by Elle Thorpe
He shook his head with a chuckle. “She was never short of confidence, was she?”
I could agree with that. But he still hadn’t answered my question. I gazed down at my hands.
He put one finger beneath my chin and lifted it so I was forced to face him. “Hey. I’m not in love with your sister. I haven’t been in love with her for a long time.”
Relief crashed through me, but he was still touching me, staring at me with those eyes, freezing me to the spot. I couldn’t speak. Except I needed to. Because it wasn’t enough that he just wasn’t in love with my sister. “You’re dating someone then?”
He dropped his hand and tilted his head to one side curiously. His gaze raked slowly over me. “Not right now.”
I don’t know why, but I found that hard to believe. If he wasn’t in love with my sister, then what the hell was his problem? He could have had any woman in the bar on her back in less than thirty seconds, if he’d wanted to. I narrowed my eyes, suddenly suspicious he wasn’t telling the truth about being over Jaye. “You have dated, though? Since Jaye?”
He ran his finger around the edge of his empty shot glass, looking like he was battling back laughter. “You wondering if I’m a born-again virgin, Mae?”
A blush heated my cheeks. “Oh my God. No. That’s not what I meant!”
He chuckled. “Then why the sudden interest in my dating life?”
He was right. Those questions had been totally over the line and inappropriate. It wasn’t my business. “Blame the old crush I had on you.” The words slipped out my mouth as if they had a mind of their own and echoed in the empty condo around us. I slapped a hand over my mouth then groaned. “And you can blame that on the tequila. How strong is that stuff? Let’s have another.” Anything to ease the embarrassment. If I drank enough tonight, perhaps I’d wake up in the morning and not remember any of it. I downed another shot quickly, and then poured two more, letting him take one.
Heath raised one eyebrow as he picked up his shot glass and downed the liquid inside. His throat had to be burning, but a chuckle formed on his lips. “Crush, huh?”
The pure amusement on his face put me at ease instantly. I’d already put my foot in it, may as well dig my grave a little deeper. By the time we got to the bottom of that bottle, this conversation would be a long-lost memory. “Yeah. A crush. You know, the embarrassing kind, that makes you say really stupid things when you’ve had too much to drink? Like telling your sister’s ex-boyfriend that you think he’s cute.”
I cringed. Did I just say cute? Heath was not cute. Babies were cute. Puppies were cute. Heath was gorgeous, all man, and sexy as fuck. I threw my hands up in the air in defeat, tequila storming around my body now, fighting for full control. “Oh boy, I just keep going and going, don’t I? Kill me now.”
“Mae?”
I lifted my gaze to meet his, surprised it was suddenly a little on the hazy side. Or maybe it was my gaze that was hazy. I blinked to clear it, but it didn’t do much to help. I tried not to let him notice, though. “Yeah?” I forced the word to sound more sober than I felt.
He hesitated, like he wanted to say something but was suddenly thinking better of it. He held a finger up, in a halt motion. “Wait.” He threw back another tequila shot, stared at me once more, swore low under his breath, and threw back another. “I don’t think you’re cute.”
Well, okay then! Nothing like a rejection straight to your face without any sort of beating around the bush. “Of course. Sorry. I’m drunk. Just ignore me.” Disappointment crushed down on me like a ton of bricks piling up on my chest. I didn’t think I was that bad to look at, but he’d dated Jayela, so I probably wasn’t his type. Despite the fact she and I were sisters, we were nothing alike. She was all hard lines, abs, and ‘I run five miles every day.’ While I was more soft curves, a tummy roll, and ‘Maybe sometimes I do yoga, but mostly because there’s a great bakery next door.’
My breath hitched when he stepped in closer. His fingers skated down the side of my face and tilted my chin once more. “You didn’t let me finish.” He grinned, his words a little slurred. “You’re not cute, anymore. You were, but now you’re not. You’re smoking fucking hot, Mae.”
I just stared at him, then when the silence was almost awkward, I burst into laughter. “You are so drunk.”
