by Jamie Canosa
“Jay!” She scolded him, flustered by what she took as a brush off of her concern. If she only knew.
Chapter Thirty-six
Em
“Hey, you all right? That sounds harsh.” Al’s voice was still rough with sleep as she joined them, rolling her neck to work out the kinks from sleeping on the ground.
Em knew it. She knew his cough was serious. Jay could lie all he wanted, but Al knew it, too.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine, Jay.” Em ground her teeth in irritation as Jay only gave her another quick squeeze before releasing her. He may not care about himself, but she did. “You need to go somewhere warm.”
“Sure. How about Sam’s?”
Em had been thinking somewhere a little more permanent, but Sam’s would do for now. It was probably one of the warmest places in the city, and her stomach couldn’t disagree with the plan.
***
There was coffee again. And the smell of baking pastries felt like a soothing balm on her raw nerves. Somehow, the time they spent at Cathy’s Cakes—limited as it may have been—felt like a time-out. A break to the constant strain of the rest of their day. Em took the chance to soak in the warmth and relax her muscles and her mind for a few precious minutes.
“Coffee?” Jay handed her a cup of black steaming liquid, which she accepted greedily, not minding the burn at all as she gulped it down.
“Is this some kind of race you forgot to mention?” Jay chuckled.
Realizing she’d nearly downed half her cup and he was still blowing on his, she slowed to sipping. Jay cleared his throat a few times and then took another sip of his drink. Em knew he didn’t want her to, so she pretended not to notice.
Sam was standing behind the pastry table as usual, but today his friendly smile was missing. He was talking quietly with Al and he actually looked upset. Al was a tough girl—she was working hard to keep her face blank—but Em could tell she was upset, too.
“Something’s wrong.”
“Huh?” Jay choked down another mouthful of coffee and stifled a cough.
“There’s something wrong with Al.”
Jay followed her gaze just as Al glanced their way and they were both caught staring. So much for covert. She looked like she was thanking Sam, who placed a comforting hand on her shoulder before she left to grab a cup of coffee and rejoin them.
“What was that all about?” They’d already been caught, no use playing coy now.
“Nothing.”
“It didn’t look like nothing.”
“Em, if she doesn’t want to talk about it—”
“No. It’s fine.” Al cut him off, leaning past them to grab a doughnut off the table. “Let’s get out of here first, though.”
Not having anywhere better to go, Em and Jay followed Al for several blocks. She didn’t seem to have any particular destination in mind. In fact, her mind seemed to be somewhere else entirely.
Finally, Jay’s patience seemed to have run out. “Hey, Al, where are we going?”
Without answering, Al veered off into the nearest alley and leaned up against a wall, fiddling with that old photo Em had seen her looking at before.
“Home.” Al spoke so softly, Em wasn’t sure they were even meant to hear her.
“What?”
“I’m going home.”
“What? Why? What happened back at Sam’s?” Em couldn’t think of a single reason worth going back home. The thought alone was terrifying.
“He got some news about my mom.” Al’s eyes never lifted from the picture as she spoke.
“What happened, Al?” Jay eased closer to her.
“She sick. Dying.”
Jay sighed. “I’m sorry.”
“I need to go back. Someone has to take care of her and it sure as hell won’t be my father.”
“Wait. You’re father’s still there?” Em couldn’t believe what she was hearing. This was the man—the dirtbag—Al had run away from in the first place and now she was just going to go back?
“Where else would he be?” Em only vaguely noted the snap in Al’s voice. Her words and all they implied were all that really mattered.
“Em . . .” Jay was trying to stop her, but Em was too worked up to notice.
“Then you can’t go! He hurts you!” All of Em’s own memories and fears came racing to the surface and her entire body shuddered. “Al, you can’t. What if he . . .” kills you? But Em couldn’t finish the horrible thought out loud. It’s what her uncle would do. He’d promised, if he ever found her—
“I have to! You think I want to go back there? I don’t have a choice!”
“But . . .” Em didn’t know Al all that well, so it surprised her how badly she wanted to protect this girl who tried to look so tough on the outside, but on the inside was just as messed up as the rest of them.
“Em.” Jay’s arms wrapped around her from behind and he pressed his lips to her ear as he spoke. “She has to do what she has to do, Em.”
“But . . .”
“It’s all right.” Al smirked at her. “Anyone ever tell you, you worry too much? Everything will be fine. I’ve got friends back home.” Her eyes dropped back to the picture in her hands, but they didn’t look as certain as she sounded.
“When are you leaving?” Jay was still wrapped tightly around Em.
“No use putting it off. I don’t know how much time she has left and I have a few dollars saved up. Should be enough for a bus ticket.”
She was leaving now? Right now? And Jay was just going to stand there and watch her go back to that man without even trying to stop her?
“Jay?” Even she could hear the plea in her voice.
“Al has to do what’s right for her. Who are we to tell her what that is?”
“I’m out.” Al shoved the picture back in her bag and threw it over her shoulder. “You two take care of yourselves, all right?”
