by Nicole Snow
Fuck you for leaving, Dad. Fuck your dirty laundry. Fuck your company. Fuck you for getting killed over nothing. And fuck your killer, too.
Someday I’ll find that asshole. I’ll figure out who he is, and this time there won’t be a body left to find.
I’ll be the man you couldn’t be.
I'll finish what you couldn't. I'll give ma a reason to smile again – really smile – while I lie through my teeth about what you truly were. A selfish, arrogant, two-timing prick who put our futures on the line every day, and God only knows how many lives.
God only knows why you wound up loving money so bad you'd do the shit you did. And wherever God is, knowing, you're not with him now. You're in hell and you're never coming back.
My heart is ice, right now. Frozen so solid and heavy it can’t even beat, but my head is spinning.
I don’t understand what I’m reading.
Landon thinks his father was killed? Crown Security was dirty and...and...Landon hated him?
Enough to want to hurt him?
Enough to want him in hell?
But he loved him enough to kill his murderer?
Landon, the boy I know, the boy who’s gone...
He’s planning to kill someone.
The boy who shipped overseas and came home to a dead father is gone. There’s a hardened, furious, would-be killer with a vendetta in his place.
I press my trembling fingers to my lips – and it’s the only thing that stops me from screaming, instinctively clamping my hand over my mouth on a whimper, when the journal suddenly rips out of my hand, pages fanning violently enough to almost tear.
My frozen heart shatters. My blood goes electric. Terror. Shock. Agony.
I stare up at Landon, looming over me, his eyes lit with a glacial fury I’ve never seen.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
The way he says it almost destroys me.
Instead of snarling temper and shouts, it’s frigid and quiet and deadly, as if any part of him that cared for me at all is gone behind this mask of slow, calculating, murderous rage.
He’s become a stranger, a man I've never seen before, and I think the reason my eyes well with burning, blurring tears is less out of fear of him, and more out of grief as I realize the Landon I knew really is lost.
Yet, there’s a glimmer of something human there, too. Awful and familiar.
The betrayal.
And I hate that it’s the only part of Landon left, and it’s directed at me.
“Um, I...”
“You, nothing. I don’t want to hear it.” He snaps the journal closed with a finality that feels like a gunshot. “Save your breath, McKenna. I don’t want to hear your apologies. Don’t want to fucking hear anything else, not from you and not from Steve. Your brother’s been up my ass for months. Everyone’s walking on eggshells, treating me like damaged fucking goods, and the worst part is they're right. I’ve had enough. My life, my privacy, my shit, McKenna. Not yours or Steve's or anybody else's. Do yourself a heaping favor: get the fuck out and leave me the fuck alone. Say anything about what you've read to anyone, and fuck, you –”
My ears stop working. I'm trying to back away but I don't even know if my knees work.
I can't breathe. I can't feel.
My throat is so tight. Choking. I’m crying as much for him as I am for me, and I rise shakily to my feet. Some brave part of me wants to reach for him.
He’s just a blur through my misting, fragmenting, blood orange vision, but I step closer to the dark shape he makes against the night. “Landon...”
“Are you listening? Leave!” He turns on me with a roar, all kinetic energy and vibrant rage, radiating his own heat. The force of his voice hits me like a shockwave. It echoes in my bones. “What the hell do you think you'll accomplish? Last thing I need is some little girl sniffing around after me. Go fuck with someone your own age, McKenna. I don't need you. I don't need fucking anything. We're done.”
That’s it.
Done.
That final word breaks me.
That word sends me stumbling away half-blind, tumbling out onto the sidewalk, fleeing home in a shaken stupor.
I don’t look back. I don’t want to see him.
I don’t want to see the hate in his eyes again, when he looks at me.
But it’s my last memory of him.
A few days later he ships out for the Army. I don’t even get to see him one last time before he’s gone. Just a hole in my life, and I don’t realize how big a space he’d occupied until it’s empty.
I’m not ashamed to admit I want him back. I miss my friend.
I want to talk to him, to tell him how much his words hurt me, to find some way back to normal. I even write to him – so many times, so many letters. I keep writing through my freshman year at college, sacrificing nights I should be out with friends or exploring myself. I give them up to pen him at least a dozen apologies and explanations, painstakingly crafted for days, with long, restless breaks in between buried in term papers and internships.
Landon never writes back.
Because he’s done, he said.
And clearly, he means it.
* * *
Present Day
It shouldn’t still hurt this much.
What happened to time healing all wounds?
My eyes are dry, but burning. How long have I been out here, losing myself in the past?
The ocean breeze tastes like sunset, and the sky is turning purple on the horizon, tinged with a touch of orange as the sun dips down like it might just set the ocean aflame. My chest is hollow. Aching.
It’s awful. It’s still so awful, like I’m that girl again, and he just ripped out my stitches, reminding me how useless I am and always will be. How I don't fit into his life, and never did.
Reminding me that he could have blood on his hands, and for some insane reason, I’ve kept his secrets all these years.
I don’t know if I want to know if he was really able to go through with it.
Hell, I know I don't want to find out if he did.
