by Chloe Cole
“Did you love Pierce too?”
“Never. But I was young and wanted my father’s approval so badly. It wasn’t until a year later that I realized that I wanted Tai more. I decided to pull the trigger. I told Pierce we were through. The plan was to wait a month or so, then let my parents know I wanted to be with Tai, no matter the consequences. In the meantime, we would meet on the sly. It was the best time of my life, in spite of the sneaking around. Each time we got a little closer, a little more intimate, waiting for the time where we could be boyfriend and girlfriend for real. On one of those occasions, we both lost control and we made love.”
Gigi leaned forward in her seat, her face rapt. “That’s so romantic.”
Christa shook her head. “It was, but it was also the beginning of the end. I was stupid and so overwhelmed with love for him, I thought I’d explode if I didn’t tell someone. So I told my best girlfriend what happened. A week later, the whole school knew. A week after that, so did my parents. I was banned from seeing Tai and if I disobeyed they were going to pull me from Westerbrook altogether.”
Gigi gasped, her eyes wide as saucers. “Those bastards!” She slapped a hand over her mouth. “I’m sorry, that’s your family. I was totally out of line.”
Christa let out a soft laugh. “Maybe, but it’s true. They were bastards then and still are. Anyway, they also forced Pierce and me into social situations together at every turn, trying to get me to fall in line and commit to him. On one of these occasions, we’d all gone to a Fourth of July party at the country club. I got a terrible headache, which happened a lot back then. I was depressed and miserable and just wanted to get out of there. They insisted that Pierce drive me home. Instead, he brought me to the lake where Tai and I had made love.”
The kettle whistled and Gigi sucked in a breath. “Good timing, I feel like I need to get up and move around a little to get through this next part. I’ll make you a cup, sit.”
“Thanks.”
Gigi stood and began bustling around the suite’s small kitchenette, clearly taking comfort in the mundane task. “Keep talking,” she urged.
Christa wrapped her arms around herself to ward the sudden chill away. Say it fast. Just the words, don’t think about it. “Pierce parked the car. I told him I didn’t want to be there, that I wanted him to take me home immediately. He refused. I was distraught, but still had no inkling I was in any danger. There were other cars there, although they were parked a long distance away. And Pierce had never shown any physical aggression toward me in the past. So when he grabbed my hair,” she swallowed hard, “and tore open my blouse, I was in complete shock.”
“Fucker.”
Christa sent Gigi a grateful smile. In spite of their rocky start, she already felt a connection with the woman.
She pressed forward, anxious to get to the end. “At first, I was too shocked to even fight back. Then I screamed, but we were too far away for anyone else in the other cars to hear me and Pierce didn’t let me scream for long. He slapped me in the mouth. Hard. Today, after a boatload of self-defense classes, I like to think I’d have had a fighting chance. But then? I was toast. I started to beg and he just kept shouting at me. ‘You’re going to give me what you gave that lowlife motherfucker. You think he’s better than me? He’s nothing.’”
She shuddered, remembering. “It was like a demon had taken over his body. Spittle was flying from his mouth, he was literally vibrating with rage. One minute, I was pinned beneath him, the next, the door flew open and I was free.”
“Tai,” Gigi said softly.
“Yeah. I guess he’d been going to the lake a lot since we’d been apart. He was there, sitting on the dock, and saw us pull up. He was walking back to his car to leave and heard what he thought was a scream.” She met the other woman’s eyes. “Do you know how many people would’ve walked away? After what I’d put him through? For all he knew, we were just joking around, or worse, it was the good kind of scream. Not Tai though. He dragged Pierce out of the car by his shirt, onto the ground. I’d never seen him so furious. Pierce got to his feet pretty quick, but not for long. He lunged at Tai and Tai laid him out with a snap kick to the jaw. It was over in less than ten seconds.”
“So not exactly a fight then. More like an old-school ass-whooping.”
