by Jo Raven
My jaw is hanging slack. I can’t formulate any response that isn’t made up of swearwords. I mean, what the fuck? It’s like I’m back to four years ago, her accusations ringing in my ears and I just can’t understand what I’ve done to deserve them.
I snap out of my blank state when she grabs her purse and heads toward the door. “Hey, wait. What the hell happened?”
“I don’t know.” She gives a little angry shrug and opens the door. “Why don’t you ask your girlfriend?”
My eyes narrow as she slams the door behind her cute ass. I grab my cell, and sure enough Marlene’s name is flashing on the screen.
Oh, what the fuck! She sent a pic of herself naked, practically shoving her tits into the camera. And they look terrible. They look inflated and fake as hell. Not like Erin’s. Soft, fitting perfectly in my hands.
Shit. Erin saw this. Dammit.
I want Erin back. Back at my side, day and night. In my bed, in my arms, at my table, on my couch—not just to mess around but to talk and laugh.
And as I fall back onto the mattress, I realize I’ve never wanted anything else so badly in my life.
Chapter Fourteen
Erin
My day is a blur. I stomp from class to class, angry with Tyler and whoever this Marlene is. His girlfriend. Who else? Don’t be an idiot, Erin. He was gone for four years. He’s gorgeous. Of course he has someone.
And you let yourself be seduced by him all over again—by his beauty, his pain, his inescapable sexuality. Jumped in with both feet, and now you have to drag yourself back out.
Mierda. This is a huge mistake. I wanted answers, and I got them. His story breaks my heart, but how do I know he’s staying this time? What if the traumas he carries inside won’t leave him in peace? I saw glimpses of the boy he used to be, but what if it was an illusion? Something that won’t last.
I can’t take provisional anymore, not with Jax in the picture. Not with my heart so broken already.
Yet, he has my name tattooed on his arm. Permanent ink. Doesn’t that mean anything?
My head hurts from this mess. Maybe he does care for me. Or maybe he had that ink done long ago. But he has a girl waiting for him, probably back in Chicago, so what does it matter?
Stop waiting for him. It’s been four freaking years.
My cell rings as I switch classrooms, and when I glance at it, I see Tyler’s number. Clenching my teeth, I shove the phone back into my bag and go to my next class.
I’m not as mad at him as I am at myself. For falling so easily. For feeling so deeply where he’s concerned. For not coming clean with him about Jax while accusing him of hiding things.
But I’m not hiding a boyfriend.
What if you’re wrong? a tiny voice whispers in the back of my mind. What if she’s not his girlfriend?
And who is she, his cousin? Yeah, right. The photo of her huge fake tits is branded in my retinas. Ugh.
God, I hate this feeling. This faint sound of dreams crashing down.
Someone steps into my path as I exit my literature class, during which I only took one note and that was ‘happy endings don’t exist.’ How sad is that?
“Erin. Been looking for you,” Dakota says and waves. Her nails are painted black. “Did you talk to Zane?”
Stunned, I blink and try to remember what I was supposed to talk to Zane about. Oh, right. “I did.”
“And? What did he say?” Her hair is a wild dark mess with pink highlights.
“He said no.”
The corners of her mouth turn down. “That’s all?”
I frown. That’s a weird reaction. Not, ‘Did he say why?’ or ‘Oh, no, I’m going to jump off a cliff right now.’
Interesting.
“What did you expect?” I ask.
She shrugs and shifts the strap of her bag on her shoulder. “An explanation?”
My memory turns back to the day when I passed Zane her request. “He said I should ask you what sort of tattoo you want, and I’d know why he refuses to ink it on you.” I cock my head at her. “So, what did you have in mind?”
She huffs and glances around as if expecting someone to be watching her. Well, at least two guys are checking her out. She’s a pretty girl, her crazy hair framing a cute little face, and with her combat boots and cargo pants, she’s an interesting combination, I guess.
But maybe it doesn’t do it for Zane. Who knows.
