- -
- 100%
- +
My brain short-circuited the moment it fully recognized that Jax was kissing me—that, in fact, his lips really were on mine.
And it wasn’t just a peck on the lips.
No, it wasn’t deep and there weren’t tongues involved, nothing like the kisses I read about in romance novels, the wet kind that seemed a little gross to me, but I imagined, if done right, would have me dropping my shorts like no tomorrow, but this kiss . . . it was real.
His lips were melded to mine, and I was awed by the way they felt. They were soft, but firm, and I didn’t know one thing could be both. They followed the curve of my lips, as if he were just mapping them out.
My arms were frozen at my sides, but I could feel my body start to lean forward, off the wall and toward his. Our bodies didn’t connect, though, which was probably a good thing.
I was already only seconds away from combusting.
Jax lifted his head from mine, and I realized then that my eyes were closed. Even so, I could feel his gaze on my warm cheeks, on the tip of my nose . . . my lips.
“You kissed me,” I whispered, and yeah, it was a stupid statement, but I was feeling pretty stupid.
“Yeah.” His voice sounded deeper, gruffer. Sexier. “I did.”
I forced my eyes open and was staring at an unofficial member of the Hot Guy Brigade.
He leaned in, his arm against the wall taking his weight as he dropped his hand from my chin. “I don’t kiss girls that I don’t find hot as hell or beautiful. So, you get my point?”
There were fuzz balls in my brain. “You kissed me to prove a point?”
A ghost of a smile appeared. “Felt like it was the quickest way to prove the point.”
That it was. I didn’t know if I should feel offended that he kissed me to prove a point and that most likely meant there was nothing else driving the kiss, or if I should be flattered that by kissing me he thought I was hot as hell and beautiful.
I didn’t know what to think or say, so I just slumped back against the wall as he pushed off it. Half grin in place, he reached over and opened the door.
“Nothing like that will ever happen again in this bar,” Jax said, and then he was out the door.
He’d said that like it was a promise—a promise there was no way he could keep, but it was another . . . sweet thing to do.
I closed my eyes again, letting out a breath as I ducked my chin to my chest. Three weeks ago, I was living in Shepherdstown with my Three F’s, close to graduating, and this bar wasn’t even a forethought in my head. My life had been focused around goals—graduating, finding a job in nursing, and reaping the benefits of following through with said goal.
That was all.
Weeks later, everything had changed. Here I was, standing in Mona’s with an MIA mom, no money, my future completely up in the air, and an unofficial member of the Hot Guy Brigade had kissed me.
Nothing planned about that and none of those things fell into my carefully crafted Three F’s plan.
But that kiss . . . to prove a point or not, it had been important. Really important. After all, it had been my first real kiss.
For about a billion reasons, I was grateful when Pearl appeared in the hall, telling me she was taking me home. Although I hated being shuffled around like I had no say in what I was doing, after what had gone down with Mack and then Jax, I wasn’t against getting out of the bar and clearing my head of the nasty and the not so nasty.
I’d grabbed my purse and said my good-byes to Clyde. On the way out, I told myself not to look for Jax, and I managed to listen to that demand for about two seconds. At the door, I glanced at the busy bar. Jax was there with Roxy. Both were smiling and laughing as they were working the customers.
Roxy looked up, giving me a quick, distracted wave, which I returned.
Jax didn’t even look up.
A twinge of unease, and something far more annoying and ridiculous, lit up my chest. I stomped the feeling down as I followed Pearl outside and focused on getting my car back ASAP the next day.
Pearl chatted idly as she drove me to the house, once again without me having to give her directions. I liked her, and being that she was probably the same age as my mom, I kind of imagined that this was what my mom would look like if she hadn’t decided to go traipsing through trashville.
When Pearl arrived at the house, she stopped me before I climbed out. “Oh, I almost forgot.” Stretching back against the seat of her older-model Honda, she pulled out a wad of cash. “The boys who ordered the wings left you a tip.”
Ah, the cop table. Smiling, I took the money, already knowing that it was way too much for a normal tip. “Thank you.”
“No problem. Now get your butt inside and get some rest.” She flashed a big smile.
I opened the door. “Drive safe.”
