That’s what we do for maybe ten minutes as he drinks his coffee, before he looks over at me, eyes bloodshot and glassy. “Don’t hurt her.”
“Not planning to.”
“Everyone lets her down. Even me.”
“I’m not everyone,” I say bluntly.
“Good.”
Another pause.
“What’s your issue?”
“Come again?”
“Your drama. You know mine. What’s your story?”
“I was left in a parking lot when I was a kid. Bounced around from foster family to foster family until I aged out.” I leave out a lot, but those are the Cliffs Notes.
“Life sucks,” Jess mutters, running a hand down his face.
“Sometimes,” I agree.
Jess looks over at me, annoyed. “Thanks for the sage advice.”
“Would you take my advice if I offered it to you?” I ask, lifting a brow.
“Probably not.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“But if I were to…” he hedges, “what would you say?”
“I guess I’d tell you to take a day or a week to be pissed off, but after that? Don’t waste so much time worrying about the people who’ve wronged you that you don’t see the ones who’ve been there all along. You have Lo to take care of you, but who’s been taking care of her?”
I hear a car door slam outside about two-point-five seconds before my front door flies open. Lo hesitates in the doorway, taking in the scene before her. Jesse, drunk and wet, streaks of blood decorating the floor from the back door to his feet from the broken bottle.
Jesse stands, lumbering over to where she stands before throwing his arms around her. His shoulders start to shake, and Lo’s face crumples as she hugs him, soothing him with soft words of comfort. I hear Jess mumble about being sorry, and she shushes him. He pulls away and wipes at his eyes with his forearm.
“I, uh…” Jesse starts, clearing his throat. “I think I just need to go to bed.”
“Get some sleep.” Lo nods. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
Jesse ambles up the stairs, and I make my way over to Lo. I cup her face with my right hand, and she holds on to my wrist, leaning into my touch. She looks tired, but beautiful.
“He came to you,” she whispers. She grabs the back of my head, lifting onto her tiptoes, and presses her lips to mine. I anchor her to me with an arm around her waist as I slip my tongue through her lips. This kiss is different somehow. Like we’re finally shedding all the bullshit and allowing ourselves to just be. Lo pulls back and whispers a thank you against my mouth.
“He trusts you. He came here. That means something.”
I don’t deserve the way she’s looking at me right now—like I’m Mother Teresa instead of a monster.
“You okay, Sally?” She gives a small, sad smile at my use of my nickname for her, but a smile nonetheless. “He’s not the only one who found out his father isn’t really his father.”
“I’m too tired to be upset. I’ll figure out how I feel in the morning.” Lo circles her arms around my neck, chin resting on my chest. She never ceases to impress me with the way she adapts to life’s curveballs. “Take me to bed,” she says before sticking her bottom lip out in a pout.
Wordlessly, I carry her up the stairs, her warm body wrapped around me. I don’t stop until we’re at the foot of my bed. Setting her to her feet, I peel her jacket off, followed by her shirt and bra, revealing her pale pink nipples. I press a kiss to one before I pull down her pants, and she holds on to my shoulders as she lifts one foot, then the other.
Lo lies down on my bed, flat on her back, the tip of her thumb between her teeth as she watches me reach behind my neck to pull my shirt over my head. I stare at her, thinking how fucking perfect she looks in my bed. Her porcelain skin against my black sheets, my ink on her thigh, signature messy ponytail spread across my pillow, face stripped of makeup. This is when she’s the most beautiful.
I kick off my pants, dropping my knee to the mattress and crawl up Lo’s body, settling in between her legs. I lift her left thigh and slowly push into her warmth. She gasps at the feeling, her back arching off the bed. Fuck, I love this girl.
Love.
The words are on repeat in my head, over and over, as I try to bury myself so deep inside her that she’ll feel me forever.
“I didn’t mean to fall in love with you,” I admit. “But I did. I love you,” I say, feeling her clench around me, her legs starting to shake. Her telltale sign that she’s close to the edge already.