“I asked him for a dragon tattoo.” She tugs on a silver hoop with a crescent moon hanging from her earlobe.
A dragon. Zane told me about the tats he inked on his friends. The brotherhood. “Why would you want that?”
“That’s what he keeps asking me.”
“And what’s your answer?”
She laughs softly. “That I won’t tell him unless he inks one on me first.”
Christ. I was sort of happy for this distraction from my dark thoughts, but now I’m irked. “Is this some sort of game? I don’t have time for it.”
“Not a game,” she mutters. Something shifts in her dark blue eyes, like a storm brewing. “This is important to me.”
“The tattoo, or Zane?”
She gives me a crooked smile. “Both. You see, Zane’s a survivor.”
I nod. I’m aware of that, but… “How do you know so much about him?”
She gives a one-shoulder shrug. “Been asking about him.”
The girl likes him. A surge of best-friend protectiveness washes over me. I’m not sure this crazy girl is what Zane needs in his life.
Then again, what do I know? I can’t even take care of my own love life.
“Why are you so insistent about getting a dragon tat?”
“Because.” She bites her lip. “It’s survivor’s ink, and I deserve it.”
With that, she turns around and walks away. I look at her go. Well, hell. Am I supposed to report this back to Zane? She didn’t ask me to.
I sigh and turn toward my car. I have a lesson to teach and dinner to make, to study and keep Tyler out of my mind.
If only it were that simple.
***
Come the night, I toss and turn in my bed. Hours pass without sleep, until I give up and turn the light back on.
It’s two in the morning. Tomorrow I’ll be like the walking dead. I pick up the novel I’m reading and try to focus on that, but the story is thin, and I quickly lose interest.
Letting the book drop back to the floor, I roll on my back and stare at the ceiling. I’ve filled it with glow-in-the-dark stars, like my bedroom back at my parents’ home where Jax now sleeps. I like looking at them. I feel warm and safe when I do, almost feeling Tyler’s arms around me, almost hearing his voice in my ear. His laughter.
This isn’t helping at all. No matter how I try to forget him, he’s all around me. Always was. And even when I try to erase his image from my mind, my body remembers how he touched me and filled me last night, and need rolls through me. The tips of my breasts tighten, and a throb starts between my legs, pulsing in time to my heart.
As I close my eyes, I touch my lips and remember how he kissed me, how he held me as if he wanted to meld with me forever. All I want to do is hop into my car and head over to his place, bang on his door and demand to be let back inside his apartment and his heart.
But I’m strong. I won’t do it. What little pride I have left will have to be enough to patch my wounds and move on.
A message lights up the screen of my phone on the bedside table. I pick it up. Tyler’s name blinks, and I want to hurl the phone against the wall.
I open it, instead, and sit up.
It reads, ‘You awake?’
I close my eyes. I shouldn’t reply.
Not two seconds pass before my phone beeps again. ‘Marlene isn’t my girlfriend.’
Oh God. How can I believe him? I sigh and caress the screen of my phone.
The cell beeps a third time. ‘Can we talk?’
I chew on my lip, fully awake and trembling with nervous energy. I
’m not ready. I fear I’ll take any excuse he throws at me just to be back in his arms.
The screen lights up again. ‘Erin?’
I get up and pace the length of my room. ‘Why would I want to talk?’ I type, my fingers shaking.
The seconds trickle by without a response. I close my eyes and grit my teeth. Then I glance at the window, and head back to my bed. I curl up on my side, the cell on the pillow next to my head.
It lights up suddenly, and I grab it. The text from Tyler reads, ‘Because I know what I really want.’
‘And what’s that?’ I have to retype every word twice to get it right, my hands shake so badly.
‘The brightest star.’
Chapter Fifteen
Tyler
Astride my bike, I wait for her reply as the seconds trickle by, turning into long minutes. I wait until dawn brightens the horizon.
She never answers. Never comments.
I look straight at her dark window. I see no movement inside.
There’s a strange pain in my chest, like a splinter being slowly shoved into my heart. Maybe it was foolish of me to tell her what I feel. What I want. She asked me, though, and this is my reply. Whatever the cost or the consequences.
