Broken Compass

by Jo Raven

  The policeman watches them go with a frown. “Very protective of you, aren’t they? Family?”

  “Yes, they are.” I’m angry, and not sure why. This isn’t the policeman’s fault. “And we didn’t fight.”

  “Right…” He nods, places the form aside, and I have a feeling he won’t give this much time. He’s already made up his mind about what happened.

  Lovers’ quarrel, or drug problems. Maybe both. It’s easy to build a story where Kash left town so he won’t face me over his financial, drug-related troubles.

  But that’s not true…

  Is it?

  What a day.

  I text Gigi to let her know I won’t be grabbing lunch with her today, as I’ll stay home instead. I wander inside the apartment and into Kash’s bedroom.

  Standing by the window, looking around, I struggle against my fear, struggle to think rationally. Both Nate and West think Kash might have left on purpose, for whatever reason. The policeman thinks the same. I can’t believe that’s true, but if it were…

  I mean, let’s say I could ever accept that Kash, my Kash, would pull such a dick move after being in our lives for more than a year, do something so out of character. What would his plan look like?

  He’d take with him what was important to him.

  We are important to him, my heart tells me, but I shush it. Rational, remember? Let’s go about it the logical way.

  If he’d planned to leave, what would he take with him? Money. Personal items that have value to him. Personal data.

  He had his phone. What about his laptop?

  I check the closet, check under his bed, but only find dust bunnies and a pair of running shoes. I pull them out, wipe at my nose and try to stop a sneeze.

  “Looking for Kash?” Nate says, startling me. He has his hip propped against the doorjamb, one hand on his hard stomach, over a riot of bruises. “Think he’s hiding under the bed?”

  “You’re not funny, Nate.”

  “Dammit.” Nate got the day off work. Doc at the hospital said he should rest. He won’t admit it, but he still has a lingering headache, and he’s so bruised even lying down hurts. “You’re gonna bruise my ego.”

  “We wouldn’t want that, would we?” I put the shoes down. “Where would Kash keep his laptop?”

  He ambles over to the closet and reaches down with a wince. Out of a plastic bag, he lifts a slim silver laptop. “This laptop, by any chance?”

  “Yes!” I pounce on it, grabbing it, then rising up to place a quick kiss on his lips. “Thank you.”

  “What did you want it for?” He winces again, and I pull him to the bed, tug until he sits down. “Ow.”

  “You should be resting. Doc’s orders.”

  “I am.” He looks pointedly down at the bed we’re sitting on. “The most strenuous thing I’ve done today was take a piss.”

  I tsk and open the laptop. I don’t know what I’m looking for, or how to find it, but I press start anyway.

  When the request for a password comes up, I glance at Nate. “Any idea what it might be?”

  “Sorry, no fucking clue.” He closes his eyes, takes a shallow, pained breath. “What’s on your mind?”

  “He wouldn’t leave his laptop behind. Not if he’d planned to leave.”

  “Okay, Sherlock. What if he didn’t plan it?”

  “So he’d just leave? Without his stuff. Without his laptop. Without telling us. Tell me how this is supposed to make sense.”

  His eyes flash. “I told you. He got a good look at my dirty past and took a hike.”

  “Kash isn’t like that, and you know it.”

  Nate looks down where our hands are linked. “I know you want to believe it…”

  “And I do. He saved you.” I lean my head on his shoulder. “I’ll never be able to thank him enough for this.”

  “Syd…” He shakes his head, his eyes a bit too bright.

  “I could never lose you.”

  He kisses my temple. “Maybe he got tired of saving me.”

  “I told you that you’re not funny.”

  He snorts softly.

  I lift my head. “His journal.”

  “Come again?”

  “He had a journal. I saw it. It could contain some clue, something to tell me who he really is, where to find him.”

  What happened to him.

  “I never saw the journal,” Nate mutters, following me with his golden gaze as I check the nightstand. “But he told me about it.”

  “It was here.” I lift a pen and an ancient paperback copy of the Lord of the Rings. Below I find a small key, and an old receipt, but no journal.

