The Theory of Deviance: Portland Rebels, Book 3

by Rebecca Grace Allen

  “What are you doing out here?”

  Krissy tossed the joint out the window, hiding the evidence of her indiscretion before Mikey could see it. “Getting my yoga out of the way and greeting the day,” she lied, turning around with a smile. “There’s no better time to do a sun salutation than at sunrise.”

  “Krissy!” He crossed the room and bundled the blanket more firmly around her. “You’re naked under there.”

  “So?” She quirked an eyebrow and nodded at the window. “Worried someone will see me?”

  She was purposely stoking the flames. Stimulating his voyeuristic tendencies.

  “No, I’m worried you’ll get sick. Your skin is like ice.”

  He led her to the futon, wrapped one arm around her, and tried to warm her with the other.

  “You make me feel like a kitten.” She nuzzled him and broke into giggles over her attempt to purr.

  Mikey pulled back, his brow creased. “Are you…okay?”

  Oh, man. Now he was looking at her like that too? She lolled her head back against the couch. “I’m fine.”

  “You’re sure?”

  A small, uneasy voice inside her whispered “maybe I’m not”, but Krissy ignored it, letting herself sink into the floaty, fuzzy feeling of being high instead. Maybe she was a little up, but she’d been taking her meds. If she’d ditched them entirely, that would be different. But nothing was happening, other than the vacation and the pot and the fact that all this awesome stuff was going on.

  “I’m sure. Just excited for tonight.”

  Mikey leaned in and kissed her, all stubble and warmth and morning breath, and she couldn’t have cared less. “Okay. I trust you.”

  He trusted her, had faith in her. Krissy melted, her limbs going slack as she cuddled closer.

  “I’m looking forward to tonight too,” he added. “Last New Year’s Eve totally blew.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Acted as designated while Dean, Connor, and Jamie got wasted. Connor hadn’t met Gabriella yet and almost got into a fight at the bar we went to. Dean disappeared with some girl because he still had his head up his ass about Jamie, and Jamie almost gave me a heart attack when she pretended she’d covered the inside of Dean’s truck with silly string.”

  It was a funny story, but it didn’t quite gel with the people she’d met. Krissy had spent a limited amount of time with Mikey’s friends back in the fall. She’d enjoyed their stories of being a ragtag bunch of teenagers but hadn’t seen any evidence of it.

  “They seem like they’ve got their stuff together now.”

  “It’s pretty recent. Most of our lives, they were the wild ones while I was tagging along, never quite fitting in.”

  Krissy reached up and stroked his hair. The locks fell across his forehead in haphazard waves. He might have thought he wasn’t a rebel, but look at what he’d done in the last few days. Sure, it was behind closed doors, but he wasn’t obeying any rules or accepting normal standards of behavior.

  “I think you’re pretty wild,” she said. “You were definitely wild last night.”

  He blushed, and Krissy’s own cheeks heated at the memory. The way he and Rafe came into the bathroom together was hot as hell. She’d loved the daisy chain they made: Rafe in her mouth, Mikey slamming into her from behind. He’d taken her with a ferocity she hadn’t expected from someone who’d been a virgin just a few days before, leaving her pleasantly sore afterward, but once it was over, she wanted more.

  She’d hoped Rafe would take her too.

  Being with Mikey had reminded her how much she’d missed that link. Yes, she loved being touched, but there was a different kind of connection when someone was inside her, an intimacy that couldn’t be established with hands alone, and she’d wanted to share that with Rafe as well.

  Maybe it couldn’t happen yesterday, but that might change, because there’d been a new element to everything last night. A fresh passion that suddenly sparked. She’d seen it in the way Rafe kissed Mikey. It was a more intense kiss than they’d had before. He’d kissed her with the same deep passion, like he was trying to tell her something. Like even though he hadn’t wanted to discuss it yesterday, he’d realized the three of them belonged together.

