Bad Habit

by Charleigh Rose

  Is he playing chicken?

  They try to dodge him, but he mirrors their every move. I hold my breath, watching through my fingers and hoping to God he doesn’t hurt himself or anyone else, when he cuts right, just before they’re about to collide, and soaks the shit out of them. The guy tries to take a sharp turn to avoid getting hit, but they end up tipping over and going under.

  Adrian and Dash howl with laughter, while Whitley rolls her eyes because the attention isn’t on her. I think I let out something between a nervous giggle and a relieved sigh, but I can’t tell because my pulse is still pounding in my ears.

  I’m not sure exactly what’s going on from here, but I can hear Asher’s threatening, booming voice, and then he’s throwing his arms up and pointing back at me. One guy swims to the shore, and one mounts the Jet Ski, idling. A few more words are exchanged before they go their separate ways.

  Once he’s back, he tells me to get my ass on the boat. I idle as close as I can get and Adrian extends a hand to pull me up. I ditch my life vest, then pull the key bracelet off, handing it to one of Dash’s other friends. Asher dives off his Jet Ski and climbs onto the boat behind me.

  “Key’s on the handlebar,” he says to anyone and everyone, but staring at only me, and one of the other guys jumps in to get it.

  “It wasn’t—” I start, but he cuts me right off.

  “No, it wasn’t your fault. Those fucks were drunker than shit.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  I didn’t expect that. I don’t know why, I just assumed he’d find a way to turn it around on me.

  “But, you weren’t paying attention.” Annnnd there it is. “If you hadn’t thought fast…”

  “Thank you, Asher,” I say simply.

  He gives a short, forced nod, but then Whitley is there next to him, tracing her talons up and down the dips and grooves of his abs. Asher tenses ever so slightly, but I catch it.

  “That’s a really cute suit, Briar,” Whitley says, her saccharine sweet voice dripping with insincerity.

  “Thanks,” I deadpan.

  “It’s really brave for someone so…curvy to wear white. I wish I was as confident as you are.”

  I roll my eyes, letting her comment roll off my back before walking away. Is this what we’re resorting to now? Backhanded, mean girl compliments? Seeing her touch his body with such ease, such intimacy, was far worse than any insult she could sling at me. I sit on the cushioned bench on the very back of the boat, resting a forearm on my folded knees.

  Dash, deciding this is as good a place as any, throws the anchor over the side, next to another boat full of partiers. There are probably ten or so guys and girls who look to be a little older than us. Maybe mid-twenties. Dash grabs the beer bong and steps over onto their boat and introduces himself. Ever the attention whore.

  “Having fun, pretty girl?” Adrian asks, plopping down beside me, flashing that megawatt smile. He’s ridiculously attractive with his inky black hair, caramel-colored skin, and golden eyes. Why couldn’t I crush on a guy like him? Because that would be too easy.

  “I was before I almost died.” I laugh.

  “I don’t think it was the near-death experience that put that look on your face,” he teases. But he’s also right.

  “When did you get so insightful?” I grumble.

  We both watch as Whitley sits on an uninterested Asher. At least, he appears to be uninterested, with the way he stares directly ahead as Whitley bounces around on his lap to some shitty Ke$ha song playing from the other boat.

  Adrian tucks a wayward hair behind my ear, and I must give him the dirtiest side-eye known to man, because he laughs and leans in, explaining himself.

  “Trust me. He just needs a little push.”

  I swallow hard and give a shaky nod. Good thing Dash is too entertained by his new friends to notice Adrian’s show. Though, somehow, I suspect that he’d get away with it, anyway. Adrian just has that way about him. He can bullshit his way out of anything, and everyone loves him. Even Ash, though you’d never know it by seeing them together.

  “Don’t look at him,” Adrian says in a hushed voice. “Keep looking at me.”

  I look into his usually mirthful eyes, but right now, they’re full of heat, and I’m wondering if this is still an act. He cups the side of my neck, pulling me closer. His lips are just an inch from mine, and even though I know it’s all for show, my stomach twists with nerves.

