by R. J. Lewis
“Text me when you’re back,” he whispered, kissing me one more time.
My eyes were half open. I couldn’t help but glance at the rear view. Thames was looking back down at his keys, flipping them over lazily. It was kind of like he was respecting our moment, which contradicted his nature. When the moment ended, Reid stepped out and shut the door. Thames tossed the keys into the cupholder and put the car into drive. Then he drove, leaving Reid standing by his car alone in the dark.
This was all kinds of wrong.
“I should be there,” I whispered, looking back.
“You should,” Thames agreed, glancing at me in the mirror. “But you wanted that drive, didn’t you?”
I swallowed and looked at the back of his head. Guilt slammed into me full force. “I want to go home,” I told him, weakly. “I don’t want to go on a drive.”
He nodded once in response. “Sure thing, dove.”
I would have this one small ride with him and that would be it. I would stay far away. By tomorrow, whatever feelings that came over me tonight would be gone. I chalked it up to a moment of insanity. I’d just met the man, had zero attachment to him, and the first opportunity to be alone with him I’d taken it. I had to seriously consider whether a year in Blackwater had impacted my principles, or whether I truly was a snake. I kind of knew the answer, though. Every time I glanced in his direction, I felt my heart thud a little harder.
This was all me.
And I couldn’t stop the growing curiosity, the daring need to have just that extra bit of time with him.
He pulled over a street away and I heard the doors unlocking. For a second, I wondered if he was going to tell me to get out and go back to Reid. But instead, he said, “Sit in the front.”
My heart jumped. “Why?”
“I want to see you.”
I breathed out slowly. “Thames –”
“Please.” He looked so sincere, the word please coming out so tenderly.
My body warmed. I didn’t think. Because you couldn’t think around Conor. You just…did. I stepped out of the car and hurried to the passenger side. Rain coated me quickly, freezing me in just a few seconds. I slid into the seat and shut it, running my hands down my wet arms. Thames leaned forward to my side and turned the heating vents in my direction. I looked at his face, his straight nose, full bottom lip, raised cheekbones visible from under his beard. My heart slowed. He turned to look at me, smiling knowingly. Yeah, he was used to this. He knew what his presence did to people. I was just another victim. Another notch on his bedpost if I wasn’t careful.
“Buckle up, beautiful,” he whispered, winking once at me before we were back on the road.
I buckled up slowly, taking my time so I wouldn’t have to look at him.
“Where’s your house?” he then asked, back to playing with the keys in one hand.
“Near the hospital.”
“Oh, dove.” His brows went up. “You’re slumming it, aren’t you?”
“How do you mean?”
“Not really suburban paradise.”
I relaxed in my seat and smiled. “Like you should talk.”
He chuckled. “You having a go at my house?”
“It needs some TLC.”
He nodded slowly. “Yeah,” he murmured. “It’s a work in progress. Probably trashed as we speak. It’ll be a fucking headache in the morning to clean up.”
“Why’d you throw a party then?”
“I didn’t.” When I kept waiting for more, he added, “It was my buddy Jem, and his idea of a welcome home.”
Welcome home from prison. My body was a fucking moron because it didn’t seem to care. I watched his hands on the steering wheel. Callouses. Scars. Fresh bruise on the knuckles of his right hand. Trouble.
“That was some welcome home,” I mumbled, sarcastically, thinking of how rowdy the crowd was.
He smiled. “There are three things that guarantee a good party, dove.”
“What’s that?”
“Beer, tits, and a good fight. Can you get any better than that?”
That was possibly the most unattractive answer. “For a Blackwater boy, I guess not.”
I thought of the girl that had been draped over him. Wildly beautiful and thin. I combed through my tangled hair already curling from the water. The frizz was starting. I was going to look like an alpaca in no time.
What was he doing driving me home? I glanced at him, questionably. Jesus, what a profile. He looked dangerously good. God, didn’t I think he was average looking an hour ago? He caught my eye and shot me that cocky smile.
“You should have had a housekeeper,” I then said, trying to keep the conversation easy. “Then you wouldn’t have had to depend on anyone to keep your place clean.”
“You’re referring to my go at Reid?”
“Yeah.”
“Just giving him a hard time, dove. I didn’t expect the shit to lift a finger at that place. Especially his boozing dad.”
“I think they’re doing what they can, by the sounds of it, inviting you to the shop.”
He gave me a funny look when he should have been staring at the road. Didn’t matter, we were hardly moving fast. “Careful believing everything you hear, Charlotte.”
“I don’t,” I replied, a little too defensively. “I’m just saying…”
He knew he’d hit a nerve because his face softened. “Nothing is ever as it seems, is what I meant, dove. Not trying to shit on your parade or make you feel silly. Not trying to be philosophical either, but you ever felt like an image was painted one way from afar, so clear and the strokes go one way, only to find the image is blurrier from up close and going in all directions? It’s kind of like that with my point.”
I thought of what he said. Of my mom and that horror house I was supposed to call home. Of the bedroom next to mine and the devil that lurked inside it. I blinked hard, relating to his words more than he could ever know.