  It wasn’t the high, or her bipolar talking. She should’ve trusted her emotions from the start. She was in love with Mikey, and who was she kidding? She’d always loved Rafe. She knew Mikey didn’t want to be the person his parents were forcing him to be, and Rafe had only said he hadn’t want to talk about it, not that the three of them couldn’t work.

  Because they could. They totally could.

  Reality could be as good as the fantasy they’d shared. And it was going to be amazing.

  The floor creaked behind them, and Rafe came into the living room. Krissy arched back to greet him, but he was frowning at his phone. Whatever he was reading, it was apparently a long message, and the line that had formed between his eyebrows got her worrying it was his agent, breaking their contract.

  “Bad news?” she asked.

  A minute passed before he answered. It was actually a minute too. She counted. When he finally glanced up, she swore a shadow passed over his face, but he threw on one of his signature casual grins.

  “Nope. Just more of the same. You kids excited for tonight?”

  Whew. Krissy knew Rafe’s savings were on the cusp of drying up. He needed whatever show his agent could land him. A short stint would be better, though. A limited run, so they could move here after her graduation.

  She punched a fist in the air. “New Year’s Eve, here we come.”

  * * * * *

  They were out the door by nine that evening, Krissy in a short black dress with a flouncy waist and Converse sneakers, her hair pulled into a sleek ponytail. Rafe wore slacks and a crisp white shirt, and Mikey was in black jeans, a button-down, and a silver tie. Krissy’s head was buzzing with that am-I-really-here feeling she had when she was overtired, but the party would snap her out of it. She’d tried to nap a couple of times, finally giving up when the sun dipped below the horizon. She’d chosen to dance around the apartment and blast music instead. She needed to warm up her voice if she was going to sing tonight, and hoped her antics would get Mikey and Rafe out of the funk they both seemed to be in.

  Whatever. If she couldn’t party it out of them, she’d fuck it out of them later.

  The dive bar they were meeting Merrick at was packed to the brim. It barely fit a hundred, lousy acoustics making the room even louder from all the people talking and laughing. Multicolored lights turned the dance floor into an inferno of color. A disco ball hung from the ceiling, and a small stage in the corner was set up with a screen. Merrick ran over to greet them and grasped Krissy’s hand.

  “You’re singing again, baby,” he said.

  He cued up the karaoke machine to Prince’s “1999”. Krissy belted out the lyrics, the anxiety that used to plague her now a thing of the past. The evening passed in a flurry of music and dancing and a tiny bit of champagne. Mikey stayed sober since he was driving, but Rafe was back to his jovial self after a pre-midnight toast and a couple of shots. A little before twelve, he donned one of the plastic, gold, sparkly top hats the bartender had handed out and joined Merrick in a duet of George Michael’s “Faith”.

  Krissy and Mikey watched from the dance floor, his arms around her with her back to his chest, both of them cheering as Rafe and Merrick played at grinding on the stage. Not touching, just pretending, showing off for them. Krissy reached up behind her to slide a palm along Mikey’s cheek.

  These boys. These boys and her. God, she’d never been so happy. She was swinging on that trapeze again, jumping happily from one of them to the other. She went up on her tiptoes and tilted her head back until her lips met his ear.

  “I love our little secret,” she said.

  “What sec
ret?”

  “This. Us. You, me, and Rafe.” Krissy spun around until she was facing him. Her heart pounded, her hands shook. She didn’t need drugs. She was high on this fucking brilliant idea. “I have something to tell you.”

  His smile was better than fireworks. “What’s that?”

  “After I graduate, Rafe and I should move here.”

  She pivoted around, trying to dance with him, but he’d gone stiff. “Both of you?”

  “Wouldn’t it be awesome?” Her voice was only high and squeaky because of the noise in here. She had to be loud, so he could hear. “We’ll all live together. Think how incredible that’ll be.”

  He wasn’t dancing. Why wasn’t he dancing? She went on her tiptoes and threw her arms around him.