Pearl nodded and she waited until I’d unlocked the door and stepped inside. Flipping on the hallway light, I tried to ignore the nostalgic feeling washing over me. My eyes closed and I was transported back to when I was sixteen, coming home late from spending the evening with Clyde at the bar. I didn’t have to imagine the sound of Mom’s laugh. She always had a good laugh—boisterous and throaty, the kind of laugh that drew people to her, but the downside of her laugh was she didn’t do it often. And when she did, it usually meant she was flying so high she could lick the clouds.
That night had been bad.
The house had been packed with her friends, other overgrown children who probably had real kids at home and were more interested in partying than being responsible.
I walked down the hallway, seeing what had been there five years ago. Some stranger dude passed out on the living room floor. Mom on the couch, bottle in her hand; another guy I’d never seen before had his face buried in her neck and a hand between her legs.
The guy on the floor hadn’t moved.
Mom had barely been aware that I was home. It had been the guy all up on her that had noticed and they had called me to join in, to party. I’d gone upstairs and had wanted to pretend that they weren’t there.
Except that guy on the floor still hadn’t moved for an hour, and finally someone in the house had grown concerned.
He’d been dead for God knows how long.
I stared at the spot near the couch, shuddering, because I could see the guy there still. Shirtless. Dirtied jeans. He lay facedown and his arms were awkward at his sides. People had bailed out of the house faster than I could blink, leaving Mom and me alone with a dead guy on the living room floor. Police had shown. It hadn’t been pretty. Paperwork had been filed, but no one from child services showed. No one came around. Not a real big surprise there.
Mom had gotten cleaned up after that . . . well, for a few months.
That had been a good couple of months.
Shaking my head, I dropped my purse on the couch and pushed those thoughts away. I reached into my pocket, pulling my hair up into a quick twist.
Not wanting to spend another night on the couch and not up to staying upstairs, I finally caved and stripped the sheets off the bed downstairs and threw them in the washer with the blanket I’d found in the upstairs linen closet, resisting the urge to Lysol the hell out of the mattress. The only thing stopping me was that the mattress seemed relatively new, and there were no suspicious stains or smells radiating from it.
Feeling antsy and full of energy instead of tired, I cleaned up Mom’s bedroom, throwing everything that looked like trash in the black garbage bags I’d found in the pantry, and then placed the bags on the back porch. There hadn’t been any clothes in the tall dresser and the vanity, something I hadn’t checked before, and there were just a few jeans and sweaters in the closet. What I found on the floor didn’t add up to a full wardrobe.
Further proof that Mom really had hit the road.
I didn’t know what to think about that or how to feel. She stole from me, throwing a major wrench into my life. She’d stolen from others. And she was out there, either freaking out or so messed up she didn’t even know what she’d done.
Digging the money out of my pocket, I counted out thirty bucks and added that to the twenty dollars the cops had left. That amount seemed excessive, and probably had more to do with pity than my service, but fifty in tips my first night wasn’t bad. I stashed the cash in my wallet after moving my purse into the downstairs bedroom.
Sighing wearily, I made up the bed and put away the clothes I’d brought with me. I took a quick shower and dried off in what Mom used to call her “cozy” bathroom. Cozy, because if you spread your legs and stretched out your arms, you could pretty much touch the sink, bathtub, and toilet.
As I turned to head out into the bedroom, the fogged-over mirror caught my attention. I don’t know why I did what I did next. It had been years since I even briefly entertained the idea, but I leaned forward, swiping my hand across the mirror, clearing it.
Maybe it was the stress of everything going on. Maybe it was what the guy—Mack—had said at the bar. Maybe it was Jax and his kiss. Probably the kiss, but it didn’t matter, because I was doing what I was doing.
I’d always avoided looking at myself, especially immediately afterward, and then through the many skin grafts that came afterward. Like I said—years since I looked at my body in the mirror. It was just something that I didn’t allow myself to do.
I bit down on my lower lip as I forced myself to really look. Not a glimpse, and my next breath lodged somewhere between my sternum and my throat.
My collarbone was okay, a peachy cream complexion. I had a great skin tone, perfect for piling on makeup and showing it off. My upper chest was smooth. Then my gaze dipped.
