Something isn’t right. The instinct to leave strikes, and I take a step back to head to the truck. Maybe I can find Mia tomorrow and explain everything.
Just then, I hear an eruption of collective laughing from a bunch of guys. And Tripp walks around from behind a tree.
“What’s up, Sil?”
Hozier – Take Me to Church
I peer through the glass of my windshield at the front of Tax’s building. This is how I am starting my Saturday morning, at square one. My internet searches still aren’t yielding much, so I figured the next best thing would be to try to follow him. I know, I have lost my fucking mind. But I will find out who he is and why he came into my life. Tax loved to mention that I owed him, well — now he owes me an explanation.
And I won’t stop until I find out why he burst into my life.
Almost an hour passes with nothing, but I have prepared to be here all day, packing a lunch and prepping a playlist loaded with plenty of music. This is what Tax has turned me into: a crazed woman who follows a man around. But I have been left with no choice. If I just let him go, the question of why Tax came and went will linger in my mind for as long as I live.
Oh my god, I’m like that astronaut who wore a diaper to drive across the country to find her lover.
It felt great to tell Tiff everything. After the shock wore off, she promised to support me in any way she could, though she admitted she wants Tax’s head on a skewer. I stressed to her that I didn’t want anyone coming to my rescue and it was important to me that I solve this on my own.
My impatience begins to set in just as the front door opens and out comes Tax, in a pair of jogging pants and a sleeveless workout T. He’s already covered in sweat, probably having just lifted, and he puts on his earphones and takes off for a run.
My heart sinks. This week has been hard, and lonely, but at least I didn’t have to see Tax. I could bury myself in other things and ignore the pervasive ache. Now, watching him run: his body covered in sweat, his muscles gleaming in the light rain, his wet, messy hair, makes my body surge with desire. It’s small things like watching him run that make me realize there’s still so much I don’t know about him. I run too. We could have run together. I mourn the things we will never do.
To my disappointment, Tax looks fine, and it hurts to think he’s probably already moved on. But that hurt fuels me to push through the pain and get my answers.
I pull out of my spot, careful to stay a few cars behind where he is on the sidewalk. If I get too close, he’ll spot me. He heads south, and I wonder if he’ll go east, to the park, effectively ruining my tail. To my surprise however, he stays on the sidewalk and runs towards a more industrial part of downtown. At some parts I think I almost lose him, having to stay at such a distance, but somehow I manage to keep track of him. Eventually, we arrive in Walkers Point, a part of Milwaukee filled with warehouses, antique shops and gay bars, not the typical area one would go for a jog. It makes me wonder if he’s headed somewhere specific. Why else would someone run all the way out here, when they were just minutes away from a beautiful lake and park system?
Eventually Tax runs down a quiet street loaded with warehouses that leads to an eventual dead end. I pull over a couple of blocks behind the dead end to keep my view on him without being too conspicuous. Tax turns abruptly into what appears to be an old collection of abandoned warehouses, maybe an old tannery. After waiting about twenty seconds, I pull out of my spot, and follow his tracks.
Could he be meeting someone?
I pull into the gravel lot in the middle of three warehouse buildings, all perpendicular to each other so that I am almost surrounded by abandoned buildings. Tax is gone. Shit. I think I really lost him this time. Or maybe he isn’t gone, and he went into one of these buildings. I just spent 45 minutes following him to get clues and I might finally have one, there’s no way I am quitting. I pull my car into a dead-end space between two buildings, doing my best to shield it from view in case he comes back out to the gravel lot.
I cautiously slide out of the car, looking for signs of life. The grinding of gravel underfoot is the only sound in the dead space. Then nearby I hear the sound of metal squeaking, just behind a door not fifteen feet away. I look side to side as paranoia kicks in. I am still alone. I tip toe towards the door, which is shrouded in graffiti, hoping to peer through one of the windows flanking it. Another squeak echoes from that direction. I hush my breathing though my heart speeds in anticipation of what I might see. Crunch. Crunch. Of all materials for a lot, this one had to be gravel. I near a shattered window, ducking underneath it, readying myself for what I might encounter.