  “This doesn’t have to stop at the end of the week. Why should it? We’re having way too much fun. He and I could come here, the three of us could be a triad. No, a trifecta, because we’re that perfect. Like the three witches, the three fates. The holy trinity, or mind, body, and soul.”

  Mikey put his hands on her arms and gently disentangled her. Around them, the music had stopped and people were counting.

  “Krissy, people don’t actually do that.”

  “Sure they do. Haven’t you ever heard of a poly-fidelitous relationship? It’s totally a thing.”

  The counting was getting louder. And Mikey was no longer smiling. “Look, I know this has been fun but, the three of us together, here—” he swallowed, “—that’s not very realistic.”

  There it was again. That look in his eyes.

  I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy.

  “You said I wouldn’t be alone here!”

  “I said you, not…both of you.”

  “So what has this week been? I saw you with Rafe. You want him too.”

  He winced. “Maybe, but I can’t do…that.”

  “Can’t, or won’t?”

  It didn’t matter. She’d read him all wrong. Maybe she wasn’t being fair, but she’d thought he was different, thought he wouldn’t judge her, and she couldn’t concentrate anymore because everyone was cheering and confetti was flying everywhere. It was too loud, everything around her a chaotic mix of sound, colors, and light. There were too many people, too much noise. She spun around, searching for Rafe. He wasn’t by the microphones.

  “Where’s Rafe?”

  “Wait, Krissy—” Mikey tried to take her hand, but she wrenched away from him and marched through the crowd. Thinking maybe Rafe had gone out for some air, she pushed through the sea of people and went outside.

  His gold, plastic top hat sat on the concrete.

  Mikey was right behind her. “Krissy, hold on a—”

  “Leave me alone,” she snapped. Her fingers were going numb as she fumbled through her wristlet for her phone.

  You haven’t logged your mood yet. How are you feeling right now?

  “Shut up!” she yelled at the screen, swiping past it to the text message from Rafe, hoping it said where to find him.

  I’m with Merrick. Enjoy your time with Mikey. You two are perfect and should have the night alone together. Happy New Year, sweetheart.

  “No!”

  She dialed his number immediately, ready to scream at him to come back, to tell him this wasn’t what she wanted, but the call went straight to voicemail.

  Krissy sank to the curb. A sob ripped from her lungs. “He’s gone.”

  “What do you mean, gone?”

  “He left. With Merrick.”

  Krissy wrapped her arms around her body. Her chest was caving in. She couldn’t remember where she’d put her jacket, and her teeth were starting to chatter.

  Mikey cursed quietly, then put one hand on her bare arm. “Come on. Let’s go. It’s cold.”

  Standing slowly, she followed him robotically inside to get her coat, then back out to the truck. Sitting in the cab, she caught her reflection in the passenger side mirror. Blonde streaks, purple eyes, mascara all over her face. Who was this person?

  Whoever she was, she looked like hell. And Mikey was seeing it. And Rafe had ditched her with nothing more than a text.

  It was a shitty thing to do, but maybe she deserved it. She’d wanted too much, had stretched them all too thin. It was right that he was moving on without her. And as for Mikey, it looked like this had just been about fun for him. She’d been nothing but a gateway drug, a way for him to get a taste of a life he was too scared to actually have.

  He slid into the driver’s seat. “Is there anything I can do?”

  His words had an echo to them, like they were coming from a long way off. She’d been here before—this dark place she was sinking into was sickeningly familiar, but finding her way out of it was like scratching at the side of a smooth, damp wall. All she wanted to do was close her eyes. Even responding to Mikey was too much effort.

  When she didn’t answer, he drove them back to the apartment. She went straight to the bedroom and crawled under the covers, her clothes still on.

  “Will you at least take your shoes off?”

  “No.” It was the longest word she could manage. She was humiliated. Disgraced by what she’d done with him, by how much she’d opened up. How much of a fool she’d been.

  He sighed quietly. “You need to take your meds.”

  She didn’t move. The bed shifted beside her and she heard sounds—a pill container unscrewing. A water bottle top coming off.

