Loving Violet

by Terri Anne Browning

  I reached for the door, but he caught my elbow and tugged me around. He enfolded me in a tight hug, and I closed my eyes as I hugged him back. I hoped this wasn’t the last hug we would ever share, but I wasn’t going to hold my breath.

  “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he promised when he finally released me.

  “Don’t be surprised if you can’t reach me. I may be grounded from everything, including my phone.” I stepped out, and with a final wave, shut the door before climbing the steps to my porch.

  Before I could put my key in the lock, the door swung open, and I met the furious glare of my dad. “Get in the house, Violet Hope. Now.”

  If I weren’t so numb, I might have been scared of what he was going to say or do, but my heart rate didn’t even increase as I walked into the house. Mom was standing at the foot of the stairs. Her hair was in a messy ponytail, and she was wearing flannel sleep pants and a cotton robe. She had a pair of slippers on her feet and looked as if she hadn’t slept in about as long as me.

  When her purple gaze fell on me, relief filled her face, and regret that I’d made her worry made my heart contract with the first real shot of emotion I’d had since Luca destroyed me.

  But with her relief quickly came her anger, and Mom pointed toward the living room. “Sit,” she commanded.

  I walked to the couch and sat down as both my parents stood in front of me. “You will never pull this shit again,” Dad snapped. “You wouldn’t even answer your phone when we called you. Texts went unread and unanswered. If I didn’t know Lyric was with you, I would have lost my fucking mind.”

  “I’m sorry,” I told him, lowering my gaze so I didn’t have to see how angry they were.

  “A video call would have been just as effective as showing up in Alabama to talk to that boy,” Dad continued.

  “I’m sorry,” I repeated.

  “I don’t want to hear your apology!” Dad started pacing, his frustration filling the room with tension. “You’re grounded.” I nodded my understanding. “For a month. You go to school, you come home, you go straight to your room. No going to Shaw’s. No—”

  “Okay,” I agreed before he’d even finished.

  “Honey.” Mom’s soft voice made me flinch, but I couldn’t look at her. “I know what happened with Cannon has turned you upside down. I’m so sorry that happened. But you can’t do this kind of stuff to us. We love you so much. You and Mason are our whole world, and if something had happened to you…”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Stop saying that!” Dad exploded.

  “Okay,” I whispered.

  Dad abruptly stopped pacing, and I could feel his eyes drilling into the top of my head. “Vi, did something happen?”

  I slowly lifted my head. The inside of my bottom lip throbbed, and I could taste fresh blood, telling me I’d bitten into the already deep cut Cannon had caused without realizing it and reopened the wound. “I’m tired, Daddy. I really am sorry I worried you. It won’t happen again, I swear.”

  “Did everything go okay with Luca?” Mom asked, her frown deepening. “Is he okay?”

  “He was pissed, and I’m sure he would have killed Cannon if he were able.” I stood. “I need a shower and a few hours’ sleep before I have to go to school.”

  “You can stay home if you don’t feel up to going,” Mom offered, but I shook my head.

  “No. I’d rather go.” It would keep my mind off everything, and I wasn’t going to just hide at home. Hiding was the coward’s way out.

  “Cannon won’t be there,” Dad informed me. “He’s already on his way to military school.”

  “Okay.” I didn’t know what else to say. Other than that brief moment of regret I’d felt when I saw how upset I’d made Mom earlier, I’d gone back to feeling nothing again all at once.

  I started toward the stairs, but Mom’s voice gave me pause. “Are you and Luca still together, Violet honey?”

  “Goodnight,” I told her, unable to answer that particular question even though I knew the answer.

  No. Luca and I were not still together. We would never be together again. There would be no moving with him when he got picked up in the draft. No playing out all those fantasies I’d made a mental list of once I turned eighteen. No asking me to marry him. No house of our own. No babies.

  Luca and Violet Thornton was a silly, stupid dream I’d had my entire life.

