Just You

Jane Lark

A division of HarperCollinsPublishers

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Chapter One

Portia

My head hurt. It was like someone was firing a nail gun into the back of my skull. I must have drunk buckets last night.

The weight of my forearm lay on my forehead. I opened my eyes. I could see the sky through the skylight. The day was bleak. Gray. Miserable. Like I felt.

Memories flashed through my thoughts as if someone had switched a PowerPoint presentation running in my head, just images popping up, then sliding out. Shit. Justin. I sat up and my brain rolled forward like a ball of rock, hitting my skull… I felt ill.

I held still for a moment. I was going to throw up. I dived out of bed racing for the bathroom.

It was on days like this I missed people. Anyone. It would just be nice to have someone around who gave a shit sometimes.

Ten minutes later, with an empty belly, and a brain that didn’t belong to me, I came out of the bathroom and headed for the sink by the burner. I poured myself a glass of water, then reached to get some Advil from the cupboard beside it to kill my headache. I drank some of the water, swallowed the pills and then washed them down with more water. My brain throbbed steadily, still protesting about the amount of alcohol I’d drunk the night before.

I sat on the bed, with my feet on the floor, and let memories and images, play through my head. Oh my God. I tumbled back, lying across the mattress, with my hands gripping my forehead and partly covering my eyes––as if I could hide from the pictures, like a stupid kid playing peek-a-boo. The images kept telling me the things I’d done.

Shit.

Did I have sex with Justin?

I didn’t even like Justin like that.

“Oh my God, Portia. What have you done now?” I could remember him kissing me. I’d definitely kissed him. It was after we’d got in the pool. Jason had just disappeared. It was Jason my lonely brain had been interested in for weeks, though the guy was unavailable…

But Justin…

He wasn’t bad looking, but he was no Jesse Williams, and he was a joker, and a bit of a douche. He always hung around the girls at work, too much––so much it was kind of creepy. He was one of those guys who worked so hard at being nice it made you want to back away…

More images paraded in my head. We’d gone through all the clothes and stuff in Mr. Rees’s room looking for bikinis to wear in the pool… Yes, I had definitely been wearing one because there was an image in my head of his fingers slipping it aside to touch my breasts, and I could feel his fingers touching me too.

Shit. I shut my eyes, then opened them again as more pictures piled in.

His hand had been in my bottoms.

My palm gripped my forehead. When would I learn not to drink so much? Well it was January 1st; the day for resolutions.

I think I’d suggested looking for the pool too, but there had been four of us in it, not just me and Justin. It had been us and the other girls we sat near in the office, Crystal and Becky. Surely I wouldn’t have let him do stuff if the others were there. Please tell me, even out of my head, I had better morals than that.

His friend Jason had been locked in the bathroom earlier in the night, during the part of the night I could remember, I’d offered to go in there and hung around to talk to him on the terrace later while he’d texted someone. That was when he’d reminded me it was his “wife” he was texting.

I had to give up alcohol––it made my judgment too bad.

Shit. I bet Justin just spotted an easy chance.

I sat up again, reaching for my cell. There was only one way I was going to find out. I flicked up the messages, then texted: ‘Hey Becky. Happy New Year’s! Is your head as bad as mine? What the hell did I do last night?’ I tapped send on the text praying it wouldn’t come back with a hideous acknowledgement that, yes, I’d entertained them in the pool with a live porn show. But they’d have stopped us long before his hand had got in my bikini bottoms, wouldn’t they?

I had obviously been too drunk to stop it myself though.

My cell vibrated in my hand.

‘Happy New Year’s! We left before you. You were with Justin in the pool. I don’t know. What did you do? ;)’

‘Not much then probably. But I don’t remember.’

‘You’ll have to ask Justin?’

‘Think I’ll pass.’

I threw my cell on the bed beside me. I couldn’t even remember how I got home. Let alone if I got dressed after getting out the pool––and what did we do with the wet swimming stuff. Mr. Rees didn’t even know we’d snuck into the pool. My dad would go psycho if someone had done that in his house. Maybe that’s why my subconscious had thrown the idea in when I was drunk.

Maybe that was why I’d got in too deep with Justin––pay back. My dad would hate that too.

