Inhaling deeply through my nose, I pace the living room.
“I don’t need forgiveness. I just needed you to know.”
“I gotta get out of here,” I say, already walking toward the door. My dad gives a resigned sigh, and I pause, one hand on the door, looking back at him.
“I, uh, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I thought about going back to Dash and Briar’s, but I needed to clear my head. Instead, I found myself at a local hole-in-the wall bar. I had exactly three shots of cheap whiskey before a woman approached me. She was pretty, in that white trash, damaged sort of way. You could say she was the female version of me. And from the way her tongue flicked over her straw, I knew I could’ve had her in the bathroom. In my car. Right there on the bar, if I really wanted it. I looked her up and down, debating, but Briar’s face was all I could see, and we made a deal, after all. I couldn’t fucking pull the trigger, even if I wanted to. Even without the deal. Which, in turn, pissed me off even more. I slapped a twenty onto the counter and walked out without a word.
I’ve been driving around for the past two hours now, as “The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot” by Brand New blares from my speakers. I light up a cigarette, relishing in the comfort and the slight buzz as the nicotine is absorbed in my bloodstream. I quit smoking in River’s Edge—except for the occasional cigarette if I’m having a few beers—but I’ve been craving them more since I’ve been back.
I’m heading toward The Tracks, but at the last second, I cut across four lanes of traffic to take a different exit. The one that leads back to my old house. Something doesn’t feel right. Or maybe it’s just that I haven’t eaten, and the whiskey is hitting me harder than usual, so I decide not to make the drive out there tonight.
When I pull up to the driveway, I know something is off immediately. There’s a car that I don’t recognize, and once I’m out of my truck, I hear yelling from inside the house. I run toward the sound to find the front door cracked open. Walking as quietly as I can, I nudge it open and step inside.
Whatever I thought I’d be walking into, this wasn’t it. David, my uncle, has John against the wall with his hand around his throat.
“Not so tough now, are ya?” David spits. “Tell me where the boy is, for the last time.”
“I told you,” John wheezes, trying to loosen the hold on his neck. “He doesn’t want nothin’ to do with me. Haven’t seen him in years.”
“That’s bullshit, and we both know it. Tell. Me.”
“Fuck you,” my dad says before spitting at him.
Before I can get to them, David’s face contorts with rage, and his elbow cocks back before nailing John square in the face. He hits him one, two, three more times as I charge in their direction, both oblivious to my presence.
Coming up behind David, I sucker punch him to the side of the head, and he goes down like a ton of fucking bricks. I jump on him, raining blow after blow to his face, head, stomach, anywhere I can.
Three years and fifty pounds later, I can finally hold my own against him. I’m not the malnourished kid I once was.
“I gotta say, I didn’t see this coming,” David says. “It’s touching, really.” He laughs, and I hit him again, but he doesn’t seem fazed. A sound from my left distracts me, and I look over to see my dad struggling to get to his feet. David jumps on the opportunity, striking my jaw with his fist. Flipping me onto my back and straddling me, he gets the upper hand. Out of the corner of my eye, I see John pull himself up, using the arm of the recliner as leverage. I take another hit to the eye, then the mouth, before I hear the unmistakable sound of a pistol cocking.
David freezes with his fist mid-air, and I give him a deranged smile through bloodstained teeth. I shove him backward with both of my palms, and then I stand above him.
“How does it feel?” I ask, my voice calm and steady. “How does it feel to be on the receiving end?” I give a swift kick to his ribs, and he clutches his side, the air leaving his lungs in a whoosh.
“I want my money,” he wheezes.
I laugh, shaking my head. “How about a bullet instead?”
“Just give me the fucking money, and I’ll leave,” David says, not making any attempt to get up.
“If I wasn’t sick, I’d beat you to a bloody pulp for touching my kid,” John says, his gun still trained on David.
It’s David’s turn to chuckle. “That’s fucking rich coming from you.”