  Where is it? Last I saw it, it was right here.

  “He said he thought it could help with his panic attacks,” Nate mutters. “But that it didn’t.”

  I wave a hand at him. “That makes it even more important, because…” I open the nightstand drawer. Empty. “…if it was a therapy of sorts, he might have written about things that happened to him. In the past.”

  Another round of the room coughs up nothing but some dusty socks that had fallen behind the bed, and a Russian textbook, presumably for his tutoring lessons.

  I don’t want to believe it. Did Kash take the journal with him? Did he really plan this?

  Did I get this all wrong?

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Nate

  Kash is gone.

  Days pass. A week. More days.

  He’s gone.

  No way am I letting the others see how hard this has hit me. What a hole it’s left in my chest. In my life.

  I can’t fucking believe he’s not here. His absence is an ache, worse than the bruises, worse than the migraines. This void where he used to be is killing me, mocking me everywhere I turn. I can still see him in my mind’s eye.

  Making coffee in the kitchen.

  Smoking on the balcony.

  Curled up in our bed.

  Goddammit. If he just up and walked away from this, from us… I’m gonna go medieval on his ass. If he’s disgusted with what he found out about me, no matter what West and Sydney think, then…

  Then what, genius? You gonna drag him back into your life by force? Insist he learns to live with someone like you? A filthy whore. A used-up body. A shattered mind.

  I’m supposed to be asleep, but I can’t relax enough for that. It’s been a week since that night, since Kash vanished into thin air. I glance at Sydney and West, asleep, arms and legs entangled, and step out of our room.

  He saved me. The dickwad saved me, twice. I don’t fucking wanna know what would’ve happened to me if Kash hadn’t stepped in, both times.

  My back hurts like hell, my sides even worse. The pain burns, deep inside, all the way to my bones, a hot blade carving me.

  I remember my dad laughing in my face, I remember his buddy Rick holding me as I fought to escape, cursing myself for deciding to go check on West after Sydney told me he was back at the old apartment, going through his things. I remember Sal Fuckface yanking my pants open, the other two assholes talking about how they’d take turns.

  My gorge rises, and I swallow hard, pacing the living room.

  Kash saved me. Saved my soul in the nick of time. I’m pretty sure I’d have lost it completely if those motherfuckers got me for good.

  What if Sydney is right? What if he didn’t leave of his own free will? If he was kidnapped, then this is… fucked up, too fucked up to make sense of. Too damn scary, because what if he’s hurt, what if he’s dead…

  Fuck, no, can’t think about that or I’ll go out of my mind.

  Between the doubts, the uneasiness, the migraines and the damn nightmares, it’s a miracle I can still function.

  My phone dings, and I check it compulsively. Guess I’m still hoping Kash is out there, doing fuck knows what, completing some task he felt was important, and ready to come back to us.

  But it’s Molly. That woman somehow got her hands on my phone number and has been texting me every day
.

  Today it’s ‘Coffee?’ and lots of coffee-chugging emojis.

  Woman doesn’t take a hint. She seems like fun, I’ll give her that, though her insistence has a slight stalkerish vibe to it.

  Or maybe it’s losing Kash that’s made me more suspicious, turned me into a complete cynic. Maybe she just wants to be friends.

  Okay, scratch that last one. Girl wants into my pants, but how many times do I have to say no before she understands the word?

  I wonder how you say ‘no’ in Russian.

  And back to Kash.

  Dammit.

  “Can’t sleep?” Sydney asks around a yawn, coming out of our room.

  “Nah.”

  “Nightmare?”

  I shake my head no. “Just wired.”

  She pads closer, her feet bare, toenails painted red. “You’re in pain. I’ll get you the painkillers.”

  “I’m okay. Can’t sleep, that’s all.”

  She sidles up to me, her red hair loose on her shoulders, green eyes like a cat’s, rosy lips parted. Dressed in a short, off the shoulder blouse that leaves her belly bare and a red lacy thong, she’s like all my wet dreams rolled into one.

