Catch Me When I Fall

by Jackson, A. L.

  Screw him.

  Still, I was having to paste on a smile when one of the guys came up to me while the other three were caught up in a conversation with the rest of the band.

  He was smiling, too. Though something about his was all wrong.

  Off.

  Salacious and vile.

  “You got the prettiest voice I ever heard,” he slurred, his breath knocking me in the face. A clean shot of stale alcohol and depravity.

  My smile slipped. I fought to maintain it.

  “Thank you,” I barely mumbled. I reached for the shirt he had so I could sign it and get him the heck out of there.

  Pulling it back, he angled his head, eyes moving places they shouldn’t. “Even prettier up close, too. Distance is a disservice.”

  I grimaced, words creaking, “You’re too kind.”

  “Good thing I’m here . . . up real close where I can get a good look.”

  Unease rolled across my flesh. A flicker of panic.

  What a creep.

  I looked around for Melanie or the security guard. Melanie’s head was poked outside the door, most likely talking to the security guard who was probably getting the next group. I prepared to give the signal, the one we used when someone was getting a little too friendly.

  “How about you and I have a drink?” he asked.

  The smile I forced was brittle. So fake I could feel it cracking. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “I think it’s a great idea.”

  “No, thank you.”

  I started to tug at my ear the way that Melanie and I had agreed as our signal. But I didn’t have time before he flew forward, a hand pawing at my hip, the man slurring through a laugh, “Ahh, come on, you don’t have to be so shy.”

  The dam holding back my panic crumbled.

  It surged free.

  Hitting my bloodstream at warp speed.

  Hot and ugly and despairing.

  There was nothing I could do.

  Nothing to stop it.

  Memories assaulted me. Picture after revolting picture invading my mind.

  A hand on my throat. Binds on my wrists. A plea on my mouth. “Don’t. Please.”

  “Don’t touch me,” I shrieked at the man, ramming my fists to his chest as a full bout of horror took hold.

  Fight or flight.

  I intended on doing both.

  But I didn’t have the time to think another step through because the guy was being tossed to the side.

  Cool rushed in to take his place, and I tried to get a breath, to remind myself I was just fine, that no one could hurt me, to clear the panic clouding sight and reason.

  But the images kept coming.

  Assaulting.

  Bashing.

  Ruining.

  Tossing me back in their hole.

  “Emmy Love. Begging doesn’t change a thing. A debt’s owed. Simple as that. Sorry your name came up when the debt came due. Though I can’t say I’m complaining.”

  Air wheezed down my throat, and I was barely processing the menacing words that reverberated through the room. “Even think about looking at her again and you bleed, motherfucker.”

  “Hey, man, I was just trying to get my shirt signed. Bitch freaked the fuck out for no reason.”

  Another growl. This one low. “You really want to die tonight, don’t you?”

  Anxiety seized every cell in my body.

  Knees went weak.

  Legs gave out.

  Then onyx eyes were flashing white violence in my blurry sight.

  A storm of aggression.

  A blaze of brutality.

  Arms were around me before I could fall, and I was suddenly floating.

  Cradled.

  Held.

  “I’ve got you, Emily. Shh. I’ve got you.”

  I loosely looped my arms around the back of his neck, pressing my face to the tattoo at the front, inhaling deep.

  Safety and warmth.

  “Royce,” I whimpered. There was nothing I could do. It broke, a flood of tears seeping from my eyes and into his hot skin.

  My spirit wept with the realization that this might never end.

  I might always be a prisoner.

  Trapped.

  Unable to get free of this.

  A sob burst up my throat, and I buried it in the tremor of his thick throat.

  “I’ve got you, Precious. Nothing is going to happen to you. I promise you that.” He murmured the words as he carried me out a door at the far end of the room and into a gloomy hall that ran the back of the club.

  The door slammed behind us.

  Voices seeped through the walls, shouts and a scuffle, and it only made me cry harder.

  A big hand was rubbing my back, the man carrying me as if I didn’t weigh a thing, his strength wrapping me whole.

  “It’s okay. It’s okay.” He turned and slid down the wall, sitting on the floor and cradling me in his lap.

  This massive, dangerous, intimidating man brushed tender fingers through my hair, whispered soothing words to the top of my head, “He can’t hurt you. He’s gone, Emily. He’s gone. I won’t let anyone hurt you. Not ever again. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

  Not ever again.

  Not ever again.

  But he didn’t know what I’d been through. What I was dealing with now. And the last thing I wanted to be was some kind of damsel in distress. But sometimes the weight of the war you were fighting felt like too much.

  I held tighter to his neck. “He touched me,” I hiccupped.

  “I know. I saw. He’s lucky he’s still breathing.”

  My eyes squeezed shut. “I hate this, Royce. I hate it so much. Someone even looks at me funny, and I’m fallin’ apart. This isn’t who I am.”

  Anger radiated from his massive body, and he tightened his huge arms around me. “He touched you without permission. You don’t have to apologize for reacting.”

  The door suddenly banged open.

  Our attention jumped that way.

  Richard strode out, rage in his stance, his face twisted with worry and frustration. One look at us and it contorted with surprise and suspicion.

