“You’re seriously wasted.” I drop the bra onto the floor, unable to take my eyes off her long, lean legs, flat, inked stomach, her perky nipples.
“So what? So are you.” She backs up until her legs brush the bed, and then she lowers herself down onto the mattress, crooking a finger at me to follow, waiting for me to go get her. And I want to badly, but I need to be a good guy, even if it’s just once in my life.
“I’m always drunk,” I admit truthfully, slowly crossing the room toward her. “You on the other hand usually aren’t.” I stop just short of the bed where her legs are dangling over. “In fact, I’ve only seen you drunk once.”
She gives me a blank stare. “Can you seriously tell me that you’ve never slept with a girl that was drunk before?”
I shake my head. “But you’re different.” I reach out and place my hand on her cheek, intoxicated enough that I don’t give a shit how emotional I’m being. “And I don’t want to sleep with you just because you’re drunk and you’re hurting over something... I want it to mean something… for both of us.” I blow out a breath, my c**k getting seriously angry with me. “But if you want to talk about it, we can. In fact, I wish you would.”
She lets out a sharp laugh. “I don’t want to talk at all.” She leans away from my hand, her expression hardening and filling with panic. “Why are you trying to be all chivalrous right now, when hours ago you were so ready to f**k me?”
“Because I got caught up in the moment earlier,” I tell her, letting my hand fall to my side. “And I’m not saying I don’t want you. Trust me, I do, but I’ve just been thinking,” I take a deep inhale and let it out slowly before I sit down on the bed beside her, “About how we haven’t really talked about anything. And I know you don’t want to, which is fine, but I just don’t think we should sleep together. Not until we’ve confronted the stuff between us.” God, this is a first for me. Naked girl in front of me, legs spread open, and I’m not willing to thrust my c**k inside her.
I wait for her to get pissed at me, but instead she starts breathing heavily as if she’s struggling to get air into her lungs and her gaze is sweeping the room, as if she’s searching for a way out, this panicked frenzy taken over the drunken look in her eyes. I’m not sure where it stemmed from so abruptly, but I know enough about panic attacks to know she’s about to have one.
“Violet, relax.” I put a hand on her knee, trying to get her to look at me. “I’m not going anywhere and I’m not going to make you talk about anything you don’t want to.”
Still breathing erratically, she looks down at my hand on her knee then wrenches her leg away from me. “Don’t touch me.” She jumps up from the bed and grabs the slip from off the floor, tugging it over her head. Then she starts for the door, ready to walk out. I get up to grab her, even though I know it’s probably not a good idea to touch her when she’s in this state of mind. But like hell I’m letting her go out there in a piece of fabric that barely covers her ass and shows the outline of her nipples.
“Please calm down.” I pause as her eyes land on me, wild panic flowing from them. I put my hands up, letting her know I’m not going to touch her. “I think you’re having a panic attack.”
“No, I’m not.” Terror fills her expression as she looks from me to the door and then her gaze lands on the window. Without saying another word, she rushes to the window and throws it open, a hot breeze gusting in.
“God dammit, Violet, stop it.” I hurry to her, snagging her arm before she can climb out the window, panicking as I think of Amy. We’re on the second floor and even though she could be okay jumping out, I’m not going to take that risk. “If you get dressed then I’ll let you go out the door…. I just didn’t want you walking out dressed in that.”
“Let me go.” She jerks her arm away from me, glaring at me. “That isn’t what this is about.” Then she swings her legs out of the window, but I grab the back of her dress and pull her to me. She fights against me, wiggling her arms and legs, writhing her body as I wrap my arms around her and pull her back to me. “Let me go… let me go…” she gasps, pushing back against me.
I rock her back and forth and kiss her head. “No, not until you tell me what’s going on.”
“There’s too much…” her voice cracks and even though I can’t see her face, I think she’s crying. “I need to turn it off…” she starts massaging her chest as if it’s tender “It hurts…” Another gasp, then another.
I hug her against me, trying to figure out what I just witnessed and how to calm her down. I’m not sure if she was actually going to jump or if she was just thinking about it, but Jesus, what if she was? What if things are so bad she’s ready to take pain over anything else?
