He slammed the crystal down and turned to look at me. “How dare you?”
“How dare I?” I raised an eyebrow and advanced. “How dare you?”
“Perhaps we should talk about this another time, maybe after you’ve had time to, uh, decompress after your accident.”
I snorted. “You think that accident has anything to do with me wanting you out of my life? Maybe it does.” I nodded. “It’s my final straw. It’s the last time you will ever have any power over my mind.”
“You’ll want my sponsorship, my support,” he intoned.
I laughed. Then I laughed some more. “Are you fucking kidding? I wouldn’t touch anything with your name on it with a ten-foot pole.”
“You’ve grown some balls since I saw you last,” he observed. It was almost as if he thought it was cute.
I stalked across the room, channeling all the anger I’d ever felt at his hands, all the humiliation, the pain. I remembered how it felt that night in the hangar after I was beaten and raped, how hopeless, and I recalled the blood I’d spilled from my own body just trying to end it all.
Whatever he saw in my eyes made his face pale. He stepped back, but I kept coming. Every step he took, I advanced. Eventually, he came up against the bar.
I smiled like the Cheshire Cat and moved in. I slammed my hands on either side of him; they slapped against the stone. He jerked like it was him I’d stuck.
I leaned in close, close enough for him to get a real good look at how very deeply I loathed him.
“I’m not scared of you,” I whispered darkly. “I might have been once, but not anymore. It’s you who should be afraid.”
“Leave now,” he commanded, but it ended up sounding weak.
His hands flattened on my shoulders and pushed. I didn’t budge, looking down to where he touched me and then back up, lifting an eyebrow.
He dropped his hands.
“Oh, I’m leaving, but not until you listen, and you better listen good. I am not fucking repeating myself.”
He swallowed.
“You listening?”
He nodded.
“I know damn well you had all mention of you wiped out of my interview. All mention of any kind of mistreatment I suffered at the hands of the man who was supposed to take care of me. Even though I didn’t mention you by name, even though I didn’t call your bitch-ass out like I should have, you still had it wiped.”
“People would have figured it out,” he snapped.
I grinned widely, but from the look in his eyes, I knew I succeeded at making it look anything but friendly.
“All you care about is people knowing what kind of sick, depraved man you really are. You thought you could waltz back into my life hand me some cash and your stamp of approval and you’d own me. Tell me, Dad,” I spewed quietly. “Are you surprised your throwaway son is the one with the pro contract? That I’m the one who would do your prestigious name the most good?”
“I made a mistake,” he said miserably, as if he really were sorry.
“Yes. You did. And now you can live with it.”
I shoved away, causing him to flinch, and strode toward the door. Just when I practically heard his sigh of relief that I was leaving, I turned and smiled again.
“Here’s what’s going to happen.” I held up my fingers to tick them off as I spoke. “You’re going to pack your shit, change out of those ridiculous pajamas, and leave. Now. You’ll go back to your pathetic existence and sit in your towering glass building and pretend you really do own the world. You won’t call. You won’t text. You won’t write. You won’t check up on me. Or bribe people to find out what I’m doing. You won’t claim me as your son.”
He rose to his full height and lifted his chin. The stubborn, cruel Sullivan was coming out to play. Good. “You don’t control me. I do what I want, when I want. You can’t stop me.”
“Oh, I can. And I will. If you don’t disappear out of my life, I’m gonna destroy you and everything you hold precious.”
He scoffed, and I took one step toward him.
He jerked back.
“Shut the fuck up and listen,” I snapped.
He nodded dumbly.
“I will call up the biggest news outlet and magazine in this country, and I will go live with an exclusive tell-all interview. You know what live means, Sullivan? It means you won’t be able to pay anyone to cut out the parts you don’t like. You won’t know when or how. You won’t see me coming. One day, you’ll walk into work, and all the people who usually scurry away or bow at your feet will look at you with disgust and horror. They’ll whisper behind your back. The secretary you love to screw on your desk and get your little dick sucked off by? She won’t touch you. No woman that you don’t pay will ever again.”
“You wouldn’t dare.” He seethed.
“Fucking try me. You pushed the wrong buttons, old man. You went for the one thing that’s off-limits to you. As of right this second, we don’t know each other. If you see me on the street, turn and walk the other way. Leave Hopper alone. You don’t talk to him, look at him, or acknowledge him. All the rules for me extend to him.”
“You’re doing all this for a man who takes it in the ass?” he snarled.
“No,” I said, not even offended he was so disgusting. “I’m doing it for love. And I’m doing it because I finally realize I am so much better than you ever tried to make me.”
He began to sputter. The color still hadn’t returned to his face.
