by I. A. Dice
I caught her hand and laced our fingers, not thinking twice about it.
“Maybe. Then again, I had no right to touch you and look where we are. Don’t act surprised when I hit him.”
I almost wanted Ethan to make one false move so I could justify my right hook breaking his nose.
Nadia snatched her hand out of my grip, and she marched back inside. The atmosphere was thicker than when we left. Nicholas sat with arms crossed, Mel sent warning glares in Nadia’s direction, and Scorpio watched me, as if anticipating a shitstorm.
He knew me well.
And Ethan? Ethan struggled to contain his excitement, fidgeting like an impatient child.
“So? What’s the dare?” Nadia asked.
Nick’s jaw tightened more, and he shot me a look I couldn’t decipher. One thing I was certain of was that after Ethan’s and Nadia’s date, Nick no longer wanted Ethan adoring his sister.
“He has to fish an ice cube out of your cleavage using his mouth,” Mel said, sounding apologetic.
She watched me instead of Nadia, as if my reaction could tell her more. I knew Nadia told her we slept together, and she’s been on my case ever since, waiting to catch me red handed.
“Thomas let me use his veto,” Nadia said.
The song we danced to the first night at the club played from the speaker, and the way her petite body felt pressed against mine, swaying to the rhythm flashed in my head. She glanced my way, and I knew we were thinking about the same moment.
Ethan took an ice cube out of his drink. “Nice try, but it doesn’t work like that, cutie.”
My temper flared when he rose, showing off his teeth. The ones he would be picking off the carpet if he took one more step.
“Sit,” I seethed. “She said no.”
“Oh come on!” Jane rolled her eyes. “What’s the big deal? We all play by the rules, and so will you. You’re out of vetoes, and you’re not having Thomas’s, so get up and get on with the show.”
“Fine,” Nadia huffed.
My stomach sank for just a second. The blinding anger was replaced with ease when she turned my way and fastened her soft lips on mine. I weaved my hand through her hair, and kissed her back with all I had, ignoring the audience. This was my one shot to remind her how good we were together, and I made the most of it. I bit her lip, slowed down, and changed the hungry moment into an intimate one. Nadia relaxed under my touch; played by my rules, taking handfuls of our closeness.
I closed her lips, and inched away, my mind racing. She was once again perfectly content. Even the dark circles under her eyes looked lighter somehow. The effect my touch had on her was mind-blowing. Harry Potter could kiss my ass. I didn’t need a fucking wand to perform magic tricks.
“You taste sweet, baby doll.”
She smiled at my blatant attempt at infuriating Nick some more, then moved to face Ethan.
“I believe that’s my veto reinstated, so… Veto.”
He looked dumbstruck, lips parted, but no words coming out. Nick was the first to react. He chose to ignore the last minute as if it never happened, reaching for a pink card to read Mel’s dare.
CHAPTER 14
NADIA
So sorry
“How the hell am I supposed to convince Nick now that there’s nothing going on between you and Thomas?!” Mel hissed, helping me clear the table when Ethan, Scorpio and Jane left.
“There is nothing going on. Stop overreacting.”
She dropped the dirty dishes in the sink, making a lot of unnecessary noise. “It’s been two weeks, and instead of his interest in you dying out, it’s growing. I see the way he looks at you, and Nick sees it too.”
The digital clock on the oven showed twenty past one in the morning—not the best time for arguments. Instead of convincing Mel she was wrong, I marched back to the living room, passing Thomas holding a handful of empty beer bottles and heading to the kitchen.
May the force be with you.
Nick wasn’t keen to help. He sat by the table, polishing the last of the chicken salad from his plate, his eyes heavy with the whiskey he poured down his throat. He patted the chair next to him, motioning for me to sit. I hesitated, not in the mood to be lectured, but he couldn’t hold his head up all that well. I took the offer, knowing It would be easier to dodge the bullets while he had a hard time forming coherent sentences.
