by Anna Brooks
I blow out a breath and apologize. “I want this fucker, Kels. Please, just one more time.”
“Fine. The last time I saw him was a couple of weeks ago. He called me at about three in the morning, and instead of having his drunk ass in my apartment, I met him in the parking lot. I only had two hundred extra dollars, but he needed five more. He got mad and hit me. I ran inside and he left.” She’s void of all emotion. I’m starting to believe that maybe she’s not covering for him after all. Liars usually vary their story, but hers has stayed the exact same every time she tells it.
“He didn’t say why he needed the money?”
“No. But it’s either gambling or booze.”
I cross my arms and lean back in the kitchen chair I pulled across from her. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
She sits up straight and looks me in the eye. “My problem.”
“It’s not anymore.”
“He was my first love. I was so stupid. It really didn’t start out bad. He had nobody else then, and I know it hasn’t changed. He’s alone, and I feel like it’s my responsibility to do whatever I can to make sure he doesn’t end up dead. I broke up with him because of the gambling, but that doesn’t mean I don’t care about him at all. He’d never hit me before that night, either. So things must have gotten really bad for him.” She shrugs and closes her eyes, resting her head on the cushion. “He’s also never sent anybody to get money. I swear to you I have no clue who that guy was.”
“How often did he ask for money?”
“Only once a month or so. Not a lot. But it started getting more frequent, and I . . . Look, I’ve gotta tell you something, but I don’t want you to be mad.” Her eyes barely open, and she bites her lip.
“What?”
“Promise you won’t be mad.”
“As long as Mary doesn’t get hurt by it, there’s not much that could piss me off. Does it involve Mary?”
“No.”
“Then I promise.”
“That time you came home in the morning . . . and I was here.”
She said she came to feed Kat. I remember that. And with everything going on with Mary, I forgot to talk to Kelsey about it. “Yeah.”
“I lied. I spent the night there because I saw him walking up to the building. I’ve snuck into your place a few times to avoid him. I’m sorry; his visits were getting more frequent and I didn’t want to deal with him and—”
“Kels,” I cut her off. “I’m more pissed that you didn’t tell me. I don’t give a shit about you staying at my place to keep yourself safe.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry I lied to you.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I scrub my hands down my face. “I’m here right now as a friend, not a cop, okay?” She nods. “Let me know if you need anything. If you hear from him, if you see him, anything.” She nods again. “And if you get scared, just come over.”
“Thanks.”
I start to walk out but turn in her door. “You might wanna knock first, though.” Now that Mary’s here, I don’t want our privacy interrupted.
Kelsey laughs. “Yeah, okay.”
I get to my place, and I lose all the air in my lungs when my eyes find Mary naked on the bed, except for those damn gray boots that go up to her thighs.
She stands and walks toward me, swaying her hips with a naughty smirk on her lips. My dick is already hard for her, standing proud behind my zipper. She reaches me and takes my long-sleeve black thermal off then drops to her knees. Before she even touches me, my heart rate accelerates in anticipation of anything and everything she’s going to do.
Her hair is down again, so I push it to one side and hold it in my fist so I can watch. She pushes my pants and boxers to my knees and sucks me to the back of her throat.
“Jesus.”
She’s on a fucking mission, sucking me hard and fast, her fist matching the strokes of her mouth. Last night was painfully slow. She begged me to move faster, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to savor every second; I wanted it to last.
“Is this your idea of revenge, baby? Gettin’ down on your knees and sucking me so good I can hardly stand?”
She pulls me out but continues to stroke me with her hand. “Revenge? No,” she laughs. “I missed you today and wanted to suck your cock. Is that okay?”
“Fuck. Yeah, it is.”
She circles the tip with her tongue before sliding her warm, wet mouth around me again. It doesn’t take long until I’m almost there, so I lean down and lift her under her arms. I press her against the door then lift her by her butt. If she wants hard and fast, then that’s what she’ll get.
Her legs slide around my waist, and she reaches between us and grips my dick to align it with her dripping entrance. Nothing hotter than my girl getting wet from sucking my dick. I push balls deep in one thrust, and she screams.
Then I fuck her. Hard. Fast. Loud. “Is this what you want?”
“Yes!”
“Fuck, Mary.”
I start to slow down, ‘cause I’m already about to come, but she squeezes me with her thighs. “No. Don’t stop. I’m so close, please. Faster.” She pants out her words.
“Hold on to me.” She grips my shoulders and I tilt her by her ass a little bit then pound into her like she asked. I’ll always give my Mary anything she asks.
Chapter 20
Mary
AFTER BRANDON THOROUGHLY FUCKS me against the wall, he holds me as if I’ll break. He carries me to the shower, gently scrubs and rinses the suds off my body, and washes my hair. Then he wraps me in a towel and kneels behind me on his bed, combing through the wet strands. His dresser still holds the picture of us that he says he never took down.
“You don’t have to do that. It’s a rat’s nest.”
“I want to.” His voice is low and quiet; the only reason I hear is because he’s so close.