  A dream that had burned to ashes right in front of my eyes the moment I saw that mark on his neck. The man who was supposed to love me and only me, who was supposed to be my first everything, had given his firsts away like they meant nothing to him.

  Like I meant nothing.

  Upstairs, I took a long hot shower and then crawled into bed, but I didn’t sleep. Instead, I just lay there replaying the moment Megan Hawthorn blew my world apart. And Luca had given her the bomb to make it happen.

  My alarm went off, and I got up to get ready for school. As I brushed my teeth, trying to be careful with my aching mouth, I realized I looked like a wraith. There were shadows under my eyes because I couldn’t remember when I’d slept last. It hadn’t been anytime that weekend, that was for sure. With my swollen, bruised mouth, I looked as if I’d been in a fight and lost.

  I pulled up my hair into a tight ponytail and didn’t even bother with makeup. There wasn’t a concealer on the market that would hide my imperfections, and I was too numb even to care. Let the world see how not-okay I really was. Let them see and whisper about me like they always did. It would be entertaining for a hot minute, and then they would move on to the next piece of juicy gossip.

  Once I was dressed in my school uniform, I grabbed my purse and phone and walked downstairs.

  Mason was sitting at the island in the kitchen eating a bowl of cereal, while Mom and Dad stood by the coffeepot. Oscar bounced over to lick my hand when I walked in, then whined pitifully when I barely scratched his head.

  “I’ll be driving you to school for the next month,” Dad informed me with that same angry bite to his voice.

  “Okay.” I opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water.

  “Do you want some breakfast, honey?” Mom asked.

  “I’m not hungry.” Turning, I held out my phone to her. “Do you want this?”

  “Keep your phone,” Dad told me. “It’s our only link to you when you’re not with us.”

  “Okay.” I put it in my purse without glancing at the screen. The ringer was still off, and I didn’t want to know if Luca had even tried to call.

  Mason carried his empty bowl to the sink. “It’s so tense in here, I feel like I’m walking through a minefield.”

  “Hush, Mase,” Dad barked at him. “Get your shit. We’re leaving in five minutes.”

  “Okay, geesh. Don’t bite my head off. I didn’t do anything,” he grumbled to himself as he went to get his backpack.

  Dad was still pissed when he dropped off Mason first and then pulled up in front of my school. I reached for the door, but he stopped me. “I’ll be here when school releases. I expect you to come straight out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He blew out a long sigh and then reached out, cupping the side of my face. “I’m sorry for being an ass. You just scared the hell out of me, little girl. If anything ever happened to you…” His eyes landed on my mouth, and his jaw clenched. “But something did happen, didn’t it, Violet? A boy I think of as a son hurt you, and I wasn’t there to protect you.”

  “You can’t be there twenty-four seven, Dad,” I told him.

  “All these years, I was so worried about Luca keeping his hands to himself, but it was Cannon who—”

  “Dad, I love you. More than anything. But can we not talk about this right now?” I leaned over and kissed his cheek, only to feel my cut reopen yet again. “I’m sorry I made you worry. It won’t ever happen again.”

  “Honey, I know what happened Friday night shook you up, but is there something els
e wrong?” His blue-gray eyes tried to look beyond what little I was letting through, but I’d already erected so many walls, there was no way he could tear them down. “You’re not acting like yourself.”

  “Just tired, Daddy.” I opened the door and stepped out. “Love you. See you at three.”

  As I started into school, I heard Shaw call my name and paused to wait on her. Her dad had driven her to school too because they had taken her car for a few weeks since she’d been drinking at Friday’s party. She didn’t seem to care about the loss of it, though. Not when she was so pissed at her brother.

  When she got close enough, she hugged me. “How are you doing?” she asked softly as she pulled back.

  I shrugged. “I’m okay.”

  Her blue eyes assessed me for a moment before her brows lifted. “How did it go with Luca yesterday?”

  I lifted a shoulder in a small shrug. “It went.” I opened the door to the school and started toward our shared locker.

  “That’s all you’re going to tell me?” Shaw asked as she fell into step beside me.