  “Damn, Briar. I’m starting to think you’d be worth the beating I’d get from your brother and Kelley.”

  Huh?

  “I’m gonna kiss you. Go with it.”

  His fingertips touch my cheek, and for some reason, my first thought is how they’re so much softer than Asher’s calloused hands. It’s a testament to how different their lives have been. How different they still are.

  I’m about to say no. These kinds of games always lead to trouble. I chance a look at Asher out of the corner of my eye, and all I can focus on is his death grip on Whitley’s thigh.

  All of a sudden, Adrian’s soft lips meet mine. I gasp, and he takes the opportunity to slip his tongue in to tangle with him. Before I can process the fact that it’s happening, his mouth is ripped away from mine. And then a moment later, a splash.

  My eyes shoot open to see Asher in front of me—face full of anger and clenched fists full of rage—and I hear Adrian sputtering and chuckling from the water. Asher pushed him off the edge? That fucker was right.

  “Keep your fucking hands to yourself.”

  Anyone in their right mind would be afraid, but Adrian literally laughs him off.

  “I mean, we can share. It’s not gay if your balls don’t touch!” Adrian yells, sending a wink in my direction.

  Turning his attention to me, Asher grabs me by my bicep and drags me toward the other side of the boat.

  “You’re coming with me. Say whatever the fuck you have to say to your brother.”

  “Why should I?”

  “Don’t fucking play with me right now, Briar,” he says roughly, snatching up a life vest and smacking it to my chest. “You’re going to pay for that little show.”

  Asher

  I’m going to kill Adrian’s bitch ass. I know exactly what he was trying to do. But I also know that he wouldn’t pass up the chance to hook up with Briar if it came down to it, either. And what the fuck was she thinking, letting him put his hands on her? His lips on her?

  After making up some excuse about needing to get back home, Dash hugged his sister and thanked me for offering to help her. I’m a piece of shit, but ask me if I care right now.

  She was wearing my shirt this morning. Just my shirt. She kept it. When I saw her standing there with her back to me, bare legs and messy hair, I wished things were different. I wished I wasn’t a fucking lowlife scumbag and that she wasn’t the girl who purposely fucked me over because her pride was wounded.

  Nothing makes sense. I was about to ask her why she did it, once and for all, if only to keep from crushing my lips to hers, but then fucking Whitley walked in.

  I didn’t invite her. Fuck that. If there’s a party, or anything even resembling one, Whitley will find out about it. My guess is that one of the other guys who still risks his life by putting his dick inside her tipped her off. I know she still tries to talk to Dash, but he shut that shit down a long time ago. And if Dash won’t touch her, that automatically excludes Adrian, seeing as how they like to share.

  I’ll admit that I’ve fucked her in the past, but it was never a relationship. We were just two lonely, miserable people who used each other. I used her for coke, and she used me for sex. She knew the drill. It’s not like I could sleep with my best friend’s fourteen-year-old sister, so I didn’t really care.

  I let Briar think that I invited her. Maybe it was payback for having to see her with Jackson. Maybe it was my way of getting her to hate me so I wouldn’t be tempted to forget her transgressions and make her mine. Maybe I’m just an asshole.

  I step o
nto the Jet Ski and hold out my hand to help Bry on behind me, but she doesn’t take it.

  “Where’s yours?” she questions.

  “My what?”

  “Your life jacket. It’s illegal to be on that thing without one,” she says, arms crossed.

  A devious smirk spreads across my face. “You’re stalling, baby girl.”

  She takes a fortifying breath before taking my hand and cautiously stepping down. Once she’s on, her thighs hug mine, and I can feel the heat of her pussy on my back.

  This was a bad fucking idea.

  I spot the key hanging off the handlebar, and I start it up, ignoring Whitley’s shrill protests from the boat. The ride back to shore does little to calm my anger. If anything, I’m only getting more pissed off by the minute.

