I want to make her feel safe, but not just in the way a cop would. It’s more than that. I want to be a friend to her, too.
We walk to the door in an awkward silence that’s filled with questions that I want to ask but I bet she won’t answer. The events of the evening seem to have sapped all her energy. Before she can pull out her keys, I touch her shoulder. I can’t let her go inside without at least trying.
“What was going on between you and that guy, Allyson?”
She seems torn, as though she wants to confide in me but doesn’t quite feel comfortable enough to do so. I get it. It’s not like we’re friends or family. We’ve had two very strange interactions and at the last one I teased her mercilessly and pushed her boundaries, maybe a little too hard.
I hope that she sees that my concern is genuine. I want her to confide in me so I can help her. I want to see the light in her eyes again, and if I’m honest, the thought of that guy being anything more than a friend to her makes me want to punch his lights out.
“We were having an argument,” she says. “He’s my ex and he wants me back. That old cliché!” She laughs in a way that sounds forced and maybe even a little frantic. What he was doing to her wasn’t funny at all and I need her to understand that if nothing else.
“The way he was holding you, that wasn’t okay, Allyson.” I gently take her hand and look pointedly at the red welts still present around her wrist. Before I get a chance to comment any further, she pulls her hand away and uses the other to cover over the sore patch.
“I know. He has a temper. And he doesn’t like it if he doesn’t get his way.”
She’s looking at me uncomfortably as though she knows I’m not entirely sure she’s telling me the whole truth. I can’t help it that the cogs of my cop-brain start turning. She turns away slightly and digs into the pocket of her jeans pulling out a key. She reaches out to unlock the dorm lobby door.
“I should go in,” she says, pushing the door. My hand slips from her shoulder and immediately my palm misses her warmth.
“Will you be okay?” I ask.
“Sure,” she says. “I’m just gonna go straight to bed.”
“You know I’ve got your back if you need me, Allyson.” I’ve kept my voice soft because I want her to know she can tell me anything and I’ll treat her gently. She turns to look at me and her eyes gaze into mine with so much worry in them that it takes every last drop of strength in me not to pull her to my chest and wipe away the tears I can see forming in her eyes. I lift a hand to brushes a lock of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. We stare at each other, frozen as we were the night at the restaurant, time passing at a rate that seems both faster and slower than normal. I want to kiss her again but it isn’t the right time. Instead, I pull out my notebook and write down my cellphone number.
“You can call me anytime, Allyson. Anything happens, or you just wanna talk.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“Anytime, Allyson. I mean it. About anything.”
“I will. If I need to. I promise.”
She turns and walks through the door, closing it behind her. I wait until the lock clicks into place then jog down the steps to get back in the squad car. It’s instinctive that I look back to check that she’s in safely. Our eyes meet as I gaze back at the dorm. She’s still standing where I left her and I know she must have been watching me get back in my vehicle. I like that.
She waves quickly and I nod in response. It’s as though neither of us wants to be the first to leave but in the end, Simons clears his throat and I’m forced to turn the ignition and drive so I don’t look like a complete love-struck idiot.
I imagine her walking up to her little room, in a building that smells of students. She held my number carefully and I wonder what she’ll do with it when she’s finally closed her door. Will she add it to her contacts or just toss it on her desk?
I hope that she feels safer for having it, but most of all I hope she’ll use it if she needs to. An uneasy feeling remains with me as we attend the next call that comes through on the radio. A feeling that my father would tell me to recognize as instinct.
9
ALLYSON
The lobby smells of laundry detergent and ramen noodles and I shuffle to my dorm room, closing the door behind me. I hold the piece of paper with Cory’s number against my heart. It’s like a key to a safer place. I sit on my bed and slip off my heels, then tap Cory’s number into my cell phone. Just as I’ve finished saving his details, it starts to ring in my hand. It’s a private number and I answer, thinking it’s Rachel calling from home. I’m not really ready to answer the questions she might ask but if I don’t pick up, she’ll only keep calling.
I swipe to answer the phone and whisper a greeting, expecting Rachel’s voice to reply. Instead, I’m shocked by an angry male voice.
Drew.
“If you think you can hide behind your punk cop fake brother you’re dumber than I thought.”
He sounds absolutely furious, as though his anger at the party has been stoked by Cory’s words. It was what I dreaded, and why I’ve been trying to appease him.
“I’m not hiding,” I insist, trying to keep my voice even. If he hears it break he’ll know how scared I am and it’ll give him more power.
“He can’t help you, you know. You had your chance to keep everything between us. I wanted you back but you blew it big time.”
Panic steals my breath. I suck in air, trying to calm my racing heart. I have to say something. I have to try and make him see that what he’s doing is wrong.
“Drew, you can’t do this anymore.” Anxiety cracks my voice. “Just delete the pictures and I’ll forget any of this ever happened. We’ll just put it down to end-of-relationship bad-blood, okay. It happens.”
Drew’s breathing sounds furious on the other end of the phone. Maybe that sounded wrong. Does he think I’m mocking him? Or trying to make him sound pathetic? Blood pounds in my head.