“How about this?” I interrupt before David gets himself shot. By the look in my dad’s eyes, I know it’s not out of the question. “You get the fuck out. Forget the money, and I’ll forget the fact that I know all about your extracurricular activities.” His mouth drops open in shock. “Yeah, you didn’t think this through, did you?” I squat, not-too-gently stubbing two fingers against his forehead. “How many warrants do you have out for your arrest, anyway? You thought just because I didn’t speak that I wasn’t listening? I know details, David. Names. Locations. And if you come back here again, I’ll sing like a goddamn canary.”
My dad looks between us, thoroughly confused, but he doesn’t let his guard down. He jerks the gun in the direction of the door, and David scrambles to his feet.
“This isn’t over,” he warns, and then he’s gone.
“I guess there’s a lot you haven’t told me,” my dad says, tiredly collapsing back into his recliner, like it’s just another Tuesday night.
“Your brother likes to steal cars and sell them for parts. Among other things.”
I even did it with him for a while. I was pissed off at the world, and the money was too tempting to pass up. Except I never saw a fucking dime. He kept me indebted to him by buying me nice cars, phones, shoes, whatever. It was nice not to have to worry about where my next meal came from for once, but I wanted my cut, and I told him that. He made excuses at first. It was always something. But still, I did his bidding. I was the youngest and the fastest. He could tell I was pulling away, and he started to lose it.
And then when I really wanted out, he got pissed that I wasn’t doing his dirty work anymore. He and his lowlife friends took turns beating the shit out of me, not even stopping when I vomited from the pain. When they were finally done, I was unable to move, unable to open my eyes. I’m pretty sure he thought I was dead. He left me for dead.
I lay there, bleeding in the dirt, in a pile of my own puke, until the sun set and rose again. Once I could walk, I hobbled back to David’s house when I knew he’d be gone and stole his chunk of cash. Booked a cheap hotel room for a few nights until I could move without being in pain and then took a cab to the bus station. When the lady asked for my destination, I told her I didn’t care. I just needed the first bus out of there. I met Dare on the bus, and the rest is history.
But I don’t say all that. No one knows those fucked-up details but me.
“Doesn’t surprise me,” my dad admits, bringing me back to our conversation.
I wipe the blood off my mouth with the back of my hand before I realize that it’s pointless. My hands are just as bad as my face. I should’ve hurt him more. I should’ve made him pay. Instead, I let him fucking walk away.
“Why’d you come back?” John asks, looking like he’s on the verge of falling asleep.
I shrug. “I don’t know. Had a feeling.”
He opens one eye and assesses me. “Well,” he says after a long beat, “I’m glad you did.”
My jaw aches—either from taking the hit or clenching it so hard the entire drive home, I’m not sure—as I haul ass down the dimly lit streets of the neighborhood. I glance at the dash, and the time isn’t much more than a blur of neon blue, thanks to the swelling in my right eye. Two oh eight A.M.
I swing into the driveway with one, single thought. Briar. But I slam my bloody fist into my steering wheel when I notice that Adrian’s car is here, too, which means Dash is still awake.
My body is moving faster than my brain can catch up, and then I’m sneaking around the side of the house and wedging Br
iar’s window up with the heels of my palms. My head swims as I hoist myself up and through the window, but I ignore it. My boots hit the hardwood floor, and Briar gasps, sitting up in her bed.
“It’s me,” I say quickly.
“Ash? What happened?” Her voice is a whisper, and though the dark works to my advantage, I know she can sense that something is wrong.
This scene is all too familiar. Me wounded and belligerent. Her unwavering concern for me.
I stand there unmoving, unspeaking. I know what I want, but I don’t want to ask for it. Don’t know how to ask for it. But Briar knows, because she lifts her blanket in invitation.
Right now, I don’t care about our pasts. I don’t care about the bad decision she made back then, or the numerous bad ones I’ve made since. All I care about is crawling into her bed and leeching off her quiet and calm.
Wordlessly, I kick my boots off, then unbutton my jeans, dropping them to the floor along with my keys. Briar says nothing. She’s completely still as she watches me. Her messy blonde hair is everywhere, and the moonlight shining through her window allows me to see the outline of her nipples beneath her thin, white tank top.