  Want hits me, nearly bowls me over. My dick hardens so fast I’m goddamn dizzy, rock-hard within seconds, trying to bore a hole through my briefs. Hissing, I reach down to adjust myself, and those green eyes drop to where my hand is.

  She draws a quick breath, licks her lips, and her nipples tighten and try to poke through her blouse.

  Damn if that doesn’t make my cock twitch and my balls draw in tight.

  “Goddamn, girl, come here.” I grab her wrist, haul her against me until her tits press to my chest. “You’re so sexy.”

  “Your bruises—”

  “Fuck my bruises. You’re the best drug in the whole world.” I kiss her, put my hands over those hot curves, cup her ass and squeeze until she moans.

  She’s soft and warm, and my dick jerks between us, pleasure mixing with the pain in my ribs and back.

  More. I want more.

  I turn her, bend her slightly over the sofa, press myself to her back. I push my hand under her blouse, cup her tit, play with her nipple, making her moan.

  A shadow at the edge of my vision makes me turn my head. It’s West, watching us from the hallway, stroking himself through his underwear, his eyes heavy-lidded.

  “Dammit…” he breathes. “That’s hot.”

  “Get your ass over here,” I grate out. “Kiss her.”

  Something is blazing inside of me, driving me, pushing me. It’s anger—at everything. Dad. Kash. The world.

  He grins at me, sharp and wicked, and I see an answering spark in his blue eyes. “Yessir.”

  “Smartass.”

  “Think you can order me around?” He’s still grinning, his mouth like a blade.

  I want it to cut me to shreds, to cut both me and Syd, make the pain stop.

  “Stop fucking around. This,” I pull out my weeping cock, “is urgent.”

  His eyes glint. “We’re gonna take care of that for you, man,” he says, his hoarse promise a shot of lust straight to my balls.

  Hell.

  Sydney reaches back for me. “Nate…”

  “I’m right here. Want West to kiss you?”

  “Yes,” she whispers, her voice choked.

  “I’m a good kisser,” West says, climbing on the sofa on his knees. “Ask Nate. He can tell you all about it.”

  But he doesn’t give her a chance to ask what he means, gripping her chin and putting his mouth over hers.

  Yeah, baby.

  Watching is good. It’s good and fine, but I need more. I have to become part of it this time. I rub my dick along the crack of her pert ass and the friction is fucking amazing.

  I toy with her nipple as she kisses West, and she moans when I tug on the tip. So much I wanna try out with her. With her and West and…

  “Syd…” I pull her back, against my chest, breaking the kiss between them. “I want you.”

  West grunts, staring at me. “Whoa, dude. You sure about this?”

  But she leans back, turns her head to see my face. “Please,” she whispers. “Do it, Nate. West. Take me to bed.”

  I drag her by the hand back to the bedroom, West keeping a grip on her other hand. We kiss as we enter the room, and then she turns her head and kisses West. We fall on the bed, yanking at our last items of clothing—our underwear and her damn blouse, at last.

  Tonight I can’t get enough of her. I need her skin on mine, her hands on me, her mouth—and West. I need West there, too.

  “I’ve got you, man,” he says, like he can read my mind. “Tell me what to do.”

  I want to be inside her, but even through the haze of anger and need, I’m not sure I’m there, not yet.

  Fishing out a bunch of condoms from my nightstand, I throw them at him, and he catches them with a snort.

  Sydney tucks red curls behind her ear, eyes a bit wide. “What are you guys up to?”

  West wraps an arm around her waist and tucks her into his side, kisses her neck. “Nate is the boss.”

  But I’m not. Never was. I’m just broken.

  And now I’m swept along with them and falling hard.

  “What do you want, Syd?” I stroke her cheek, something impossibly big filling my chest. “What do you need?”

  “I want you both, I want you…” She falters, her eyes too bright. “I want to feel you.”

  God, me too, baby.

  West is trying to get the condom on one-handed, and I grab it out of his hand and tear the foil. “Put this on him,” I say, since they expect me to tell them what to do. “Want him to fuck you?”