I feel too out in the open, right now. Too exposed. Vulnerable.
I don’t want to run into him, and I know he’s in the house somewhere, rattling around and getting ready to leave for Sonoma in the morning. I risk a glance over my shoulder, then escape to my room.
One of the cats – Velvet, I think, still not sure after he’d tersely flung names at me a few hours ago – trails after me, a sweet blue-gray comfort twining around my ankles.
While the guest room is spacious, right now it just feels like more emptiness for me to rattle around in.
I hate feeling like a loose end. I should sit down, write, but I don’t think I could even manage to sit still. I’m not exactly a Type A personality.
I’m more like Type ADHD, bouncing between wild periods of hyperactive multitasking productivity and long inert daydreaming sessions. When you catch me somewhere in between, it’s nothing but disquiet.
What I like to call 'creative procrastinating.'
I need to do something to feel better right now, but my brain’s still trapped in the dream.
Drifting to the bedroom window, drawn by the colors of the sunset, I let my eyes steal a little balm for my soul from the landscape. California sunsets are like pastel fires and dripping watercolors blended together, an arresting sight that helps take my mind off the lingering ache in my chest.
But the ache becomes a knife stabbing me as I catch motion on the beach again.
Landon.
He’s standing on the sand, a change of clothes stacked on a beach towel close by. Only this time, he’s naked. Brazenly, shamelessly nude.
Gorgeous, too, the setting sunlight gilding every edge of him until I could trace the poetry of his sculpted body in lines of glowing, gleaming light. His tattoos shape him, as if they’re arcane markings binding this demon into the shape of a man.
From his broad, square shoulders to the trim line of his hips to the
sinfully decadent dip of his Hercules crest, he’s breathtaking. If he turns around, I just might die. If I see that secret part of him and start imagining all the terrible, wonderful, and wonderfully terrible things his cock can do to me...
No. Kenna, no, I tell myself.
Don't. Even. Go. There.
But my eyes do. It’s like watching a wildcat move as he forges into the powerful push and pull of the waves. Mercifully before I catch a glimpse of everything.
I'm transfixed. Drunk. Watching all that compact, tight, dense muscle, working and flowing together in this brutally enchanting machine fueled by raw, primal masculinity.
Everything hurts.
Everything I am.
I've been horny before, like any red blooded woman, but this? It's on another level.
I'm suffocating with the force of this longing; my whole body prickles with the craving, the need, the wetness that has me pinching my thighs shut, my lips pulsing, my heart beating far too hard.
I’m all raw edges, and I don’t know what I need more.
Landon’s touch, or his forgiveness.
God. It really was stupid to ever come here, wasn't it? To ever think this was a good idea.
I can’t go back in time and change what happened half a decade ago. I can’t take back finding his journal, snooping, and cornering him like an injured animal.
And I can’t pretend I feel different.
I'm still obsessed with Landon Strauss.
That's what shreds the other can'ts into tiny little scraps of heart-sad confetti. That's what puts me in this unbearable situation.
Standing here with my heart on fire. Alone in a house that isn’t mine. Desperate for a man I’ll never have, once again invading a place where I don’t belong.
8
Miss Holly (Landon)
I’m not ten miles down the road to Sonoma before I already want to turn around.
I don’t feel right leaving Kenna alone.
The sense of something wrong lingers, this weight in my gut – and that weight is slewed toward my house and the girl in it and the feeling I'm a fucking fool for not being there.
What if something happens? What if she needs protection?
I pound my fist on the wheel. The loud, jarring thump brings me out of it.
It’s nerves, probably. I’m still too keyed up after the fire. Still in animal mode, reacting on pure instinct.
There's no reason I should worry.
She’s got the security system, the cops, and Riker, the guy I left behind to do patrols. He was one of the first I hired for Enguard, and I’d trust him with my own blood.
If I had much family left, other than Steve, that is.
Hell, he's so close he might as well be my brother.
Except that would make Kenna my sister, and the deep hungry pull in my gut doesn’t see that woman in an ewww-family way at all.
Ten years ago, yeah.
Now?
Sweet fuck. I wish she hadn’t grown up so much.
My dick springs to life, tormenting me a few miles, remembering how I walked in on her underdressed this morning. Her hair was tossed around, like she'd just lifted it off the pillow, and seeing that hair in its wild, natural state makes me think terrible things.
Far too close to how I imagine her chestnut mess would look in my fist. After I've left her lush body crawling up my bed. The sass, the tension, the hate-love curdling the air between us thoroughly railed out of her.
My balls throb. They're turning half-blue with unquenchable need when another sound chirps in the car.
My Bluetooth dash light flicks on with an incoming call.
The disquiet thrumming through me turns into irritation. My whole car – a late-model Impala that’s pure Dean from Supernatural – is networked so I can handle work hands-free on the go, and the radio LED doubles as caller ID, flashing with a familiar number and the name Reese, Dallas.
Fucking Dallas.
It’s no coincidence the second half of his name rhymes with 'ass.'
I’m tempted not to answer it. But there’s an old sense of loyalty to my father’s former company, a sense of duty, that says I’d better.