I linger a bit longer, but I know I should go. The cops might arrest a creepy guy sitting on his bike on the street. I rev up my Ducati and consider my options.
Find my bed. Ride my bike out of town. Find a bar and drink myself stupid.
Option number two wins out. I ram the helmet on my head and ride aimlessly along the quiet road by the lakes. As day breaks, I see frost glimmer on the grass and fences. The cold is working its way into my bones, into my muscles, numbing the strange pain.
Looks like I found my answer and my goal too late. Maybe her question was meant only for me—to help me find my way, without any connection to her.
Four years. Four damn long years. Who would have waited for you?
Why did I think this was a good idea? Returning to my home town, trying to pick up where I left off. Thinking it was possible.
Enough. This isn’t cowardice. This is realizing when something isn’t working out, knowing when to step back and let Ash and Erin live their lives unburdened by me.
As the sky lightens, I know what I must do today.
Face my last demons. Clear my past. Make space for the future before I go.
***
I sit on my bike outside Dad’s—Jake Devlin’s—house. I don’t have a key, but I know my window has a trick with the latch. If the window hasn’t been replaced. Or the latch fixed.
Hell, I don’t want to get into that house. That basement. Maybe I don’t wanna face my demons after all.
But I know I have to. That basement has been haunting me for years. I can’t go on living like this. I don’t know if visiting it will change something, but know I have to give it a try.
I step off my bike and push the kickstand into place with my boot. It’s early afternoon. I passed by Damage, and Rafe told me the shop would be closed today to repair a leak that sprang overnight.
So here I am. Clouds move over the sky, casting the world in gray. I pull off my gloves and put them in my pockets, then wipe my hands down my jeans.
Damn. It’s like going back in time. I’m a gangly teenager, hoping Dad won’t be disappointed in me today, won’t throw me suspicious looks and tell me for the millionth time that I can’t be his son, because I’m nothing like him.
Focus, Tyler. This is now. The past is behind.
Clenching and unclenching my hands at my sides, I stride to the window of my old bedroom. I run my fingers over the frame and reach up for the latch.
“You forgot to invite me,” a low male voice says from behind me, making me jump. “But I won’t hold it against you.”
I turn slowly. “Ash?”
His hair’s spiked up with gel, his pale eyes narrowed on me. He lifts a brow, challenging. “So what’s it gonna be? Are we going in or not?”
He’s going in with me? This doesn’t compute. “How did you know I was here?”
He shrugs. “Rafe told me.” He steps closer, shoving his hands into the pockets of his pants. “Need to pick up a few things?” Those pale eyes are on me. Asher always knew me too well. When we were little, he most often guessed my thoughts before I said anything.
“I need to… check out a couple of things,” I say, and there’s no hiding from that wolfish gaze.
He nods. “Okay. Let’s go check them out, then.”
The weight lifting off my chest is like the fucking Appalachian Mountains. Call me a coward, but going into that basement alone isn’t at the top of my favorite activities of all time.
I’d trust Ash to have my back anywhere, even in a nightmare. I can hardly believe he’s here.
I open the window and count on Ash to keep watch as I slip into the house. My boots thump on the old carpet, and I straighten, taking it all in.
The narrow bed with the yellow comforter. The shelves with science-fiction books and model motorbikes set against the far wall. Posters of old rock bands. Nothing has changed. It’s exactly as I remember it.
Then the memories slam into me. Of Mom sitting on my bed when I was little, reading me stories. Of Dad checking on me as I played. Ash, a tiny thing, following me around, grabbing my toys.
“Hey, Ty, you okay?” Ash has appeared right next to me, his brow furrowed.
“Yeah, I’m good.” My heart is like an animal trapped inside my chest, slamming against my ribs. “Let’s go.”
We step out into the corridor. Dust overlays everything. Big boxes stand in the living room.
Asher unlocks the door to the basement. “Dad always kept this door locked. I can’t remember ever being down there.”
