Holding On To Heaven_A Reverse Harem Contemporary Romance

by Angel Lawson

  Noah cradled his cheek. “Her dad is a petty con-man preacher trying to get my father to fund his program. My father told me it was never going to happen but to play along for my mother’s sake. She wanted me with a sweet little Christian girl—who better than a doe-eyed girl named Heaven?”

  Anderson grunted behind me and I held out my hand.

  “So what? She thought she was helping her dad?”

  “She felt obligated and I played up to it. The girl is pretty naïve for growing up with a dad like that. But, yeah, I figured I could string her along for a while, get her to put out and then walk away.” He winced. “Unfortunately, she was a pain in the ass so I had to use some leverage to keep her around.”

  “What kind of leverage?” I asked.

  “I found the cache of photos of her from high school. You’re in them—both of you. And a bunch of other guys, too.”

  “That was a set up. She was harassed all year,” Anderson said. Noah glanced at him warily.

  “Yeah, well she didn’t want her dad to know about it. And she certainly didn’t want him to know she was still seeing you guys, and was willing to do what it took to keep that information safe. Or at least I thought so, until she bailed on me tonight, effectively calling off our deal.”

  “And that’s when you fucked Ruthie.”

  “Hey!” Ruthie said, feigning offense. “I was just trying to help a guy out. I didn’t know he was playing so many games.”

  “What? Like you haven’t been playing them yourself?” Samantha asked. We all turned in surprise.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ruthie sniffed.

  “Heaven’s dad approached both of us about keeping tabs on her. He wanted any kind of evidence about her friends, her social life, her grades.”

  “And you gave it to him?” I asked her, feeling disgusted.

  “Hell no. It was weird and he’s a scary guy.” She nodded at her roommate. “Ruthie took the money, though.”

  “Hell yeah I did.” She shrugged, making her red hair tumble down her shoulders. “I tried to make friends with her. And you guys for that matter. She was possessive and spoiled and I got sick of it.”

  “That’s your excuse for betraying someone’s privacy?”

  “That and the fact I like nice things.”

  “You sold your roommate out because you ‘like nice things’? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” My rage was barely contained. “And you want to call my girl a whore? You’ve got no clue what it’s like to be someone like Heaven. She’s smart and kind. She’s kick-ass and sensitive. She struggles. Do you know that? She struggles every goddamn day of her life and the last thing she needs is a bitch like you dragging her down.”

  “How dare you—”

  “No,” Amber said, suddenly appearing in the door. “I’ll take it from here, Jax.” She stepped closer to Ruthie. “You don’t get to defend yourself. You get to shut the hell up. Take your blood money and get the hell out of here, because if I ever see your face again I will scratch your eyes out.”

  Ruthi whimpered but shut her mouth, sinking back on the bed.

  I looked away from the shitshow surrounding us and faced Anderson. “We need to find her.”

  He nodded. “I think I know how.”

  “Will you stay here in case she comes back?” I asked Amber.

  “Yes, and I’ll throw out the trash while I wait.”

  Noah called out as we walked toward the front door, “Don’t think I won’t press charges. My father will sue!”

  It took enormous strength but Anderson walked out the door. I stopped and looked at Noah, restraining myself. We locked eyes and I said, “Don’t think that I won’t let him come back and finish the job. You better hope that Heaven’s okay when we find her.”

  28

  Heaven

  The rain started while I was inside—while my world imploded. I jogged down to the student lot. My phone vibrated steadily in my hand and I shut it off, stashing it in my pocket until I reached Amber’s car. I felt like a thief, but I slipped behind the wheel anyway and embraced the quiet.

  “What have you done, Heaven Reeves,” I muttered to myself. What had I done? So many lies upon lies. Why did I think I could live this life—have it all?