  “Yes,” she breathes.

  And okay, I do get a thrill from telling them what to do—but my point is that I’m done being on the outside.

  Time to get down and dirty.

  I groan in anticipation as she places the condom on West’s erection and rolls it down. West is staring down at her hands on his dick, his gaze dark, pupils blown, and it’s damn hot.

  My dick twitches and leaks in response.

  “Come here.” I tug her, turning her until she’s facing me. “My turn.”

  “You haven’t said what we’re doing.” She laughs breathlessly, and I slam my mouth on hers, licking off her smile.

  Then her hand wanders down to my cock and I jerk. She doesn’t move back, though. She kisses me softly, sweetly. “Your turn,” she whispers. “Tell me.”

  But I can’t. Not when she’s working my dick in her small fist, kissing me, when I’m torn between panic and burning need.

  West breaks through the moment of confusion, molding himself to her back, brushing her long hair off one pale shoulder and bending to lick the skin under her ear. “Suck him off,” he orders. “Don’t you wanna taste him, girl?”

  “Yes,” she moans. “God, yes.”

  She places her other hand on my chest and I jerk, falling back on my ass, unsure… off-kilter. Horny and excited and terrified. “Fuck.”

  Her lips part, the tip of her pink tongue darting out to lick them, and I reach for my cock. With her tits bare, her bare pussy glistening wet so close as she kneels there with her thighs splayed, I’m so fucking close to shooting my load.

  She shoves a bit more, and I lie on my back, panting. She bends over me, kneeling between my legs, and pushes my hand off my dick. “Let me.”

  I grunt, my dick jumping when West follows her, kneeling behind her, his big frame dwarfing her. He strokes his hands down her arms, then slides them over her belly and over her tits, making her moan.

  “Show him,” he whispers in her ear, and bends her over me.

  Over my straining cock.

  Her eyes meet mine. “You okay doing this?” she murmurs.

  “Yeah.” I’m still coiled tight, every muscle tense and trembling as she reclaims her hold on my cock.

  But I haven’t freaked out completely, not yet. Would you look at that. Not
only insomnia and pain don’t seem to affect my sex drive, but apparently, sexual assaults don’t either. I may still have nightmares—I may never get rid of them—but something in me seems to have changed.

  Knowing I escaped last time without them getting what they wanted. That my friends had my back. That they now know everything and don’t hate me, don’t cringe away from me.

  So I can’t cringe away from myself, either.

  Still, it isn’t easy to keep from jerking away when she moves closer, when she leans in and licks the underside of my cock.

  Damn, it feels so good, though. When she does it again, my balls tighten.

  Then she slides her lips over the head, and down my length, and my head falls back. I swallow down a groan, struggle to keep my hips from rocking up.

  But she swallows my dick down, and I arch up with a cry.

  God. Yes.

  My hand finds its way to her hair and I hold on, praying I’m not hurting her. Can’t recall the last time someone’s hands and mouth on me felt good, when it wasn’t forced on me, and I didn’t hate myself for feeling even a shred of pleasure.

  Syd, I chant inside my head. It’s Syd. My Syd.

  She cares. She’s my girl. It’s different.

  Don’t let yourself get sucked back into the black hole of memory.

  She hums, and everything inside my body clenches, tight and ready to go. I’m straining, racing toward release, the pressure in my balls excruciating. My hips roll. I’m fucking her sweet mouth and I can’t seem to stop.

  I’d planned for her to suck me while West fucks her from behind, but he seems more interested in watching me now, and I can’t hold back.

  I lift my head to look at her, look where my cock disappears into her mouth, between those lush lips, and I come.

  My body shudders and shakes. My vision shuts down. It’s a whiteout. Blackout. I fall back on the bed, my mind blank, my thoughts erased, my body trembling.

  “Nate.” That’s West, placing a hand on top of my thigh, a concerned expression on his face. “Are you okay?”

  Should I be embarrassed for skirting the edge of panic, so close it ruffles my hair, and then shooting like a train coming off the rails?