“That’s exactly what it was. We left Pierce on the ground groaning and Tai brought me home. I was a wreck, shaking and crying. He was so sweet and gentle to me. Walked me to the door, then left. The next time I saw him was two nights ago.”
“Wait, what do you mean?” Gigi demanded. “Why didn’t you go see him? And I still don’t get why the hell he got arrested.”
“Pierce ended up with a broken jaw. Tai was a black belt in Shotokan Karate. According to the law, he assaulted Pierce with a deadly weapon, using his expertise to maim him with forethought and malice.”
“He was trying to hurt you. Not to mention he came at Tai first. That’s total bullshit.” Gigi’s expressive eyes snapped with anger as she handed Christa a steaming cup of tea.
“Total,” she confirmed with a nod. “I was a minor and my parents wouldn’t allow me to go and testify, but I did have to give a statement to the police explaining what happened. What I don’t get is why they didn’t seem to take my statement into account at all.”
“What happened to Pierce?”
“My parents insisted that the issues with Pierce should be settled privately, in a civilized manner. In the end, they laid the blame on Tai. If he hadn’t treated me like ‘one of his ghetto sluts’, Pierce would have known I wasn’t that type of girl and he wouldn’t have tried to ‘seduce’ me. No matter what I said, they refused to believe that he was actually prepared to rape me, which hurt even more. His family was very influential, mine was in denial, and no charges were ever filed. In fact, my parents still summer in the Hamptons with the Ridells.”
She paused to take a sip of tea to wash the bitterness from her tongue before continuing. “My father told me Tai was sentenced to six months in a juvenile detention center. I begged to visit or at least know where he was so I could send letters. They refused. When I was able to sneak away a few weeks later, I tried to see his mother, but when I went to the apartment there was already a new tenant there. There was nothing to do but wait. I figured when Tai got released, he would contact me. But six months came and went and he never did.”
Gigi looked away, staring off into space for a long moment before she met Christa’s gaze again. “Two years,” she said flatly.
“What?” Christa stared at the other woman’s stark face.
“They lied to you. It wasn’t six months. He did two years in a medium-security penitentiary for that kick.”
Christa’s stomach lurched. “Th—that can’t be right. He was a minor. And a first-time offender,” she protested. A bout of dizziness assailed her and she set down her mug and bent low, putting her head between her knees. Two years. Exactly the length of time Mitch said Tai had been off the grid.
“He was tried as an adult.” Gigi’s voice was low and soothing, but her words slammed into Christa like bricks. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you. I thought you should know.”
A gentle hand rubbed her back. “I appreciate it.” She couldn’t hear the sound of her own voice through the rush of blood in her ears.
Two years. In a real jail. Hot tears sprang to her eyes as she thought of the boy she knew. Alone. In the dark. Behind bars. He’d lost two years of his life because of her and she was following him around like some spoiled brat asking for his forgiveness? No wonder he hated her.
Right then, she hated her too.
* * * * *
It was dark. The smell hit him first. Stale, recycled air. That astringent, almost metallic smell straining to mask the pervasive aroma of body odor. Panic hit hard as he squinted to see through the shadows. He stood, blindly stumbling forward, straight into iron bars.
Prison.
Panic clawed at him as he tried to process what was ha
ppening. That this was to be his life for the next two years. From science class and yearbooks to this. The catcalls echoed in his ears and he ran to the toilet and vomited.
A cool hand in his hair, a tug and a groan and the smell faded. Honeysuckle and fresh air. Christa at the lake. She was kissing him, running her hand over his back. Lower. The panic receded and he leaned forward to talk to her. Tell her how much he loved her.
He stared down into her face, but her eyes were lifeless, blood trickling from her mouth. He screamed and laid her on the ground, shaking her, calling her name through broken sobs.
“She was a slut anyway,” Pierce said on a laugh.
Tai stood, blessed rage coalescing in his heart, momentarily eclipsing his sorrow.