Everything looked like a fucked-up Picasso painting from there.
The same kind of scar that screwed up my face had gotten a hold of my left breast, slicing right over the top of the swell, across the areola, narrowly missing my nipple. I was lucky. Having only one nipple would suck. Not that anyone saw either of my nipples, but still, I didn’t want to think of myself as One Nipple Calla. My other breast was fine. Both were decent sized, I thought, but the skin between them was discolored, a lighter color. Second-degree burns. Scarring was just pigment changes, but then there was my stomach.
I looked like an old couch that someone had used different flesh tone fabrics to piece together. Seriously. Third-degree burns were no joke. None whatsoever.
Patches of the skin were a deep pink, other parts faded to a rose color, and otherwise smooth, but the edges of the scars along my side were raised. I could see that in the mirror. Kind of looked like a birthmark, but when I twisted around and craned my neck, I saw my back. From just above my rump and all the way across my shoulder blades, it matched my front, except the scars were worse, rugged and puckered skin, almost wrinkled in some areas, and a much deeper color, almost brown.
There had been no skin grafts there.
Dad had left by that point, disappearing into the drama- and-grief-free great unknown. When I graduated from high school, with the help from Clyde, I’d managed to track down my father.
He’d remarried.
He was living in Florida.
He didn’t have any kids.
And after one phone call with him, I knew he didn’t want to rekindle any father/daughter bond.
So he’d been gone when it came time to do the skin grafts on my back, and Mom . . . well, I guessed she’d forgotten about the doctor appointments or stopped caring or something.
The backs of my eyes stung as I forced the air to become unstuck. The pain from the burns had been the worst thing I’d ever experienced in my life, at least physically. Many times, even as young as I had been, I had wanted death in those hours and days afterward. The scars didn’t hurt now. They just looked like crap.
I closed my eyes as I turned back around, but I could still see myself. That hadn’t been pretty. Could’ve been worse. When I’d been on the burn floor, I’d seen worse. Little kids that played with fire. Adults in fiery car accidents. Skin literally melted. And then there were the people—the kids—who didn’t survive fires, be it the heat or the smoke. So I knew it could’ve been worse, but no matter what I did, no matter how far I traveled or how long I stayed away, the night of the fire had left its mark on me, physically and emotionally.
And it had done a number on Mom.
Kissing.
I bit down on my lip until I tasted blood.
Kissing was stupid. Crushing on Brandon had been dumb. Kissing Jax James was even dumber. Everything was dumb.
Hurrying away from the mirror, I changed into a pair of cotton sleep shorts with a long-sleeve thin shirt. For some reason, no matter the time of year, this house always stayed cool and could get downright chilly at night, so I pulled on a pair of long socks to keep my toesies warm.
I headed into the kitchen, tummy grumbling, but the trip was pretty pointless because all there was in the pantry was saltine crackers. Grabbing the box, I promised myself that no matter what condition my car was in, I was going to the grocery store and spending some of that fifty dollars on oodles and noodles.
Taking a packet of what I hoped wasn’t stale crackers and the leftover tea I’d had last night into the living room, I came to a startled stop when I heard a knock on the front door.
I dropped the packet of crackers on the couch cushion and turned to look at the clock on the wall. If the time was accurate, it was almost one in the morning, so what the hell?
Standing still, I winced when I heard the knock come again. Nervous, I spun and hurried quietly to the narrow and short hallway. Stretching up, I peered through the peephole.
I frowned.
From what I could see, no one was there. Pressing my hands against the door, I stared through the peephole. The porch was empty.
“What the hell?” I muttered.
Thinking I might be going crazy, I rocked back and unlocked the door. Opening it up about a foot, I immediately recognized my mistake. The porch hadn’t been empty. The guy had been sitting down and he rose suddenly, causing my heart to throw itself against my ribs painfully.
What I could see of the guy in the dim light wasn’t good. Tall and really skinny, he had shoulder-length blond hair that was stringy and greasy. His face was gaunt and lips chapped. Yuck. I didn’t want to see anything else. I inched back, clutching the doorknob, about to shut it when he slammed a large hand into the door.
