by Shey Stahl
“Why do you care?” Josh stared him down, leading into something. I knew it by the look on his face.
“You know exactly why I care,” Brevin replied, low-toned and tense.
“So is this about your baby sister, or my girl?” Josh smiled, sinister and cold. “I fucked both, just wondering which one you’re defending here.”
His baby sister? What?
Brevin said nothing at first, and then reacted by taking a swing at Josh. He landed the punch, square on the side of Josh’s face. Naturally, Josh reacted and the two of them threw a few more punches, neither wanting to end it.
“Stop it!” I screamed, and then immediately regretted the action from the pain radiating through my face and neck. Dropping to my knees, I clutched my neck with both hands, gravel digging into my knees. Stevie was right beside me, crying, begging me to get in her car with her and go to the hospital.
“Why don’t you go ahead and tell Logan that you used her. That the only reason you were with her was to get to me,” Josh revealed, wiping the back of his hand over his bleeding mouth. “You wanted that tape of Ashley so you fucked Logan hoping you’d be that much closer to getting it.”
Brevin groaned as if hearing Josh say those words made his stomach sick. “It wasn’t like that.”
My soul unraveled like a ball of string, all at once, sliding out of control. Shaking my head, I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to know this truth, and I was beyond the limits of furious. I was gone. I couldn’t process this truth.
At the pause in his words, I finally took a breath, the sound sharp and sudden as if I had finally come up for air.
When Josh spoke—when another lie became reality—my feet and hands were tingling, my whole life changing in front of me, out of reach because what I knew was a lie, an illusion he led me to believe was a lie.
“Is he serious right now…?” I tried to fathom what he was saying, but failed—the anger—the resentment—all rolling through me and shaking my bones.
Brevin took a deep breath before continuing, and even though his voice was soft, I could hear the embarrassment in his words. “I never met to hurt you, and I didn’t sleep with you because of that. It had nothing to do with it.” Brevin cleared his throat, blinked, and then shifted his eyes to mine.
When I looked at him, his eyes filled with regret. Running his hands over his face, groaning, he seemed torn at what he wanted to say next. He wanted to say something. Staring at me, dark eyes so deep and tortured I feared they’d never be free, he hesitated.
I looked back at Josh, wanting to tell him how much I hated him and just how much I wanted to kick the shit out of him. “Leave.”
He did. “Get her to a hospital.”
Brevin bowed his head, the weight of his admittance heavy. Placing his hands on his hips, he took a careful breath. “Logan…”
When he looked up, his face was contorted like he had thought about this moment so often that it consumed every minute of our time spent together.
”Just take me to the hospital. We’ll talk about this later.”
TRYING TO CLEAR the haze around me, I blinked away the confusion. I had to go to the hospital to have ten stitches in my neck. I told them some bullshit excuse about falling on a rake. Like they fucking believed me, but luckily for me, one of Brevin’s sisters was a nurse at Saint Peter’s Hospital and they didn’t ask questions.
Stevie held my hand in the emergency room, Brevin waited in the waiting room.
She was fuming, hands shaking, tears pooling in pretty brown eyes that made me sad to see her so concerned. She shouldn’t feel bad about any of this. “I want to beat the crap out of Josh so bad and cut that assholes dick off!”
“Me too,” I mumbled, the smell of iodine and bandages engulfing me. When I looked down, an IV with antibiotics indicated I’d be here for a few hours. Along with the stitches in my neck, I had a swollen black eye, a bruised cheek bone and one hell of a rope burn. It was pretty evident a rake didn’t do this.
“You don’t have to stay.” I didn’t want Stevie thinking she needed to stay all night at the hospital. Or rather, all morning. It was nearing two a.m.
Poor girl needed to get some sleep. I was going to need her to fill in at the shop since I wouldn’t be able to work for a few days. I would be counting on her to help me. “Go home and get some sleep.”
“Where are you going?” Stevie panicked at the thought of leaving, shaking her head as if to say she couldn’t leave me here.
“Brevin will give me a ride back to your place. Can I stay there tonight and then I’ll figure out what to do?”
“Definitely.” Her arms wrapped around my shoulders. “Stay as long as you need.”
“Thank you.” My tears slipped over my cheeks, unable to control them.
How the hell did I wind up like this?
I wanted to run-away, escape, get lost, forget, and drown. But the truth of the matter was that I had nowhere else to go.
BREVIN TOOK ME back to his place.
I had to know why he let me believe we had something when he was only using me.
The tears began, loose and quiet with no control as I stood there. I wanted to sit down, but then I couldn’t. I wanted to stand, but I felt too weak. So I paced.
“Tell me something that’s not a lie.” I tried to control myself, but I had so much going through me I wanted to scream. Or vomit again. Either one was good right now.
“Tell you what, come over here and talk to me.” His voice had that same rasp I knew well. “I’ll tell you everything.”
“I can’t do that.” The beat of my heart took over and I wanted to fall to the floor.
“Why?”
“Because…” I gave him the best bitch brow I could. “…I just can’t.”
“You can’t or won’t?”
“Won’t.”
“Well…” His head hung low, tucked against his chest. “That changes everything then.”