“You, too.” That was all Jay had to say to her.
Em just stood there, wrapped in Jay’s arms, watching in disbelief as she headed out of the alley and back to who-knows-what. When she disappeared around the corner, all of Em’s fear crashed down around her.
Whirling around, she shoved at Jay’s chest until he released her. “How could you just let her go?”
“It’s her decision, Em.”
“Would you let me just turn around and go home that easily?”
“Hell no.”
“Then how could you let her?”
“First of all? Because I’m not in love with her. And secondly, because she has a reason to go. You don’t. She has someone who needs her back there. Someone she’s willing to risk it for. I can understand that.”
Jay’s eyes flashed with raw pain. He more than understood it. He could relate.
“Jay.” She hadn’t asked, afraid the question alone would shut the door that seemed to have opened between them, but she needed to know. “What happened to you? Why are you here?”
Chapter Thirty-seven
Jay
He knew the question would come eventually. It was only fair. He’d asked her first, after all. That didn’t make him any more prepared to answer it. It wasn’t that he was trying to hide anything from her. He just didn’t want to think about it. Talking about it was something he’d never done. With anyone.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.” Em tried to let him off the hook, but the hurt look in her eyes only served to seal the deal. She’d trusted him with her scars, how could he do any less?
“My dad was . . . a real asshole. An asshole with anger management issues. The kind he liked to take out on the people around him. I’d like to tell you that he was just a worthless drunk. That he only did it when he was too wasted to know better. That the rest of the time he was a decent guy. But he wasn’t. The man didn’t have a decent bone in his body, and he never drank a day in his life. He was stone cold sober each and every single time he beat the shit out of someone.” Em sat perfectly
still beside him, like any movement may end his story, but now that he was sharing it for the first time ever, he didn’t think there was anything in the world that could stop him. The words just kept coming, spilling over one another. “It started with my mother when I was little. I’d hear him yelling at her and her crying. I’d see the bruises he left on her. I hated him.”
Jay didn’t even realized he’d been clenching his fists so hard his nails were beginning to pierce the skin of his palms until Em pried them open and slipped her hands into his. He was afraid his story would frighten her, but she looked back at him with nothing but strength and love in her eyes. Things he desperately needed to continue.
“When I was about twelve, my mom got sick. She was weak and tired all of the time. She could barely get out of bed some days. The doctors couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her, but I knew. It was him. He destroyed her. When she finally stopped putting up a fight, he turned on me instead. He was a vicious son of a bitch. You felt the scars. I put up with it for four years before I finally took off and never looked back.”
“Why did you wait so long?” There was no accusation in Em’s tone, only sad curiosity and a longing to understand.
“My mom. I knew if I left, he’d just go back to beating on her. She couldn’t take it anymore. I stood by and watched him break her. I sure as hell wasn’t going to walk away and let him kill her. Bastard won in the end anyway, though. Two years ago, I came home from school early. He’d been particularly ruthless the night before and I was having trouble covering up bruised ribs at school, so I said I had a stomach ache and walked myself home. When I got there, I went to the bathroom to check on the bandages I’d put on earlier. That’s where I found her. She was lying on the floor. Blood everywhere.”
Jay choked on the image that consumed his mind. Her body sprawled on the cold tiles. Long blonde hair, matted and stained red by the puddle of blood it was lying in. She was lying in. The mirror was shattered, shards of glass scattered across the counter and floor. One particularly bloody shard still clasped in her lifeless hand.
The lump in his throat just kept growing—threatening to choke the life from him—until small arms wrapped around his body and pulled him back. When he found himself again, he was wrapped just as tightly around Em. They were both crying and he held her like she was his last tether to life. A real life. Not just existing. Not just surviving. But really living again.
“I’m so sorry.” Em sobbed as she held him even tighter. “I love you. I’m so sorry about your mother. I’m so sorry about everything.”
She cried and clung to him, taking on his pain as her own and finally allowing him to release it. After all these years, he’d been holding onto it for so long, he almost didn’t want to let it go. The anger and hurt grounded him. It motivated him. But now he had something else. He had the love of this girl who was stronger than she’d ever give herself credit for. Who was stronger than any pain, or any anger, or any fear. Her love banished them all.
When enough tears had been spilt that they should have flooded the earth, Jay started to pull himself back together.
“It’s okay.” Em was still crying quietly in his arms and he smoothed back her soft hair, tucking the strands that had escaped her braid behind her ears. “You know what? It’s really okay. When my mom killed herself, she set me free. I think she knew she was the only reason I never left, and she took that responsibility away from me. She saved me the only way she knew how. And if she hadn’t done that, I never would have met you. That’s something I can be thankful to her for every day for the rest of my life.”