I stop in my tracks. Cold sweat drenches my back.
“Is this a good idea?” Ash asks, his mouth flat. “You don’t look so hot.”
I don’t know. This could be the worst idea I’ve ever had, but at least I’m not alone. “Let’s go already.”
Ash says nothing but opens the door and steps through. I follow, the hairs on my arms rising like antennae. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
What a goddamn stupid idea.
I tap my fingertips on my thighs—three times—take three steps, then stop. Just inside the door, on top of the stairs.
Goddamn rabbit hole.
“You coming, man?” Ash is staring up at me from the bottom of the stairs. He’s turned on the light, a bare bulb swinging behind him, and I force myself to keep going.
One step. Two. Three. One. Two. Thr—
Stop counting.
I reach the bottom, and Ash moves out of the way. Stench of musty furniture and urine, plus something sour that brings bile up my throat.
Swallowing hard, I willingly step into my nightmare.
Asher moves about, but I barely notice. Memories rise from the walls, from the floor. I can see Dad’s face, I can see the knife in his hands. His slurred words, taunting me, breaking me, echo in my ears.
‘Bastard. Worthless. Retard. Freak. Mongrel. You pretend you’re mine, but you’ve nothing to do with me. You think I’ll let the world mock me? Let them know?’
The tape tore at my mouth as I tried to yell at him and his buddy to stop. My wrists hurt where the cable-ties held them bound to rings in the wall. My legs were taped from ankle to mid-thigh. My ribs burned with every breath. My chest…
“Ty. Hey.” Ash’s face is right in front of me. His hands are on my shoulders, shaking me. “Snap out of it.”
In memory time, he was barely fourteen, much shorter than me and less muscled. It’s a shock to see him stand as tall as me, staring me eye to eye.
“I’m okay.” I take a step back, and he lets go. I rub at the phantom pain in my wrists, stretch my fingers.
“You don’t look okay.”
I sidestep him, needing a second to gather my wits.
“What are we here to see?” Ash asks. “Let’s look at it and go, yeah?”
>
Sounds like a plan.
The old scars on my chest and abdomen itch, my lungs labor, and I press a hand under my ribs. You can face this. There’s nothing here anymore that can hurt you.
Believe it.
In the corner of the room, there are stacks of beer craters and other junk, partly covered by an old green military blanket. My steps lead me that way without input from my brain. My thoughts have stilled like the waves on a windless day.
I know what is underneath. And yet it doesn’t feel real as I yank the blanket away and step closer to the hooks in the wall, the cut cable ties still hanging from them, still encrusted with my blood. The concrete underneath is brown with blood. Another blade, rusty and stained, has been left on the floor.
Blood everywhere. Dripping, sluicing, running, splashing—filling my mouth where I bite through my lip, squishing underneath me when I shift, filling the air with a sweet-sour stench that makes me gag.
“Dammit, Ty,” Asher mutters, grabbing my arm and dragging me away. “We’ve seen enough. Let’s get outta here.”
In a daze I let him pull me to the stairs and force my numb feet to climb. Then Ash is there, hauling me upward, toward the fresh air and the light. It feels like it takes an eternity before we are out and standing in the living room. I’m panting.
Ash looks murderous. He paces the length of the dusty room, stops by the sheet-covered sofa and shoves his hands through his hair. “Fucking hell, Ty. I swear I thought Dad was a bit unhinged, but this… This is totally sick, man. Did he…?”
He braces himself on the back of the couch and bows his head. He looks like he’s gonna throw up. “Did he do that often? Did he beat you? What else did he do to you?”
Still dazed, I back away until I hit a wall. “Roughed me up a bit from time to time. Not much.”
Not until he beat up my real father, got kicked out of the ring, started drinking more and began using me to vent his frustration. Not until that night from hell when he dragged me down to the basement.
“Why didn’t you say something about the beatings?” Ash stares at me sideways.
“He wanted to hurt me. Had nothing to do with you. I wasn’t gonna drag you into that and get you hurt.”