’t want to do it. I think it would be better if you went to her yourself, but if you won’t help yourself, I have to do something. I can’t sit back and watch you self destruct like this.”
Eva smirked. “Tell her,” she said. “It’s a waste of time, but go ahead and try.”
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“I should be the one to say that,” she said.
I couldn’t stand to watch her anymore, so I headed upstairs to my bedroom. I pulled up an old movie where Johnny Depp channeled his inner Buster Keaton and proved that offbeat people fall in love too.
I’d watched it so many times that it had easily become my favorite white noise. I kept looking at the message Anna sent. Four words. I fe
lt like all of my hopes for the future were held up by those four words. But even then, it didn’t feel like enough, because at the end of all of that there was one word that put everything into a very dark perspective.
Friend.
That was never what Anna was supposed to be to me.
And I had my sister, my twin sister, to thank for that.
Chapter 28
NOW
Two hours later I heard mom come home. She was in a good mood and I took it as a sign. I’d have hated to throw more worries on top of a troubling day.
I waited until she made her way upstairs to confront her.
“Mom, can I talk to you for a minute?” I said, unable to meet her eye to eye.
She looked at me with slightly unfocused eyes. “Of course. What is it, Adam?”
Her silly smile and red cheeks told me she had been drinking. Maybe that was for the best as well. Maybe she wouldn’t take the news so hard. Hell, I felt like maybe I should have downed a bottle of whiskey before I walked into this.
Mom followed me into my room, only a little bit skeptical. Once inside, she looked around like she hadn’t been in here for years.
“Look at you, all grown up,” she said and pinched my cheeks. “My handsome man.”
“Mom,” I said, keeping my voice even. “What I’m about to tell you is serious.”
Her smile dropped and she sat on the edge of the bed, her body swaying a little to and a little fro. “Okay.”
Sucking in a deep breath, I tried to get my nerves in order. The truth was, there wasn’t an easy way to work into this subject and so I knew that I needed to just put it out on the table. Say what I needed to say in as few words as possible. “Eva hasn’t been taking her medicine lately.” The words came out strangled, pained, and when I looked at my mother I knew that they went right over her head. Maybe because of the alcohol. Maybe because it was the last thing she was expecting to hear. Maybe because she didn’t want to believe them.
Filthy Pride: Dark Bully Romance Page 18