by Anne Jolin
“You are everything you wanted in this tattoo, Peyton,” he praises, his finger tracing the exposed skin on my collarbone. “You are a graceful strength composed in a sweet package, all the while harboring a ferocity that makes you remarkably brave, and I love—”
My hands bolt up to cover his mouth, one placed over the other in an attempt to keep the rest of his statement from leaving his perfect lips. When he pinches his eyebrows together, I can see the hurt radiating in his blue eyes. I shake my head, tears descending down my cheeks.
“Not like this,” I whisper. “Not now.”
I feel him try to speak behind my hands, and my heart breaks at taking this moment away from him.
“I need you to see the ugly in me,” I choke out. “The monsters at my back door are the kind even nightmares do not have the strength to allow into their circles. I need you to see all of me, even the dark places, and then you can decide if you still love me. If you wish to keep me as I so desperately wish to keep you.”
When I’m sure he’s understood, I let my hands fall back to my sides.
“Tonight,” is all he says.
My eyes close in fear of what he might think when the house of cards I’ve played so close to my chest comes crashing down around us.
Wordlessly, he moves around to stand behind me, resting his hands on my hips. “For you, my fierce girl,” he whispers against my ear.
Then I open my eyes and the tears come again at the sight of what he’s done for me. “It’s beautiful, Jayden!” I cry, letting my gaze roam over the tattoo in the mirror.
It’s exactly what I asked for but far more stunning than I could have ever imagined. More than that, it covers my ungodly scars. My King painted art over the wounds made from my devil. For that, I did not know how to repay him.
He spends a few minutes cleaning up my tattoo again before bandaging it for the night. I get dressed as he closes the shop down. And after closing the front door behind us, he scoops me up into his arms.
“Take me home, sugar, and show me your ugly. I promise it’ll only make you more beautiful to me.”
If he only knew.
I WAS COMPLETELY fucking gutted by tattooing her scar tissue. It took physical strength to keep my body from shaking at the mere thought that someone else could have given her those scars. Her smooth skin took to the ink perfectly, and the design seemed to fit her like she’d been born with it. What absolutely destroyed me was the look on her face when I tried to tell her that I love her. So many emotions battling behind her violet eyes made my goddamned heart ache. How she could possibly think that anything in her past would change the way I feel about her made me desperate to fix it, desperate to prove that I would always be here, that I would always come for her, no matter what.
“Sit down,” she murmurs, pointing to the carpeted floor in our living room, a war of emotions still fighting for control over her features.
“Okay,” I say hesitantly, looking back towards the couch but sitting on the floor like she asked.
When she disappears into the kitchen, I hear the sound of cupboards opening and closing then the clink of glasses. She enters the room a minute later carrying a bottle of tequila and two shot glasses. I eye them but decide not to say anything. If she needs the courage to tell me, then so be it.
It is well past due time I knew my girl—all of her.
Bending over, she rests the vices in front of me before sitting cross-legged opposite me. She grips the glass neck of the bottle, screwing off the cap and pouring us each a shot. There’s no pause for a cheers, no instruction—she simply brings the alcohol up to her lips, tipping the small glass back and letting the burn coat her throat.
Not wanting to stall the forward momentum, I follow suit, knocking back my shot and then placing it back down in front of me. She quickly tops off both glasses before placing the bottle back down beside them.
“I don’t know if you know this, but I’m from Quebec,” she starts, a hollow tone seeping into her usually sweet voice. “Not originally, of course. I don’t have a French name or an accent, obviously.” She laughs, no humor to be found in the sound whatsoever. “I lived with my dad in Ontario. It was always just the two of us—my mom died during childbirth.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, reaching out to touch her knee.
Waving her hand between us, she shakes her head. “Thanks, but I have no memory of her at all. It’s hard to miss something you’ve never had.” Swallowing deeply, she steadies her eyes on mine. “When I was sixteen my dad died in a fire on one of the oil rigs.”