“Stefan,” she breathes, and another piece of ice falls away from my heart upon hearing her say my name.
“Say it again,” I all but beg, rutting into her. Black fingernails dig into my chest. I welcome the sting.
“Stefan,” she repeats. I roll onto my side, pulling her with me. Lo’s leg goes over my hip, and I grip her perfect ass as I slowly tunnel in and out of the warmest, wettest heaven.
“Again,” I command, wrapping one arm around the small of her back and cradling her head with the other one.
“I love you, Stefan. I love you, I love you…” She trails off, clenching and contracting around me as she comes. Another piece of ice melts away, and I’m no longer frozen, but liquid inside as I spill inside her.
I roll onto my back and pull her on top of me. Her legs bend, thighs cradling me, torso flat against mine as I lazily thrust into her while we both come down. She tucks her head into the space between my neck and shoulders, kissing and sucking on my collarbone softly. I slide my palms all over her body—her arms, her back, her thighs—before finally coming to rest on her ass.
Lo’s breathing starts to even out, her warm breath rhythmically ghosting across my neck. She falls asleep while I’m still inside her, and in this moment, I decide that even though I don’t deserve her, I’m too fucking self-serving not to take the only thing that offers me peace. The only thing that allows me to feel warmth when I’ve been cold all my life. Add it to my list of sins, right next to murderer.
* * *
“ANYONE WANT TO TELL ME why my house is condemned?” Crystal asks before taking a drag of her cigarette. I pluck it out of her wrinkled lips and put it out in the ashtray.
After Dare drove us to where Jess remembered leaving the 4Runner, we got a call from Henry asking us to come over, so we could hash everything out. Dare offered to come with us, but he has to work, and this isn’t his mess. Besides, I don’t necessarily love the idea of him meeting Crystal. Ever.
“Should I have paid your bills while you were locked up?” I ask.
“Well, it would’ve been the decent thing to do,” she says.
Jess snorts out a bitter laugh, and I try to smother my own with the back of my hand. “Tell me more about how to be decent like you,” Jess says, sarcasm dripping from every word. “The only reason you’re here is because your boyfriend is still behind bars and you have no one else.”
“All right, all right,” Henry says, standing next to the fireplace. Crystal sits on one end of the couch, and Jesse and I are huddled together on the other end.
I was afraid of what I’d find when I went to wake Jess earlier, but to my surprise, he’d already been awake and showered. And when I asked him how he was feeling, he acted like nothing happened at all. I have a feeling it will all come out sooner or later, though.
“Someone better start talking,” I say, cutting to the chase. No one speaks. “Okay, I’ll make it easy on you. Henry, I’m going to go ahead and assume that you’re not, in fact, our dad?”
Henry adjusts his ball cap, clearing his throat before answering. “No.”
Jess grits his jaw next to me but doesn’t react otherwise. He’s sitting slightly behind me, his back all the way up against the cushion while I’m leaning forward with my elbows on top of my knees. I reach my open palm behind my back, and Jess puts his hand in mine. I give it a squeeze of reassurance.
“How long have you known?”
“I alwa
ys knew you weren’t mine,” he says to me, and despite myself, I feel a jolt of disappointment at the fact. “I didn’t meet your mother until you were two. I thought maybe Jesse was, for a while, but the dates didn’t add up. She always insisted that he was mine, so eventually, I figured, what the hell do I know about pregnancy?”
I never questioned why Jess and I didn’t have Henry’s last name. I always assumed it was because they were never married.
“It’s not exactly rocket science,” Jess deadpans.
“Yeah, well, you’d be surprised at what you can convince yourself of if you really want it,” Henry says, looking at the steel toe of his boots.
“So, why’d you leave? If you wanted it so badly?” Jess asks.
“Because he’s a selfish shit,” Crystal spits.