I turned to walk away.
“You won’t get away with this. If you out me to the press, I will ruin your life.”
I smiled. “No. You won’t. You don’t have that power over me, and you never will again.”
He frowned.
“If you want everyone to know every sick detail of every sick thing you’ve done to me, go ahead. I’ll spill it. It won’t matter. The only one it will hurt is you, because the people in my life, they’ll love me regardless.”
“No one loves you, you little bastard!” he screamed after me as I pulled open the door.
I heard his slippers slapping against the floor as he raced after me. I turned to see him raising a fist. I caught it in my hand and squeezed. He looked between me and our hands, his eyes nearly popping out of his head.
I reared back, ready to bury my fist right in his face.
Then I didn’t. I dropped it. I let go of his hand and I stepped away. “You’re nothing to me. Not even worth the energy of a fucking punch.”
He stared at me in shock as I hit the button for the elevator. It opened immediately, and I stepped inside, folded my hands in front of me, and stood straight and tall.
Sullivan stared at me as the doors slowly slid shut.
I saw the defeat in his eyes. The shock. Maybe even a hint of regret.
When the doors secured, I was left staring at myself in the glass once more.
I smiled.
When I got home, the apartment was still empty. Arrow was still not home.
Worry curled through my stomach, and I pulled out my phone and shot off a text.
Where are you?
The second it sent, the front door opened and Arrow’s blond head appeared. He was wearing my hoodie. He looked better in it than I did. Seconds later, his phone when off in his hand.
“That was me,” I said. My face split into a smile because he was here and he was sexy.
“You need something?” he asked, immediately concerned.
“Just you.”
He smiled and crossed the room, kissing me deeply, and when we pulled back, he rubbed at my lower lip.
“What’ve you been up to?” he asked, looking around, seeing my shoes next to his and turning back ninja fast.
“Hope you don’t mind… I moved in.”
“Seriously?”
I nodded. “My underwear and pants are in the bedroom. You know, so I don’t have to answer the door naked.”
He leapt at me. Like for reals leapt off the ground into my ar
ms. I laughed and caught him. His legs wrapped around my waist, and he made a whoop sound.
“You’re skinny, babe. But you aren’t that skinny.” I joked.
“I’m hungry.” He complained.
I pulled his head down and kissed him. As we kissed, his cock grew against my stomach and aroused my own desire. But I banked it for now and walked with him still in my arms to the sofa, where I sat down with him in my lap.
“How was it?” I asked, nervous, but not quite as much now that he was in my arms and smiling.
“He’s not going to be a problem ever again,” he replied confidently. Confidence was a good look on him.
“Want to talk about it?” I asked, completely ready to listen.
Arrow shook his head. “No.”
I nodded. Confronting his father was something he did for him, not for anyone else. And I didn’t need to know what happened, because the most important thing was Arrow felt free of him.
“I’m proud of you,” I told him, rubbing my hands up his back.
Sometimes he looked at me with awe in his eyes. I didn’t think I’d ever get used to it, and I doubted he would ever stop. “I love you.”
I was a lucky man.
I reached up to cover his heart with my palm, wanting to feel the strength of his heartbeat.
He winced.
Immediately, I pulled back. “What’s wrong?” I demanded. “Motherfucker, if that peckerhead touched you…” I started to get up.
Arrow laughed, then pushed me back down. “He didn’t touch me.” He promised. “Calm down.”
I sagged back against the seat, and he settled again in my lap. I slapped a hand to my forehead and dragged it down my face.
“Hey,” he said, alarmed. “What’s this?”
Gingerly, he lifted my arm up, looking at the white bandage wrapped around my wrist. “Where’s your bracelet?” he demanded.
“In the bedroom.” I gestured to the room with my head. He surrendered my arm, and I peeled up the tape around the bandage. “I did more than just move in while you were gone.”
He lifted an eyebrow.
Slowly, I unwrapped the bandage and turned my wrist for him to see.
His breath caught. His fingers hovered over area, his eyes entranced.
“You got a new tattoo?” he whispered.
“Like it?” I asked.
He looked up, then back down. A smile so happy it actually hurt my heart bloomed on his face. “Are you fucking kidding me?” He glanced up. “You did this for me?”
I cupped his face. “For us.”
He gazed down at the design again.
“I hope it’s okay I put it under the coordinates.”
“It’s perfect,” he murmured, his voice watery and low. Still staring down, he traced the design in the air above it, knowing it was still to tender to touch.
It was an infinity sign with an arrow right through the center. It represented him and me and how he shot right into my life and handed me forever.
He pulled his hand back but still stared down. Seconds later, a drop of moisture fell on the design. I tipped his head up; he tried to stop me, but I prevailed.