  Briar’s only five feet tall, but the girl is all legs. And right now, those thighs have me in a vise grip as she holds on to me for dear life. After hitting a rough wave that forces us even closer together, she finally wraps her timid arms around my stomach. I’m hard from her touch alone. I feel her tuck into me, her forehead hitting the top of my spine—probably to shield her face from the wind—and her long, blonde hair whips in my face.

  We hit another wave, and instinctively, my left hand shoots out to grip her thigh. But I don’t remove it. Not even when we’re in the no-wake zone.

  Once we reach the shore, I yank the key out while she takes off her vest, exposing those perky tits covered by thin scraps of white triangles. Fuck, she looks good. I bend down and lift her around the waist, and even though she squeals, her legs immediately lock around me.

  “Put me down!”

  “Shut up.”

  She tries to wriggle down my body, but all she does is make my dick harder, and the moment she feels it, she freezes. I laugh darkly at her wide eyes.

  Once we’re to my truck, I lay her down in the bed of it, on top of an old quilt I keep back here to prevent tools from scratching the paint.

  “Tell me, Briar. What was your plan?” I ask, leaning over her.

  She lies there, and with the setting sun making her hair appear more golden than blonde, those faint freckles across her nose, and cheeks rosy from the sun, she looks even more innocent than usual. She shakes her head. “What are you talking about?”

  “Your plan. With Adrian?” Don’t play dumb, baby.

  “He wasn’t being serious.”

  “Bullshit,” I say, trailing my hand up her soft thigh. Higher, higher, higher. “Were you going to let him touch this?” I grip her between her legs through her bathing suit bottoms, and she gasps.

  “Huh? Were you going to let him touch your pussy?”

  “No,” she breathes, as the flat of my fingers start to rub up and down.

  “Because he would, you know. He’d fuck you in a heartbeat if given half the chance.”

  “You’re such a hypocrite,” she says, eyes closing in pleasure. “You can be all over Whitley, but I can’t kiss anyone?”

  “Fuck Whitley. I don’t want her.” I want you. I don’t say it out loud, but the insinuation is clear.

  She pushes into my hand, and I feel her wetness through the fabric of her bathing suit.

  “Who are you wet for, baby girl? Is it for him? Or me?”

  Briar doesn’t answer, too focused on trying to close her legs around my hand to stop my movements. Her eyes dart around, making sure we don’t have any company. The sun is going down, so there are people only feet away, packing up for the day.

  “No one can see you,” I say, covering her body with mine. “But even if they could…let them watch.”

  “We shouldn’t be doing this,” she says on a gasp, but she parts her legs for me anyway, and I rub her clit with the heel of my palm at the same time that I pull her bathing suit top to the side with my teeth. I suck the soft flesh into my mouth, leaving my mark on her.

  “You wanted to play big girl games, Briar. Now, I’m going to treat you like a big girl.”

  Briar’s head drops back, exposing her slender throat. A lone freckle where her neck meets her shoulder catches my eye, and without thinking twice, I bite into her. Hard.

  She shrieks in pain before I feel her entire body tense up, and her knees clamp shut, effectively trapping my hand between her legs. Once she starts to shudder and shake, I realize she wasn’t screaming in pain. She was screaming from pleasure.

  Baby girl likes it rough.

  “Did you really just come?” I ask wryly.

  She throws an arm over to shield her face and rolls away from me.

  “Fuck you.”

  “Why, so you can come on my cock this time?”

  “You’re disgusting. Take me home.”

  “How long has it been, Bry? You must be going through quite the dry spell to get off so easily. Or is it just me that has that effect on you?”

  I’m just saying things to get under her skin at this point. Getting a rise out of her is my newest addiction. It’s better than cocaine. Briar sits up and jumps down from the tailgate, then stomps around to the front of the truck. She hops into the passenger seat and slams the door.

  I decide to let her stew in her post-orgasmic bliss-slash-guilt while I set the Jet Ski up onto the trailer. It takes a while, and by the time I get back, the sun has completely set.

  Briar sits in the front seat, chipping away at her white nail polish. She doesn’t glance my way when I open the door. Not even when I start the truck. And not even when we pull up to her house.

