Sloane

by V. J. Chambers

  “Hey,” said Silas, his chin jutting out. “You might want to watch it.”

  I laughed. “Jesus, Silas, he’s just…” I got up and went over to Axel. “That’s the way he flirts.”

  Axel smiled up at me. “He still hates me, doesn’t he?”

  I bit my lip. “I think so.”

  “Hey,” said Silas. “I never said I hated him.” He looked at Axel pointedly. “I don’t hate you.”

  “Good,” said Christa, drinking more beer. “Because I think Axel’s great.”

  And Silas was glaring again.

  Axel didn’t seem to mind. He laced his fingers into mine. “You want a beer, love? Your brother did go out and get quite a selection.”

  I cocked my head. “You gonna get me one?”

  He considered, and then he vaulted off the couch. “Absolutely.” He sauntered out of the room and into the kitchen.

  Christa set down her beer. “I think I’m drunk. It’s probably the painkillers.”

  I sat down heavily on the couch.

  “Sloane,” said Silas, “if that guy is really your boyfriend, I don’t know if I can handle that.”

  Leigh looked up. “Seriously, Sloane, what are you doing?”

  Christa wrinkled her nose, her gaze darting back and forth between them. “Why don’t you guys mind your own business?”

  Leigh sighed. “You don’t know him, Christa.”

  Axel cleared his throat as he came back in with a beer for me. “You are all aware of the fact that I can hear you, right?”

  Leigh and Silas both stared down at the floor.

  He laughed to himself. “Well, Sloane, here’s your beer. I think I’ll find somewhere else to hang out.”

  “No!” said Christa. “I don’t want you to leave.”

  I stood up. “Wait.”

  He held up a hand. “Trust me. It’s fine.” He left the room.

  I started after him, but Leigh got up and blocked my path. “Let him go. We should all get packed and try to get a plane out of here as soon as possible anyway. We’ve imposed on him enough.”

  “But I need to—”

  “I’ll go talk to him,” she said, and she disappeared the same way he’d gone.

  LEIGH

  “Axel,” I called.

  He was standing in front of the elevator in the hallway between the apartments on this level. He turned at the sound of my voice.

  I hurried over to him. “Talk to me. What’s your deal with Sloane?”

  “Seems to me like you already have your mind made up about me, Leigh.” He hit the button on the elevator. “And you’re determined to make up her mind too.”

  I caught him by the shoulder. “You told her you loved her?”

  He shook me off, his face stone. “Why are you even talking to me? We’re not friends anymore, are we?”

  “Why would you say that to her?” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why her, Axel? There are zillions of girls in this city, all of them willing to sleep with you. Why pick my best friend? Why lie to her about your feelings?”

  “Oh, she’s your best friend,” he said. “Well, good to know that you’ve had such an easy time moving on and leaving me behind.” The elevator doors opened, and he got inside.

  I went after him. “I’ve known you for a long time, Axel, and you’ve never, ever loved anyone. Not even your family.”

  He shut his eyes. When he spoke, his voice was quiet and trembling—barely controlled. “Get out of the elevator, Leigh.”

  I put my hands on my hips. “No. You’re going to explain this to me. You’ve been a jackass one too many times, and now you’re messing with Sloane, and I don’t like it.”

  Axel clenched his hands into fists. He stalked out of the elevator.

  I went after him. “You can’t run away from me.”

  He walked faster.

  I picked up my pace. I managed to get in front of him. I walked backwards as I spoke. “Explain it to me, Axel. Explain to me why you’d do this to her.”

  He turned and walked the other direction.

  “Axel!” I scrambled after him.

  Suddenly, he stopped. He turned on his heel and glared at me. His face was red. “I used to tell you everything.”

  “So tell me this,” I said.

  His voice was rising. “You say that I never loved anyone, but I loved you. You were the only real friend I ever had.”

  “Axel, you didn’t care about me. You treated me like shit when I showed up asking for your help.”

  He looked down at his shoes. “It was because you were different.”

  “What?”

  He raised his gaze defiantly. “You weren’t the Leigh I knew. You showed back up, and you were pathetic, and you were hung up on some guy, and you weren’t interested in having fun anymore, and—”

  “That’s no reason to—”

  “Let me finish,” he snapped. “I didn’t get it. Not then. But you and me, Leigh, we used to be the same. Neither of us had lasting relationships. We both slept around a lot, and—”

  “That wasn’t the same,” I said. “I wanted a relationship. But I also wanted to get laid. And I knew that if I had sex with the same guy too many times, I’d start getting attached. You couldn’t get attached if your life depended on it.”

  He smirked. “Oh, you’re so sure of that, huh?”

  “I know you.”

  “No,” he said. “You knew me. But when you showed back up here asking for help, you were different. And maybe I’m different now. Is that outside the realm of possibility for you to even consider?”

  I started to say something, and then what he’d said started to sink in. I shook my head. “You can’t expect me to believe that you’re actually into her.”

  His face twitched.

  “No way, Axel. You don’t do that. You’re using her for something, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out what.”

  He ran a hand through his hair. “I just like her, Leigh. Okay? I like her.”