“Please, let me go…” she begs between gasps, tearing my heart in half with the agony in her voice. “I just need to sit in the window for a moment… see it… and I’ll be okay…” She tries to suck air in her lungs, but the anxiety is too great and I can tell she’s not breathing very well.
She’s going to blackout and I know I need to calm her down somehow, but I honestly have no idea how. When I get riled up like this, I either drink, gamble recklessly, or start fights. I want none of that for her so instead I turn her around so she’s facing me. She’s too weak to really fight me, too focused on trying to breathe. Tears stain her green eyes and face, mascara running down her cheeks as she refuses to look me in the eye.
“Violet, look at me,” I say in a soft but steady voice I’m pretty sure I’ve never, ever used before. I cup her face with one hand, while supporting her weight in the other. When she shakes her head, more tears streaming down her face, I try again in the gentlest voice I can summon. “Baby, look at me.”
Her eyelids flutter as she tips her head up, the light reflecting in her glossy pupils. But she makes eye contact with me, which is surprisingly intense, considering how exhausted she looks.
“I don’t want to feel this way,” she whispers, tears rolling down her cheeks. “I want to feel something else… not this… not all this pain… I don’t even know where it came from. One minute I was drunk and then you turned me down and I…” she trails off, sucking in a breath.
“I’m so sorry, Violet. For causing you pain.” God, kill me now. This is too much. Too unbearable, seeing her like this.
“Stop apologizing… It’s not even your fault… it’s your mom’s… it’s Preston’s for making me do all that stuff… It’s my own damn fault for not fighting him harder… for going back… for not just being able to let go of shit…” She starts to sob, drunken tears and I wonder if she’ll even be able to remember any of this in the morning. One thing’s for certain, I sure as hell will, especially the part about Preston. “If you’d just let me near the window….” She inhales, forcing oxygen into her lungs as she opens her eyes to look at me again. “Just let me calm myself down… this would all be better.” Her speech is a little slurred from the alcohol and it looks like she’s fighting exhaustion, probably from the panic attack. I’m guessing if she was more alert and sober then she’d not be openly admitting this to me.
“You want to jump out the window to make yourself feel better?” I choke on the idea of Violet hurting herself.
She shakes her head. “No, I just want to think about it… I need to feel the rush, not this.” She puts a hand on her chest and presses her heart as if it’s aching. “Please, Luke, just let me go and everything will be okay.”
I shake my head. “No, I can’t do that… ever…” My voice is strained as I stand us both to our feet and support most of her weight. Then without saying anything, I pick her up and walk back to the window, not letting her go when I set her down; even when she climbs up in the windowsill and lets her legs hang down the other side.
It starts to make sense a little, bit by bit, piece by piece, how Violet never can seem to comprehend danger, at least that’s what I thought. But now, I get that she understands it, she just welcomes it. In fact, it seems to settle her down like booze and gambling do to me.
After what seems like a thousand deep breaths, she finally relaxes against me. “It’s not the same with you holding me,” she mutters, but she doesn’t try to slip out of my arms or tell me to let her go. She just leans her head against my chest and I rest my chin on top of her head, holding on for dear life, praying to God we both don’t fall.
Chapter 12
Violet.
The first thing that comes to my mind when I wake up is that I can remember losing it. Completely and utterly losing it right in front of Luke. I was so drunk I didn’t give a shit, even when he looked like I was scaring the crap out of him. But when morning rolls around, it’s a whole other story.
When I open my eyes and notice the heavy weight on my side. I realize that it’s Luke’s arm and that we’re spooning in the bed, our bodies so close to each other there’s no room for anything else. I’ve got my ass pressed against his manly part, which is gracing me with its morning wood. He’s got his face pressed into the back of my neck, his warm breath caressing my skin and our legs are tangled together, the slip I have on riding up so I’m barely covered up at all and his hand is resting softly on my side. The smell of him overwhelms me and all I can think is please, just freeze this moment right here and never let me move forward or backward again.
I’m surprised how content I feel, especially after the drama of last night. But maybe that’s just denial. I don’t want to admit that I got so trashed that I completely fell apart and he discovered my dirty little secret. God knows what all I told him… I remember some stuff about pain… and Preston… dammit, did I tell him about the bruises and the blowjob?