“I need to see Mona,” he rasped in a scratchy, dry voice.
“She’s n-not here. Sorry.” I started to shut the door again, but he got one leg in and then pushed—pushed harder than I thought he could, flinging me back. I bounced into the wall, cracking the back of my head. There was a flare of pain that quickly spiked when the door flew at me, smacking into my forehead.
“Holy crap,” I gasped.
The greasy guy stepped inside, glancing at where I was smashed like a gross bug. “Sorry,” he grunted, hauling the door off me and kicking it closed with a scuffed-up biker boot. “I need to see Mona.”
I blinked a couple of times as I pressed my palm against the side of my head. For a moment, I think I saw birdies.
“Mona!” the man shouted, moving down the hall.
Wincing, I dropped my hand and straightened just as the guy walked into the living room, still shouting my mom’s name like she was going to magically appear out of thin air.
I hurried down the hall, still somewhat in a daze. “She’s not here.”
Greasy Guy stood in front of the couch, his shoulders hunched. In the brighter light, I really didn’t want to see what I saw. The man was dirty—his shirt and his jeans. His arms were bare, the insides of them covered in red, puckered marks.
Shit.
Track marks.
Greasy Guy was strung-out.
Shit galore.
“Mona isn’t here,” I tried again, my heart kicking into high gear, which caused the ache in my temple to feel like a miniature jackhammer.
He turned to me, his jaw working. “She owes me.”
Shit galore everywhere and on my shoes.
Greasy Guy turned to me, and his eyes were a pale blue, unfocused. I wasn’t sure he even saw me. “She’s got shit here. I know she does.”
My eyes widened. There had so better be no shit here.
Without saying another word, he brushed past me, heading for the bedroom. My heart lurched in my chest. “What are you doing?” I demanded.
He didn’t respond as he went straight for the bed, ripping off the clean sheets and blankets.
“Hey!” I shouted.
Still, he ignored me as he slipped his hands under the mattress and then flipped it over. When he found nothing, he let out a string of curses.
Oh, this was so not good and quickly spiraling out of control.
I started toward him, but he threw out a jacked-up arm and growled, “Stay the fuck back.”
My stomach tumbled, and I stayed the fuck back as he went to the dresser, pulled out my folded clothes, and then went over to the closet. Out of some small miracle, he didn’t go for my purse after demolishing the room I’d straightened.
Then he stopped at the entrance to the bathroom, his back straightening. A strange look crossed his face. “Damnit.” Greasy Guy turned and jogged out of the bedroom, aiming for the stairs.
Oh no. Where in the hell did he think he was going? Hands shaking, I whirled around and got in front of him, blocking the stairs. “I’m sorry, but she’s not here. I don’t know where she is or what you’re looking for, but you need to—”
He planted a hand in the center of my chest, pushing me back, and then he got right up in my face. His teeth were yellow, some completely rotten out, and his breath smelled like days-old garbage. Bile rose in my throat.
“Look, I don’t know who you are and I don’t give a fuck. But I don’t have a problem with you,” he said. “So, don’t make me have a problem with you. Okay?”
I forced a jerky nod. I did not want to have a problem with him. “Got it.”
He stared at me a moment, and then his gaze narrowed over my left cheek. “You’re Mona’s kid, aren’t you?”
I didn’t answer because I wasn’t sure if that would mean I’d have a problem with him if I did.
“Shit sucks for you,” he said, and then dropped his hand. Greasy Guy climbed the stairs.
Against common sense, I followed him up the stairs and into the loft bedroom—my old bedroom. Greasy Guy knew what he was looking for. He went straight to the closet and ripped the door open so hard I was surprised it didn’t come off the hinges. Then he dropped to his knees and leaned into the tight space. Holding my breath, I crept behind him, debating if I should go for the lamp on the nightstand and knock him out.
Greasy Guy reached in, brushing shoe boxes out of the way, and then I couldn’t see what he was doing when he grunted and jerked back. He tossed a piece of the wall aside—a piece that had been cut out, which probably hid a cubbyhole.
Oh no.
“Fuck yeah,” Greasy Man breathed as he scuttled back out of the closet, stumbling to his feet. “Jackpot. Motherfucking jackpot.”