His foot snapped out like a whip, high and fast, with pinpoint accuracy, followed by the sickening yet satisfying crack of bone.
“Again!” his brain screamed.
As if on a loop, that foot flew, over and over.
Crack.
Crack.
Crack.
His eyes snapped open as he sucked in a breath. Sweat poured from his body and the sheets clung to his chest like seaweed as he looked around the dimly lit room.
The Man Bus.
Okay. He was okay. His thundering heart began to slow as he scrubbed a hand down his slick face.
One night with Christa Reilly and this was the result.
Even as the thought occurred to him, guilt prickled some small, rational part of his mind. She’d been a kid. Same as him. What did she know back then? Could it be that the woman she was today would have made better choices?
Like choosing him.
He sat up and hung his head in his hands. He was just rationalizing now. Trying to make some excuse for her abandonment so he could be with her. Funny, he used to do the same thing with his dad. Bastard would blow him off for the third time in a row, without even a phone call. How many times had Tai made up excuses for him, to himself and his mom?
“He probably had to work late”. Or “Maybe he forgot. He does that sometimes, even with real important stuff”.
His mother, God bless her, would give him a sad little smile and nod, never contradicting him. Never saying a bad word about the useless piece of shit. Her tongue should have been nothing more than a mass of scar tissue from all the biting.
Tai pushed off the bed and padded into the kitchen. He took a carton of orange juice from the fridge and drank deeply.
“You’re a real shit.”
Tai cursed under his breath, set the carton back into the fridge and turned to face a furious Gigi.
“Okay, I’ll buy another one and drink out of a glass next time. But for the record, I think you’re overreacting.”
He closed the refrigerator door and attempted to leave the room, but Gigi stepped in his way.
“Don’t try to be cute, Tai. I’m talking about Christa. But ew on the juice too. That’s disgusting,” she said, her tone softening as her sharp eyes scanned his face.
“Babe, come on, go easy on him. It looks like he’s had a rough night,” Beau called from the living room where he sat balancing a plate of pancakes on his knee.
Truer words. Tai had spent most of the night tossing and turning. When he did finally fall asleep, he regretted it. Those dreams were hellacious.
“I saw her. In fact I just left there.”
Shock and fury hit him hard and fast. “What the fuck, Gi? Who do you think you are? This was none of your business. And you? You let her go?” he asked Beau incredulously.
Beau shrugged and held up a placating hand. “Hey, this isn’t the eighteen hundreds. I don’t get to tell her where to go or what to do, man. Besides, she was really upset and felt like it was the right thing to do. Who am I to say different?”
The anger drained away as quick as it had come. This was his own stupid fault. Gigi had been awake when he got home, claiming she couldn’t sleep, but it was pretty obvious she was waiting up for him. He should have never told her he’d slept with Christa.
“You’re my friend and I care about you,” Gigi said. “That makes it my business. I just went to tell her to leave you alone. Dammit, Tai, if I came home looking like you did last night, you’d have done the same. I wanted to kill her for toying with you that way.” She broke off and looked away before pinning him with a teary gaze. “But then I saw her. You think you look bad?”
“And you do,” Beau chimed in.
Gigi shot him a look then continued. “Even before she told me what happened, I knew you and I had it wrong somehow. The woman loves you, Tai.”
Fear crashed over him in waves. “Bullshit. You went there, fine. What’s done is done. But don’t fucking do this, okay? I can’t take it.” He turned and went around the island, desperate for escape.
The last thing he needed was someone giving him a reason to break the vow he’d made to himself. If he gave Christa another chance, he was just opening himself to more pain, and she’d served up more than his fill. People didn’t change. He only needed to look at his father to drive that lesson home.
Gigi moved, again blocking his way. “She didn’t know.”
He put a firm hand on her shoulder and thrust her to the side. “I need to get some air.”