Henry’s face reddens and contorts with anger like I’ve never seen coming from him. “I was selfish,” he agrees. “I was selfish when I stayed with you for years because I loved those fucking kids even though you’d use them as leverage or threaten to take them away every time something didn’t go your way. It was selfish of me to pretend they were mine. And yes, it was selfish of me to leave them to finally get the fuck away from your crazy ass.”
Crystal jumps off the couch, getting in Henry’s face. They argue for a minute, but I don’t hear it. Years of practice have made me a professional at blocking her voice out once it reaches a certain decibel.
“How did Eric contact you?” I ask, interrupting their yelling.
Crystal turns to face me, her expression full of resentment. “He came to visit me in jail, unlike my children. He put money on my books for smokes. He told me he was worried about you and couldn’t find you, so I gave him your new number. Told him I thought you were staying with Henry. What’s the big deal?”
I roll my eyes, letting out a hollow laugh. “I’m done here,” I say, standing. “Henry, thanks for letting us crash here, but I think our time is up.”
The look in Henry’s eyes almost makes me feel bad, but he’s not the victim here. Jess is. “Crystal, you can fuck off. For good.”
Jess follows me out, without a word to either one of them. We get into the trusty old Toyota, and I start the engine.
“Lo?” Jess asks, eyes focused on something outside his window.
“Yeah?”
“I don’t want to go back to The Bay.”
“This doesn’t change anything,” I assure him as I drive us home. To Dare’s.
* * *
Three weeks later
“OKAY. I’VE GOT YOU DOWN for next Thursday at noon. See you then,” Lo says before hanging up the phone. I walk up behind her, gathering her hair into my fist before scooping it out of the neck of the hoodie she commandeered from me. She tilts her head back, flashing me one of her real smiles, and I kiss her forehead. Funny how I went from not being comfortable with affection to constantly needing to touch her in just a few weeks.
“How could you ever think you’re a monster?” she muses, looking up into my eyes. I give her hair a tug before letting go. I still haven’t come clean about everything. I know I should, but things have been good for once, and I didn’t want to do anything to throw a wrench in it.
Crystal reluctantly went back to Oakland. Jesse’s doing well in school. We haven’t heard anything from Eric. They’ve even talked to Henry a few times. Lo won’t admit it, but she was more hurt than she led on. I know she wants Henry to stay in their lives in some capacity, even if he isn’t their biological father. I think we all know that blood doesn’t mean shit.
It’s been three weeks of fucking and laughing and eating and drinking and falling in love with Lo. Watching my friends fall in love with her and Jess. So, why dig up the past? That would be self-sabotaging behavior.
“Ready to go?” I ask Lo a couple of hours later after everyone has gone home for the night.
“Yep,” she says, bending over to pick up her bag from underneath the front desk. I lock up, then we trudge through the snow to my truck.
Once we’re home, we head straight upstairs. Lo talked me into buying a TV for my room, so we’ve gotten in the habit of falling asleep to a movie almost every night.
She drops her bag onto my bed—our bed, I should say, because even though I said she could have her own room, we both knew that shit wasn’t happening—and fishes out a Redbox DVD with a goofy smile on her face.
“What is it? If you make me watch Grandma’s Boy one more time…” I say, wary of her selection. She has the same taste in movies as a college frat boy.
“First of all, that movie is a national treasure,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Second of all, no. It’s even better.” She tosses me the red plastic container, and I open it up to find The Nightmare Before Christmas.
“Good one,” I say, a smirk tugging at my lips.
“’Tis the season. I just need a shower first,” she says, stripping out of her clothes as she walks toward the bathroom.
“Weird, so do I.” I follow her, staring at her perky, round ass as I pull my shirt over my head and kick off my jeans and boots. One of the best parts about living with Lo is getting to shower with her.
She opens the glass door and steps inside. I’m right behind her. She pulls the faucet up, and we stand back, waiting for the water to get warm. I take the opportunity to kiss her, long and hard, and I feel her nipples pebbling against my torso.
The shower fills with steam and I wash her body, loving the feel of her slippery, soapy skin underneath my hand. Lo moans when I rub between her legs.