His eyes catch mine in the mirror and his lips tip up ever so slightly, embarrassed almost. I watch as his eyes follow his fingers, concentrating on every little move. He gets transfixed on my hair, rubbing the strands between his fingertips, carefully getting the knots out. There’s something so insanely sweet about it that it makes me blush.
He’s really not that much different from before—still stubborn, protective, sexy. I knew I always loved him, but I don’t think I even understood back then what being in love meant. His dad was right to hold Brandon back from dating me.
I’d like to think that nothing would have kept us apart, that nothing would have broken us. But who knows? He would have gone off to State, and I would have stayed home. Waiting. I planned to wait for him regardless. Being the star baseball player, I’m sure he would have been one of the most wanted guys on campus. Girls would have flocked to him, taunted and teased him. There’s no way he could have resisted all that temptation back then.
And being the amazing man he is, he wouldn’t have cheated on me. He would have come home and talked to me. Told me that he wanted to take a break or see other people. And I would have let him. It would have killed me, but I wouldn’t have had a choice.
Maybe everything really does happen for a reason. Maybe we were meant to be apart—to live without each other—so that when we got back together, not one millisecond is taken for granted. Things normal couples fight about, we laugh at. We don’t want to waste a breath speaking anything other than love.
“What are you thinking?” His soft voice by my ear startles me.
I meet his eyes in the mirror affixed to the dresser. “That maybe everything happened for a reason.”
His hands still in my hair for a brief moment, and then he nods. “Maybe. All I care about is now, though. That I have you and I never want to lose you. After last night . . .”
“I know.” I echo his fear. Being shot at certainly puts things into perspective even more. “It scared me, too. Makes you realize how quickly things can change.”
He
goes back to watching his hands work, and I sigh with contentment. Completely relaxed. Insanely at ease and wonderfully happy. Which makes me feel like shit since Kelsey is sitting next door recovering from a head wound. I checked on her as soon as she got back, but she was tired so I left her to sleep.
“Did you find out anything else from Kelsey?”
“Not really.” He tells me what she told him about her ex.
“Oh, my God.”
“What?”
“That was them,” I say it more to myself but, of course, he hears me.
“Who?”
“The night I couldn’t sleep. I was looking out the window, and I saw two people in the parking lot. He hit her and then drove away.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Shock overrides the anger . . . but his tone is sharper than normal.
“Because I didn’t see anything that would really help. Just a man and a woman, their shadows, really. It was dark.”
A frustrated look passes over his face, but he gives me a gentle nod and smile then presses a kiss to my temple and hands me my pajamas. I dress, crawl under the covers, and snuggle up to him. He wraps his arms around me.
“I’m exhausted,” he sighs.
“Yeah. Me, too.”
“Love you.”
“You, too.”
My eyes become heavy, and just as I’m drifting off I hear him mumble, “Not gonna lose you again.”
* * *
“How on Earth have you never seen Miss Congeniality?” I shriek at Kelsey.
It’s been a week since the incident, and she’s keeping me company . . . or I’m keeping her company. Either way, I’m putting my all-time favorite movie in the DVD player.
“I don’t know. Not much of a movie person, I guess.” She shrugs.
I cup my hands around my mouth and try to make my voice deep, like one of those infomercial guys. “Well, get comfortable and prepare yourself for something amazing.”
Like a child, I hop on the couch next to her and curl my legs under me. This movie makes me feel young. Fresh and carefree.
“Why do you like it so much?”
“What’s there not to love?” I realize I look like an idiot with my hand on my heart, as if I’m professing my undying love for a movie, so I move it away and grab a handful of popcorn. “Everything. The whole ugly duckling thing. How funny it is. And most important, the line about April twenty-fifth.”
She looks at me like I’m crazy, a grown-ass woman getting so excited about a movie. I shrug and point at the screen when it starts. “Just watch. You’ll love it.”
Like always, the movie pulls me in and I become absorbed. Laughing and even tearing up. Kelsey seems to be enjoying it too, if her laughter is a sign of how great this movie is. As soon as the credits roll, I give her an I told you so look.
“Okay, okay. You were right. It was good. I liked it.”
“I knew you would.”
“Why do you like the scene so much about that day in April? You were mesmerized watching it.”
The first time I saw it, I was in shock because that’s my and Brandon’s birthday. It’s not every day you hear your birthday mentioned in a movie. I know it has nothing to do with me, but it was so cool to see. I ran to Brandon’s house and forced him to sit with me and watch it. Since that point on, it was our thing, to say the lines from the movie on our birthday.
“Brandon and I have the same birthday. April twenty-fifth.”
She smiles knowingly. “That makes sense. And hey.” Her fingers swipe her cell phone screen, and she laughs. “I can’t believe I’m so out of it that I have to look at my phone to check a calendar. Guess what tomorrow is?” she sing-songs.
April twenty-fifth. “I know.” Even I can hear the skepticism in my voice.
“Why don’t you seem happy about it?”
“It’s just . . .” I chew on my thumbnail, contemplating how much I want to divulge. I really like Kelsey. We’ve grown close over the past week, but she doesn’t know details of my past. Char is also a friend, but she’s Brandon’s sister-in-law. Not that I don’t trust her, but I worry she’d tell Travis and he would tell Brandon.