My fucking heart starts to break for her, but I say nothing, not wanting to interrupt her strength or allow anything to stop her from telling me.
“I didn’t have any living relatives except my dad’s mother. So, thus, I was shipped off to live in Beaconsfeild, Quebec, to finish out my last two years in high school. I managed to fly under the radar during my first year, and I was comfortable with that—until I met him.”
Fuck.
The muscles in my body tense at the first mention of a man.
“Daniel Dubois was the son of the town’s mayor and somewhat a golden boy. He took a liking to me during my grade-twelve year, and I was flattered. After a few dates, he asked me to be his girlfriend, and I thought my tables were turning. I had someone.” She stops abruptly, picking her glass up and shooting it back harshly.
I follow suit again, figuring that, if she needed it, I’d sure as fuck need it too.
“He seemed nice.” She chuckles darkly. “Until he wasn’t. It began in small ways that I didn’t seem to put together. I wasn’t allowed to talk to other boys. He would randomly show up at my house during the night to check on me, and on occasion, I’d find him in my room when I got home from spending time with my friends. He was possessive and controlling, but I thought it meant he loved me.”
Her eyes flick down to the ground, and her hands fist into the carpet at her sides. “One night, I’d just come home from dropping my grandmother off at bingo, and when I stepped in the front door, he was there.”
A tear slips past her strong demeanor, and it takes every ounce of my fucking willpower not to pull her into my arms and tell her that it doesn’t matter. But it does. It matters like it mattered for me to tell her about Michelle. We can’t build on dishonesty; we both know that.
“I knew something was off right away. He was staggering and slurring his words a little. He liked to drink, and Daniel was always a nasty drunk.”
My teeth start to grind, and my stomach twists in knots. That fucker better not have hurt her or I’ll fucking kill him.
“I asked him to leave, but he wouldn’t go. He wanted to fuck, he said.” She spits out the curse word. “I went into the kitchen to call him a cab, and that’s when he landed the first hit.”
The rage coursing through my veins makes my body fucking shake.
“He hit me in the back of the head, the police said. They figure it was with one of the statues from the living room mantel. The next blow was to my stomach before he rolled me over onto my back and climbed on top of me.”
“Jesus Christ,” I hiss, giving everything I have into not throwing the bottle in front of me against the wall.
“He told me I was a virgin tease and I was going to give it like a slut or he’d take it from me anyway.”
Not able to sit still and afraid a fucking outburst of insanity will scare her, I try to settle my shaking fury by pouring us each another shot.
“I tried to scream,” she confesses, tears spilling onto the carpet in front of her.
I need to touch her. So I wrap my hands around the tops of her thighs, squeezing them encouragingly. “I believe you, Petyon.”
“I tried so hard to make him stop,” she chokes out. “But it only pissed him off. He was fucking psychotic and I couldn’t get through to him.” She starts shaking her head, the pain of the memory vibrating through her body and into my hands. “That’s when he pulled out his buck knife, the huge, god-awf
ul one he kept on his hip like some kind of redneck hillbilly. He put it to my throat as he inched up my dress. He was going to rape me,” she says on barely a whisper.
I’m going to fucking kill him with my bare hands.
“I bucked my hips underneath him to try to make him stop, but he was too heavy. The first cuts were to the front of my dress, where he exposed my breasts, biting on one of my nipples until it bled.” Her body is racked with sobs now, unable to fight off the physical reaction to her memories any longer. “I screamed again, thrashing my body around wildly, and that’s when he decided to put me in my place for good.”
The breath physically leaves my body entirely as I wait for what I know is fucking coming and I die inside knowing I can’t stop her from saying it.
“He stabbed me once here.” She points to the location of one of the scars I just covered. “And then, when I cried, he stabbed me again here,” she says, indicating her second scar. “And I sobbed. I pleaded with him, but he was too far gone.