But why did I have to do it at the work party? That was really going to impress my boss. What if I’d stumbled back into his living room wearing his girlfriend’s bikini, dripping water, and puked on his polished marble floor?

I’d get the pointed finger tomorrow. You’re fired.

Dad would go super crazy if I told him I’d done something so embarrassing. He’d think it would impact on his reputation.

But I wasn’t telling him because I wasn’t going to lose my job, there would be a way to convince Mr. Rees to keep me on, if I had to. I’d worked out a hundred wiles for manipulating people in my years of growing up.

British boarding schools were full of stuck-up––get me I’m rich––bitches. You learned to be loud and stand up for yourself or you ended up the school dupe, laughed at and constantly bullied. I had got loud and I’d learned to win attention. Manipulation was an art I’d learned from my daddy though, not just school. But I wasn’t proud of that.

Well, New Year’s Day or not, it seemed to me the miserable weather, and my hangover, called for a day spent in bed watching any movie that didn’t take much brain power to follow it. I leaned over and picked up my laptop, then lay back down and flipped the lid open.

I went into Netflix, ignoring Twitter and Instagram, and everything else. I didn’t want to face any malicious office party pictures; I’d deal with them tomorrow. Today, I was all for pulling the bed covers over my head and hiding.

I scanned through the lists.

Justin

Fuck. My head felt like someone was banging it against a wall. Fucking free champagne. I wished I hadn’t indulged so aggressively. But then, hey––it was free.

An image of Portia flowed into my head––Portia in an emerald green bikini. All the girls had looked hot, but she’d looked the best, and she’d felt pretty hot in the pool too––when the others had gone.

Shit. My head.

“Justin! Justin!” My eight-year-old kid brother rushed into my room, thrusting the door aside, and then jumped on my bed. My head spun, and my belly did a full roll, as pain pierced through my forehead and out the back of my skull like someone fired a gun through it.

“Go steady––you pain in the butt.”

“It’s New Year’s, Mom’s cooking lunch, it’ll be ready soon. You’re lazy.”

“Cheers bro, but––get off, Dillon.”

He climbed off me with a huge grin and then ran away again.

“You getting up, man?” I looked up. Another of my brothers, Robin, stood in the doorway, his shoulder resting against the doorjamb.

We shared this room, but he looked like he’d been up and dressed for ages.

Robin was seventeen. Then there was Jake who was fourteen.

“You were in late last night.”

“Yeah.” I sat up. My brain rolled around in my head like a pinball. I needed food and coffee. I pulled my T-shirt on.

“Mom’s checked your cell.”

“Great. I’m twenty-two, why the fuck is she checking my cell?”

“For the same reason you check ours. ‘Cause she don’t want you getting into trouble.”

“Like I’d have a chance.”

Robin twisted his lips in a grin that mocked me. I screwed up my face at him, saying whatever, as I stood and pulled my jeans on over my boxers, then ran my fingers over my hair.

“You look fucked.”

“Don’t copy my bad language. Mum ’ll smack you ‘round the ear for it. Do as I say, not as I do…” But I wished I had got fucked last night. Nearly.

I got another twisted smile.

Robin had grown out of idolizing me long ago, but we still got on, and we talked a lot, about everything. He rarely talked to Mom. But I kept him talking to me ‘cause I didn’t want him falling in with any of the gangs in our neighborhood.

I think if he did have any trouble, he’d tell me.

I did look out for them, my brothers. All my brothers.

When I walked into the kitchen, I saw my cell on the counter next to Mom. She was mashing potatoes to go with the chicken that stood on the side. Lunch smelt good, spicy. My belly rolled over––hunger giving it a bite. That was all I needed to cure my hangover––food.

“Justin.” Mom looked up at me turning her cheek.

I leaned down and kissed it. “Morning, Mom.”

“Afternoon,” she corrected, “And where were you, child?”

I rolled my eyes. “At Mr Rees’s party, like I was last New Year’s Eve. I told you where I was going. I told you I’d be late.”

I knew why she was asking––for the same reason I checked up on Robin, Jake, and Dillon. ‘Cause she didn’t want me caught up in trouble––but she ought to know, I looked after myself. I’d got to twenty-two and stayed out of it.

