by Eden O'Neill
Before I knew it, she was starting to put her clothes on, dress herself like she was some quick fuck for me. She’d never been that with me, no matter how much I’d led her to believe that when it came to similar things in the past. I was well aware I’d messed a few things up before, and looking back, I was definitely not proud of that. I reacted with fear a lot when it came to her. My default sometimes and Royal was right. When it came to women, sometimes I was just scared to hold on too tight to them. Anything could be taken away, a harsh reality I knew.
“Everything all right?” I touched her back, her clothes back on, and I didn’t like that. I pinched at her top. “You’ve been different since we got back from your mom and Ben’s.”
She barely spoke to me in the car ride back here, normally so talkative I couldn’t get her to slow down. It balanced well with me since when it came to conversation, I’d rather listen than be a part. Anyway, after we got back here, I’d started to talk to her, but once we’d realized her dorm was empty, I had a one-track mind. I’d poked at her for her body, and then, well, no conversation. I hadn’t thought it weird at first.
But now, she was getting up. She turned. “Want a drink? I want a drink.”
She didn’t wait for my response before leaving the room, and lifting my eyes, something did feel wrong. I got up myself, quickly tossing away the condom before putting my clothes back on and following after her. I found her back out in her dorm’s common area, head dipped inside the fridge. I lounged against a wall in the kitchen. “I feel like something’s going on. You mad at me? Mad I took up your mom’s invite for dinner?”
Yeah, I had taken it because it’d seemed she hadn’t wanted me there. But then again, that was our dynamic. I poked, bugging her, and she ran her mouth, bugging the shit out of me. We didn’t work unless we were arguing or handling each other. Greer stayed in the fridge, her sigh hard. “I just want a drink.”
“Okay.” Pushing off the wall, I helped her, taking the bottle of juice from her when she rose with it. I served her, then served myself, the pair of us taking it back into the common area.
Plopping on her couch, I took her with me, putting my juice on the coffee table and reaching for my controller. I queued up a game since I kept the system over here, playing around Greer’s body for a while. She drank her juice, leaning back into me, and eventually, she was looking up at me. She looked so sad it actually pissed me off. Why was she sad?
What the fuck did I do?
It was crazy I even cared, so different now, but seeing her sad truly did piss me off. I didn’t think I had done anything, which meant something outside of me did something to her. That’s what pissed me off. That I might have to do something about it and hurt someone.
“What’s going on?” I asked again, and though I let the game play, my attention was on nothing but her. Her when she put her cup down and eased her arms around me, her when her body shook again and I wasn’t even fucking her. Worried now, I put the controller down. “Greer? What the fuck? You’re kind of scaring me.”
“I am scared,” she said, and at that moment, I realized she was crying. Fucking crying, with tears in her eyes. The sheen made them starkly blue, and she squeezed them. “Knight…”
What. The. Hell? Everything had been fine before we came here tonight and I rose up, taking her with me.
She shook her head. “I… I just need to talk to you about something.”
Dread, like harsh to my core. Girls didn’t say that shit unless something was up. I just never cared about that before, girls easy. A dime a dozen, but it was never easy with Greer. It was fucking harder, and I worked so hard not to be who I usually was with her. In fact, it pulled at me so much every day. I wanted to be abrasive, a jerk. It was just my MO because feeling things, feeling this was the harsh opposite of the good feeling. You couldn’t get one without the other in a relationship, hence why I always stayed the fuck away from them.
I folded a hand behind her back. “Talk.”
Instead, she reached over and grabbed her phone, showing it to me. “I got an email from my psych professor.”
That’s what this was? I smiled a little. “You get a bad grade or something?” I knew she took all this shit way more seriously than me, but what the hell? “They’ll be other ways to pad your grade. If you want I can even talk to…”
Then I read the conversation, an email he’d sent her. It talked about what a good job she’d done on her term paper. Shit, yeah she had. I helped her.
But then I read on, scanning as it came to the part about things that had nothing to do with her, things that had to do with my family and me. I lifted my gaze, my eyes narrow. “You told him about my mom?”
“I took lots of notes at the nursing home.” Panicked, she waved her arms. Her face had shifted into at least three variations of cherry red, her palms going to her teary eyes. “He thought it was fascinating because he used to work with coma patients. After I turned in my paper, he wanted to know more.”
All right. No big. I shook my head. “Why the tears?”
“Did you see what the email said?” She put it in front of my face again. “The part about the coma? He thinks it’s medically induced, and I don’t know what that means, Knight. But that’s weird, right? You said the coma was from trauma… not that.”
But I also saw she could have been mistaken, copied her notes down wrong like he said. Maybe she thought she heard something different when speaking to my mom’s doctors. I framed her face. “I’m sure you just misheard. How many doctors and medical staff did you interview that day? I’m sure you just wrote down something wrong like your professor mentioned.”
But then she tapped around on her phone again, showing me something she definitely shouldn’t have. She had a picture of a chart in her phone, my mom’s name in the top corner.
My mouth parted. “Why do you have this?”