“You’re so smart,” he muttered the smell of whiskey fanning my face. “You know that, right? You’re so smart. Don’t fall for his shit, okay? Please don’t. He’ll hurt you, and I’ll lose my best friend.”
“You should get some sleep, Nick. You’re wasted.”
He watched me, pressing a finger to his mouth. “You like him.” A long, heavy sigh followed while he massaged his temples. “If he weren’t such a whore… If he could take care of you the way you deserve… God, sis, I would do anything for you, you know that right? Just trust me here. Thomas doesn’t deserve you. Whatever went wrong between you and Adrian… I’m sure you can fix it!”
Fifty-eight hours without meds. Fifty-eight hours of busying my mind and using every calming technique I knew only for it to go to hell thanks to Nick.
Flashbacks broke the walls, crashing down on me like an avalanche. The feeling of impending doom hit me hard, the way it did every time Adrian walked through the door, crazy in his black eyes. It was a feeling that was easily numbed with alprazolam, but I didn’t have it now. My heart raced and images flashed before my eyes.
“Where were you?” Adrian sat by the breakfast bar, his pupils dilated, breathing shallow and hastened.
The grey t-shirt on his back was drenched in sweat; cheeks flushed.
“Are you okay?” I asked, leaving my bag by the door. “You look ill.”
I pressed my hand to his forehead, but instead of feverish he felt cold to the touch. He covered my palm with his and squeezed hard.
“I asked you a question. Where the fuck were you? It’s late!”
For a short moment he rendered me speechless. It was the first time he swore at me.
“I bumped into Katie after lectures, and she took me out shopping. Why are you mad? I sent you a message. Did you check your phone?”
He stood, swaying on his feet, and I rushed to steady him. Then something on the breakfast bar caught my attention, and my mind drew a blank. A small plastic packet filled with at least a dozen of yellow pills had my heartrate in a frenzy. I glanced at Adrian again, hoping against all hope, that he didn’t take any, but the symptoms were visible on his face, in his eyes and in his behaviour.
I was offered one of those pills by a freshman a few months earlier at a frat party. Ty was there with me, and he beat the hell out of the guy, threatening to call the cops if he ever saw him again.
“Don’t ever take this shit,” he told me, looking around the room, searching for Adrian who disappeared with his sparring partner. “They call it Angel Dust. It’s a hallucinogenic. It’ll mess you up like nothing else, girl.”
Angel Dust, or PCP as they officially referred to it, claimed its first victim on our campus a month later. A girl jumped out of a third-floor window in the middle of the day.
“You’re high?!” I cried, snatching the foil packet and running to the bathroom to flush the pills down the drain. “Why did you take it? We need to get you to the hospital.”
But before I could drop the pills into the toilet, Adrian tore them out of my hand, and swallowed one more.
“You’re such a fucking liar!” he bellowed. “I know you were with Ty! Are you cheating on me?!” He towered above me.
I pushed him away and ducked under his arm, fighting to stay in control of the situation. I fell to my knees, rummaging through my bag to find my phone and call Ty.
“Nadia!” Nick slammed his fists on the table.
I blinked, then grabbed an empty crystal glass from the table, focusing for a few seconds on how it felt in my hand.
Firm, cold, smooth.
Round, heavy, empty.
>
It was a grounding technique James taught me two years ago. I hadn’t used it since the doctor in New York prescribed me with sedatives.
“What?” I asked, my throat dry, heart slamming against my ribs. “I’m sorry, did you say something?”
Playing dumb never worked on Nick. He saw me on a verge of a panic attack and during one too after our father died, but I hoped he was too drunk to connect the dots.
“You switched off, Nadia. You switched off the same way you used to when Dad died. And you’re still shaking!”
Sometime during the last minute or so he sobered, and now looked just as worried as Thomas, who sat on my right, his eyes not leaving my face, body leaning toward me, as if ready to catch me.
“This has gone on long enough,” Nick continued. “You need to tell me what the hell happened. You’re a mess again. I want to help, but I can’t because you’re not telling me anything!”