“Are you listening to me? She didn’t know, Tai,” Gigi said, hot on his tail. “Her father told her you’d gone to a juvenile detention center for a few months. Until this morning, she didn’t even know you went to a real prison, never mind that you spent two years there.”
He paused, mid-step, as the implications washed over him. Blood pounded in his ears as he tried to make sense of it all. “Well, if she didn’t know it was because she didn’t want to know.” Even as he spoke, the words fell flat. Still. “Why didn’t she try to see me? She would’ve known then.”
“Her parents wouldn’t allow it. Once things calmed down some, she went to see your mother, but she was gone. There was another tenant living in your apartment.” Gigi took his hand. “Tai, she isn’t perfect. Maybe she could’ve done something differently. But she was a kid under the thumb of a powerful man.”
A tiny kernel of hope took residence in his chest as Gigi turned him to face her. “You have a lot to talk about, and maybe too much time has passed. Maybe it can’t be fixed. But I promise you one thing. That woman loves you. I would bet my business on it.”
He didn’t speak. He couldn’t. His brain was on overload trying to reconcile what she was saying with everything he’d “known” for the past decade.
She released him with a sigh and stepped back. “That’s it. You can run away now. I just wanted to make sure you had all the information before you made a decision you might regret. Remember what you told me about regret, Tai? It’s a terrible, all-encompassing thing. It fucks with you constantly, makes you feel like if you’d only done that one thing differently, everything just might be perfect right now. Even when your shit is going good, it keeps it from ever being great because you wonder if it could have been better if only…”
Damn if that wasn’t exactly what he’d said.
“Man, what are you waiting for?” Beau asked, his typical, teasing grin notably absent. “You gotta go make this right.”
Fucking A, he did.
Chapter Seven
“You want me to put that in a to-go container?” the bartender asked with a puzzled glance at the still-full bowl of chili in front of her.
“No thanks. I’m getting on a plane. It was very good, I just wasn’t as hungry as I thought.” Christa forced a smile and laid a twenty on the bar.
She turned to stare out the window. It was raining again but she hardly minded. A gorgeous, sunny day wouldn’t have seemed at all fitting. She flicked a glance at her watch. Her plane would be leaving in two hours. Time to call a cab and get ready to leave Cincinnati—and Tai—behind.
Tai. She pressed a hand to her lips and tried to remember exactly what his mouth had felt like.
Gigi’s words from earlier that morning st
ill rang in her head. How could she not have known? Surely it had been in the newspapers, or maybe gossip in school? She’d been so blind. The sorrow threatened to spill over again, but she slammed the brakes on. Plenty of time for that when she got home. Her leave of absence was open-ended so she could snuggle her Boston Terrier Milo tight and not leave her bed for a week if she wanted. Hell, maybe she’d never go back.
The sound of music interrupted her thoughts. Little early for the jukebox to be cranking.
When your baby
Leaves you all alone
Her stomach clenched tight and her heart broke just a little more. Of all the songs they could’ve picked.
And nobody
Calls you on the phone
Tears rushed to her eyes and she swiped at them with her sleeve. Time to get the hell out of there before she came unhinged. She stood, nearly toppling her chair, and turned. Keeping her head down, she made her way to the exit. A male voice stopped her in her tracks.
“Well, it just looks silly doing the dance by myself.”
The breath whooshed from her lungs as she looked up to see Tai swaying on the empty dance floor. Despite the teasing words, his face was grave, his eyes full of sorrow.
“Come here,” he murmured.
She searched his face for a sign that he was toying with her. That once she got there, in the warmth of his arms, he might snatch them away. Because how could he ever possibly get past what she’d done, and worse, what she hadn’t?
She took a tentative step forward. “Tai, I’m so sorry.” The meltdown she’d hoped to stave off came on like an avalanche and sobs racked her body. And then he was there, scooping her into his arms, holding her close, rocking her to the music while he whispered into her ear.