I think about lifting his arm up and sneaking out before I can find out. Finding the nearest bus stop and going home to avoid confrontation. But technically I don’t have a home, so it’d just be me going back to Laramie and trying to find a bench to sleep on until I can come up with an alternative living situation.
“How are you feeling?” Luke’s voice dusts the back of my neck as he presses a soft kiss to my neck, right where my tattoos are, startling me.
My body twitches as he brushes my hair away from my shoulder and begins tracing gentle circles on it with his finger. “Fine, I guess,” I tell him. “I have a little bit of a headache but nothing a few pain killers won’t cure.” I force my tone to be light, hopefully he’ll play along and pretend, let me stay in my land of make believe.
“What about the other stuff?” His hand slowly slides from my shoulder, down my side, then rests on the side of my leg, bare skin to bare skin, his palm right over the bruises.
I squeeze my eyes shut and take several deep breaths before I can speak. “I’m not sure what to say… I’m sorry.”
His hand tenses on my leg. “For what?”
I open my eyes and stare at the wall. “For turning all psychopath on you last night.”
“You didn’t go all psychopath on me last night. You had a f**king panic attack, which I totally get. Trust me. I’ve had my fair share of them.” A pause, then his hand glides back up my body and neck, residing on my jawline. He turns my head toward him, forcing me to rotate my body with it so I’m facing him. He looks so worn out, the circles under his eyes even more defined and his skin even paler than usual. He’s shirtless, the blanket covering just his bottom half so I can see his bare chest. He’s still in shape and everything, but he looks like he’s lost some weight. It’s starting to concern me, like maybe he’s not taking care of himself enough with his diabetes, but how do I bring it up to him? “I want you to tell me what happened with Preston.”
I shake my head, my lips trembling as I smash them tightly together, weak just with the mention of his name. “I can’t.”
“I know it’s hard,” he says, his fingers spreading across my cheek. “But I need you to tell me… if he hurt you then I—”
I cover his mouth with my hand. “I don’t want you hurting him,” I state firmly. “And not because I care about him at all—I don’t want you getting hurt.” I wait a minute then lower my hand.
He’s grinding his teeth in frustration. “If I promised you I wouldn’t hurt him, would you tell me?” It seems like it takes a lot of self-control for him to say it.
He wants me to willingly talk about my problems? There’s a new one. “I hate talking about stuff aloud,” I admit. “Don’t you think it’s so much easier just to keep stuff to yourself? Especially when you’re the reason it happened it the first place? I mean, it’d be pretty pathetic for me to whine about anything that happened when I walked straight into it.”
He considers what I said, then stuns me when I see a flicker of anger transpire in his eyes. “I used to think it was better to keep things bottled up,” he says. “But I’m not so sure anymore. Not since I met you… And you running away, to Preston’s, that wasn’t your fault. Yeah, I wish you would have stayed…but completely get why you left.”
“I should have came back after you called the police and turned your mom in… things would have been less horrible if I had,” I mutter, then swallow hard, my mind racing with every bad choice I’ve made. “It wasn’t like I fought him or anything. It was our deal while I stayed there.” Air in, air out. Breathe. “He gives me a roof over my head and in return I have to touch him… at least that’s what it was in the beginning. But then a week ago, I messed up a stupid deal and he got super pissed and kind of forced me down on my knees to,” I make a motioning gesture with my hand, “Well, you know. And that’s where the bruises came from. I hit my leg on the bed when he was shoving me to my knees,” I say. Luke’s face turns from pale to red, his breathing quickening, his fingers going stiff on my cheek as if battling the urge not to ram his fist into something. I feel the need to add something. “You can’t get mad at him. In fact, you should be mad at me. I should have never gone back to him. I would have been better going and living out on the streets, but I was too scared to do that again and honestly, for some reason, I didn’t want to be completely alone in the world yet and Preston is the only family I have, as f**ked up as that is. I was weak and I know better than to let myself get that way.” I shrug and continue. “The stuff that happens to me—the messes I get myself into—are my fault. In fact, it’s kind of my thing. I’m careless and I don’t think things through and this is where it’s gotten me. Homeless, famililess. And now I’m paying for my mistakes.”