I put the glass away and placed my hand on his shoulder, forcing him to look at me, and at the same time, I caught Thomas’s hand out of Nick’s view, squeezing hard to get some semblance of peace, even if just for a moment. It was selfish, but the fear residing in every cell of my body pushed me to grasp the one thing within reach that could help.
Thomas did exactly what I hoped he would. He let me feed off his strength, lacing our fingers, and stroking my hand with his thumb, agreeing to being used as an antidote to my disease.
“What happened is irrelevant. I might be a mess now, but I’m getting help; soon I’ll be back to my normal self.”
The sad part was that I didn’t believe I would ever be the same again.
“Help?” Nick rose to his feet. “What are you talking about?”
I let go of Thomas’s hand, careful not to enrage Nick more. The one thing I failed to notice before was Mel standing in the doorway. Her eyes jumping from me to Thomas and back.
“I’m seeing James again,” I said.
Nick scoffed, pacing around the room. “Yeah, because that worked so well last time. He’s not the right doctor for you. I know you trust him, but after six months of therapy you weren’t much better.”
“It’s not magic, Nick,” Mel interjected. “These things take time. I mean, it’s been fifteen years since my parents abandoned me, and I still struggle sometimes.”
Nick disregarded his fiancée, then turned back to me, a sense of enlightenment in his eyes. “Did Adrian cheat on you?”
“No!” I blurted out before taking a moment to think.
It would have been the perfect explanation. Nick knew that cheating was the one thing that could destroy my relationship with Adrian in a blink of an eye and beyond repair.
I still blamed our mother for Dad’s death. If she hadn’t cheated on him, he would still be alive.
“Then what did he do?!”
The answer sat on the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed hard, not letting the heated moment ruin my brother.
“If I’m ever ready to talk, then I will, but now is not the time.”
I glanced at Mel, willing her to take Nick home before we would argue, but with one look at her, I knew she wasn’t siding with me on this one.
“You should tell us. You’re keeping it in, and it’s not helping you move on. You’re making it harder for all of us.”
A pang of disappointment dabbed at the back of my mind. She was the only one who could understand the reluctance to sharing traumatic events, and despite that she pushed.
Cornered by two of the most important people in my life, I was left with no choice but to take the easiest way out.
“I’m going to bed.” I crossed the room. “Let yourselves out. Goodnight.”
A minute later, I gently closed the door to my bedroom. My composure was an illusion, a defence mechanism designed to protect everyone but me. Silent tears dripped down my chin; feelings of detachment and failure resurfaced, stripping my mind of the firewall. More memories seeped through the cracks, and the second the door to my apartment closed with a bang, I fell backward, curled into a ball, and fisted the sheets, crying like I hadn’t cried since Nick told me Dad died.
For months, I fought to suppress the negative emotions and consequently failed to process what Adrian had done. Heavily medicated from day one, fighting to stay sane and help him through the addiction, I forgot to take care of myself.
I fell to my knees, rummaging through my bag to find my phone and call Ty. Adrian snatched the cell from me and sent it flying across the room. He caught my arm and shoved me hard against the wall. My head hit a picture frame. The glass shattered, and shards broke the skin.
“Stop it!” I cried, punching his chest. “Let me go. Please, you’re high, Adrian. You’re delusional. Let me get help!”
“Help?” He gripped my neck and five fingers dug into my skin. “You mean Ty?!” He squeezed harder, cutting off my air supply. “He’s not getting near you. You’re mine, puppet. You’re only mine. Say it.”
I nodded vigorously. Tears blurred my vision as I gasped for air and tried to move his hands away so I could breath. I was ready to say and do anything to calm him down.
“I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch if he as much as looks at you.”
Adrian loosened the grip, and his attitude changed in an instant. I coughed, pumping air back into my lungs, and watched the aggression fade away. His eyes turned heavy, as if his system was crashing. He took a few rickety steps back, then marched straight to the bedroom, and a thud followed.
I stood there, plastered to the wall, blood dripping down my neck, chaos in my mind. My heart beat so hard that I heard it over my hastened breathing and almost inaudible whimpers.