  Part of me knew this was fixable…a small part, but the dark dread that lived in my chest—in my mind—all the time beat away at the logic, twisting it in my brain until it no longer mattered. I was doomed. Fated. Anything I touched turned bad and the look on Oliver’s face earlier confirmed this. I couldn’t put him through this again. I couldn’t put any of them through it.

  Especially myself.

  I wiped off my face and suddenly knew where I should go. Where I had to go.

  Home.

  Pulling into the heavy rain, I drove and formulated a plan. A plan always helped and I’d been without one for too long, allowing my father and Noah to dictate my life. Letting fear take over. Things were out of control and I needed to take it back.

  The roads were dark and slick—forcing me to drive slower than I liked. Finally, my lights flashed on the sign for Allendale and I pulled off, stopping in a closed gas station parking lot. My phone lit up with messages but I ignored them, hitting my mother’s number instead. She’d talk me through this. We’d work it out.

  It was late and I worried she’d not answer, but my heart leapt when I heard the click.

  “Mom?” I blurted.

  “Hello? Heaven?”

  My heart sank.

  “Hi, Daddy.”

  “It’s late sweetheart, is something wrong?”

  I stared out the window, watching the rain fall. “I screwed up your plan, Daddy. With Noah.”

  “What?” he asked, obviously confused. “I don’t understand.”

  “Noah’s a creep.” My fingers clenched the steering wheel. “I couldn’t do what he wanted. What you needed from me. I just couldn’t.”

  He sighed. “Heaven, I have long prayed for your soul. Ever since I found out about the sinful ways you lead your life while I was gone. Leaving you like that—without a father to guide you—your path went astray.”

  His words hit me hard. “No, Daddy, that’s not what happened. It wasn’t like that.”

  “No? Are you telling me you didn’t sin with those boys? That you didn’t display your sexuality with inappropriate clothing? That you weren’t fornicating outside of marriage? That you’re not supportive of homosexuals and sinners?” he asked, listing my sins. “Did you really think you could keep it away from me?”

  “I…I…” I chewed on my fingernail, tugging at the skin around it until it tore and bled. I wanted to deny his accusations, but they were all true. All of it. Except I knew in my heart it wasn’t so simple. “It’s not as bad as it seems. So much of it was lies. I was being stalked. Bullied.”

  “I saw what you were wearing. What you did. You asked for it.”

  “No. I didn’t.” Didn’t you? my brain whispered. “Things got out of control and it was happening again with Noah.”

  “Baby girl, why do you think I sent you to Noah? He’s a sinner just like you. I figured you’d be fine with doing what you needed to make the arrangement between his father and I work.”

  I blinked. “You what?”

  “You had one job, Heaven, and that was to please Noah Hancock. Obviously, you’ve failed at that, just like you’ve failed at everything else in your life.”

  “You wanted me to have sex with him?”

  “Why not? You spread your legs for every other male that crosses your path. What’s one more? Oh wait, I know.” His voice turned hard. “Noah was the one that held the key to the funding I needed to continue my work at the church. The one that would pave the way toward your mother’s happiness and our future together. She’s told me of your selfishness, Heaven. The dramatics and intentional harm you did to yourself. The hours lost. The money spent. She assured me you’d gotten better, but obviously you’re still an entitled brat incapable o
f looking out for anyone else.”

  Tears ran down my face, hot and bitter. Every word he said was dipped in truth.

  “I’m sorry, Daddy,” I choked. Hardly able to see through my tears.

  “It’s too late for apologies, Heaven, but thank you for the call. I can at least try to attempt some damage control with Mr. Hancock in the morning.”

  He hung up and I sat in the silent car holding the phone, feeling the darkness spread until the flicker of an idea tugged at me and I started the car. I turned away from Allendale and got back on the two-lane highway.

  I felt a pang of homesickness as I drove away; for the small house I’d shared with my mother, the bedroom the boys snuck into at different times, squeezing their large bodies into my small, single bed. That was where they’d learned the truth about my self-harm and when they built the protective wall around me. A wall I continued to jackhammer away with my bad decisions.

