“I’ve never taken supplements, and Mandy would never cheat on her finals. And you know nothing happened between us while I was with Brent. It’s all lies. No one is going to believe you.”
“Do you want to take that chance, Gardener Girl? It’ll be me against you. Only one of the lies would need to stick, I imagine. Can you really risk it?”
Tears filled my eyes, but I willed them not to fall. “I don’t believe you. Even you aren’t that shitty.”
He shrugged, and I could practically feel the coldness radiating from his icy gaze. “It doesn’t really matter if you believe me. You can stay, if you want, and I’ll do everything I said. You can leave, and I won’t need to. It makes no difference to me.”
One minute, I had been imagining what it would be like for Zach to start being nice to me. I thought maybe the kiss was the first step of many. And without any warning, this?
“At least tell me what I did,” I said. “Tell me what is going on. Help me understand.” I still couldn’t quite comprehend or make myself believe I’d actually leave. I had no money. Nowhere to go. I couldn’t possibly just pack up and leave, could I? I believed him though. I saw the promise in his eyes. He’d do everything he said.
“You want to understand why?” he asked. “Because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and because life isn’t fair. Leave Belvedere or you know what happens. Don’t you, Gardener Girl? Leave tonight. Any questions?”
22
Zach
Eight Years Ago
She actually left. Her sister wouldn’t so much as look at me, which told me she had at least explained who was responsible for her leaving. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel like shit for it. I did. But I couldn’t let her stay, not after what she heard.
I had replayed the conversation between Tammy and I enough times to be sure of that. If Gardener Girl heard the whole conversation, then she knew I was getting bullied into disinheriting myself, that my dad had cast my mom aside like some worthless, broken toy, and she could’ve figured out that Tammy had sexually abused me. It was too much. Too much truth in the world of lies I had built for myself, the world I was comfortable and safe inside.
She had to go.
I respected her for having the balls to actually do it. I tried to guess how many high school girls would actually pack up and leave their entire families behind to protect them, and figured she was one-in-a-million. Once I had taken care of my mom’s bills and got my hands on some of the trust-fund money, I’d make sure her parents were taken care of financially. Maybe I’d help grease the right palms to get her sister a scholarship, and I’d find out where Gardener Girl was and keep tabs. I didn’t want her to have a bad life. I wanted her to be happy, just not here.
It wasn’t the revenge I wanted. It felt sour and bitter in my throat, and if I didn’t already hate myself, I was sure it would’ve been the tipping point. Unfortunately, it was just another drop of black water in an already black ocean.
23
Aribella
I had fun with my parents and Mandy. We all went to a park and had a spread of cheese, bread, and fresh deli meats with wine. We watched the geese mulling in a lake and walked along the shore, leaning against the edge of a dock for close to an hour while we talked.
It felt good. I had never been close with my parents. I think part of me always resented them for being so selfish and irresponsible, for knowing they were stealing and taking advantage of their clients and forcing us to move almost every year. I always felt like gardening might not be the most luxurious job, but it would have been enough to at least pay for a small place to live and a modest life, which I would’ve taken in a heartbeat.
I also resented them for only managing to stay in one place after I was chased away from it by Zach. Suddenly they seemed to find the wealth and stability they had always been chasing, and the irony was that it kept us apart.
But eight years was a long time, and I forgave them. Mandy had been full of questions about Zach and the tour when my parents headed home, and I told her everything, except the dirty details of the last two weeks and how Zach and I had transitioned into some sort of weird purgatory between dating and not dating.
Being here made the wound feel fresh again. Zach had literally upended my life. He made me leave my family and my sister before I even graduated, and I ended up dropping out of school, working two jobs, and sleeping on strangers’ couches for over a year until I got my footing. Life moved on. I made excuses to my parents. Lied about how I thought tennis was sucking the life out of me and college was a scam. I pretended I wanted out of that place. I ran away.
My parents never understood. They still didn’t, and I couldn’t blame them. I’d told Mandy the truth—most of it, at least. But I never told my parents. I probably never would.
I let my memories of him stir up enough anger in me that by the time I made it back to the hotel that evening, I was ready to break things off with Zach. We’d fooled around. We’d pretended it was okay to ignore all the issues between us because we were attracted to each other. We’d tried all of that, but I was done with it.
If Zach didn’t want to open up to me and let me in for once, then I was done playing his games.
I rehearsed some version of that speech on my way back, and it all fell to pieces when I saw him standing there in the lobby. He looked drained, like someone had sucked all the life out of him. He was sitting in a big red chair, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his head hanging.
“Zach?”
He looked up, saw it was me, and then winced, like seeing me actually hurt him.
“What’s going on?”
“Can I take you somewhere?” he asked.
We pulled up to the top of a hill overlooking most of the city. It was dark now, and the lights of the city were just pinpricks of light in the darkness from how high up we were.
“This is beautiful,” I said.
He nodded, and we both got out of the rental car. He motioned for me to come sit with him on the hood.