  “Why?” I said. “She’s not the kind of girl you would like. She’s not flashy. She’s not sophisticated. She’s quiet and unassuming and shy and ordinary. And what would you want with a girl like that?”

  Axel shook his head. “Maybe you’re not so different, after all, Leigh. I used to be your best friend, but you don’t know a thing about me. And now you claim Sloane’s your best friend, but it’s pretty obvious you don’t know her either.” He turned and went down the hallway.

  I started to go after him, but I hesitated. Why was I getting myself involved in this drama, anyway? I told myself I was protecting Sloane, but maybe I was only trying to find a way to distract myself from the fact that things were not good with Griffin.

  I hadn’t even seen him in hours.

  Axel got in the elevator, and the doors closed on him.

  I rubbed my face. I needed to find Griffin.

  I went back to the room where I’d been sleeping earlier, and I found him there. He was in bed, the covers in disarray. He was asleep.

  I sat down on the bed and looked at him. He looked so peaceful and innocent when he was asleep. So young, like he was still a little boy.

  I loved this man. I loved him with all of my being, and I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. I wanted to be close to him all the time. He made me better. He gave me someone to care about, someone to be better for.

  And he wanted to have babies with me.

  And I…

  Okay, I liked babies. I thought they were incredibly neat and cute and sweet, with their tiny fingers and noses. I even thought the way they squirmed was cute. I didn’t think I’d have a problem with having a kid if someone just gave one to me.

  But pregnancy… Oh God, pregnancy horrified me. It seemed so foreign and wrong. It made me think of being infected. I’d been pregnant before. Twice. And I had to admit that I’d had an overwhelming relief when the thing was not in me anymore.

  I knew that sounded horrible. I knew that everyone else in
the world thought that pregnancy was beautiful and magical. Most women got really excited at the thought of a strange being taking up residency in their uterus and turning their bodies into vessels for its arrival in the world. But when I thought about that, about being that, I was flooded with disgust and panic.

  I didn’t want to feel that way. I wanted to feel normal, the way everyone else did about pregnancy. I wanted to get excited about it and be happy. I didn’t know how to manage it, though.

  None of the arguments or reassurances made me feel better about it. People told me that it was normal to have fears, and that if you just jumped right in and got pregnant, those fears would go away. They tried to explain how natural the process was, how spiritual, not disgusting and frightening at all.

  But their explanations didn’t work, because my fears weren’t normal fears. They were huge, and they made me feel powerless and small.

  Griffin wasn’t going to wait around forever for me. He really wanted to have children, and I was afraid that if I didn’t have a baby with him, he would leave.

  I knew what life was like without Griffin, and I didn’t like it at all. He completed me. He was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I didn’t want to lose him.

  However, I knew that having a baby to keep your significant other was a bad idea.

  And it was all so confusing. I wasn’t afraid of actually having the baby. I knew that it would be difficult having a kid. I knew that there were lots of things to be frightened about when the baby was born. But all of those fears were normal ones, the kinds that everyone had. Everyone worried they’d be a bad parent. Everyone worried that their kid would get hurt. Everyone worried that they wouldn’t know how to discipline. Everyone worried that they’d be too tired to exist. Those fears I could handle, because they were ordinary fears.

  But I didn’t know anyone else who was afraid of being pregnant because it made her feel like she’d lost her status as a person and had instead become nothing more than a baby-growing blob.

  And people could tell me all they wanted that it wasn’t true, but I knew it was. I saw the way people interacted with pregnant women. They were somewhat freakish and no one treated them quite the way they treated other people. People felt as if they could come up and talk to them even if they didn’t know them. But when they did, it was about the baby that they were growing in their bodies, not about the woman herself. People felt like they could touch the women’s bodies. And… well, this was a horrible thing to admit, but I thought that pregnant women looked positively disgusting. I thought they looked distorted and wrong, and whenever I saw one, it made me weak with revulsion.

  The thought of that happening to me…

  No.

  No, I couldn’t. I kept trying to pretend like I could, for Griffin, but I just couldn’t.

  And I didn’t think he was ever going to forgive me for that.

  The force of that thought hit me hard, and big, fat tears started forming in my eyes. They dripped down over my cheeks.

  One of them landed on Griffin’s face.

  He stirred.

  Shit. I wiped at my eyes. I wanted to let him sleep.

  His eyelids fluttered open. “Doll?” he whispered.

  I turned away.

  He pulled me down next to him.

  I huddled against his body, the thought of losing him making me cling to him as tightly as I could. And the tears kept coming.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  I tried to catch my breath. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that I’m screwed up and stupid and that I can’t be like regular people and just want to get pregnant.”

  He kissed my forehead.

  “I want…” It was hard to talk because I was crying so much. “I want to do it, but I’m too scared. And I’m screwing everything up, and you’re going leave me, and I’m going to hate myself, and—”

  “Shh.” He stroked my hair. “I’m never going to leave you, doll.”

  “But—you said when we were locked up—” I thought he’d sort of threatened that.

  “No.” He kissed the tip of my nose. “How could I manage without you?”