A pigeon coos and flutters over me, escaping the broken window, and causing me to take a few flustered steps back. The shock is enough for me to lose my nerve.
This is crazy. I should just go back to his building at start over. It’s clear I’ve lost him for now and I must be patient.
I pull my phone out of my pocket to check the time, when I hear gravel crunching behind me. Before I can turn, a huge warm body presses against mine, pushing me onto the cold hood of my car. My sensory memory explodes, and I don’t even have to hear his voice to know that Tax has already busted me.
“You’re following me now?” he growls into my ear.
My body heats up against his. The feeling of his pelvis pressing against my ass brings a mixture of rage and desire.
“I’m going to find out who you are, Tax. You can’t do what you did to me.”
“Mia, just let it go.”
Just let it go. Like it was all nothing. Just let go months of insanity.
“No.”
“You think you want this, but you don’t.”
“Don’t tell me what I want!” I wrestle him again, and he only presses harder against me.
“You really want this, Mia? You really fucking want me? You want to know who I am?” he asks, his voice bursting with frustration. Suddenly, a serrated blade is pressing against my neck. “This is who I am Mia. That first night. That psycho, that’s me.”
“You are so full of shit,” I sob out. He doesn’t really want to hurt me. There is little I am sure of, but that, I know.
“This isn’t a fucking game, Mia. I’m not some boy you can feed and make better. You can’t fix me. I am not a project. I am not some charity case you can use to feel better about yourself. I’m not some guy you can fuck to take you out of the monotony of your boring life.”
“Oh fuck you!”
“You want me to make you feel dirty? You like dirty? Huh? I am destructive. My danger is real, Mia. You should leave and never look back. Forget you ever knew me. Because I will only bring you pain. This is who I am.”
Tax leans his upper body onto mine and his hips jut forward, rubbing his thickness against my lower back. The teeth of the knife dig painfully into my neck, always on the verge of breaking the skin, but his precise grip keeps me from shedding blood. “This is who I am. I am a fucking savage.”
He pulls up my floral dress and rips down my panties, rubbing my pussy from behind. “Fuck, you’re always so wet for me. Goddammit Mia. I gave you a fucking chance to be normal.”
“I don’t want to be normal.”
“Shut up,” he says, pressing the blade against my neck and I let out a frightened yelp as it bites into my skin. “Don’t fucking say a word. Why are you out here? You want me to fuck you? Hurt you?”
His contradictions enrage me, but I want him like this. I want this beast to savage me, to hurt me while taking me to the apex of pleasure.
He pulls down his sweatpants. His essence reaches my nose, and like a powerful aphrodisiac, it stupefies me. “You want my fucking cock? You want it this bad?” He rubs the head along my slit, between my cheeks and back down.
The drizzle turns into a light rain, and it falls on us, mixing sweat with water, filth with cleanliness. My wet hair clings to my face and shoulders, droplets collect on my eyelashes and slide down my cheeks, onto my lips.
&nbs
p; Whatever desires stir in me, I won’t give him the satisfaction of knowing it.
“I want the truth, you fucking asshole.”
He presses the knife against my neck again.
“Watch your fucking mouth or I’ll watch it for you.”
He runs his hand up my ass, my waist, reaching around and squeezing a breast. “These fucking tits,” he mutters.
He slides his hand down my stomach and massages my clit through my lips, sending waves of pleasure to my belly.
“You get so fucking wet for me. My little slut,” he says, almost affectionately. He bites my shoulder and sparks dance out from the spot. “You keep asking for trouble Mia, you’re gonna get it.”
I crave him in my bones. It’s been barely a week, but it might as well have been a month. I hate him. I want him. And I want the truth, but right now, I just want him inside of me. I miss our bodies melding together in a mixture of fear, anger, passion, and affection. I am strong, dammit. But Tax, he makes me fucking weak. I’ll get my truth, but his wet, hard body pressed against mine reminds me he is the only man who can give me the things I want.