  “You wanna tell me why I’m the one with blue balls and you’re giving the silent treatment?” It was a joke, but apparently the wrong thing to say, because when she looks up at me, her eyes are shining with unshed tears.

  “Why do you do this to me?”

  “What exactly am I doing to you? Besides making you come on my hand?”

  “You know exactly what you’re doing. You’ve been stringing me along since I was fourteen fucking years old.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I seethe. Does she think I do this on purpose? That I like feeling this way? I want to hate her. I do hate her. But I also just want her. This is her fault. If it weren’t for her, none of the past three years would’ve happened.

  “No, Asher, I think I do. You don’t want me until someone else does. But we’re just friends, right? At least, we were. Now, we’re not even that.”

  “Because you’re so innocent,” I snap back. “Little Briar fucking Vale. Such a saint. Such a victim. That’s what you want people to think, isn’t it? But they don’t know you like I do. I see you.”

  Briar huffs, avoiding eye contact while clumsily slapping around for the handle.

  “I was trying to protect you,” I say grudgingly. “Jackson isn’t a good guy.”

  “You’re miserable. And you won’t be happy until everyone is just as miserable as you. I’m done.”

  “Why don’t you ask him about his list then?” I toss back, ignoring the fact there is some truth to her words.

  She gives me an appraising look, probably trying to gauge whether or not I’m telling the truth before she storms out of the truck and slams the door. Her pale hair whipping around in the dark behind her is the last thing I see before I drive off. I can’t be here right now, so I go to the one place I’ve been avoiding since I got into town.

  Home.

  I stand in front of the house I grew up in with its flaking, once-white paint, and front yard full of dirt for the second time since coming back. The first time, I took exactly one step inside before bailing.

  The olive-green Oldsmobile sits in the cracked driveway, and nothing seems to have changed since I’ve been gone, except the boarded-up front window. The mailbox is knocked over, almost completely horizontal. I kick it when I walk past, inadvertently causing it to stand almost straight.

  Don’t say I never did anything for you, you piece of shit.

  Once I’m at the front door, I smell the old familiar scent of mothballs that my dad insists keeps stray c
ats away. I raise a fist to knock before deciding to let myself in. Inside, it’s dark, hot, and smells of stale cigarettes. Years of smoking in the house have resulted in nicotine-stained walls, but I can still see faint white patches where pictures used to hang.

  And then I see him. John Kelley, in all his glory. Passed out in his black, cracked leather recliner, in front of an old television with a rabbit-ear antenna. A cigarette dangles from his fingertips with ash a mile long, and below it sits a collection of beer bottles.

  “You got somethin’ to say, boy, or are you just gonna stand there and keep killing me in your mind?”

  Okay, so maybe he isn’t asleep.

  Wordlessly, I scan his face, noticing his yellow complexion and clammy skin. I didn’t know how I’d feel standing in this house, facing this man who couldn’t seem to put his bullshit aside for one goddamn minute to be a decent father. Even a decent human would’ve sufficed. But, the bitterness, resentment, and flat-out disgust are all still there.

  “Well, no need,” he says with a cough. “My liver will kill me before you get the balls.”

  “Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?” I ask, the picture of apathy as I casually sit on the filthy couch. It’s the same one that was old, even when I was a baby, with its plaid design made up of different shades of tans and browns and wooden arms.

  “No,” he says thoughtfully. “No, I guess you wouldn’t have any reason to, would you?”

  “If you think that we’re going to be buddy-buddy just because you’re dying, think again.”

  “Then, why are you here?” he rasps, taking a drag of his cigarette.

  I look him dead in the eyes. “To bury you.”

  He nods once, before looking back at the TV. “Fair enough.”

  Minutes pass, him not knowing what to say, and me not wanting to say anything at all. Finally, he breaks the silence.

  “I never meant for you to meet David.”

  “Shut the fuck up.”

  Even hearing that name has my blood boiling, but he keeps speaking.

  “I didn’t want him to know you so much as existed. And, hell, for the first few years, he didn’t.”