Deciding I want to get this off my chest, I tell Kelsey, “I know you know I grew up with Brandon.”
She nods. “Yeah. You guys were really good friends.”
“Right. Well, I went away for a while, and we recently got back together. Again, as you know.”
“Yup.”
“It sounds so stupid saying it out loud.” My fingers twirl my hair. Stupid, nervous habit.
“Hey.” Her voice softens. “It’s okay. You can tell me.”
“I don’t think he’s going to like what I got him. And before you say he’ll love whatever it is, you have to understand that I never had much when I was growing up. So the gifts I got him were miniscule compared to the things he would get me. But he always loved them because I put a lot of thought into them.”
“Okay.” Her nose scrunches slightly, trying to figure out my angle. “That makes sense.”
“But this year, I don’t know what he wants. I haven’t seen him in so long, and it’s killing me that I had to get him something generic. When he opens it, I’m afraid to see the disappointment when he realizes how little I know him now.” I untuck my legs and set my feet flat on the floor, picking at the imaginary lint on my pants.
“What did you get him?”
A puff of air passes between my lips. “A new wallet. A movie. Some cologne and a hoodie.”
“Mary, those are all great gifts. I’m sure he’ll love them. Don’t beat yourself up. You can’t expect to know everything about him if it’s been so long. Maybe he’s feeling the same way?”
“Not likely.”
“All it’ll take is a little more time and I’m sure you’ll know everything again.”
Her words make sense. They do. But these unwanted feelings of insecurity and doubt creep up just when I think everything is almost back to normal. Right when I begin to believe I can be normal.
“I’ve already wasted enough time.”
* * *
“Delivery for Ms. Benson.”
“Yeah. That’s me.” I offer a confused smile for the deliveryman.
“Sign here, please.”
I accept the clipboard and scribble my name on the X. I just got home from my morning class, and I haven’t even figured out what I’m eating for lunch.
“We’ll be right back.”
“Okay,” I say to his back, still confused.
A trail of men begin climbing the stairs and I gasp and step back as vase after vase of pink, purple, and red sweet peas is set down on any and every available surface.
“There’s more,” they laugh. “Keep the door open.”
After several trips, I thank the men and close the door. My back sags against the cold wood while my knees buckle and I fall to my butt. Hundreds of flowers surround me, their sweet scent hugging me, reminding me what a perfect man Brandon is.
“Oh, my God,” I whisper, still processing.
This morning, Brandon woke me up slow and sweet, loving me, holding me, making promises, cursing the past, and securing the future. This day feels like a fresh start for all the right reasons.
A vase on the kitchen counter with a card sticking out draws my attention. I crawl over and pull myself up, legs still too weak to function properly. This is what he does to me. He has the ability to cause lower limb paralysis.
I suck in a deep breath and pull myself up. My fingers shake as I open the card, and his handwriting jumps out on the small cardboard square.
For all the years I missed
Happy Birthday, Mary
Love you
I hold the card against my rapidly beating heart and take a few collective breaths. That is so him—short and to the point. Guilt begins to fester, but I push it back and focus on the happiness, the elation, I feel because of this wonderful man. Yes, we missed many years. But we have a ton more to look forward to.
I need to see him. With a final look at what can only be described as a flower shop on steroids, I grab my purse and force my feet to walk to my beat-up old car. He doesn’t hold steady hours, and I don’t know if he’ll even be at the police station, but I have to try.
The excitement quickly turns to nerves when I step inside and glance at the busy building. People, in and out of uniform, bustle around me. Some on their phones, but most with a clear destination in sight. If it weren’t for the woman who apologized when she bumped into me, I’d think I was invisible.
What if he doesn’t want me here? Has he even told anyone about me? Shit. I begin to turn around to leave when his voice calls my name and makes me freeze.
His handsome face comes into my line of vision and I immediately feel stupid for causing the worry lines to appear on his forehead. “You okay?”
My throat catches when I begin to talk, so I clear it and try again. “Yes. Fine. I got the flowers and I . . . I just had to see you. Wanted to thank you. I know you’re probably busy . . .”
“I was on my way to a meeting, but I’m never too busy for you.” His soothing voice calms me and my confidence builds again.
“They’re beautiful. Thank you.” Conscious of the people around us, I place a gentle kiss on his cheek.
“You’re beautiful.”
A blush creeps up my neck, and I bite the inside of my cheeks to keep the dopey smile off my face. “I can’t believe you did that. There are so many!”
“I’d do it every day if it means I get to see this smile on your face. I’ve missed this smile.” His thumb traces my lips and it takes everything in me not to suck it into my mouth. “Uh-uh,” he scolds. “Not til later.”
I sigh and lean into his chest. Our arms wrap around each other, and the stubble on his chin tickles my ear. My birthday wish is to stay here like this forever in his arms, where the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
“I love you,” I murmur into his chest.
The beat of his heart speeds up and his arms hold a little tighter. “Love you, too. So damn much.”
“Hey, Parker. Interrogation’s open if you need a room,” a familiar male voice calls out.
Brandon’s lips form a smile against me and he presses them against my temple then pulls back. “Fuck off, Jay!”