A moment passed before I regained feeling in my stiff body and slid to the floor. I couldn’t tell how long I stared into the distance, listening to Adrian’s loud, steady breaths coming from the bedroom.
Then, as if jolted by electricity, I jumped to my feet and picked the phone from the floor, praying for it to work. The screen was cracked, but it switched on, and I dialled Ty’s number.
“Hey, girl. What’s up?”
Relief at the sound of his voice intensified my whimpers.
“What’s wrong, Nadia?”
“Adrian’s high,” I rocked back and forth in the corner of the room. “He fell asleep, but he’s been acting crazy. Can you come? I’m scared, and I don’t know what to do.”
“Hold on.” Doors slammed in the background and gravel crunched under his feet. “I’m on my way. Get out of the apartment. Meet me downstairs. I’ll be there in five minutes.”
He cut the call, but not before the big engine of his car sprung to life, roaring like a wild animal. I tiptoed across the room, my legs like cotton candy. I took care opening and closing the door, careful not to make a sound.
Ty jumped out of the driver’s seat when I was halfway through a cigarette, trembling in the cold January air like a frightened kitten.
“What happened?” he asked, taking long strides in my direction, but when he was just two feet away, he stopped, and colour drained from his face. “He did this?” He motioned to my neck, and took two more weary steps, then placed a finger under my chin, to take a better look.
“I don’t know what got into him,” I mumbled, the chocked-back sobs threatening to unleash. “He acted insane. I have never seen him like this, not even during the worst of our fights.”
He cupped my face, then hid me in his arms, but it lasted just a second. He spun me, his right hand marked with blood. “What the fuck did he do to you?” he seethed. “Get in the car, Nadia. I’ll grab some of your things. You’re staying with me tonight.”
The next morning was the first time since I was a little girl that I saw a man in tears. Adrian called Ty around noon. He screamed down the line so loud that a speakerphone was unnecessary.
Panic in his voice sent shivers down my spine.
“Is Nadia there with you?!”
“Yeah, she’s here.” Ty draped his arm over my shoulders and drew m
e to his side.
“I’m coming.”
Before Ty could answer, Adrian cut the call. My body tensed, fear blooming in the pit of my stomach and spreading to all vital organs.
“He needs to see you,” Ty said. “He has to see what he did. He loves you. Once he sees how he hurt you, he’s never touching drugs again.”
We waited in silence, and five minutes later, the door to Ty’s apartment banged against the wall. Adrian rushed into the living room and halted three feet away from me.
“No,” he muttered. “No, no, no.” His eyes filled with tears.
A bizarre memory stole my attention—the image of my father shedding a few tears at his mother’s funeral. I was only five when Nanny died and remembered little about the funeral. My father’s tears were etched into my brain and they had me convinced that men cried square tears. It was only when I saw Adrian cry that I realised it wasn’t possible.
He pulled hard on his hair, then covered his mouth and fell to his knees. “I’m so sorry, puppet.” Tears stained the beige fabric of the couch.
He held his hand out to take mine. I wanted to run, but the self-loathing on his face convinced me to stay. Seeing me hurt and knowing he was the one who did that broke him in ways only a man in love could be broken.
“Please,” he whispered, wiping the tears away. “I’m so sorry. I love you so much, puppet. You know that, right? Nothing matters more than you. Please, please don’t leave me. I’ll never take that shit again. Just don’t leave me.”
“You scared me.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Promise you won’t do that ever again.”
“I swear, puppet. I swear on my mother.” He took my hand, and placed it on his head, hiding his face in my lap. “I’m so sorry. I can’t believe I hurt you.” His voice broke, and he hugged my legs tight, “I won’t ever do it again.”
Ever lasted three weeks. Then a vicious cycle began—drugs, bruises, apologies. We were stuck believing that Adrian could change and that he could stop, that I could help him. We were deluding ourselves, hoping for better days, which were never to come.
CHAPTER 15