I stared him down, making sure he knew exactly what I meant. “As it should, Brevin. You can’t treat people like that.”
“I know,” Brevin said with a bitter smile, turning to face the side of the wall. “I should have just told you about it.”
He shoved his hands through his hair and stepped back.
“You showed me how beautiful things could be, in just a few short weeks.” I admitted, looking at him nervously. “I felt normal with you, and to know you weren’t with anyone else, I enjoyed that. And I wanted it, Brevin. I shouldn’t have but I did.”
He didn’t say a word to anything I was telling him; instead, he listened.
“I have one more question.” Brevin gave me a nod to continue. The worry evident in his eyes at what I was going to ask him. “Why did you join Adult Friend Finder?”
When he spoke, his voice felt forced, admitting to something he didn’t want to say. “I only joined that site to make sure Josh didn’t put that tape of Ashley on there.” He drew a ragged breath and fixed his attention on his hands.
I believed him.
I did.
“I need to go gather some clothes.” I stood, taking my keys in my palm and reaching for my purse. “I left and didn’t even grab my keys for the store.”
Brevin cringed, looking as though I stabbed him with my words. “No way. You’re not going back there.”
I closed my eyes. “I have to. The keys to the shop are there and Stevie needs them for tomorrow.”
“I don’t want you anywhere near him.” Brevin frowned, looking almost afraid and panicked with wide eyes at the idea that I’d be around Josh again after what he did. I could tell he was struggling to express himself in a way that I would understand and not focus on the lies I’d been told. The thing was, I needed to think and not be near him, or Josh.
“I’m sorry. Please don’t leave like this.” Our eyes locked. After a moment when I didn’t reply, he dropped his head forward, as if he were giving up.
“Brevin, I get it. You did what you needed to do,”
I finished. “I’m not mad at you for that.”
His eyes lifted to meet mine. “It wasn’t like that, Logan.”
I nodded, my voice hitched when I said, “I know.”
He tipped his head to the side. “Do you?”
My heart jumped, my eyes swollen, filled with that sadness I knew too well.
Brevin never want to hurt me. I understood that. But he did in the process.
“Don’t you see, Brevin? You let me believe that what we had was real but I’m not sure it was. I just…need a few days.”
“It was real, Logan.”
“No, it wasn’t real,” I admitted, hoping he’d understand the words, rather than just hearing them. “If it was, you wouldn’t have lied to me.”
“Can you listen to me?” he begged.
“Admitting the truth is never easy,” I said, barely above a whisper.
He glared at my words. “Can you just please listen to me and hear me out?” My mouth went dry looking at him and I snuck a glance. He was taking large even breaths now, warming himself up for something, or maybe settling his nerves.
“Okay,” I said, actually feeling a little relieved. “Just tell me the truth.”
“Fine.” He was growing impatient and irritated. He started pacing as I had just done, hands trembling and rash movements as if he couldn’t stay still. “You wanna know the fucking truth, here it is. Josh had sex with my younger sister Ashley when she was seventeen. From what she told me, he didn’t tell her he was taping her until it was over. Then when she said she wanted the tape, he wouldn’t give it to her. I don’t exactly know if it was rape but he made a video of it without her consent. I wanted to get the tape for her.”
I nodded, a little shocked.
“So you had sex with me because you were trying to get that tape from Josh?”
“No,” he said, his eyes were distant but I believed him in a way.
“Then why—”
His anger took over again. I wanted to let it go and stop asking so many questions, but I couldn’t. I had to know.
And he couldn’t stop his outburst.
Standing, he paced, and then fell to his knees before me. His hands reached for mine, gripping them so tightly I had no choice but to look at him. “Stop fucking talking and asking the same questions over and over. For the last time…It. Wasn’t. About. The. Tape! That was before I met you. I was a fucking stupid kid trying to protect my younger sister. But with you, what we experienced, no matter how you fucking look at it, that was real. It was. It’s always been you!”
“Then why couldn’t you have told me before?”
It was like I wasn’t listening. I probably wasn’t. And he was right. I was asking the same questions over and over again.
“I wanted to tell you,” he pleaded, emotion vibrating between us, his hands still wrapped around mine. “So many times I wanted to, but I couldn’t say it to you. And then I…we…I don’t know. I was fascinated by you and fell hard.” His hand was over his chest now, staring at me with regret.
“I feel like I don’t even know who you are, Brevin. I feel like I never knew,” I mumbled, hoping he heard me.
“You do know me.” His voice came out shattered, and his appearance wasn’t any better. The darkness of his eyes took over, shadowing his cheeks and the frown set in place. His jaw clenched, brow drawn together in agony.
“No, I don’t.” Shaking my head, I repeated, “I don’t know you.”
That guy, the one that went around lying to his friend—or whatever I was to him—I didn’t know that guy.
Brevin turned and looked at me, and for a moment, he let me see just how truly tired he was of not telling me about the tape and his sister and how Josh was related to it.
He frowned and looked at me like he wanted to say something.
I waited—nothing.
“You do know me. Better than anyone else.” He swallowed, his eyes intense, maybe too intense for me to make contact with.