  “There’s nothing else to tell.”

  “I call bullshit.” She jumped in front of me and walked backward so she could keep her eyes on my face. “Talk to me, Vi. What happened yesterday? Did he threaten to kill my brother? Because I’m all too happy to help him if he wants to murder that shithead.”

  Feeling a headache begin to throb behind my eyes, I tried to walk around my best friend. “I would really rather not talk about it.”

  She cut me off and wrapped an arm around my waist to stop me. “Violet?” There was real distress in her voice, and my numbness faded for all of five seconds before it flooded over me again. “Tell me.”

  I swallowed the lump that had entered my throat and shrugged. “There’s nothing to tell. Luca and I broke up.”

  “What?” Her voice echoed off the other lockers, catching everyone’s attention. But her eyes were glued to my face. “Why? Surely not because he still thinks you wanted to kiss Cannon.”

  “No,” I agreed. “It was more to do with him having sex with Megan Hawthorn Saturday night.”

  She blinked her long, thick lashes at me. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “You heard me, Shaw. Now, can you get out of my way? I need to grab my book and get to class. I don’t need to give my parents yet another reason to extend my grounding.” Shocked, she stepped aside. “Thank you.”

  I finally made it to our locker, but it took two attempts before I could get the lock undone. My fingers shook so badly I messed up the combination, but I wasn’t sure if the shaking was from everything that had taken place over the past several days, lack of sleep, or if I was close to having a total breakdown.

  No, I thought as I jerked the locker door open. I would not fall apart completely. I was stronger than that. I had to be strong. I just needed to take a deep breath, and I would be fine.

  Boyfriends cheated on their girlfriends every day. They got through it, and so would I.

  “Vi…I don’t know what to say,” Shaw said from behind me.

  “Don’t say anything. It happened. We broke up. There’s nothing left to talk about.” I grabbed my book and left the door open so she could get her own. Without looking at her, I turned in the direction of my first class. “I’ll see you at lunch.”

  “Vi, I’m sorry,” she called after me.

  I stopped and turned to face her. “Don’t be. Nothing that happened this weekend was your fault.”

  “If I hadn’t taken you to that party…”

  “It would have happened eventually, regardless,” I told her with a careless shrug, but that small movement felt like it took the last of my energy. “Megan warned me, remember? She warned me, and I didn’t listen.”

  But I should have.

  Chapter 23

  Violet

  By lunch, I knew I was probably going to have to get stitches in my lip. It kept reopening, and I’d had to go to the bathroom to clean up the blood that continued to pour out of my mouth.

  When it happened for the second time in the same class, my teacher sent me to the nurse, who took one look at the wound and called Dad. I was sitting there waiting on him when the door opened and Remington walked in.

  The nurse glanced at him and shook her head. “Back again, I see.”

  “You know I can’t go two hours without seeing your lovely face, Nurse Brenda.” He gave her a charming smile and winked.

  “Have a seat, Mr. Sawyer. I’ll be with you shortly.” She waved him over to the cot beside where I was sitting and walked into the back of the small clinic-like area that was her domain.

  Remington did as he was told, and his eyes fell on me. “What are you in for, Stevenson?” he asked with a small smile as he dropped down onto the cot.

  “I keep reopening the cut on the inside of my mouth,” I said with a lift of my shoulders. “Apparently I need stitches.”

  His face darkened. “How did it go with your parents? I noticed Baby Cage wasn’t in homeroom this morning.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t expect to see him anytime soon. Aunt Dallas and Uncle Axton shipped him off to some hard-core military school or something. I’m not really sure.” Talking had made my lip start to bleed again, and I grabbed a tissue to wipe my mouth.

  “Good for them. Not many parents these days would have punished him since boys will be boys and all that bullshit.”

  “They’ve been threatening him with it for years.” I grabbed another tissue when the first one got too saturated. “What about your parents? Would they have shipped you off if you were to do something like Cannon did?”