“‘Vais vous envoyer au ciel, ma belle pėtale,’” she whispers out loud in French before repeating in English, “‘I’m going to send you to Heaven, my beautiful petal,’ he said the moment his knife circled around my throat.”
My head feels dizzy. I can hear the fucking sound of my eyelids closing every time I blink. Clenching my jaw, I grind my teeth against each other.
“I knew in that moment he was going to kill me, so I asked him for one last kiss, to send me to Heaven with him on my lips.”
I want to rip someone’s fucking head off or burn that entire goddamned city to the ground.
“He smiled like the fucking devil incarnate as he pulled the blade off my throat. He rested his hands on either side of me, and at the same time that I felt the taste of his lips on mine, I grabbed his unguarded wrist and stabbed him in the stomach.”
What the fuck?
“He rolled off me, but I couldn’t stop. The fear was too ingrained in me. I stabbed him a total of six times before I made it to my discarded purse to call nine-one-one.”
She killed him.
“He was pronounced dead on the scene, and I was taken to the hospital to be treated for my stab wounds as well as a punctured lung. It was ruled a self-defense and I was not charged with the death of my boyfriend.” Her features morph into anger. “That didn’t matter though. I’d killed the town’s golden boy and I was as good as dead.”
I finally allow myself to speak. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“They spray-painted my locker with SLUT, my house with MURDERER, and my grandmother’s car with KILLER. I was bullied to the extreme against which the school system could not even protect me, I finished my grade-twelve year homeschooled. Three months before I moved here, my grandmother died and I had no reason to remain there, so I left. I came here, and I’ve never looked back.”
“They should die—every last fucking one of them,” I spit, caving and pulling her onto my lap.
She curls into me, resting her head on my chest, her tears soaking into my shirt.
“Is that what your nightmare was after the baby shower?” I ask.
“Yes,” she whispers. “I’ve had them for years since—until you. I never have them when I sleep with you. It might make me a horrible person, the fact that I killed him and don’t feel guilty. But he was about to end my life and I couldn’t have that. I had so much life left to live.”
“I’m fucking glad you did, Pey. You saved your own life for me. You had to be here with me.”
She spills her tears again, breaking my heart.
“Does anyone else know?” I ask her, my curiosity getting the better of me.
“Colt.”
My body recoils at his name, knowing she was able to confide in him, not me. Jealousy suffocates my anger until I hear her explain.
“My first week in Rock Falls, I went to a support group at the community center. It was for victims suffering from survivor’s guilt. I was there to try to cope with what had happened to me, to face that I’d taken someone’s life, and he was there after an officer-involved shooting that resulted in the death of a young boy. He blamed himself.”
“Fuck, Peyton,” I say, burying my face into her hair. “I’m sorry no one was there to protect you, but fuck if I’m not proud that you survived that all on your own. Those people are the scum of the Earth. I will never, so help me God, let another person make you feel anything less than the angel you are.”
She hiccups quiet sobs into my neck, but this next part is something she needs to hear while she looks into my eyes.
“Peyton,” I say against her hair. “Look at me.”
She slowly lifts her head, and the uncertainty in her eyes guts me.
“I refuse to live my life buried under the weight of mediocrity. I refuse to be adequately unremarkable in a world rich with awe-inspiring possibilities. I will take advantage of every breath and every moment I steal from the sun and borrow from the stars. The day I met you was the day the stillness in my heart shook, the hope in my chest waking, and with time, you’ve breathed love back into my soul.”
She chokes back a sob.
“This is it, sugar—our second chance. Spending chances is a wasteful extravagance, and I’m hell-bent on making sure that luxury is not abused by the likes of us. Every King needs a Queen, Peyton. You’re mine. I love you.”
“You still love me?”
Resting my forehead against hers, I pull her as close to me as I can. “Today will be the day I look back on as the day I loved you the least, because every day from here on in, I’ll only love you more. All of you, even the dark and ugly places. You fill the wounds in my chest and I’ll soothe the scars on your heart. You’re it for me, sugar. I’m all in.”