“I used to come here to get away and write songs when I was a kid,” he said.
“To get away,” I repeated quietly, and my thoughts went back to that Friday night in Belvedere, to the conversation I’d overheard. I had puzzled over what it all meant so many times and never settled on anything. That woman had made it sound like something happened to Zach when he crossed her, and Zach had been uncharacteristically silent when she taunted him with it. “Zach, what happened to you back then? What did you think I overheard that night at your party?”
He shook his head, studying the city below us and looking every bit the troubled rock star. I looked past the perfect jawline, straight nose, and full lips most women probably focused on, and I watched his eyes, the way there was pain in them. Old pain. Pain that had settled and been left untreated for so long that it had festered and infected him.
“Zach,” I said, reaching to hold his hand. It was a more intimate gesture than anything we’d done these past two weeks. Everything had been so purely sexual. This was more, and it made my skin prickle with heat. “If anyone in the world has been through enough punishment and abuse to deserve answers from you, I think I might be the one.”
He blew a small laugh out through his nose, squeezing my hand back, but still not taking his eyes off the city.
“I wouldn’t know where to start,” he said.
“Anywhere. I’m yours for the night. I’ll be yours in the morning too, if it takes that long.”
He looked up at me then, and suddenly my choice of words took on a whole new meaning in those stormcloud eyes of his. I swallowed, throat clicking.
“I was sixteen,” he said slowly. “My mom had just recently gotten sick. Cancer. It was in her stomach. We went as a family to the first few treatments. Dad was by her side then, still supportive. I caught him flirting with one of the nurses who was hardly older than me, but that wasn’t too unusual for him. A few months later, her hair started fallin
g out from the chemo. I guess that was the turning point for him. He literally had the divorce papers signed and handled within a couple weeks. My mom was devastated, but she didn’t want to force him to be tied to her if he didn’t want it. She was always good like that. She thought of other people first. She let them walk all over her if she thought it was the right thing to do.”
He chuckled then, but there was no humor in the sound. “And she taught me what happens to good people.”
“What happened?” I asked.
"The nurse was my dad's wife in three months. The prenup my dad made my mom sign left her with pennies, and she couldn't even pay for treatment anymore without his money and his insurance. She was racking up debt and eventually getting put on waitlists for meds and treatment because they knew she'd probably never pay. Meanwhile, dad was galavanting around with the nurse, having the time of his life with a gold digger less than half his age.
“So I threatened her. I told her I was set to inherit the family business when dad died, and if she was planning on playing the long game and waiting for my old man to croak, she was going to get screwed. I’d make sure she got nothing.
“So she slipped something in my drink at one of my dad’s parties. It looked like I’d snuck some alcohol or taken drugs to everyone, and she did the nice step-mom thing and offered to take me somewhere to lay down. I don’t remember anything past that, except that I woke up in the wrong bed. There was…” he swallowed hard and his eyes clouded with tears.
I leaned forward, holding on to his arm and leaning my head into his shoulder. I couldn't bear the sight of seeing him cry. He was so strong. Always so strong. I felt where his story was going in the pit of my stomach and my heart was breaking for him, piece by piece. Everything that happened was falling into place like a horrible mosaic, and it was all starting to make sense, but he wasn't done.
“There was fucking lipstick all over my—” He blew out a shuddering breath and angrily wiped at his eyes. The vulnerability there was replaced with a white-hot anger I’d never seen in him, not even in his worst moments. “Red lipstick marks on my hips. My stomach. My cock. She had been the only one wearing lipstick at the party. I could smell it in the room when I woke up. That fucking smell. I’ve never forgotten it.”
“Oh God, Zach,” I said, putting my hand to my mouth and remembering how I had worn lipstick to the concert to spite him. I had no way of knowing, but I still felt sick when I thought of what that must have made him think when he saw it. If he thought I knew what happened… No. Even if he thought I had overheard enough to guess she had abused him, he’d know I had no way of knowing about the lipstick.
“She’d pinch my ass when no one was looking. Whisper dirty shit in my ear when no one could hear. She made my life a living hell. She lorded over me like I was some boy toy. And I couldn’t do shit about it, because she had her claws so deeply in my dad that he was refusing to pay for mom’s meds. The only way I got money was with her approval, her voice in his ear. I had to wait until I was eighteen to get money from my trust fund, but go figure, mom had passed by then and Tammy had made sure my trust fund was as gutted as she could manage.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “God, I’m so sorry, Zach. I had no idea.”
“You did though,” he said, looking confused. “You must have had an idea, even if you didn’t know the details. Tammy had just finished bragging about all the shit she did to me that night when I caught you listening in.” He trailed off at the look on my face.
“I didn’t know what she meant,” I said. “Even if I had, do you really think I would have told anyone?”
He shook his head, eyes searching the distance like he didn’t even hear me. “Fuck, Aribella. Fuck,” he said again, raking a hand through his hair. “You must hate me. You should hate me.” He stood, turning to face me. “I need you to hate me. I need to know you didn’t let me off the hook for what I did, because I won’t be able to live with myself if you don’t hate me.”