Her knees came up, and she cradled them. “I… I thought it would be help—”
“You’re not listening to me.” She moved off my lap, to my side and I basically put her there. I put the phone in her face. “Why do you have a picture of one of my mom’s fucking medical charts? You shouldn’t even have access to that. What the fuck, Greer?”
“I just stumbled upon it. I swear. It was just sitting there in a pocket next to your mom’s bed. Maybe one of the nurses or doctors left it there or something—”
“And so that meant you should take fucking pictures of it!” Enraged, livid as my body heat traveled a million and a half fucking degrees. “What right did you fucking have?”
“I didn’t. Fuck.” She covered her face, opening her hands. “It was out of line, but that doesn’t deny what I read. What I saw right there.” She pointed to the picture. “I didn’t copy anything down wrong, Knight. It’s all right there, facts.”
“And it’s still probably a fucking error.” I didn’t want to look at what she was showing me anymore, the lies and invasiveness…
The betrayal.
She showed her professor this, my family just a pack of freaks for her viewing pleasure. Her term paper had been about general psychology terms, not prying into my goddamn life. I got up, finished with this shit.
“Knight, please. Just listen to me!”
Hence, the reason for her tears. She obviously didn’t want to show me this, worried how I’d react, and she should have been worried.
She should fear.
I grabbed my coat, ignoring her as I left the dorm room and slammed the door. I hoped she got a good grade on her term paper.
I hoped it was all fucking worth it.
Chapter Twenty
Knight
My grandpa called the next day, asking me if I wanted to go to New York City with him for the day. He was going into town for business, and since I needed something to do besides dwell on bullshit, I took him up on the offer, readily taking the car he sent for me. I met him up at the airport, and we had a nice calm ride through the air on private charter, barely talking an
d just hanging out. That’s how things used to be way back when before school and women got in the way. It was just Gramps and me, simpler.
I wished for simpler times again as I let him go about his day. I didn’t attend his business meetings with him, of course, opting out to shop and hang out in the city. But once all that concluded for him, we ended up at the flower market. Gramps didn’t do much of his own gardening, but he liked to pick out blooms personally when he wanted them. I stayed nearby as he thumbed petals for the flower boxes at the house, giving my opinion when asked. I wasn’t really into all that shit, but did enjoy just being near him, near family. Some things were obviously put into perspective recently.
My fingers thumbed my phone screen, distracted a little when he asked me my opinion this time. I pointed at one bunch in his hand. “Red looks good.”
My grandpa merely chuckled in response, knowing I didn’t know anything about this shit. Even still, he asked and I appreciated that. His house was my house too, always would be. He pinched a bud. “I’ll make a note, son. I’m thinking we need more in the gardens too.”
I headed over to look at what he wanted for that, more reds, pinks, and even some teals. He had his assistant Joshua with him so anytime he liked something or stopped to look, Joshua made a note. I supposed I’d have a Joshua one day, why I was getting my business degree to take over things one day. My family’s presence was very prominent in my small town. We owned many business just like the Prinzes, my boy Royal’s family.
When I missed another cue for my opinion about the flowers, my grandpa turned, smiling at me. “You’ve been distracted, yes?”
I had, but also had too much pride to agree. I shrugged. “Nothing to be concerned about.”
“Is it school?” He waved a hand for Joshua to do what he wished, and the guy nodded like the manservant he was, leaving us before ducking behind a set of bushes out of sight. Having people around to serve me and my family was just something that came along with the territory of my life, used to it since I always had been around it. Grandfather frowned. “You haven’t mentioned anything.”
That was because I hadn’t been talking to him, lying to him a lot lately by keeping things from him. With this whole thing with Greer, I’d basically become obsessed over keeping what she’d seen that night at the frat quiet, but eventually, it turned into something completely else. More obsession.
Then later bullshit.
She’d put me completely on fire, and I could only be mad at myself. I’d shared that part of myself with her, gave her details about my family when it’d been none of her goddamn business, and she’d not only used it against me but betrayed me. She’d actually had the nerve to text and call me after I’d left her dorm yesterday. She’d said she was sorry for prying, just wanted to talk to me like she had a fucking right. She’d betrayed my trust, point blank. My jaw moved. “School’s not bothering me.”
“So what is?”
I shook my head, and once again, he smiled. His hands rested on his cane. “You know you are so much like your father. So strong-willed.”
Chuckling, I scratched the side of my neck with a finger. “You say that all the time.”
“Because it’s true.” He tapped his cane in my direction before using it to bring his arm around me. “Couldn’t take care of him. No one could because…”
“He was too busy being stubborn,” I said, having heard this all before. “And taking care of everyone else.”
“A fierce protector, that one.” His eyes warmed. “He’d run into the fire for someone he cared about, getting so deep before he realized doing so could swallow him whole. By then, of course, it’s always too late, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” I’d heard this story too, many, many times. Dad had reacted. He hadn’t waited around, and Gramps said when Dad had been a kid, that shit had gotten him in trouble—often. I could definitely relate. My hands slid into his pockets. “But how do you keep from getting burnt?”
“You don’t, and that makes for a hell of a life, doesn’t it?”