Chapter Thirty-eight
Em
Silent tears streamed down her face, while her heart swelled so large she thought it might burst. Jay had shattered her heart and put it back together again stronger than ever. To think of him in pain and suffering, to remember the feel of those scars marring his skin? It killed her. But knowing he had done that, borne that kind of pain, to protect someone he loved? She’d never felt such pride for someone in her entire life. And this boy—this real life knight in shining armor—had chosen to love her. It was humbling.
“Then I’ll thank her, too.” Em wiped at the tears in her eyes and looked up into Jay’s beautiful face. Her heart ached at just the sight of it, filling with so much love it was surely straining at the seams. “I love you so much.”
“I love you, too.” Jay’s mouth dipped to hers and he stole her next breath with a kiss. A kiss that started out hungry and only grew from there. Hands, and lips, and tongues moved frantically on both sides. Desperate to comfort each other. Desperate for more of each other.
Em’s back slammed into the wall, but she barely noticed as Jay’s lips traveled down her throat. He hoisted her up in one smooth motion and her legs wrapped around his waist. It was the middle of the afternoon in an alley visible from the street to anyone who cared to look, but she couldn’t have cared less. Jay’s mouth was like a magic eraser, wiping away all of her fear and anxiety.
His teeth grazed her collar bone and her body began to react in ways she never expected it would . . . or could. Heat flared, and her head dropped back against the wall. A sound she didn’t know she was capable of making escaped her lips, but that only seemed to fuel Jay’s passion. He redoubled his efforts, sucking lightly on her neck and then making his way back up to her lips. Slowly, so slowly. Up to suck on her earlobe—teasing the sensitive skin with his teeth—and then dropping tiny, feather light kisses down her jaw until finally, finally his mouth reunited with hers.
Another spike of heat made her gasp, and moan. Em’s legs cinched tighter, pulling herself more firmly against him. Her hands slid up the back of his neck and threaded through his hair, trying to maintain control. She was seconds away from saying ‘screw it’ and reaching for his belt buckle when Jay pulled away with a throaty groan.
“We need to stop. Now.”
But she didn’t want to stop. For the first time ever this felt good. It felt right, and she wanted to know how far she could take it. She reached his buckle anyway, but Jay caught her wrist in his hand. “Em. You’re killing me. We have to stop now.”
“Why?” She didn’t mean for it to come out as a whine, but it did.
“Because.” He chuckled and placed her hand back on his shoulder so he could lower her to the ground. “If I don’t stop now, I won’t be able to stop at all and this is hardly the place.”
Em glanced around and felt her cheeks heat up. They were practically in public and she’d been so close to . . . Thank goodness someone had been able to keep their head on straight.
“Oh . . . I . . . um.”
Jay chuckled again and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “You’re pretty damn cute when you get flustered, you know that?”
***
They’d already covered every square inch of the outlying neighborhoods without any luck. That left them with only one choice. To head further into the heart of the city in search of a place to stay. Em didn’t like it. Mostly, because Jay didn’t like it.
It was only a little after noon, so for now everything seemed normal, but she’d never been this far into the city after dark before. Jay had made sure of it, and that worried her. She may not know what to expect, but she was fairly certain he did. And the fact that he’d steered clear until they were desperate combined with the rigid set to his shoulders that seemed to grow more and more tense with each block they covered . . . the butterflies in Em’s stomach had morphed into something more closely resembling mutant pterodactyls.
Throughout the day, Jay’s cough had only grown worse. He must have cleared his throat close to a million times so far, but he couldn’t hold them back forever and when they did break free . . . His entire body shook with the force of them and from the way his breath rattled, she knew it had moved into his chest. If they couldn’t find a place to stay before night fell, they were going to have more problems than just the dangerous city streets.
“Jay?”
&nbs
p; “I’m fine.” He cut off his most recent bout of coughs and rubbed what she was sure he thought was a discreet hand over his chest. But she didn’t miss it. She didn’t miss anything. Worry had turned into a magnifying glass which she watched him through, zooming in on every little distressing detail. He’d taken care of everything she could have possibly needed since she set foot on these streets. There had to be something she could do for him, now.
“Jay, maybe we could—” He cut her off with a single glance. Easily done, since she hadn’t actually figured out the end of that sentence, yet.
And then, like some kind of saving grace—or maybe the devil’s temptation—there was Cretan. Surrounded by girls and leering at Em like he wanted to eat her alive.
“Hey, there. You’re looking good.” Em couldn’t be sure if he recognized her or not, but by the way he licked his lips, she figured it probably didn’t really matter much. It was clear this guy only ever had one thing on his mind. And every time his eyes settled on her, she could practically see the dollar signs floating in them.
“Leave her alone.”
“What? You’re mommy never teach you to share, Jay?”
Jay growled deep in his throat. He was already raw from everything that had happened earlier and Em knew anything Cretan said would rub him the wrong way.
She pressed up on her toes, bringing her mouth to his ear so she could be sure he’d hear her, “Let’s go.”
“Aw, you’re not even going to hear me out?” Cretan actually had the nerve to look hurt.
“I’m not interested,” she sniped before Jay could get the chance. They’re been through all of this already.