  “Krissy,” he said, a little more forcefully. “Please sit up and take your pill.”

  She snapped upright, snatched the pill from his hand, and swallowed it dry before diving back under the covers. The silence stretched on until Mikey sighed again and stood.

  “I’ll let you rest. I’ll be in the living room if you need me.”

  She didn’t answer. She knew she was being horrible. She was too numb to care. The hole she’d fallen into was too deep for her to feel anything but pain. All she wanted was oblivion.

  He left the room, and Krissy stared into the darkness until the black emptiness of sleep found her.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Rafe, pick up your damn phone!”

  Mikey yelled the same message he’d left five times into Rafe’s voicemail, then ended the call and dropped his phone on the couch. He’d copied Rafe’s number from Krissy’s contacts and tried him a dozen times over the course of the night, nodding off in between calls and jumping up to check on her. She hadn’t moved, hadn’t spoken to him once. Now it was morning, and the silence he was getting from both of them was deafening.

  He needed to find Rafe, right the fuck now.

  Moving into the bedroom, he stood by the side of the bed and spoke quietly. “I need to run out for a bit. You’ll be safe here, and I’ll have my phone on me the whole time. Call me right away if you need anything, okay?”

  She didn’t answer.

  Not that he blamed her. He’d watch the light in her eyes go out when he shot her down last night. It had killed him to say so, but she had to know there was no way he could live here with them in some kind of poly triad. He figured she’d be upset but this…this was terrifying.

  He had no idea how far her sudden depression could go or how long it would last, and had spent some time during the night looking up hotline numbers and reading about bipolar lows. He hadn’t wanted to leave her alone, but she wouldn’t fucking talk to him, and getting Rafe back seemed like the best course of action.

  Bundling up, Mikey went downstairs and slammed the truck door shut. He’d never been so mad. How could Rafe go off and leave them like that? Did he care so little about Krissy?

  Did Rafe care so little about him?

  It was an unfair thought to have. He knew Rafe was hurt. The cavern that had opened between them yesterday was proof of that. But abandoning them without a word, going off with Merrick…it made
Mikey sick. And the thought of Rafe being touched by someone other than him or Krissy, he couldn’t stand it.

  Mikey gripped the steering wheel, unable to move. He closed his eyes and prayed for a way to fix this, but given the circumstances, was God really going to answer?

  His phone beeped with a text. Mikey snatched it from his pocket.

  You’re supposed to be with Krissy.

  Rafe. Mikey pressed the heel of his hand against his temple in relief, then shoved his hair out of his eyes.

  Where are you? he typed back. Then, nauseously, Are you still with Merrick?

  Like that was ever going to happen.

  What the—

  Don’t worry about me, the next text said. Be with Krissy. I’m fine.

  Bullshit. Where the hell are you?

  No reply.

  Mikey banged his head against the seat in frustration. Why was Rafe doing this? If he wasn’t with Merrick, then he was off alone somewhere, feeling like he wasn’t welcome. If Mikey were in Rafe’s place, where would he go?

  Where had he gone when he was running away from them?

  Mikey threw his phone on the seat and put the truck in drive.

  A few minutes later he pulled up in front of his church. Rafe was huddled on the steps with his head bowed. Mikey cut the engine and marched to Rafe’s side. He had half a mind to yank him up and drag him back to the apartment without saying a word, but the guy looked like a ghost, sitting by himself on those bleak cement stairs.

  “What are you doing?” Mikey asked.

  Rafe raised his head. His tear-streaked face didn’t match his wry smile. “Asking for forgiveness.”

  “For what?”

  Rafe’s shoulders shook on his chuckle. “For being selfish. What else?”

  Mikey sat next to him. The concrete was freezing. “How long have you been here?”

  “A while. I had Merrick drop me off.” He studied the ground in front of him. “We didn’t do anything, just so you know. I tried, but I couldn’t. He’s not who I want.”

  Something wrenched through Mikey—feelings of hope and confusion and worry that were too many layers of complicated for words. “Am I?”