“Mom, give me a little line, I’m not a kid. Trust me why don’t you…”

She smiled, still smashing the potatoes. I caught up my cell and shoved it in my back pocket.

Jake was sitting on the sofa watching Dillon’s cartoons, with his arms crossed over his chest. He was in a bad mood––but then the kid was always in a bad mood. It was a rite of passage for boys his age to be shitheads. A rite I hadn’t had chance to claim. But Robin had gone through it and come out the other side… I had my fingers crossed for Jake.

He didn’t talk to me much, but he talked to Robin. I figured if I kept Robin safe, Robin would do the same for Jake.

I hoped.

Mom started dishing up. “Wash up and sit at the table.”

Dillon ran off to the bathroom to wash his hands, and Robin followed, to check he did it. Jake didn’t move.

“Come on.” Mom urged. She turned with a pile of cutlery in her hand. I took it from her and laid it out on the table. Jake still hadn’t moved as Dillon and Robin came back.

I glanced over my shoulder at him. He was staring at the TV. Dillon sat down and Robin moved to collect the plates, as Mom finished them off with corn. Jake still hadn’t moved. I went over and knocked his leg with mine. He looked up.

With my gaze and a nod of my head I told him to get the fuck up, asshole. Mom worked hard for us. She’d been on her own for years, since before Dillon was born, but we’d never gone hungry or not had clothes. She deserved respect––even if she was like a bloody stalker some times.

I wasn’t gonna lie and say it didn’t annoy me. It annoyed me.

But she was like that because Dad had messed her around for years. He was a waster, a woman beater and a drug addict. She’d kicked him out when I was a little kid. He’d been released from jail for the fifth time, and when he’d crawled back and knocked on our door she’d pointed a finger at him and told him where to go, then slammed the door in his face.

Now her single-minded mission in life was that none of us would turn out like him.

That’s why I gave her leeway ‘cause out of all of us, I was the one who knew most about the things Dad had said and done.

For the last few years I’d spent my life trying to make it all up to her, and make her life easy––and that was why I was on the same mission as her––to make sure my brothers stayed out of trouble––and turned out nothing like the man who’s DNA ran in our blood.

Jake moved, finally, ‘cause he knew I was getting pissed off, and there was no point in messing with me. I’d lose my shit if he pissed me off.

I wasn’t letting any of my brother’s grow up like Dad. I didn’t accept any of their bullshit. At least Robin had hit the point that he understood that. Jake? I didn’t know about Jake… He was the odd one out, but only ‘cause he was at that obnoxious teen stage. He didn’t know any better. It was just instinct at his age to think of himself first.

I wished I’d had that chance.

Chapter Two

Justin

When I walked into the office my gaze honed in on Portia. She was sitting at her desk, with earphones in, typing up some dictation. Or maybe listening to her latest favorite song and pretending to type up dictation––I knew she did that. I walked past her. She didn’t acknowledge me, but I caught the color of her skin shifting up several levels of pink.

I smiled. Maybe if I’d been looking in a mirror it would have come out looking leery, but she didn’t look up at me, just stared at her screen, like two days ago her tongue hadn’t been in my mouth, and my fingers…

I walked over to the rack to strip off my jacket. Was she embarrassed about hooking up with me?

I turned and looked at her again. She was still staring at her screen with her fingers flying over the keyboard, but her face was nearly as red as the takeaway Starbucks cup sitting by her elbow. I wanted to laugh.

It looked like she was feeling awkward.

I wasn’t suffering. I had no complaints. I was super happy with the opportunity she’d given me… The girl was awesome, if a bit arrogant. But, shit, I’d never really had any expectation I could hook up with a pretty, money loaded, white girl like Portia.

On my way back, I swiped the usual no-nonsense ponytail she had her blonde hair confined in. One of her hands lifted off the keyboard. But then it fell and she didn’t look around.

Whenever I saw her outside work, her hair was always down. It had been down New Year’s Eve.

Her pretty red lip-gloss painted mouth, that had a natural perfect pout, stayed closed. Her lips were held tightly together as she focused on her screen, like her screen was the savior of the world.