Fuck, I want him so bad, but I won’t give in to him until he gives me more. My sex is the only power I have because while he will never admit it, I think he’s weak for me too.
My pussy is so ready, his head slides into me, almost effortlessly, and my walls clench, anticipating his cock filling its vacancy. Though the knife still digs into my neck, the pain dulls to a steady awareness of danger, but it’s just part of the dance. He won’t hurt me. I know it.
I curl my spine towards him, encouraging him to enter me, to make me forget who I am right now. If he thrusts inside of me, with a knife to my neck, I can blame him for making me do this, instead of myself for allowing this to happen. But despite the frustrated firmness of his cock, he resists, teasing me with his head.
“Beg.”
My fists ball up in consternation. He always does this, makes me grovel, making it clear to both of us, that no matter how great his show of force, I want it just as badly as he does. But, I can’t. I won’t beg for someone who doesn’t want all of me. Who abandons me like I mean nothing. I won’t let him have all the power again. I won’t fucking beg. Not until I know who this man really is and that he really gives a shit.
“No.”
The knife digs deeper. This is who I really am, Mia. He’s telling me, but I don’t believe that’s all of him. I have seen his other sides, he’s already shown me too much for me to believe he is only some brute.
“I said fucking beg.” He slides his head out and back in, it electrifies my labia with arousal. I bite my lip and scrunch my face to bear the agony of resisting him. I hate saying no to Tax.
“You followed me. I’m here Mia. I’ll give you what you fucking want. But you better fucking beg for it.”
“Fuck you,” I wince. “Go to hell.”
He yanks my ponytail ferociously, the knife pressed so tightly against me, that if I jerk, it will cut my skin. “No, fuck you,” he thrusts into me once, punctuating his statement. We both let out gasps of intense relief and pleasure. We both melt in that moment of singular surrender.
But Tax doesn’t surrender. He gives a little and he always takes more. Just as quickly as he is in me, he pulls out. The sting of the knife against my throat quickly fades, and his warmth leaves my body, leaving me wet and cold. His feet crunch the gravel as he tucks himself back into his sweatpants and tucks his knife back into his ankle holster.
I turn to face him, frigid from the rain and abandon, my panties still resting at the top of my rain boots, feeling naked though my soaked dress still clings to my body.
I glare at him, the rain on my face disguising the tears that mingle with it. But my lips tremble with disdain. He’s leaving me. Again. Everything is always on his terms. I might see him again, I might not. I have tried to stay cool, to not meet his aggression with my aggression. I didn’t mince my words the day he walked out of my house, but that was still restrained. I lashed out at him, but I didn’t want to tell him how much he hurt me. In that moment, I just wanted to hurt him back.
But he needs to know. If he does want to protect me, if he thinks that what he did was good for me, he needs to know the truth. He has hurt me to the core. He has made me feel a type of emotional pain that no physical pain can match. He doesn’t get to walk away thinking he’s doing what’s best.
If he really doesn’t give a shit, then he’ll walk away without a care. But if he does care, I want him to feel the pain he is putting me through. He will fucking feel it. He will know what a piece of shit he is.
Tax looks at me, his brown eyes determined, but the snakes along his neck swerve. His tat is a tell. He can’t hide the tension in his neck and how uneasy he feels walking away from me.
He doesn’t say a fucking word, looking at me with dead eyes, before turning to walk away.
I watch him, his body a monument to destruction as it walks away, leaving me in shambles again.
And this time, I fucking lose it.
I yank up my underwear so quickly it tangles in my dress and run towards him along the wet and muddy gravel.
“What the fuck is wrong with you!” I scream, tripping over my rainboots and landing on my knees. The tiny rocks pierce into my skin, but the pain is negligible compared to the fire breathing out of my lungs. I pick up a handful of gravel and throw it at him. “You ruined me! You son of a bitch!” I collapse down, on all fours, heaving tears. I grab another handful and throw it at him. Most of the gravel and mud, heavy with rain, barely makes it to him.
He keeps walking, but his body gets heavier with each step. “How can you be such a heartless bastard,” I scream through tears. “You ruined me! You said you wouldn’t leave and then you threw me away like garbage! You said you wouldn’t leave and then you walked away like you hated me!”