  “What if I can never handle getting pregnant?” I sobbed. “You’ll resent me. You’ll hate me for never letting you have children, and we’ll end up a horrible, bitter couple who’s never happy and—”

  “We’ll work it out,” he murmured. “I don’t know how yet, but we will. Maybe we try something else. The adoption thing or the surrogate thing. Or maybe we learn how to be happy without kids.”

  “You mean that?”

  He held me close. “We’ve got time, doll. French is dead. No one’s after us anymore. We have our whole lives ahead of us. Both of us. Together.”

  I closed my eyes and hung on to him. As long as we had each other, it would be okay. I knew that. Things had only ever gone really wrong when we lost each other.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  I found Axel in his destroyed living room. It was dark and there was only the light of the moon filtering through the windows, bathing everything with a blue-gray glow. In the darkness, and the shadows, it looked like a war zone, and Axel was standing in the middle of it, his head bowed.

  I crept to him and placed my hand on his shoulder.

  He turned to look at me, his perfect lips parting.

  I laid my hand against his cheek.

  And he tugged me into his arms.

  His mouth was on me, hot and eager, and I surrendered to his fevered kisses. I didn’t want to let go of him. I wanted to let him engulf me. It was easier to be near him. When we were close like this, I didn’t have to think, and right now, it felt like nothing made sense.

  But I hadn’t come up here for this, and so, with effort, I pulled myself away.

  I could barely see his expression in the shadows, but I knew hurt when I glimpsed it. “Axel…” I started.

  “Don’t,” he said, turning away. “I know what you’re going to say.”

  “You do?” I laughed a little, but my laughter sounded hollow. “That’s funny, because I’m not really sure myself.”

  “You’re going to tell me that you have to leave, and that you think I’m awful, and that you never want to see me again. You’re going to say that I manipulated you and that I used you. You’re going to tell me never to try to contact you again. And everything’s going to go back to exactly the way it was before. Tomorrow, I’ll hire someone to come in and start cleaning this place up. And then I’ll go back to the club, and I’ll stare at all the women taking off their clothes. And I’ll keep going. But everything will feel empty, because it’s not what I want anymore.”

  I started to reach for him again, but then I pulled my hand back. “I don’t think that’s what I want either.”

  He turned back around. “No?”

  I fidgeted, searching for words.

  “What do you want?” he whispered.

  I licked my lips. “There are things I’m worried about, Axel. If I was going to be with you, I wouldn’t want to share you. If you thought you could keep sleeping with—”

  “No,” he said. “Why would I ever want to have sex with someone else, when touching you is a thousand times more intense than anything I’ve ever felt before?”

  I ducked my head. I felt the same way, but it was good to hear it coming out of his mouth. “And the cocaine. I don’t think I can—”

  He winced. “Right.”

  “It’s not good for you, anyway.”

  He scratched the back of his neck. “I haven’t touched any since we did it together, you know.”

  “I know. But do you really think you can keep that up?”

  “I…” He rubbed his chin. “Well, I could get help.”

  “But would you? Or would you decide it was too hard and just give up on us?”

  He didn’t say anything.

  I waited.

  “You know, Sloane, I could make a lot of promises, but one thing I know is that talk is really cheap. I’m
sure my father swore to my mother that he’d be devoted to her forever. The only way we’re going to know if this can work between us is if we try.”

  “And you want to?” I needed to hear this. “You want to be in a relationship?”

  “Yes.” His voice was ragged. “God, yes.” He picked up my hand, brought it to his mouth, and kissed the inside of my palm.

  I was melting. I couldn’t resist him. He might be bad for me, but he might… oh, he might be so, so good for me. I wanted to give him a chance. I wanted to give us a chance.

  I stepped closed and kissed him slow and deep.

  He eased his arms around my waist, sighing against me, content.

  “But how does it work?” I breathed. “You live here. I live in West Virginia. What do we do?”

  He considered. “I don’t know if I can live in West Virginia.”

  I giggled.

  “We’ll just have to travel,” he said. “You have school, and you should concentrate on that, I guess. But we’ll have the summer.”

  “Actually,” I said. “I’m sort of graduating.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “You are?”

  “And I only went to West Virginia because Silas wanted to go there. And he only wanted to go there so that he could kill this guy named Rolf, which he already did. Well, Christa did it, but… the point is, I don’t have any real attachment to that place.”

  His lips curved into a smile. “So, stay. Stay here. Stay with me.”

  “I could move to Boston.” I grinned back. “But I don’t know if I can get an apartment quite as fancy as this one.”

  He shook his head, and his hands began to roam over my back and shoulder blades. His voice dropped. “No, don’t get an apartment. Don’t just move to Boston. Move here. With me.”

  I gasped as his hands began to send shivers over my skin. “Move in with you? But Axel, we’ve barely been officially together for three minutes. Don’t you think we’re moving too fast?”

  “No.” His fingers went under my shirt, dancing over my flesh. “I don’t really think I want to spend another night away from you.”

  I closed my eyes.

  He kissed my neck. My ear lobe. He cupped my breasts with both his hands, rubbing circles around my nipples.