Dropping my stare and trying to breath, I focused on anything but him.
And then as if my heart wouldn’t allow the separation, my eyes snapped back to his.
Feeling controlled, something flickered behind his eyes, but he blinked, and it was gone.
“I’m not saying that so you’ll give me a chance.” His voice softened finally, and he sat back down across from me, grabbing the bottle from my hands and taking a drink. “I’m saying that so you’ll understand that you were never in the equation. Yes I should have told you the truth but I never planned on involving you.” His emotions were raw and clear in the depth of his eyes and the crease in his brow.
He was looking at me again, longing for a redemption I wouldn’t easily give. I could see him now, repeating words in his head, going over everything he wanted to say, just as I had done on the way here. He also knew this was our last chance to do right by one another.
“I didn’t think, and I’m sorry. I knew it would be tough after I got to know you, but I couldn’t say anything and risk having you walk out of my life.” I shook my head, trying to fight the emotion to let him hold me. His voice went quiet, hands on my face. “It’s you. It’s not some ploy to get that tape back. It was with Josh, but not you. It’s you. Everything between us was real.”
“Don’t tell me what you think I want to hear.” I sounded pitiful as I spoke the words. “How do I know any of that was real?”
“I’m not telling you what you want to hear.” His eyes bored down on me, his voice dropping in both pitch and volume. “I’m telling you the fucking truth.”
I wondered when this happened. When it got to this, a day of lies and confessions. If by chance what went on with Sutton and Josh tonight wouldn’t have taken place, would he even be saying these things to me? Would he have told me?
It reminded me of finding out about Josh and his lifestyle. Had I not caught him, when would he have told me?
“So when you came into the cupcake store, it was because you were trying to get to Josh? You were just trying to get that tape through me?”
“No. It wasn’t like that. I was already working for Josh when my sister slept with him. They met through me about a year ago. When I found out about the tape in March, I joined that site to try to understand what it was she had gotten herself into, and if Josh had posted it on that site. I was basically going to demand he give it back to her or else I’d call the cops.” He shrugged. “I had no idea how I was going to get it back, just that I needed to for my little sister. Yeah, I was just another guy once I found out you could get laid on there, but I tried not to lose sight of what I was really doing. And then you messaged me. And I fell hard for you in the dumbest possible way.”
For a second, I let myself look at him without the distorting haze of anger and resentment, and I saw him as I did when I delivered the cupcakes to Camdyn’s party that day. He was everything I wanted in a friend and the life he showed me over the last six months, beautiful and special, remarkable.
His eyes caught mine, and suddenly I was back to the day we first met.
The day I first saw those eyes looking at me like no one else ever had.
Brevin looked offended that I would leave, or that I needed to.
The looked was fleeting as he tried to wash it away, blink away the sadness, but doing that only made it that much more obvious.
The emotion welled up in my eyes, spilling over, falling free from the control I had over them. “Just give me a few days.”
“I don’t want to let you go.” His lips pressed to the side of my neck, giving me a jolt and a moment of weakness. “I really am sorry.”
Maybe I don’t need to leave. Maybe I can just stay here, let him hold me. Where’s the harm in that?
No. You need to leave and deal with reality, step back and assess the situation for what it is.
My hands shook when he said those words, black eyes dragging me through the mud with their sadness.
Drawing back, he framed my face with his hands and s
tared at me like I was the most beautiful piece of art he’d ever laid eyes on.
He wanted to say something to make me change my mind, but he didn’t, the sadness etched in the crease of his brow at glassy eyes. “Don’t go.” He repeated, hoping I’d listen.
His eyes were lost, searching for something to say, and I kept mine on his, waiting. He licked his lips, studying me to see how I was going to act.
“I just need a few days to process everything.”
Brevin blinked at my words, his eyes persistent on mine, and then he leaned toward me, placing a soft kiss on the shell of my ear. “Okay. I really am sorry.”
I nodded, my tear-stained lips brushing the cotton of his shirt. Apologizing to someone doesn’t always mean you’re wrong. I knew that. And maybe he was in some ways. But in this case, I think Brevin wanted our relationship more than his pride.
He pulled me from his chest, his hands on my shoulders, face suddenly serious as if he wanted to turn off any emotion he had for this, and me, completely.
With those eyes, the depths of his darkness would never go away completely. It was like trying to hide a star in the dead of night. No matter how hard you tried, that star shined. A tiny glimmer of hope that you weren’t alone completely.
In some ways, I understood why Brevin was trying to blink away his feelings. This was one of those moments in my life where I wanted to be alone and process everything.
Removing my hand from around his neck, Brevin kissed the knuckles of one hand and touched my face with the other. He let my hand fall away, breaking our contact. “Can I call you in a few days?”
“Yes.”
Would he?
His eyes said he wouldn’t but in my heart, I knew he would call. This wasn’t goodbye.
My stomach twisted at his words and the thought that this might be goodbye for us.
“Bye.” As soon as I said those words, a sharp sting of pain radiated throughout my body, my heart, and my soul. I also think that both of us knew—deep down in our aching souls—this couldn’t be goodbye. For something like we had experienced, the depths in which we connected, no way this was over for us.