He shrugged. “Yeah, but I still meant what I said. And I mean this, too.” He paused, his gaze on my lips again. “I want to kiss you. But I don’t want to scare you off. Or do something you’ll regret.”
My eyes widened. I almost asked him to repeat himself but instead I picked up the tequila bottle and took a slug straight from the opening. It didn’t even burn anymore.
Then I offered it to him because this was crazy talk. He swallowed straight from the bottle, too, his gaze never leaving mine.
“We can’t be talking like this,” I said, but I didn’t move back, just watched his Adam’s apple bob.
He shifted the tequila to his left hand and twirled a lock of my hair around his finger, the blonde strands falling back around my shoulders. “We’re both consenting adults…” He ran his thumb over my lip. “Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop.”
He was insane if he thought I was going to tell him to stop. I couldn’t now, even if I’d wanted to. The throbbing between my thighs had taken over and was talking for me.
“Jayela can’t see you here.”
“I’m not hers.”
I shook my head but stopped quickly when it made the world spin. “That’s not how sisters work. You were hers once. That makes you…forbidden fruit.”
He laughed, and the sound curled my toes pleasantly. “Forbidden fruit? I’m just a guy, Mae. Nothing special. I’m single. You’re single. We aren’t hurting anyone, standing here like this.” He leaned in, lowering his lips to my ear, brushing my hair aside as he went. “We wouldn’t be hurting anyone, if while we were standing here, I pushed these straps down and kissed your shoulder.”
I still wasn’t saying no. I didn’t want to. Not for a second. What I really wanted to do was scream, “Yes! Dear God, yes!”
His lips skated over the skin of my shoulder, dragging up toward my neck.
“We wouldn’t be hurting anyone if I hiked that dress up, gripped your hips, and wrapped your thighs around my waist…”
My eyes fluttered closed, and a breathy noise escaped my throat.
I waited for him to do it, a pulse pounding between my legs.
The rattle of the doorknob turning had my eyes flying open in panic. All good feelings smashed into smithereens when I imagined my sister walking in and finding me standing in the kitchen with her ex talking dirty in my ear, and my nipples so hard they stood out through even a padded bra. I spun away, ready to intercept, but Heath’s fingers wrapped around my wrist and hauled me toward my open bedroom door. My feet didn’t move well after copious amounts of alcohol, and Heath caught me as I stumbled, shutting us into my room. I let out a nervous giggle, wrapped in his arms, and he pressed a finger to my lips.
“Shh. She’ll hear.”
I giggled again. “You shh.”
His grin was devastating. He tightened his grip on me, and we both froze, listening to Jayela’s footsteps pass my bedroom. Her door closed with a soft click.
His quiet laughter subsided. “I really do want to kiss you.”
“I really want you to as well.”
“But…”
With a sigh, I stepped away to the wall, sliding down it to sit on my carpet. “This isn’t the right time, is it?”
“We’re really drunk.”
I snorted because that was the understatement of the year. “There’s two of you. You’d be really hot as a twin, you know that? Like, two Heaths! Hotttttt.”
We both laughed, shushing each other.
Heath stared down at me. “What now? You want me to sneak out once she’s asleep?”
Maybe I’d regret it in the cold light of dawn, but right now, I just wanted him to stay, even if kissing was
off the table. I tugged at the leg of his jeans and held up the bottle of tequila still clutched in my fingers. “You gotta be gone by the time she wakes up. But…we’ve still got tequila. You can’t go yet.”
He slid down the wall beside me, then took the bottle from my hand.
When I passed out, it was with Heath’s arm wrapped tightly around my shoulders, my head on his chest, and a sense of rightness I’d never felt before.
4
Heath
A thousand spears stabbed into my brain; tequila salt shoved into the wounds. I squeezed my eyes shut tight against the single blinding sunbeam shining in around the edge of the blackout curtain and racked my fuzzy brain for where I was and why I was so horrifically hungover. My stomach churned, and bile rose in my throat, threatening to erupt, but I went perfectly still, forcing the nauseous feeling away so I could think.