She was hiding from me, without actually hiding. She didn’t want to face up to what had happened at the party. Clearly she did regret our little interlude.

Well, whatever. Who gave a shit?

I sat down––ignoring her too.

If that’s the way she wanted to play it––that’s the way we’d play it.

I had two pages of the magazine to pull together today. Vacations always had to be paid for, I’d be short of time today.

My mate Jason rocked up twenty minutes after me, just before nine, drawing a fine line between being on time and getting caught up in a pile of shit; especially as he’d had a bunch of time off with short notice before Christmas.

He threw his stuff down under the desk and glared at his computer, starting it up. He seemed in just as bad a mood as Portia.

“Where’d you go to New Year’s Eve, you just disappeared?”

“I had to go.” He looked up at me. “Rach texted.” That didn’t have a ring of truth, it stunk of an excuse.

“Wife-y got you on a ball and chain already?” The guy had got married about a week ago. I mean he was twenty-two and the girl was already knocked up, and he’d only met her two months ago. Fool. But then I’d never seen the girl, maybe she was that hot.

My screen pinged to say I’d got an email.

‘Can we get a coffee at lunchtime?’ It was from Portia.

I glanced over at her desk, but I couldn’t see anything other than her arm.

‘Okay. What time?’

‘12.30. Meet me in Starbucks.’

‘Ashamed of me, baby?’

There was no reply. I had a feeling the conversation was gonna go something like––don’t tell anyone I hooked up with you.

Well we were from different leagues. The girl was arrogant and preppy and she liked to stick her pretty little nose up in the air.

Her tastes had turned to Jason, she’d had her eye on him for weeks. Me… I was just the one who’d been there when she’d got drunk… When she was sober––I was way below her standards.

I said something about the party to Jason. He ignored me and glanced at Mr. Rees’s office. The boss wasn’t in yet.

Jason looked over to the door into the office.

I gave up trying to talk and focused on getting my pages done. The whole place was in a bad mood today.

At eleven-thirty, not that I was clock checking, Portia got up and headed for the restrooms. She was slender, but she was slender with hips. The girl had some junk in her trunk for sure, Beyoncé style, and she had a pencil skirt on today that exaggerated the movement of her hips as she walked across the open plan room weaving between desks. The movement thrust the image of her ass in an emerald bikini into my head. My temperature soared.

I got up, without even thinking about it––and followed.

When I got in there, I found myself hovering outside the women’s like a pervert.

I leaned against the wall, slipping my hands into the back pockets of my pants.

She took a couple of minutes to come out, but when she did her pretty pouted lips parted in an ‘o’ and she turned pink… tipping up her chin, and her pretty little nose, with a look that implied disgust, like I smelled bad.

I shifted off the wall and stepped forward. “Portia, we need to talk.”

“We’re going to talk, at lunchtime. Away from the office.” Her words were a sharp, crisp rejection; spoken in her slightly British––perfectly rounded and toned, I’m-up-here-and-you’re-down-there––accent. Then she just walked past me, her body expressing her usual demeanor that said: stay away from me, you’re worth nothing.

Shit. She was definitely regretting what had happened––awkward.

I went into the restroom but didn’t use it, just stared at myself in the mirror over the basins. I wasn’t that bad looking, was I? I ran my hand over my hair. I kept it buzzed short. I really didn’t think I was that bad?

Bad enough to regret.

But then I wasn’t rich and I wasn’t Jason––white, Mr. handsome and nice from-out-of-town. Nope. I was straight out of the ghetto. Not Portia’s type at all.

I was seriously surprised she’d gone anywhere near me if I was being honest with myself.

But dishonest… I wasn’t that bad, and persistence and a bit of charm usually paid off.

I washed my hands and went back into the office.

Mr. Rees came in a few minutes later. That would lift the mood. The man was a tyrant and as arrogant and ignorant as Portia. Really, what the fuck had made me want to kiss her… Oh yeah, her in a bikini.

I started talking to Jason, about the party again––about everything other than me and Portia in the pool. But I’d lay hot odds she was sitting at her desk listening, fearing I’d throw in that little fact. Then all of a sudden Jason got up…