Besides, with Dallas as my main competition, I might as well stay on top of his antics just so I’m not caught blindsided if he tries to steal Milah out from under me.
I press the dash button to activate the in-car speaker, then settle my hands back on the ten and two on the steering wheel.
“What?”
“You could at least say hello,” Dallas' smooth voice echoes across the speaker, a smirk in his tone.
“You’re the second person to say that to me in twenty-four hours. Again, what?”
“Really, Landon?” He clucks his tongue. “I was just calling to see if you were all right.”
The bullshit concern in his voice takes me back to an earlier time. Dallas, standing on my parents' porch, shortly after my old man's funeral. His flimsy hand on my shoulder, a hand I never asked for, because he was the last asshole on earth I wanted sympathy from.
Not a memory I want. Or need.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I heard you had a little trouble at your place. Something about a fire?”
I narrow my eyes at the road. “How the hell do you know about that?”
“One of my team doubles as a volunteer firefighter. Word gets around. Frankly, I’m just glad you’re all right. Lighten up, pal.”
“Sure you are,” I snarl, my throat turning into sandpaper.
“You sure have a talent for sarcasm, Landon.” Dallas sighs, throwing it back at me. “Unfortunately, I did feel it was my civic duty to inform Miss Holly’s team of the mishap. Business, you understand? In the event that you were indisposed and she needed a fallback –”
“Civic duty,” I bark back, teeth clenched so hard my entire face hurts. “Fuck you. If you had anything to do with that fire –”
“Oh, come on! Must you be so suspicious? Have you ever thought I was trying to help you, Landon? This entire thing could've been arranged like gentlemen. So you were the reliable party who set up the fallback, ensuring Miss Holly was well cared for. Client satisfaction.”
“While you get the fat paycheck, you mean.” I'm so not in the mood for this.
“It’s not about the money! How many times do I have to keep saying it?” He always sounds so calm, so smooth, every answer as prepared as a slick-dick politician’s speech, and I hate it. “It’s about your reputation. Enguard's reputation, I mean. Even if you’re no longer with Crown Security, I can’t help taking an interest in what you’re doing. We're friends in the same industry. Quite a few people take an interest in what you’re doing, you know. You’re a person of interest now – and everyone in private security is watching and waiting for you to slip up on a job that’s too big for your little outfit to handle.”
Too big for me to handle?
I bet finding Dallas and wringing his fucking neck would give his sense of size a whole new meaning.
This smug, shitty asshole, pretending to actually give a damn about me or my company or my reputation –
But he’s still talking. He’s always talking.
Fucker treats the sound of his own voice like music.
“When it’s too much for you,” he says, “there’s always a place for you at Crown. I hope you know it. Your father would've wanted it that way. He’d never have wanted you to lone wolf it, to leave the company he worked so hard to build.”
There's a long, arrogant pause. Here it comes.
“Landon? Tell me one thing: why can’t we just bury bad blood and work together? Partners?”
Not in this lifetime. Not in the next ten.
“Because I don’t work with fucking vultures,” I spit. “Fuck you, fuck Crown Security, and fuck the idea that you and I could ever work together. I'm not your friend, Dallas. And you weren't mine, even though you did a damn good job getting under my skin after dad was buried, and you thought I was all busted
up, needing a shoulder to cry on. Go fuck yourself. I’d rather choke on glass than work with you.”
“You'll certainly choke on that overgrown ego of yours if you’re not careful.” Smug piece of shit. There's always a comeback. “Remember, Miss Holly has a reputation for litigation. Not to mention, the star power – and funding – to eat you alive in court. Screw up, and you’ll lose more than a contract. You’ll lose –”
“My patience with this conversation,” I interrupt. “Get to the point. Whatever you really called for, Dallas. Because it wasn’t to play ‘whose dick is bigger.’ We outgrew that years ago.”
“Am I really so transparent?” He sighs. At least when he speaks, this time, it doesn’t sound mocking and trite; it sounds tired, and genuinely so. “Look, I’m not comfortable talking about this on an unsecured line, but we should meet soon.”
I go still. There’s only ever one thing Dallas wants to meet in person about. My entire body tingles with tension. It's too good to be true, especially when it's the very thing he holds over me, baiting my sorry ass into taking more of his calls. “You’ve got new intel?”
“Possibly. New details the police hadn’t released before. It’s best if we discuss it in person, Landon. You know that.”
“Fine. When I get back from Sonoma. I'll call.”
“Lovely. I really think we might be close to a break this time.”
“That’s what you’ve said every time.” It’s the closest to polite I can manage to be with him, when one more word will have me seeing red. My hands are aching, my knuckles white, from how hard I’m gripping the steering wheel, and if I’m not careful I’m going to swerve off the road just trying to unclench. “I’m driving and can’t talk, Dallas. Gotta go.”
He makes a sound that doesn’t quite become a word before I slam the dash button, ending the call.
Shit. the last thing I need when I’ve got Kenna on my mind and in my house is Dallas planting seeds of doubt.
I’ve got this, though.
I’ve got this, and I don’t need a massive security company behind me to make it work. Smaller is better. Lean. Tough. Focused.