“I get that,” I whispered, swallowing a hard lump in my throat.
Since when was a criminal meant to give me food for thought? They’re not supposed to talk like you, I thought, staring at him in awe. He looked back, and the look he gave me made me feel like he knew exactly what I was thinking.
“You been at the lookout yet?” he asked curiously.
“No,” I answered.
“It’s a quick detour. Worth a look.”
I didn’t argue. I went quiet, disturbed by the lack of fight in me. I was asking for whatever trouble was going to come of this. In the moment, I just didn’t care. In life, you find people and you get to know them on a deeper level. Sometimes you like what you find, sometimes you don’t and move on. Other times you meet someone and instantly get tethered to them without choice. Like them or not, they’re there, and they’re not going anywhere. They’re not going to let you go and move on. This was Thames. He tethered me to him, and I was imprisoned in his world without realizing what that meant.
Thames’ “detour” wasn’t quick at all. He drove practically out of town and up a steep set of hills. We got higher up the hillside to the lookout. All the while, we sat in the quiet, in darkness, nothing but our breaths filling the air. There was the occasional glance. I saw his eyes on mine. Saw them on my bare legs at times too. My skin felt like it was licked by fire every time he looked my way.
We reached the top to an open dirt patch of land. I saw the town of Blackwater, lit up, alive from Halloween. There wasn’t a soul lurking up here, which was surprising. This was a known make out spot. Reid had called it too cheesy of a place to be intimate in. He’d probably taken Rebecca here. I rolled my eyes at the thought. So trivial. All of it. Sitting next to Thames, it felt so far away now, like I was in a different reality. I wondered why it didn’t matter anymore.
I would later learn that a person can touch your life without having known you at all.
Thames parked and we sat silently, looking out the window, at the rain picking up. It was relaxing. I leaned my
head back, closing my eyes for a moment to soak it all in. When I opened them, Thames was looking right at me. Just the dashboard lights were on, but it cast enough glow to parts of his face for me to see. His lips were relaxed, his gaze intent. He looked seriously at me. That look reached my bones, stiffening them. Nerves lit up inside me like tiny little fireworks.
“What?” I forced out, quietly.
“You know what,” he replied solemnly.
I didn’t respond. Didn’t want to confront it. I blinked away and tried to be awed by the town. Let’s not kid ourselves, though, it looked like a piece of crap even from afar. Blackwater was a black hole of despair with even blacker souls than Conor Thames poisoning it.
“I shouldn’t be here,” I whispered again, because I was meant to say it in that moment. It was the appropriate response. “This is wrong.”
“Is it?” he questioned.
I looked at him, helpless. “I don’t know you.”
“Yes, you do.”
“I know of you. That’s different. And the things I know of you aren’t good.”
He flipped the keys around, still relaxed, still staring. “This is innocent, Charlotte. Nothing’s happened yet.”
“Yet?” I took a huge breath, resting a shaking hand against my forehead. “There can be no yet. I’m with Reid.”
“That won’t last long.”
“We’ve been together almost a year.”
“That’s cute,” he remarked, a small smile on his lips. “It’s really cute when you girls do that. Form little milestones with time, like it means a fucking thing. Twelve months. Twelve days. Twelve minutes. It’s the same, dove. A person shows you what they want you to see. Reid’s no different. Just a coward disguised as a wolf. You’ll see that soon enough. You and me, we’re different. We see each other for who we are without the pretence of time. That connection is instant.”
His words made me light. My heart practically stopped. I absorbed what he said, trying to understand it, but… “You think you see me?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I see you.”
What did he see exactly? All my broken, or all I hoped to be?
I caught his eyes glimpsing my legs again and I shook my head, disgusted with myself. They were just lines.
“No, you don’t see anything but a fuck.”
“I wouldn’t go through all this trouble if I wanted a fuck. Fucks are easy for me. They don’t require conversation, and I’m talking…a lot…with you.”
I kept shaking my head. “I’m not…I’m not like that girl that was on your lap.”
“I know,” he agreed, cheekily adding, “For one, you have a better costume than her.”
I went still and eyed him perplexedly. “You think I’m wearing a costume?”
He grinned. “Little schoolgirl outfit. It’s not usually my taste, but there’s something very naughty about it with you.”
I stifled a groan. This wasn’t happening. “I’m not wearing a costume, Conor.” Pause. God, the cringe. “This is my school uniform. I’m…in high school.”
Conor was good at hiding emotion, but this…this shock was inescapable. He went completely still. The keys smacked against his hand and stayed there. He looked me dead in the eye for what felt like forever. It was like he was waiting for me to laugh and tell him what a joke that was. But the punchline wasn’t coming; there wasn’t one.
“Your shock is a relief,” I forced out, trying to break the awkward tension. “For a moment I thought you liked them young.”
He visibly shuddered, shaking his head once before redirecting his gaze to the window. He wasn’t really staring out, though. He was lost inside his head.
Clearing his throat, he said, “Tell me you’re legal.”
I hesitated a moment. He was genuinely disturbed. “What if I’m not?”