I didn’t want to look, but I had to. Greasy Guy was holding, not one, but at least eight Ziploc bags in his hands—bags full of something off-brown that reminded me of clumpy brown sugar.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
Greasy Guy didn’t hear me. He was staring at the bags in his hands like he was seconds away from ripping one open and shoving his face into the crap.
My knees felt weak. There had been drugs in the house, drugs hidden in a secret spot in the closet of my old bedroom. Not pot or something else relatively harmless, but something I bet was real bad and real costly.
Greasy Guy seemed to forget that I existed, which was okey-dokey fine with me. He headed down the stairs, and then a few seconds later, I heard the front door slam shut, causing me to jump.
I don’t know how long I stood in the bedroom, staring at the open closet door before I forced my feet to move. I went downstairs and into the bedroom, dragging my cell phone out of my purse. My hand shook as I called Clyde.
He answered on the third ring. “You okay, baby girl?”
It was late, and he was probably still at the bar. “Some guy was here.”
There was a pause, and then his voice got real low and real serious. “What happened?”
I told him everything in a rush, and then he told me to make sure the door was locked—good point—and to hold still. He was coming over. There wasn’t anything he could do now, but I appreciated it. Admittedly, I was freaked-out. Way freaked-out.
I made sure the closet door in my old bedroom was closed, reapplied my makeup even though it was only Clyde, and then the next twenty minutes or so, I sat on the couch, clutching the phone to my chest until there was a quick, loud knock on the front door.
I checked the peephole again, and this time I saw someone out there—someone that sent my already overworked heart into cardiac arrest territory.
Jax was standing on the other side of the door.
Chapter 9
“What the hell were you thinking?” was the first thing out of Jax’s mouth when I opened the front door.
I had a better question. “What are you doing here? I called Clyde.”
“And Clyde told me, so I’m here.” He pushed inside, pulled the door from my grasp, and pushed it shut, locking it. “You didn’t answer my question.”
Having not come to terms with the fact that it was Jax that was suddenly standing in the foyer, I blinked slowly. “What question?”
“Why in the hell did you answer the door in the middle of the night?”
“Oh. I checked the peephole first, you know.”
Jax stared at me.
“And I didn’t see anyone,” I added in my defense.
He folded well-defined arms across his chest. “So, let me get this correct. You heard knocking on your front door, went and actually used the peephole, but when you didn’t see anyone, you thought, Oh, what the hell, I’ll just open the door? Did it ever occur to you that someone could’ve been hiding?”
Oh wow, he looked and sounded pissed, but he could kiss my rosy red behind. “The guy wasn’t hiding. He was sitting down.”
His dark brows flew up. “Did you know that when you opened the door?”
“Well, no, but—”
“So, why in the hell did you answer the door?” he demanded again, eyes turning dark.
“Look, I get that answering the door was stupid.” My hand tightened around my cell phone, and I sort of wanted to slam my other fist into his chest. “I wasn’t thinking.”
“No shit,” he growled.
My eyes narrowed. “I get it. I don’t need you to keep pointing it out.”
“Jesus Christ, Calla, I’ve told you about the kind of shit your mom was messed up in, and I told you not to stay here. The least you could do is not answer the door in the middle of the night.”
I drew in a deep breath as I reached up and brushed the still damp hair back behind my right ear. “Got it. Thanks for hand-delivering your message. Now you can . . .” I trailed off, eyes widening.
A scary look entered his eyes, and then he was right in front of me, moving like he had in the office earlier in the night. I backed up, hitting the wall, and there was no other place to go. The tips of two of his fingers pressed lightly under my right temple. His gaze, troubled and stormy, was fixed to that area.
My heart was pounding as fast as it had when Greasy Guy had busted up into the house. “Jax . . . ?”
His gaze swept over to mine. “Did he hit you?”
“No,” I whispered.
“Then what happened to your temple? It’s red and swollen.” His voice was icy and hard.
“It was the door. When he pushed it open, I was kind of standing in the way.” Anger flashed in those eyes, and his jaw tightened. “He actually didn’t try to hurt me, Jax. He just wanted to get to what was in this house.”