A single tear tracked down his cheek.
I brushed it away with my thumb.
He sniffled and pulled back, reaching for the hem of his shirts. “I didn’t just go see my father,” he admitted and peeled the clothes over his head.
There was a bandage very similar to mine over his heart.
I sucked in a breath. “Are you freaking kidding?”
He shook his head slowly. I fingered the edge of the bandage and glanced up for permission. He nodded, his eyes still slightly wet.
I peeled away the bandage, and it fell, fluttering between our bodies.
“Arrow,” I half groaned.
“Guess we had the same idea,” he mused.
He had the exact same tattoo over his heart, just a little bigger because it was on his chest.
I touched the edges, just out of reach of the tenderness.
“You’re my infinity, Hopp,” he vowed. “I don’t care where life takes me as long as you come, too.”
I wrapped my arms around his back and dove into the couch, sliding him beneath me. My mouth landed on his instantly, and we kissed like it was the first time. His lips were warm and soft, his tongue promised pleasure to come, and when he started smiling in the middle of our kiss, my heart expanded to a size I never thought possible.
“I love you,” I growled against his smile. “I fucking love you forever.”
And I did.
Our love was infinite.
Author’s Note
If you made it here, you deserve a cookie. Warm from the oven.
I was supposed to release this book in July. It is now December, and I’m just writing THE END. I knew this book would be challenging. I mean, all of them are. But I really had no idea how much it would take to write.
#Blur was incredibly hard to just sit down and “pound out.” I would write some. Then I would need a day or two to almost digest it. To think about it. I spent a lot of time just thinking about this book, trying to understand these two characters. Trying to get it right.
I don’t know if I will ever fully understand them, because I’ve never experienced what they have. Perhaps that’s why this was so hard. I try to write with truth, with emotion, and with a certain type of empathy. Not only was the subject matter in this book very challenging and dark, but I felt an overwhelming desire to “get it right.” Arrow claimed my heart a long time ago, back when he first appeared in #Junkie. I didn’t know a lot about him then, but I understood he was broken.
I wanted to tell his story. I wanted to give him a happily ever after, but good Lord, getting there was a task! It wasn’t easy to get him there. And Hopper… he surprised you, didn’t he? Me, too. He’s real and raw. And that hair of his… Does anyone else just want to push your hands through it?
No? Just me?
I’m delirious. This book has drained me.
(I still want to touch his hair.)
I wish I could sit here and write an epic author’s note, pour out exactly what I went through with this book. How it was a fight at times, how it was awkward at times, and how sometimes I would have butterflies in my stomach when I wrote. Alas, I am exhausted. Even so, I don’t think I can fully explain what it was like to write this book. I’m hoping the words speak for themselves. I hope you feel everything I tried to say. I also hope you find this story to be everything you wanted it to be and a book fitting of the GearShark series.
I have to say the GearShark series is something I am very proud of. It really challenged me as a writer. It pushed me way out of my comfort zone. I’m tired, I’m a little brain fried, but the end result is something I wouldn’t change for anything.
I want to thank you for reading this far, for hanging in there as I told Hopper and Arrow’s story. I think it might be a little different than all of us were expecting (longer, too!), but I truly hope it’s one you enjoyed.
See you next book!
XOXO,
Cambria
Cambria Hebert is an award-winning, bestselling novelist of more than thirty books. She went to college for a bachelor’s degree, couldn’t pick a major, and ended up with a degree in cosmetology. So rest assured her characters will always have good hair.
Besides writing, Cambria loves a caramel latte, staying up late, sleeping in, and watching movies. She considers math human torture and has an irrational fear of birds (including chickens). You can often find her painting her toenails (because she bites her fingernails) or walking her Chihuahuas (the real rulers of the house).
Cambria has written within the young adult and new adult genres, penning many paranormal and contemporary titles. She has also written romantic suspense, science fiction, and, most recently, male/male romance. Her favorite genre to read and write is contemporary romance. A few of her most recognized titles are: The Hashtag Series, GearShark Series, Text, Torch,
and Tattoo.
Recent awards include: Author of the Year, Best Contemporary Series (The Hashtag Series), Best Contemporary Book of the Year, Best Book Trailer of the Year, Best Contemporary Lead, and Best Contemporary Book Cover of the Year. In addition, her most recognized title, #Nerd, was listed at Buzzfeed.com as a top fifty summer romance read.
Cambria Hebert owns and operates Cambria Hebert Books, LLC.
You can find out more about Cambria and her titles by visiting and following her here:
Website: http://www.cambriahebert.com
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#Blur (The GearShark Series Book 4) Page 36