I had come back to the hotel tonight planning to tell him exactly that. I was done letting him walk all over me. I was going to say he didn’t deserve my forgiveness and nothing he could ever do would earn it.
Maybe his past didn’t excuse him from what he did. I don’t know if any past could’ve excused what he did to me, but it was a start, and him opening up to me—trusting me—was an even bigger step in the right direction.
“I don’t hate you,” I said.
“Say you hate me,” he said, reaching and taking my face in his hands. His palms were warm and soft against my cheeks. “Please.”
“I don’t hate you. I probably should, but I don’t.”
He leaned his head in until our foreheads touched. “I can’t take back what I did to you. I would if I could. I was stupid. I was selfish. And if you stick around, I doubt it’ll be the last time.”
“Since when was sticking around an option?” I asked.
“Since now,” he said. He leaned in and kissed me softly. I wanted to melt into that kiss, and for once, I gave in to what I wanted with him. I let my muscles relax and my fingers thread through his hair. I let him pull my shirt up and grind himself into me while he still wore his jeans and I wore leggings.
Every touch was fire. Every sensation bliss.
Things weren’t magically fixed between us. We still had issues, and we still had flaws, but he had given me what I never thought he’d actually give—his trust. He trusted me with his past, and that was enough.
He pulled me up so I was standing and then turned me around roughly, putting his lips to my ear. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted to do this?”
“I could make an educated guess,” I said.
“Smart ass,” he growled, and he actually slapped my ass. It wasn’t hard, but the surprise of it had me feeling warm all over.
He undressed me almost reverently. I expected him to be in a rush, for this to be animalistic. He was going to fuck me. After eight years and after two weeks of everything we could possibly do except the real thing, we were going to do it. Even after everything he'd said and shared with me, I guess I still thought he'd be in a rush because I still thought this was some sort of checkbox for him, just an item on his long-held to-do list that needed seeing to.
I was wrong.
This meant more to him than that. It was so blindingly obvious from the way he carefully stripped my clothes and stopped to kiss my skin, letting his lips linger until I burned all over. He was careful with me, considerate. He made me feel cherished and precious.
He knelt, kissing the insides of my thighs while he had me bent over the hood of his car. I felt myself clenching on nothing in anticipation of his attention, like my nerves were flooding to the spaces I knew he would be, ready to soak up every last bit of sensation he gave me.
Before, we’d fooled around with a kind of recklessness. It had its own thrill—the thrill of never knowing if each time was going to be our last, and feeling like I still didn’t really know the man I was letting take such intimate parts of me.
This was different. God it was so different.
I felt the promise of more behind every kiss, every touch. He was marking me, drawing his signature across my body so that I’d never be able to forget who I belonged to. I was his, and he was mine. The thought let me relax into him, to release the last of my inhibitions and enjoy him fully for the first time.
I came hard and fast on his tongue, my entire body shaking as he drove his tongue into me again and again like he was fucking me with it, all while the same fingers that strummed a guitar in front of thousands worked on my clit.
He didn’t stop when I came. He never did. It was like he couldn’t get enough, and I realized he would probably eat me out as long as I’d let him. There was something so incredibly sexy about how much he seemed to like it, how delirious with lust he got at the idea of taking me with his mouth, having my arousal coat his tongue and lips.
“I want you,” I breathed, turning to look at hi
m. He was gorgeous in the moonlight with the lights of the city behind him. His naked body was outlined in the silvery moonlight, catching the curves of his sculpted body and highlighting his abs and erection. My rockstar. My broken prince. My everything.
I stood, took his shoulders, and turned him around so his ass was against the hood of the car, and then I knelt, steadying myself on his thighs. I gripped him and took him in my mouth. I'd tried oral once before Zach and hated it. With Zach, it was ecstasy. I took his silky smooth skin between my lips and couldn't tear my eyes from his face while I worked him, using my tongue as much as my lips. I didn't neglect any part of him. I ran my hands everywhere, my lips, my tongue. Nothing was forgotten, and a sense of sexual power flooded through me. I could bring the strongest, darkest man I'd ever met to his knees right here with soft touches and a gentle caress. He was giving me the keys to his body, and I happily took them, taking special enjoyment in how quickly I could make him need to stop me. He didn't want to cum in my mouth, not this time. He was saving that.
I was breathing hard, heart pounding out of control. I could feel it coming. It was almost time. It shouldn’t feel so significant—we’d done so much already, what did it matter if he was inside my pussy instead of my mouth or my hands, after all? But it was significant. We both knew it. Like anything else, it had the power we gave it, and we’d both spent eight years building up that moment. It was our climax. The peak of our story together. The turning point—the place where I said I’d never go if I thought he’d discard me after, and the place he had always wanted to be to get me out of his head.
Hate at First Sight Page 16