He chuckled dryly, sounding almost pained. “I’m not afraid of waiting.”
“Waiting for what exactly?”
“I know a good thing when I see it. I want you. God, for some reason I want you so bad, it hurts.”
“What if you get into a lot of trouble?”
“I’m not very good with the law.”
My lips parted. I searched for a response, but I was conflicted. “How many times have you been in jail?”
He tapped on the steering wheel, thinking. “Too many times to count.” When I didn’t answer, he looked at me and smiled. “Does that bother you, pup?”
I shrugged, at war with myself. “You know, jail is meant to rehabilitate.”
He let out a hard laugh. “No, it’s punishment.”
“Do you have any remorse at all for the things you’ve done?”
“No.”
It wasn’t an answer I expected to hear. I hesitated, trying to understand. “You think you’ll go back then?”
“Probably. When I find something else worth fighting for.” His eyes looked deeper at me when he said that. “The punishment is worth it sometimes.”
“Like now?”
“Yes.”
“You would touch me right now?”
“If you let me.”
I shouldn’t have liked that response, but I couldn’t control the way my body reacted to it. I felt warmth deep in my bones.
“That’s sick,” I forced myself to say. It was the cookie cutter response. Dr. Phil would be proud. Good job, Charlotte.
“Is it?” he challenged. “Do you feel ill, dove? Or do you feel more alive than ever?”
My lips parted as I drew in breaths. My head was all kinds of fucked up, because I did feel alive. I felt more alive in this moment than the entire year I’d been in this hellhole of a place, playing the part of straight A schoolgirl and fun girlfriend, while my life was a train-wreck that could rival any guest on Jerry Springer.
“I know which one it is for me,” he whispered. “The second I saw you standing there, your sexy as hell eyes damning me, alive isn’t enough to describe it.”
Jesus. I shut my eyes for seconds at a time. “I’m with Reid,” I re-iterated.
“Good for you,” he replied, amused. “But that doesn’t mean anything. Because Reid’s not here, and you don’t belong to him. You had every opportunity to stay behind in that parking lot, but you didn’t. Because a part of you knew.”
“Knew what?” I pushed out, opening my eyes to look at him.
He looked wistful, peering at me. “You knew you’d wind up here. Now, end my suffering and tell me you’re legal.”
I let out a defeated sigh. I could lie and tell him I wasn’t. Maybe it would buy me time. He might take me straight home and that would be the end of it.
But I knew that wasn’t entirely true, either. Thames followed through with his words. He wasn’t just a talker. He did. He would have either found out my age by beating it out of someone – because he liked to hurt people, I’d learn later – or he would have waited.
“I’m eighteen,” I assured him quietly. I didn’t realize how tense he was until his body relaxed in the seat. “You don’t know how old your own cousin is.”
“I thought he was in college. Pops his fucking collar like he is.”
“You hate him.”
“He’s a fucking pest.”
I couldn’t help the smile on my face. “And you’re a jerk.”
“I’m not going to play nice with people I don’t like. If I have to impress someone to make them like me, do I really want to know them?”
“No.”
The window was too blurry to look out of. The rain pelted the car as if the storm was directly above us. It felt like the perfect setting. Locked in a car with a tempting man, exchanging breaths and inquisitive gazes. I would have liked if he were a bit wet. If there were rain streaks on his face and bottom lip. God, he really was gorgeous.
“You want to come to my place?” he asked, his voice dropping lower.
I swallowed hard. Temptation gnawed inside me. “We just came from there, Thames, and I’m not a fan of crowded places.”
“I meant my apartment.”
“You have an apartment too?”
“Yes.”
“Is it as rundown?”
“No, it isn’t. My sister’s been living there, taking care of things. It’ll be innocent.”
I shook my head and chuckled wryly. “I don’t think there’s innocent with you.”
“I’m good at pretending.”
He watched me as I deliberated, and god, why was I even? There was only one reason he was pushing this hard.
“You want to sleep with me?” I asked him, straight to the point.
His smile was lopsided as he regarded me. “Of course.”
“Well, I don’t.”
“You think you don’t, but you do. It’s going to happen. Maybe not tonight, but at some point. But, dove, I’d really love if it were tonight.”
I was annoyed. Because he was so goddamn confident about it, and that fucking confidence he possessed was so damn alluring. Looking at him sitting there, all cocky, that smile still flitting across his lips, I was damned. He was now beautiful to me in that short span of time I knew him. Graduated so easily and quickly without logic.
My phone buzzed in my skirt pocket. I pulled it out and glanced at the glowing screen. Reid had messaged me.
Are you home yet?
I looked at the screen for some time, and then I let out a long sigh and put it back in my pocket. The message cracked the moment. Out there, Reid was wondering about me and hoping I’d made it home.
And I was a douchebag for being here.
The first opportunity to step out of my relationship and I had done it. Just like that. How was I going to live with myself in the morning when I awoke to realize I’d ditched my boyfriend in a parking lot alone to spend time with his asshole cousin at the seedy lookout people lost their virginity in?
How would I explain it?
Look, Reid, there’s something about him. Pfft. Yeah, right.