  His face tensed for a moment, then he shook his head. “I don’t know. They died twelve years ago. It’s just me and my grandfather. Now, he’s one of those with the mind-set of ‘boys will be boys.’ He’s an asshole and a total misogynist. Sons can do no wrong in his eyes. I would have gotten a stern ‘Don’t do it again, Remington’ in public and then a pat on the back behind closed doors.”

  Despite my numbness, I felt a wave of pain when he told me his parents were dead. I couldn’t imagine losing either my mom or dad, even though I’d been so scared it would happen when Dad had donated part of his liver to Uncle Drake. “I’m so sorry,” I told him. “I had no idea you…”

  “That I’m an orphan?” He laughed. “I don’t go around making it public knowledge, Stevenson.” I had to get a third tissue, and his face clouded over. Standing, he came over to crouch in front of me. Taking the tissue from me, he dabbed at the corner of my mouth. “I should have hit that bastard harder. He butchered your mouth.”

  “Shaw mentioned you may have knocked a few of his teeth loose with that punch.” I found myself actually smiling at him, only to have more blood spill out of my mouth.

  His lips twitched in a ghost of a smile as he mopped up the fresh blood. “Wish I’d broken his jaw.”

  “Me too.”

  Remington’s gaze went to my phone that was sitting beside me on my cot. “Looks like you’re getting a call from the boyfriend,” he said, nodding toward the lit-up screen.

  I didn’t even glance at it. “He’s not my boyfriend anymore.” As soon as the words were out, I felt a slice of pain cut straight through my heart. Sucking in a deep breath, I prayed the numbness would return, but for some reason, it had lifted when I saw Remington.

  I wasn’t sure why I was telling him when I hadn’t even told my parents about the breakup. I hadn’t even really wanted to tell Shaw, yet there I was, the truth spilling out of me like word vomit.

  His clear blue eyes widened. “Can I ask why?”

  I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t. Tears wouldn’t solve anything. They wouldn’t wash away the past and make it so that Luca hadn’t cheated on me. I blinked back the moisture in my eyes and swallowed the lump trying to choke me. “He put his dick in someone else.”

  “Fuck,” he muttered. “I’m sorry, Violet.”

  “Don’t be.
It was bound to happen eventually. It was stupid of me to think that we actually had a chance when the age difference was in our way.” I took the tissue from him when he lowered it. “Love doesn’t really mean anything when a guy’s dick is the one doing the thinking.”

  “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been in love.” He grabbed a fresh tissue and started cleaning me up again, his touch so soft I barely felt it. “But it’s on my bucket list.”

  “Bucket list? Aren’t you a little young for one of those?”

  “Poor choice of words,” he said with a smile. “Love is something I want to find. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt it, though. I can’t remember my parents very well, so I’m not sure if they loved me or not. And I feel more disdain for my grandfather than affection or even respect. As for romantic love…” He shrugged. “Ask me again in a few years.”

  The door opened, and Dad walked in. When he saw Remington taking care of me, his blue-gray eyes narrowed. My friend stood as Dad entered the room, the blood-soaked tissues still in his hand.

  “Let’s go, Vi,” Dad said, his brow wrinkled as he frowned from me to Remington and back again.

  I took the bloody tissues from Remington’s hand. “Thanks.”

  “Call me if you need to talk.”

  “I…might do that.” I picked up my purse and phone and followed Dad out of the room.

  No sooner had we gotten in the car than he was grilling me. “Who the hell was that guy?”

  “He’s my friend.” I stuffed my phone in my purse when I saw it light up again and pulled on my seat belt.

  “Does Luca know you have a guy friend?”

  I didn’t even flinch at the sound of my ex’s name and was thankful the numbness had descended on me again. “He knows I talk to Remington.”

  “Okay, then,” he muttered unhappily. Then his gaze dropped to my mouth. “Looks like we’re going to the emergency room to get you stitched up.”

  “Doesn’t Mom know?”

  “She’s going to meet us there,” he said as he backed up. “You should go ahead and tell Luca now since you might not be able to talk later.”