“Don’t stop,” she insists, grabbing my wrist. I don’t listen, pulling back my hand, earning a glare and a growl from Lo. But that doesn’t last long, because I back her up against the wall and lift her thigh as I push inside her. She gasps, her head hitting the wall.
I fuck her slowly, getting as deep as I possibly can, applying pressure to her clit with my pelvis with each thrust. She comes quietly, her body shaking as she clenches around me, pulling my release from me.
Still inside her, I lean my forehead against the wall behind her, panting, and Lo absently toys with my nipple ring as she peppers kisses against my shoulder.
What happens when fire meets ice? Fire wins. Every time.
“Meet you at the shop?” I ask Lo as she heads for the door to drop Jess off at school.
“Yep. My shift at Blackbear doesn’t start until three, so I’ll get a few hours in first.”
I decide to stop at Sissy’s and Belle’s for some coffee and Lo’s favorite cherry danishes. Sissy hooks me up with a bag of extra pastries, per usual.
I turn for the door, bag of pastries between my teeth, hands full of food and coffee, when I see her walking through the door. Sarah. She looks exactly the same. Long, wavy blond hair. Bright, blue eyes. But there’s a sadness behind those eyes that wasn’t always there. And I’m the one who’s responsible for that.
Sarah gasps, and we both stop short, not knowing what to do. She hates me. Her parents hate me. I hate me. I haven’t seen her in almost ten years. Haven’t spoken to her since they took me away in handcuffs. Her family moved away a long time ago. She’s the last person I expected to see here.
Sarah’s wide eyes fill with tears and she glances behind her, as if she’s looking for someone. A second later, Mark appears. Sarah’s father. My old foster dad. These are the people who I thought might actually become my permanent family. But all of that changed in an instant, reminding me that I didn’t have a real family, and nothing could ever change that.
Mark’s eyes burn with a mixture of rage and pain when he recognizes me, and the same emotions consume me, as if it just happened yesterday. I feel my throat closing up. I feel the break in my arm and the stabbing cold of ice puncturing my skin as I jump in. I feel my oxygen running out, and I see the blood spilled along the ice above me.
The bag of pastries falls from my mouth, tumbling out of the bag on the way to the floor. The cherry danish splatters across the white floor. Dread slams into my gut
like a thousand-pound weight as all three of us stand before each other, reliving the worst day of our lives in the span of three seconds.
“You’re still here,” Mark spits, voice full of disdain. If he could kill me where I stand and get away with it, I have no doubt in my mind that he would. He wanted me in prison. And he almost got his wish. But I can’t fault him.
Guilt, my only friend, is ever-present. It took the back burner when Lo came into my life, but right now, it threatens to swallow me whole. I don’t speak. I couldn’t find words even if I wanted to. I move around them, accidentally smashing another pastry underneath my boot. Somehow, I manage to hold on to everything else as I bolt the fuck away from there.
I was stupid for thinking I could have something real with Lo. These past few weeks, I thought something had shifted. I could almost feel the ice thawing inside me. But, nothing has changed. I’m still a fucking murderer. The guilt, the anxiety, the self-loathing…it’s all still there. Lo was just a Band-Aid. A distraction. And maybe that’s all she’s doing with me. Maybe we’re just using each other to escape reality. To feel good for once.
The only difference is, I deserve this life. Lo doesn’t.
* * *
“STILL NO WORD FROM DARE?” I ask Cordell and Matty. After dropping Jess off, I went straight to the shop, thinking Dare would be there early, like usual. I waited around for a while, but he never showed, so I went back home to see if he was there. No luck.
I didn’t think much of it. I told myself he’d show up when the shop opened, because I knew he had a twelve o’clock appointment. He never misses an appointment. But it’s now almost dark. His clients have come and gone, and still, no sign of Dare.
“Not since last night,” Matty answers, looking perplexed.
A knowing look passes over Cord’s face.
“What do you know?” I ask as unease pricks the back of my neck.
Bad Intentions (Bad Love) Page 21