We lock eyes, and she sucks her bottom lip in a nervous gesture. I reach behind my neck, pulling my black T-shirt over my head, letting it fall to join the rest of my shit. Closing the distance between us, I slip in beside her.
Briar lies on her side, facing me, and her fingers reach out to touch my face. I intercept her, directing her hand away from my wounds, and instead, she curls her fingers into the short hair at the nape of my neck.
“Turn around, Bry,” I rasp, lowering my head to hide my face. She massages the back of my head, and fuck, it’s probably the most affectionate gesture I’ve ever received.
“Talk to me,” she murmurs pleadingly. “You’re drunk.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and pry her hand from me, holding it away in a tight grip.
“Please.”
Her voice is barely above a whisper, and then her nose grazes mine. I don’t pull back, so she does it again, but this time, our lips brush, too. Briar hooks a bare leg over mine, her lips touching mine with every move, every breath, but we don’t kiss.
I’m still holding on to her wrist between us, and she twists her arm to bring my hand to the curve of her hip. Her shirt has ridden up, and I feel the warmth of her skin against my calloused hands. I shouldn’t be able to touch anything this pure, I think to myself. I’ll only taint it.
Despite the fucked-up events of tonight, I’m hard as a rock. I want nothing more than to bend her over, shove inside, and forget all the bullshit. But she’s not Whitley. She’s not any of those girls. This is Briar, and she is fucking everything, even if she is a little liar.
“Turn around, Briar,” I say, firmer this time, as I physically turn her over, then lock my arms around her waist. Her firm ass settles right on my cock, and I fight the urge to grind against her. If I were a little less exhausted and a lot less fucked up, things would go very differently.
Her fingers trace mine, and I know that she feels the gashes and tacky half-dried blood, but she doesn’t speak. I wait for her breathing to even out before I dip my head forward, inhaling her scent and pressing my lips to the back of her neck. It isn’t long before I start to drift off, too content to care about the consequences that tonight might bring.
Briar
I’m not sure what time it is when I wake up, but the sun has just barely started to peek over the mountains in the distance, so I know it must be before six.
I look down at the hand flattened against my stomach, halfway under my shirt. He’s really here. He’s still here. I almost expected him to be gone when I woke up, leaving me to wonder if it was all just a dream.
Carefully, I lift his hand to inspect the damage that I felt last night, and I notice streaks of dried blood on my stomach, on my shirt, my hip, and as I turn around to face his sleeping form, I see that it’s on my white sheets, too.
Jesus, Asher. What did you do this time?
Underneath his nose is also caked with blood, and his right eye is bruised and swollen. I lightly kiss his knuckles before leaning forward to do the same to the corner of his eye, and then I feel his hands squeeze my ass, pulling me into him.
“Mmm,” I moan, dragging my hands through his hair and dropping my head back as he peppers open-mouthed kisses all over my neck, shoulders, and chest. He rolls me onto my back and settles between my spread legs, letting me feel his want for me.
Something about this time just feels…different. More intense. More real. We still haven’t spoken. We let our bodies do the talking, and in this moment, we’re the most honest we’ve ever been with each other. We show each other everything we’re feeling with our gasps and tongues and teeth.
Asher shifts down slightly to take my nipple into his mouth and sucks it through the fabric of my shirt. God, I love when he does that. I arch into his hot mouth, and he brings both hands up to squeeze my breasts. Flattening his palms, he smooths them up my chest and over my shoulders to push the thin straps of my shirt down my arms.
With his forefinger, he pulls down the top of my tank, exposing one pink nipple. Looking up at me for the first time, he closes his mouth around the hardened tip and bites before licking and sucking away the sting. I feel myself growing slick at the mixture of pain and pleasure that Asher is so skilled at, and I shamelessly lock my legs around his waist, rubbing myself against him.