  In a flash, Royce had us on our feet. He took a step in front of me as if he were a shield.

  Richard stumbled to a stop, lines denting across his brow as he looked at Royce glowering back.

  “I’ve got her, you can go,” Richard told Royce offhandedly.

  Dismissing him.

  “I don’t think so,” Royce replied.

  Richard frowned before he leaned around to get an eye on me. “You can come out, Em. That handsy fucker is out on his ass. We don’t need any of that shit. You okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I said, wiping the tears from my cheeks with the back of my hand and trying to keep the quiverin’ from my voice.

  Richard scowled. “You’re not fine. I mean, fuck, Emily . . .” He threw an exasperated hand back in the direction of the room Royce had just rescued me from. “You’ve dealt with a million guys like that, and never once have you had this kind of reaction.”

  Fury huffed from Royce’s nose. “Back down, Ramsey. The last thing she needs right now is you coming out here tossing around accusations.”

  “How the fuck is this any of your business, Reilly?”

  Royce lifted his chin. “You can’t expect me to sign a band and not be concerned about the welfare of its members. It’s my job to see to both their mental and physical well-being.”

  Richard looked as if he wanted to call bullshit.

  Maybe I did, too.

  Because I couldn’t put my finger on this man. Only thing I did know was I wanted to sink every single one of mine into his skin.

  Hold on for dear life.

  “Well there’s no fuckin’ band if she can’t stand on a stage,” Richard spat. “If she can’t stand in front of the fans. Even the assholes. You think chicks weren’t climbing all over Rhys? You didn’t see him losing his shit.”

  A low, fo
rbidding sound rumbled from the man in front of me. “I think it’d be best if you went back in with the rest of the band.”

  “That’s my sister.”

  “Who’s obviously upset. I won’t stand for you making it worse.”

  Richard huffed in disbelief, propping his hands on his waist, pacing a circle. “Fuck,” he suddenly swore.

  Anger and regret.

  “Fuck, Emily.” Richard’s tone turned pleading. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t toss this shit in your face. Not when you’re upset like this. But you’ve got to admit it . . . you’re different. Fucking different and something has changed and it’s killing me that you won’t let the ones who care about you most in on it. You are scaring me.”

  Didn’t he get that he was scaring me, too?

  A fresh round of tears built in my eyes. I tried to hold the burn back, to stop from squeezing them closed.

  No use.

  Moisture spilled free.

  Hot and fast.

  “I’m here for you, Rich. Because of you. Don’t you get it? That I would do absolutely anything for you? What I would sacrifice for you?”

  He thought I was pushing him away, and I was begging him to breach the space.

  Pain blanched my brother’s face, and I wondered what was goin’ through his mind. What would he do if he knew what I’d done for him?

  My brother was rough and kind and passionate. Talented and beautiful to the eye. He had always been my hero. The one I’d looked up to.

  I couldn’t fathom how he could get involved in something so filthy. Something so wrong and depraved.

  I guessed maybe I was the fool to think that I could derail it.

  “I would never ask that of you,” Richard said, shaking his head in misunderstanding. “And this isn’t about me.”

  But it was.

  It’d always been.

  I sniffled, the words stifled, frozen on my tongue.

  I wanted to release them. So badly. But they were bottled. A festering mess that I was sure one day would blow.

  Richard fisted a hand in a frustrated appeal. “Nothing is going to change if you don’t make that change, Emily. Nothing. It’s time for you to come clean about what you really want, about what is really going on, before we run out of time. Ask Reilly here . . .” Richard gestured to him with his chin. “Opportunities like this don’t come around more than once, and I want you to take it with us. Fuck . . . we need you to. Carolina George isn’t Carolina George without you.”

  Sadness billowed, and I wanted to rush him. To hug him and hold him and beg him to open up to me, too. To confess.

  “I’m almost there, Rich. I’ll make up my mind soon. I promise.”

  In or out. Because I couldn’t keep going on like this.

  He just nodded, sent a questioning, confused glare at Royce before spinning around and heading back for the door.

  “Ramsey,” Royce grated just as my brother was getting ready to step back into the room.

  My brother paused, looked over his shoulder.

  “Just to be clear . . . from here on out? If someone touches her without her permission? They lose their hands. And if anyone pushes her before she’s ready? That becomes my problem. Do you understand?”

  Richard shook his head in disgust. “Fuck you, Royce, if you don’t think I want what’s best for my sister. What’s best for this band.”

  The door slammed closed behind him, and I exhaled a heavy sound.

  Unable to keep up with the events of the night.

  Soaring to the highest high before I’d been sent crashing to the lowest low.

  A free fall I wasn’t sure I was ever gonna recover from.

  “You don’t have to get in the middle of me and my brother, Royce. I know you want me to sign as badly as Rich does.”

  For a beat, Royce stood with his back to me before he slowly turned around.

  Eyes stared back as if he could see right into the heart of me.

  Molten fire.

  My soul on display.

  I wanted to gather it up.

  Cover it.

  “I’m a big girl. I can handle it.” The words shook loose of my tongue.

  He swiveled the rest of the way around and slowly started my way.

  One step.