A hell of a short life in my dad’s case, gone way too soon. His accident had nothing to do with him being rash, but he had been adventurous. Always wanting to take chances, and that was something even I remembered about him.
Grandpa shook me and, after directing Joshua back, asked if I wanted to get dinner before leaving the city. I was always fucking famished so of course, I said sure. We had a favorite burger place we both liked to go when we were in town, and after Joshua had our car come around and filled with flowers, we headed over to it from the market, the sedan fragrant with my grandpa’s blooms.
“Have you thought any more about your mom?” Gramps asked me inside. I’d been on my phone again and looked up. He frowned. “I don’t want to pressure you but…”
The decision did need to be made, and I needed to stop being such a goddamn priss and make it. Maybe if I did let Mom go, we both could move on. Grandfather and I would be able to grieve, and Mom, well, she could be with Dad in our family plot. Letting her go was the responsible thing to do.
My hand gripped my phone. “Probably should.”
“Yeah?” Leaning in, Grandfather squeezed my shoulder. “I just don’t want the decision plaguing you. I feel like it has a potential to be that.”
He was right, of course, and even in this short time of consideration, that’s exactly what it’d been doing. I think I knew that’s where things were heading all along, and there’d definitely been a reason I hadn’t been able to go and see her lately. It just hurt seeing her that way. It hurt every damn time. I nodded again. “I think it’s best. And you’re right it’s… it’s time.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Grandfather didn’t say anything else as he let go of my shoulder, but I knew he’d take care of all the arrangements. He was like my dad and me, that protector part we obviously got from somewhere. Where I failed in the end was I decided to protect the wrong person, and as we headed toward the restaurant, I decided to ask my grandpa a question. He was always asking about what kinds of programs and departments I felt needed attention on campus, funding. Since I was there, he felt I had insights where he didn’t, and in the past, I’d been reluctant to share my thoughts. Even more so about the departments money should be taken away from, scaled back…
“Grandfather, I think some money should be moved around. Money you give to the school?” I said, and once his brow lifted, I continued. “Obviously, this is just all my opinion. But I’m wondering if Pembroke needs as much as they do in some departments…”
Chapter Twenty-One
Greer
I spotted Knight on a transition between classes. I was cutting across the quad, and he was walking along the concrete path, his grandpa Gerald beside him. They were amongst a group, a bunch of other old guys also wearing suits and walking about this place like they owned it.
I guessed in a way they did.
I was hot fire as I bee-lined in that direction, unavailable to think straight. Hell, even see straight because if I had, I might have considered my next move. If I had, I wouldn’t have waltzed right up to Knight Reed…
And slapped him across his gorgeous face.
He hadn’t seen it coming at all, of course, gripping his jaw, and my hand burning at my side, and I literally thought about what I’d done after. I thought about what would come next and what that would mean. This guy had done a lot of damage already.
Well, I could do more.
Scorching rage in his eyes as he turned back, and many of the older men with him gasped. One of which had been his grandfather, completely stunned with that cane in his hands. His salt and pepper eyes narrowed. “Young lady, what is the meaning of this!”
My fist clenched, ready to strike again, but Knight got my arm before I could lift it. He pulled me, jerked me so hard I thought my arm might pull right out of its socket. He had me by the shoulders as he pushed me away from the old guys, the older men talking amongst t
hemselves while Knight skirted me away from the crowd. He basically tossed me behind a tree, and when I came for him again, not only did he get my wrist, he pulled me up to meet his face.
His expression could have frightened even the most wicked man.
“I let you have that one, dove,” he announced, throwing my arm away from him. He darted a finger. “But hit me the fuck again, and I don’t know what that will mean for you.”
He was literally the worst, literally the most fucked-up human being on the planet. How else could he explain what he did to me, did to Mom, Ben, and me. My eyes watered. “How dare you? How fucking dare you—”
“Young lady, I’ll ask you to calm down, or I will have to call campus security for you.”
Gerald Reed strolling across the quad, clearly the representative amongst the old guys. The rest of them congregated out of the fray while Mr. Reed strode off to obviously see what was up, but on the ball, Knight didn’t let him get within many feet of me before jerking me away. He raised a hand. “I’m handling this, Grandfather. You don’t need to worry.”
“And what’s to be handled?” The older man came forward, raising his chin. “What is this, son—”
“This,” I said, working Knight’s hands off me, “is your grandson being a complete and utter dick.”
“I recognize you, don’t I?” Mr. Reed asked, then lift his chin again. “You were at the frat house the other night when I’d been there.”
“She was, but she doesn’t mean anything.” Again, with the disrespect. Again with him being a complete jerk to me when it hadn’t been warranted at all. I never asked to stand between him and Bryce, to come across what I’d seen that horrible night.
My lips quivered. “How could you, Knight?”
He faced me then, looked me clear in my eyes. His hand lowered from his grandpa’s direction. “I’m assuming this is about my family’s decision to redirect some of its funds.”
“Redirection?” Mr. Reed exchanged a glance between us, then sighed as his attention drifted to me. “If the reallocation of the monies has affected you negatively, I’m sorry. The Reed family puts its money where it feels its needed more when it comes to campus activities and programs. I’m sure you understand.”