  I sped away from the main road that passed the high school where I won Winter Princess and Spencer tried to rape me in the parking lot. Going further would take me to Oliver’s massive home and his cozy apartment. The place Anderson took my virginity. The place where that precious, special moment was recorded and used against me.

  Everything good in my life had an equal and resounding negative reaction.

  They were the light. I was the dark and as long I was in their lives I would continue to taint them with pain.

  My father made that clear.

  With both hands on the wheel, I kept going, knowing now that Allendale wasn’t the place for me to make my peace. I needed to go further down the road, past the tree line to the place where the ocean met the shore.

  I got off at the final exit—the last one before the road took a sharp left up the coast. The sign read Oceanside, the letters rusty with age, like everything else about this town. Unchanging. Unrelenting. This was where I came from. The soil from my birth. If any place could wash away my sins, it would be this tiny edge of earth.

  I drove down the quiet beach road. It was late. The locals were all asleep and it was long past any kind of tourist season. There was a small dirt road that led straight to the water. I’d been down it many times with Justin and when I found it, I took it. The rain drops lessened, and by the time I parked they’d stopped entirely. Rolling down my window, I caught the strong scent of salty air and the rumble of crashing waves, feeling a sense of peace that’d been missing for too long.

  Kicking off my shoes, I stepped into the cool, wet sand. The wind blew hard, pushing the storm out to sea, and my ears filled with the roaring waves.

  The clouds vanished, revealing a sky full of stars. For the first time in ages I felt whole. On the edge of the continent I was just me. Heaven. Not the slut or the whore. Not the girl that could be manipulated and used. Not a body or a vessel to further someone else’s agenda.

  Out here, I couldn’t hurt anyone else and no one could hurt me.

  Taking a deep, solidifying breath, I waded in.

  29

  Hayden

  Oliver screeched the Mustang to a stop outside of Stetson Hall. I climbed in the back, leaving the seat up. Jackson scrambled in, wet from the rain, and Anderson sat in the front. His hand was bloody and swollen.

  “What the hell happened to you?” I asked, reaching forward.

  “He punched Noah,” Jackson said. “Fucker had it coming.”

  Anderson let me inspect his hand—I’d busted mine up dozens of times in the goal. “I don’t think you broke anything.”

  In his other hand he held up his phone. “I know how we can find Heaven.”

  “Remember a few months ago when we went on that trip to the amusement park? I put that tracker on everyone’s phone so we could meet up.”

  Oliver nodded. “It’s still on there?”

  “Unless Heaven turned hers off. I’ve used it a few times since to check up on everyone.” He looked at me. “You know, when you’re running late.”

  “Stalker.”

  “Well, my stalker-ness may just save our asses tonight. Shit has officially hit the fan.” He glanced at Oliver. “You were right. Things are bad. We’ve got to find her.”

  He pulled up the app and a red star popped up on the map. Anderson frowned. “She’s headed down the highway.” He looked back at us. “Toward home.”

  Jackson shook his head. “That’s not good. She doesn’t know about her dad.”

  “Know about what?” Oliver asked.

  I sat in the back of the Mustang, my long legs cramped and antsy, listening as they explained what happened upstairs. The rumble of the engine made it hard to hear but it didn’t stop the wave after wave of anger that rolled through me. Noah had no idea how lucky he was that Anderson was the one that punched him. He was too civilized for actual violence. But me? I would have torn him to pieces.

  “He was blackmailing her?” Oliver asked.

  “And her father was spying on her,” Jackson said, adding, “and us.”

  “Shit,” I muttered, looking out the window and into the dark. “So he knows everything.”

  “Seems like it,” Anderson said.

  “She’ll be crushed.”

  Because that was what this was all about. What we’d spent months doing for this girl that we loved so much. Keeping her safe. Building her up. Making her feel sexy, wanted, and whole. There was a glitch in Heaven’s brain that told her otherwise, which was why we reminded her constantly.