  Two.

  The click of his dress shoes on the cement floor sent bursts of energy through the air.

  They struck my body like little lightning pulses.

  One of the first songs I’d ever written played in a slow drone that crawled in from the recesses of the dingy music hall.

  As if maybe it were calling me back.

  My voice barely distinct enough to touch our ears. It was a sad, sad love song. Edged in longing and painted in faith that things would one day be better.

  Turn out the way they were always meant to be.

  I just wished it were the truth.

  “I’m not here for Richard.” Royce’s voice was a sharp barb.

  I nodded quick, tongue darting out to wet my lips. “I know . . . you’re here for the band.”

  He reached out and brushed a lock of hair from my face, those fingertips riding down my cheek in a coarse caress.

  It buzzed all the way to my center. “No, I’m here for you.”

  My mouth dropped open. Attraction alive. No longer did I know where I was standing.

  Flying. Falling. Hoping. Weeping.

  “I . . . I don’t understand what you mean.”

  The tattoo on his throat bobbed. “You changed everything,” he murmured, like admitting it caused him physical distress.

  “You don’t even know me,” I whispered.

  “Are you sure about that?” he challenged.

  My mouth trembled, and my tongue almost managed to form another lie, but instead the hint of a truth was breaking free. “I don’t want to be afraid, anymore, Royce. I don’t want to feel powerless.”

  “You are the strongest person I know,” he grated hard.

  My head shook. “No. I’ve been breaking apart for a long time now.”

  “No, Emily, you’re searching for a way to be whole.”

  I blinked at him, unable to process, to understand how he could know that about me. “I’m trying. I really am.”

  “You have to be willing to destroy whatever it is that is holding you back.” He gazed back at me as if he had a first-row seat to all my secrets. Like he knew them better than me.

  My mouth flapped open, my senses going haywire, this feeling that he could really see to the vile stain in me. “I want to be. Strong. Like you said.”

  A big hand stroked across my jaw.

  Shivers raced. Heart stampeding.

  But it was in a whole different way than with that jerk inside.

  “You are, Precious. Brave. Strong. I see it in you. No one can stop you.”

  “I don’t want to let wickedness reign.” How was I admitting this to him, as vague as it was? But it felt natural.

  Trusting him when I’d thought he was the last person that I could.

  Felt so right after I’d been the brunt of such a lie.

  “Then don’t,” he almost demanded.

  “My standing up means knocking down someone powerful. It’s not gonna be easy.”

  “But is it worth it?”

  “Yes,” I whispered so fast. I’d never heard a truth ring so loud. I couldn’t allow Cory Douglas to remain free after what he’d done. Sickness tremored through my body when I thought about him doing it again. Hurting someone innocent. Someone who couldn’t fight back.

  Royce’s eyes flashed. The blackest black. That white fire burning fury. “Then you take the motherfucker down.”

  “I . . . I’m almost ready. Almost there.”

  He blinked long, his lips twisting in something that looked like guilt. “We should get you out of here. I shouldn’t be out here with you.”

  My teeth raked my bottom lip, not sure that I wanted to give up on the connection. The feeling that maybe someone got me on a le
vel no one else could. As if he’d been sent to make me see myself in a different light.

  To remind myself of who I wanted to be.

  “What if I don’t want to leave?”

  He huffed out a rough chuckle. “It’s a conflict of interest.”

  The way he said it made it sound like it was a whole lot more.

  “Are you not . . . interested?” I wanted it to come off as sexy.

  Progress, you know.

  Asking for what I wanted . . . for what I needed.

  Too bad I was shaking under the ferocity powering from his body.

  “Am I not interested?” He angled closer, cedar filling my nose, the threat of sex hitting my tongue. “Have been dying to touch you. Taste you. Take you. But we can’t do this.”

  I blinked up at him. “I’m starting to wonder if us doing this is how it’s supposed to be.”

  His thumb traced my cheek, and he slowly shook his head. “Grace always precedes beauty.”

  My eyes pinched. Confused.

  “Belief always precedes strength. You are all those things. And I won’t taint that.”

  “What if I want you to taint me?” It left me on a breathy plea.

  Danger rumbled in his chest, and his mouth was at my ear. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”

  He stepped back, straightened out his jacket. “Come on, let’s get you back to the hotel. I’m going to walk you to your door, let you inside, and then leave you there and spend the rest of the night wishing that I didn’t have to.”

  Ten

  Royce

  The next night, after yet another show, I was trailing twenty feet behind the rest of the band that walked the sidewalk.

  Call me antisocial.

  But I really couldn’t risk getting in Emily’s space. Not when she was calling to me like a goddamn drug, one so powerful it could never be kicked. And I’d barely even had a taste.

  Laughter billowed through the humid night air, Rhys acting like the clown he was, telling some over-the-top story about Richard and him when they were teenagers. Dude never let the cloud hovering over his band rain on his parade.

  The whole time, I watched Emily like a hawk.

  Ready to swoop in if she so much as stumbled.

  If Richard so much as looked at her wrong.

  It wasn’t his fault. I got it. He was at a loss as to what was wrong with her. Trying to help her, not even knowing he was partly to blame.