I rise back to my knees, the pebbles digging deeper into my skin, like some sort of self-imposed punishment for allowing myself to get this low.
“What did I ever do to you, Tax? Why do you hate me so much? What did I ever do to deserve the way you treat me! You hurt me so much. You made me care about you and then you abandoned me. You fucking bastard! You don’t even have the fucking balls to tell me, you asshole! Man up! Man the fuck up! Face the mess you made!”
Tax finally stops, like each word was another weight added and finally they were just too heavy to bear. In the moment of quiet, I have a moment of clarity as Tax’s back faces me. He looks heavy, his rain-soaked body looks like it holds decades of pain. My words, they hurt him. My words matter.
And instead of screaming this time, I plead, with a week’s worth of hidden tears in my voice: “Tax, what did I ever do to you?”
The rain begins to downpour, and I sink back on all fours, letting the drops wash over me. I look down at the gray rocks and dirt, unwilling to watch Tax walk away again.
His footsteps scrape along the gravel. But this time the sound comes closer.
I look up to see Tax standing over me, water cascading off of his head and shoulders.
His eyes are heavy. “Nothing,” he says quietly.
It’s not the answer I want to hear. I have to know why. I have to know this wasn’t random, that there is meaning behind it all. He offers me his hand.
“Tell me, Tax,” I say, refusing the gesture.
“Nothing.” He sticks his hand out again.
“Liar!” I shout, slapping his hand away.
And now, Tax doesn’t ask to help me up, he grabs my wrists and I wrestle him as he pops me up to my feet. I wrangle with him and he lets me go, allowing me to push him, shove him, and beat my wrists against his chest.
“You are a fucking liar!” I scream.
“I’m not, Mia,” he says calmly. His calmness frustrates me. It makes me feel hysterical as Tax stands firm, taking the beating like someone who knows he deserves it.
“There’s more. I know. And you need to fucking tell me. You owe me th
at. You owe me.”
Finally, he grows frustrated and grabs my forearms, pulling me close to him. Our wet bodies cling to each other, and I stop wrangling with him.
Tax’s lips brush against my ear. “You only get once chance to get away from me Mia. I’m giving it to you. I can’t resist you. I was doing this for you,” he breathes into my neck.
“No, you are doing this for you,” I say. “You don’t get to walk away from me. You don’t get to set me on fire and leave me like a pile of ashes.”
“I never left you, Mia. But, it’s me who will hurt you. I am protecting you from me.”
“Are you protecting me? Or yourself?”
The fire between our bodies makes the coldness of the rain evaporate from my skin. It’s just me in Tax’s arms. The elements bend to us. Time freezes. Sounds go quiet.
“Fuck,” Tax says as he digs a hand into my wet hair and pulls me into a kiss so passionate it hurts. Not just my lips, but my heart twists and contorts in agony. We both know we are fucked. We keep fighting whatever this is, and we keep losing the battle.
I become pliant, molding my body to his. His apology is in the way his tongue slides against mine, the way his arm wraps around my waist, the way his hand knots the soaking fabric of my dress. “I owe you,” he says, as his lips graze my neck. “There’s no one like you, Mia.”
While my mind wants answers now, my body cries out much louder, screaming for the relief of Tax’s touch. He slides his hands down to my ass, and boosts me up as I wrap my legs around him. He carries me back over to my car and presses me up against the driver’s side door, pulling out his cock. He guides it as I slide down onto him. The sensation of him filling me is agonizingly pleasurable. I moan out a half laugh, deliriously overwhelmed by the explosion of ecstasy.
His powerful hips thrust me up and down over his weighty, curved cock as I cry out curses and warped versions of his name. His strong fingers dig into the mounds of my ass, bouncing my pussy against his cock. Wet flesh slaps against wet flesh. The straps of my dress collapse, my dripping breasts bouncing against Tax’s lips. He grips the flesh between his teeth, sparking an electric path from my breasts to the walls of my pussy.
Debt Page 25