Mae.
Talking to her at the bar. Walking her home. Going inside and kissing her neck, and then… Shit. Then what? I squeezed my eyes tighter. She was five years younger than me and Jayela’s little sister. What the hell had I been thinking?
My dick stiffened at the barely-there memory. I remembered standing in the kitchen wanting to kiss her. Wanting to run my hands up her thighs and over the curve of her hips and tits. But after that everything was black. Had we done more? The uncomfortable, stiff denim of my jeans still chaffed around my thighs, so I didn’t think so, but my brain could neither confirm nor deny.
I cracked open one eye, expecting to see Mae’s waterfall of blonde hair spread out across her pillow.
The hair spread out across the pillow wasn’t blonde.
It was dark. Almost jet-black. And entirely too familiar. My eyes widened as I took in the decorations of the room around me. It was not the mint walls I remembered from Mae’s bedroom. These were a more familiar navy blue and decorated with symbols from the police force. There was a certificate, received the day she finished at the Academy. And a medal for outstanding excellence she’d accepted at an awards night I’d accompanied her to. I scrubbed a hand over my face, the realization sinking in.
I wasn’t in Mae’s bed.
I was in Jayela’s.
Shit. I was fucked and without any clue of how I’d gotten there. I’d been flirting with Mae while we did shots. We’d made it to her bedroom at some point, though now I wasn’t exactly sure why, if it hadn’t been to hook up. Ugh, fucking tequila. All those memories were surrounded in intense feelings of desire and need. They were good feelings. But after that it was a complete black hole of nothing. Maybe I’d gotten up in the middle of the night and gotten confused? I’d spent hundreds of nights here. Had it just been habit that had me waking up in the wrong bed? And how was it that Jayela hadn’t woken up and kicked me out? Fuck! This was all seriously messed up, and I needed to get the hell out.
Jayela’s back was to me so I couldn’t see her face, blankets tucked tightly around her. She always had slept like the dead; maybe if I was lucky, I could sneak out of here without her even noticing.
I pulled the covers back on my side, only far enough that I could carefully slip out without disturbing her. I blinked a few times in the still dark room, my gaze fuzzy with sleep and the aftereffects of alcohol, and then stumbled for the door.
At the doorway, so close to freedom, a sudden sinking feeling swamped me so hard it stopped me in my tracks.
Something wasn’t right.
An odd smell permeated the room, finally cutting through my groggy senses.
My eyes narrowed on Jayela’s silent form, the only noise in the room my stilted breathing.
Jayela was entirely too still.
I stared at her for a long moment. Waiting for her shoulders to rise and fall with her breaths, but there was no noticeable movement. Concern seeped in, and my desire to escape disintegrated. I went back to the bed and reached out a hand to touch her back. “Jayela?” I whispered. When she didn’t respond, I shook her shoulder a little harder until she flopped onto her back.
The breath punched from my lungs, and my knees went weak.
Her eyes stared emptily at the ceiling. Fixed and unmoving.
A red gash slashed across her milky-white throat.
I couldn’t even identify the sound that ripped from my chest. It was something between a shout and a stifled, “No!”
A sudden rush of energy filled my body. The headache disappeared. The nausea disintegrated. The bile rising up my throat doubled, trying to choke me around a horrified scream that couldn’t escape. But my body went into action. On autopilot I launched myself onto the bed, shaking her harder even though my logical brain was already screaming words I didn’t want to hear. I yanked the blanket back and recoiled from the sight before me.
Blood. So much blood. It was everywhere.
The bile rose up my throat again as I tried to yell for Mae, but my voice wouldn’t work. I tried again. My hands went into autopilot, one trying to stem the blood from her throat, the other blindly finding the center of Jayela’s chest to start CPR.
Blood covered that, too.
But I pushed on anyway. I had no idea if I was doing it right, leaning on her chest, her body flopping and bouncing on the mattress beneath my weight, while her blood coated my hands.
“Mae!” I yelled, voice finally working.
From down the hall, the click of a door opening sounded. “Heath? Where are you?”