Ash reaches behind him, grasps one ankle, and unlocks my legs before moving down my body, kissing everything along the way. My heart hammers in my chest, and goose bumps assault my arms and stomach as he gets lower and lower.
This is something we’ve never done before, something I’ve never had done to me, but I’m too far gone to be nervous. I just want him. I want it all from him. Everything he has to give me, before he decides to take it all away, again.
Once he settles between my thighs, he pushes them open with a hand on each one, squeezing the soft flesh. Lowering his head, he rolls his face between my legs, then nibbles at my panty-covered clit.
Holy shit.
My hips rock against his face on their own accord, chasing that delicious friction. Asher hooks a finger inside my plain black underwear, pulling the crotch to the side, and exposes me to him completely.
He pauses, and I see his throat bob as he swallows. I think he’s going to say something cocky, or maybe make me beg for it, but he just stares for a moment, looking conflicted, yet mesmerized. Angry, yet excited all at the same time.
I squirm under his attention, needing to feel more—to feel everything with him. Asher pushes my legs together before pulling my underwear down to my ankles. Smoothing his hands back up my closed legs, he spreads me, ever so slightly, with his thumbs. My entire body is trembling from my toes to my chin, but it’s not out of fear. I’m literally shaking with need.
“My beautiful little liar,” Ash breathes before closing the final distance and places a wet kiss on my clit. I suck in a breath at the feeling of his mouth on me. God, I didn’t know anything could be this good. I try to spread my legs for better access, but Asher keeps them clamped shut with a hand on either thigh.
I look down at him, confusion painting my features, but then his tongue slides in between my lower lips. My back bows off the bed, and Asher’s bruising grip on my legs keeps me anchored to the bed. To the earth.
“Quit squirming, baby,” he mumbles between my thighs.
Baby. Not taunting. Not baby girl. Not little girl. Baby.
I tangle my fingers through his perfectly disheveled hair as he devours me, needing him closer. But we’ll never be close enough. His tongue flattens against me, and with a few long strokes, I’m tensing up, ready to combust.
“Asher,” I say, tilting his chin up to look at me. “I don’t want to come like this.” My voice is a whispered plea, and I know he understands.
Asher stares up at me and brushes his thumb across my bottom lip.
“Yeah?” he asks, pushing his thumb into my mouth, eyes full of heat. I suck on it, nodding my head, and he groans.
“How do you want to come then?”
“The only way I’ve ever wanted to. With you inside me.”
Asher’s jaw clenches, his nostrils flare, and I know that I’m finally going to get my way.
“You play dirty, baby girl,” he says, moving up my body, bracing his palms on either side of my head. His lips hover above mine, and I wrap my arms around his neck, pulling him closer. I’m done talking. “Lucky for you, I do, too.”
Asher takes my face in his hands before licking at the seam of my lips, and I open for him, letting his tongue in to dance with mine. His movements are unhurried and forceful. Intense, just like him. He kisses me like it’s the main event instead of the opening act. I kiss him like he’s my oxygen, and I’m afraid it’s going to be taken away at any moment, leaving me deprived again.
Ash’s hand trails down my neck, and his fingers dip under my tank top, squeezing and kneading. He circles my nipple, and I feel myself growing slicker. Everything he does is magic. I arch into his touch, and he takes the opportunity to pull my top over my head.
I’m laid completely bare before him, and he’s still in his boxer briefs. I look at his tanned skin, the muscular dips and grooves of his stomach, the veins in his arms as he holds himself over me, his stormy eyes, and I can’t believe this is real. This is happening. He’s perfection, even bruised and bleeding. This beautifully damaged boy is about to give me the one part of him I’ve never had. And I’m about to give him what should’ve been his.
“Take me out,” Asher says in a strangled voice.
I slide my hands underneath the elastic and lower his boxers, smoothing my palms over his firm ass. His dick springs out, thick, and angry and ready. I can finally see his piercing clearly, and I realize that there is more than one. Two tiny, straight barbells underneath the head. For the first time, I wonder what that means for sex.
Bad Habit (Bad Love Book 1) Page 10