“I’m keeping you, Jayden King. I love you too.”
I’M IN LOVE with Jayden King, and he loves me back.
Standing in his arms, I feel the buzz from my tequila shots warm my body. After stalking towards our bedroom, he pushes the door open and then lays me down on the bed.
“Clothes.” He points to me. “Off. Now.”
Once I’ve undone my jeans, I shimmy them down and kick them off the end of the bed.
“You didn’t wear panties today?” he growls, pulling his shirt over his head.
I blush, squirming on the bed under the heat of his stare. “No.”
“Fuck,” he hisses.
It’s a good thing I don’t have any on or they’d be completely soaked at the sight of him standing shirtless, his heated eyes glaring at me.
After I yank my shirt over my head, I undo the clasp on my bra and then toss both items to the ground. “I want to feel you inside me, Jayden. Please,” I beg.
His muscles tense in the way they always do when I beg him sexually. It makes him lose the control he tries desperately to rein in with me in the bedroom.
Crawling to the edge of the bed, I crook my finger in his direction. He stalks towards me, and I reach out, curling my fingers in the waistband of his boxer briefs. I pull them down, and the moment my eyes take in his hard cock, I have to press my legs together in an attempt at relief.
I might not have a lot of experience, but I’ve definitely watched enough porn over the years to know that he’s well hung. I lean forward and flick the metal of his piercing with my tongue before sucking on his swollen head.
“Ahh,” he moans before pulling me off with a pop and tossing me back down onto the bed. “Not tonight, sugar,” he scolds. “Spread your legs for me and let’s see how wet you are.”
“I’m wet,” I argue, sliding a hand down my flat stomach before slipping a finger between my pussy lips.
He nips at my hand. “I’m going to stretch you with my fingers, Peyton,” he growls, pumping two fingers in and out of my wetness. “Then, when you’re dripping on these sheets and begging to be filled with me—then I’ll fuck you. Working you over with my cock until you come around it, screaming my name.”
“Yes,” I whimper, desp
erate to have him inside me for the first time.
He teases me awhile longer, pinching my clit with his other hand. I feel wild for him.
“I’m clean, baby, and I know you are because this sweet pussy only belongs to me. Are you on birth control?”
“Yes.” I nod vigorously. “Please.”
My hips buck off the bed every time he licks and sucks between my legs in time with the movement of his fingers.
“Please what, Peyton? Tell me want you want.”
Thrashing my head from side to side, I can feel my body begging to give it more. More of everything.
“Fuck me please, Jayden. I want you.”
Kneeling between my legs, he wraps a hand around his cock and pumps it slowly. “Is this what you want?”
“Yes.” I lick my lips wickedly.
“It’s going to hurt at first, but then it will feel good. I promise,” he says. “Do you trust me?”
Cupping my breasts with my hands I pinch both of the nipples between my thumbs and forefingers. “Yes,” I whimper. “I trust you.”
“So fucking perfect,” he groans, spitting on his hand and then rubbing it over the head of his cock. He lifts my hips up onto his thighs and teases my entrance with his massive length. “You’ll watch me while I fuck you for the first time, Peyton.”
My eyes close in pleasure at the deep growl in his voice. I feel the loss of him where I want him most and open my violet orbs in panic to see where he’s gone.
“Naughty girl,” he scolds. “If you close those pretty eyes, I’ll stop fucking you. Do you understand?”
I nod.
“Say it.”
“I understand,” I repeat.
“Good,” he praises, sinking inside me. “Fuck. So tight.”
I wince a little at the pain, but it’s gone as quickly as it came, replaced by an overwhelming sensation. I’ve never felt this full yet craved more.
“Are you okay?” The concern is his voice tugs at my heartstrings while he moves at a gentle pace inside me.