“Shut up,” he says. “You stupid bitch. You think you get any kind of say in what happens next. YOU GET NO SAY, DO YOU UNDERSTAND? You think you can just walk away from me because you want to. I say when it’s over, Allyson. And I haven’t said it’s over.” It sounds as though his teeth are gritted. Everything is falling apart. I should have known things wouldn’t end well when I first told him it wasn’t working out between us. I never imagined he would be so vindictive.
“Drew, you can’t force me to be with you. That isn’t how it works.”
“It works, however I say it works,” he growls. “You think you’re just going to walk away and hook up with someone else and I’m going to say nothing about it. You’re mine. Everything from your stupid laugh to your fat ass is mine.”
I want to tell him to go fuck himself. I want to slam the phone down on his horrible, cruel words. His jealousy has always been difficult to deal with but this is taking things to a whole other level.
I don’t know what to say next. Nothing’s working. If reasonable words have failed, then lashing out in anger is only going to stoke his fury.
“Drew, please delete the pictures. I won’t tell anyone anything. I promise.”
His harsh laugh sends a shudder through me. “Everyone thinks you’re a whore anyway. The way you dress and carry yourself. I’ve already shown the pictures to most of my friends. They’ve seen exactly what kind of a slut you are.”
My heart sinks, hot blood creeping up my cheeks as I think about people looking at what he did to me. “You said you hadn’t shown anyone.”
His laugh sends fear skittering down my spine. “If you want, they all said they’ll fuck you too. They’ll give it to you exactly the way you like it.”
I can’t hold the tears in anymore. They spill over my hot cheeks, dripping onto the knees of my jeans. I know that no amount of begging will change his mind. There will be no reasoning with him now. He’s gone too far. Threats have now become a reality. From the moment I broke up with him, his revenge was decided. A
ll the bullshit about us getting back together, that was never his intention. He just wanted to control me and find a way to humiliate me some more. He strung me along making me think I could convince him to delete the pictures. That he wouldn’t show anyone. But he never had any intention of deleting them. He’d probably already shown them to his friends before the party.
I end the call and sit staring at my phone, letting the full horror of my situation sink in. All his friends know. That’s his whole fraternity, most likely. And the football team. And his lame ass drinking buddies from the dive in town. Even if just one other person saw them, the rumors will circulate. Tremors shake my body as I finally let myself cry. If he’s let people see them, he’s probably sent them out too, and as soon as those photos hit the internet, my dreams of becoming a teacher will be ruined.
I have no choice. As much as I wanted to keep him out of this, Cory is the only person who might be able to help me now. I swipe the tears from my face, get my breathing under control and pick up my cell. With a trembling hand, I dial Cory’s number and hold my breath until he answers.
“Officer Carlisle.” He barks his name as though he’s pissed or in the middle of dealing with something unpleasant. Fuck. How the hell am I going to tell this man who’s a virtual stranger, all the shit I have going on in my life? I pause and the line at the other end is quiet.
“Hello,” he says impatiently. There’s rustling as though he’s looking at the phone screen to see if he recognizes the number.
I finally find my mouth but all I can think of to say is his name.
“Cory.”
“Allyson?” He’s not sure it’s me for a second. Maybe he wasn’t expecting me to call him so soon. Maybe my voice sounds different on the phone. “Are you okay?”
I shake my head, even though he can’t see it, and drag in another breath. I feel so damn tired; drained to the marrow of my bones. All I need is a shoulder to cry on or some arms to hold me. I need someone with a magic wand to conjure away my problems and leave me swirling with fairy dust. But Cory isn’t magic. There’s no one in my life who can help me. I shouldn’t have called so I can push all my worry onto him.
“I just wanted to call to say thanks, for the lift and being so kind.”
“Yeah?” he answers. He doesn’t believe me but that’s fine.
“Yeah, and to make sure you gave me your real number.”
“You think I would have given you a fake?”
“Nah, not really.”
He chuckles and I try to picture where he is in our city. Maybe sitting in his car, waiting for his next call? I don’t know what to say next but I don’t want to hang up. Hearing him this way has already calmed me.
I used to have one of those simple joke books when I was a kid and I still remember some silly ones. “What do you get if you cross a cop and a sleeping bag?”
“You called me to tell me jokes, Allyson?”
“You don’t like humor?”
He snorts and I can almost imagine what he looks like; eyes twinkling, a half-smirk. So damn sexy. “Tell me, pretty girl,” he says and my heart feels warm as though he cupped it in his hands and kissed it tenderly.
“A pig in a blanket.”
I wait for his response but the phone goes silent, then he roars with laughter.
“I’m gonna have to tell Simons that one,” he chuckles.
I wait for him to say something else but he doesn’t. I have so many thoughts jostling around in my head, so many questions.
“Why’d you kiss me, at the restaurant?” I ask him.
“Because you’re so damn sexy I couldn’t keep my hands off you.” His voice is low and dripping with sex. I press the phone closer to my ear, wanting to hear every breath and rustle he makes.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” My heart skips, as I remember the way his tongue slid against mine like the promise of something even more intimate. “Why’d you kiss me back,” he asks.