  But these two bastards came in her life and in a matter of days tore her down again, and it was my biggest goddamn fear she wouldn’t survive.

  I tapped Oliver on the shoulder. “Drive faster.”

  He pressed down on the gas, kicking the engine into high gear.

  The car grew quiet. Oliver focused on the road. Jackson dialed and redialed her number. Anderson held out his phone and we watched the red star, the distance closing between where we were and where she was headed.

  Until her star stopped.

  “Where is that?” I asked, leaning over the seat.

  “Outside Allendale.” Anderson zoomed in. “Looks like the gas station on Route 4?”

  “It’s two-fucking-a.m. What is she doing there?” Jackson growled.

  We watched silently as our little star got closer to hers. My adrenaline surged, thinking we’d make it to her.

  “What? Where are you going?” Anderson muttered as the star started moving, taking a sudden U-turn.

  “Is she headed back?” I asked.

  Jackson pulled out his phone and dialed her number again. He slammed it against the seat when she didn’t answer.

  “No. She’s going toward the coast.”

  Oliver frowned. His eyes caught mine in the rearview mirror. “Is she going to see Justin?”

  Not the best thing but certainly not the worst.

  “Maybe, but I don’t think they talk much anymore,” Jackson said, leaning into the seat.

  The Mustang ate up the miles, getting closer and closer. Anderson held up the phone. The star clung to the edge of the land—nothing but blue beyond. “She’s at the beach.”

  “I don’t like this,” Oliver said.

  The uneasy feeling in my chest blossomed into sheer panic. “I don’t either.”

  Oliver turned off the highway toward Oceanside, rumbling down the deserted road. The rain ceased, making the windshield wipers scrape across the dry surface. Jackson barked for Oliver to turn them off. Tension—fear—ran high.

  We kept our eyes peeled as Anderson barked out directions. We were close. So close.

  But would we be there in time?

  30

  Heaven

  Ice-cold water rushed over my toes, swallowing my ankles in white-foam. The moon appeared from behind the drifting clouds, giving me a path reflecting off the dark water to follow.

  One more step.

  Then another.

  Then it would be over.

  The pain.

  The disappointment.

  The
shame.

  The hollowness.

  I touched the puckered skin from my most recent cut, hating it and craving it at the same time. No more of this. No more.

  The boys—I pushed them out of my head. I couldn’t think of them now. It was just more pain. Their lives were better off without the tangled web of darkness that followed me.

  I took another step, thinking of my father’s world. I’d cleanse myself. Make myself pure again. Maybe then I’d be worthy for the other side.

  Another wave rolled over my knees, lapping at my skirt and at the cuffs of my sweater. The cold water chilled my skin, soothed the cuts. Took away the pain.

  I took one last look at the stars above and plunged beneath.

  31

  Anderson

  Amber’s little red car sat alone on the dirt road leading toward the ocean. I hopped out of the car before Oliver even stopped, running in the direction of crashing waves.

  Something was so very, very wrong.

  My shoes bogged in the wet sand and I kicked off my sneakers as I ran over the dunes down the path that led to the beach.

  Moonlight lit my path, like a signal from the heavens, revealing fresh footprints in the sand. Voices called behind me—shouting her name. I didn’t waste my breath. I knew. In my heart, I knew.

  I shucked off my hoodie, tossing it in the sand, following the footsteps straight to the edge of the water, heading into the icy ocean.

  “Anderson!” I heard my name shouted in the wind. Oliver stood on the shore behind me. Jackson and Hayden took off in opposite directions of the beach.

  I ignored him, shouting her name instead. “Heaven! Heaven!”

  It was so dark. So ridiculously dark, and the water was freezing. I didn’t stop, knowing she was out there. Water seeped up my legs, pulling at my jeans. I waded in deeper. “Heaven!”