“Here.” I pumped Jayela’s chest, trying not to look at the unseeing expression on her face, trying not to see the blue around her lips, trying not to see how utterly lifeless she remained, no matter what I did. I choked on my words. “Call an ambulance.”
Mae’s footsteps in the hallway turned into a run at my command, and she threw the door open. I glanced up at her.
The expression of pure horror on her face gutted me from the inside out. She didn’t even scream. The blood just drained from her face.
“Call an ambulance,” I repeated.
She didn’t move.
In that moment, Mae was as lifeless as her sister.
“Mae! Move!” I snapped. “Do it now.”
She finally rushed across the room, grabbing her sister’s phone from the charger and stabbing at it with trembling fingers. I couldn’t pay attention to her any longer. I stared down at Jayela, down at my hands covered in her blood, and my heart broke open.
Her eyes didn’t flicker. Her waxy flesh was freezing. Her wounds had stopped bleeding, her heart long given out.
There was no saving her. What I’d said to Mae last night had been the truth. I didn’t love Jayela anymore. I hadn’t loved her for a long time. But she’d been such a big part of my life once upon a time, and seeing her now, seeing her like this, seeing what some monster had done to her while I was passed out in the very same condo was impossible. It was futile trying to comprehend any of it. None of it made sense. I would have heard. I should have seen. How could I have let myself get so drunk that someone could do this and I wouldn’t even know? Guilt swamped me hard and fast, an avalanche of remorse burying me deep.
I didn’t notice when Mae dropped the phone to the floor. All I noticed was her tiny, shaking voice when she finally spoke to me once more. “What did you do?”
The tremble in her voice was like a tremor before the volcano erupted. Her words hadn’t even sunk through my head before she was screaming. “What did you do, Heath?”
I froze. “What?”
She stared at the savage slit across her sister’s throat. “You’re covered in blood!”
I glanced up, into the mirror on the wall, and recoiled at my reflection. The blood wasn’t just on my hands. It was splattered across my face. And when I stopped to look down at myself, it soaked my shirt and jeans.
“I didn’t…”
But Mae’s face said that I did. Said that I had. She stared at me with an expression I’d never seen before and one I hoped I never would again.
She stared at me with pure fear.
I’d been
here before. With blood on my hands and people staring at me in shock. The screams echoed through my ears once more, as loud and clear as if I were right back there. The body beneath me morphed and became a face that had haunted my dreams for the past fifteen years. A face I knew I would never forget as long as I lived.
Mae launched herself across the room, hitting and pushing at me, her fists beating at my face. “Get away from her!”
I backed right off and stopped trying to be the hero who brought Jayela back. The logical side of my brain told me that it wouldn’t make any difference anyway. She was gone. She’d been gone as I lay there by her side. I took in what Mae saw from across the room. The white shirt I’d worn to the bar last night was still stretched across my chest, but now instead of white, it was decorated a sickly crimson.
So was the knife that lay discarded on the floor at the end of the bed.
I hadn’t even noticed it before…but now it was all I could see.
I staggered away until my back hit the wall, shock pumping through my veins. My brain yelled accusations. You’ve been here before. You have a temper. You don’t know when to stop. Look what you’ve done. Look what you’ve done. Look what you’ve done!
“No.”
I’d heard that voice before. For years it had taunted me, and I’d silenced it in so many different ways. Alcohol. Women. Therapy. I wasn’t going back there.
I knew who I was. I knew what I’d done. And what I hadn’t.
I might have grown up on the wrong side of the tracks. I might have been dealt with a shitty hand, over and over. Jayela might have taken the one thing I’d desperately wanted from me. But I knew who I was. And killing an innocent woman—a woman I’d once loved—I was not that man.
But Mae’s reaction was like the knife covered in Jayela’s blood, stabbing through my own heart. Her screams and the fear in her eyes as she yelled for help sent me spiraling out of control, and the nightmare that was my past reared up like some evil beast, coating the room in its black smoke, swirling it around me, chuckling darkly as it went.