“I wanted to know if what I’d imagined was better than reality.”
“You imagined us kissing?”
“Something like that,” I chuckle. If he knew the half of it, he’d probably have an embolism.
“And was it better than your fantasy?” Cory’s voice is so hopeful that I find myself putting aside all the feelings of annoyance at his cockiness and sinking down onto my bed to talk to him more comfortably.
“Yeah, it was better.”
He makes a soft, happy sound. “That’s good. I wouldn’t want to fall short of my imaginary self.”
“You’ve got a lot to live up to,” I whisper, brushing my cheeks with the back of my hand and wiping away the last evidence of my tears. They have no place here. Here is somewhere happy and safe. I’ve closed my worries back in the box and Cory is holding it closed for me.
“I do, do I?”
“Yeah.”
“You wanna tell me?” I can hear how much he wants me to tell him, so much so that I think he’d beg if I said no.
“You tell me something first. Why’d you let me off the ticket?”
Cory sighs gently as if he’s reluctant to say. “Quid pro quo,” I say encouragingly, remembering the line from that freaky film Silence of the Lambs.
“You think it’s because I wanted to fuck you?” he asks and I feel the last two words like a surge of heat between my legs.
“Did you?” I want to hear him say yes so badly.
“A blind man would want to fuck you, Allyson. Have you not seen yourself?”
I sigh, thinking about all the critical things Drew told me about my appearance over the past few months; fat ass, how my thighs squish together in the middle, how one of my boobs is slightly bigger than the other. Even though I know he was saying them to hurt me and to try and steal my self-confidence, it doesn’t mean that I haven’t felt the truth of them. When I don’t answer I hear him sigh.
“You’re beautiful, Allyson, but that’s not why I let you off the ticket.”
“Why then?”
“Because I could sense you had something going on in your life that was making you scared and I didn’t want to make whatever was going on worse.”
I wasn’t expecting that answer at all and it hits me like an arrow in the heart. Fresh tears spill from my eyes, marking my temples and dripping into my hair.
“Are you okay?” he asks me again, but this time, I feel ready, to be honest. This time, I know his concern for me is genuine.
“I’m really not,” I say around a throat that’s closed and burning.
“What’s wrong? What’s happened?”
Even though I don’t want to see the look on his face when I tell him about Drew, I can’t tell him over the phone either.
“I think I need your help.”
10
ALLYSON
I pace my dorm room feeling antsy and exhausted, second guessing my call to Cory. When the police arrived at the party last night his shift had just started so now I’m waiting for him to get off work. As the hours have passed I’ve started to regret my call. It was a knee-jerk reaction to the panic I felt after I hung up on Drew.
Why had I said I needed his help?
I’m so torn, knowing that he’s a professional and will help me if I tell him what’s going on. But he’s too close to the situation now. In a few months, we’ll be family. Could he keep what I tell him from my mom? What if Drew’s just full of empty threats? If I tell Cory, there’ll be no going back.
And I really genuinely like him. For all his cockiness and teasing, I get the impression that he’s actually a good guy with a kind heart.
I stop my pacing and walk to the window, pulling the curtain aside to scan the street for him. About to check the clock on the microwave, I stop myself. I must have checked it ten times in the last five minutes. I’m starting to feel frantic, pumped up with adrenaline and no sleep. I smother a yawn and pad to the kitchen area of the room. I don’t usually make coffee here, preferring to grab a latte from the coffee shop. But I
can’t face Cory like this, feeling all sleepy and shaky. I need caffeine to perk me up.
I pop a filter into the machine, measure out enough grinds for four cups, add water and hit the start button. The machine gurgles to life, filling the room with the rich scent of coffee. My eyes flutter closed briefly but if I leave them shut for too long I’m in danger of falling asleep standing up. I walk to the cupboard that houses my mugs; four of them just in case I have company. I pull out two and put them on the counter. No doubt Cory will be shattered after a long night shift.
When the coffee machine finishes I pour a mug, splash in some milk and two teaspoons of sugar. More than usual but I need the energy. I take a tentative sip, savoring the heat and bitterness. With my coffee cup in hand, I walk back over to the window to scan the front of the building again.
Cory should be off work by now. How long does it take to get from the station to the university? How much paperwork did he have? Would he have to finish that before leaving? Before I can come up with other excuses for him not being here yet his car pulls up in front of the hall. Butterflies launch in my stomach, fluttering around like mad, but it’s too late for second thoughts. He gets out and I’m surprised to see he’s still in his uniform.
Panic slices through me as he walks up the stairs to the lobby door. The buzzer in my room rings and I hit the button to disengage the front door lock.
Oh god, I’m not ready to tell him exactly what happened with Drew. Now he’s here and he’ll be mad if I tell him I called him for no reason. A lump of dread languishes in my stomach and the coffee makes my otherwise empty stomach churn. I have to tell him something, and I do need help. Maybe there’s a way to salvage this.
HUGE X3: A MFMM Menage Stepbrother Romance Page 19