Earning Her Trust: Braxton Arcade Book One

by Adore Ian

  I move away to sit on the edge of the bed. I inhale deeply, slowly through my nose and exhale slowly through my mouth. I recognize the bad thoughts. Recognize that it’s the anxiety talking and nothing more. I work through them one at a time, placing each in an imaginary box then closing the top. Then I rethink each in a positive, rational way, just as my therapists have taught me.

  I am not going to ruin everything. My brain is just latching onto insecurities from a long time ago.

  I am not a child anymore.

  I’m a grown-ass man.

  There is nothing wrong with me, and I won’t let the past ruin this moment. I can do this. I’m fine. I deserve to be happy. I deserve to be loved.

  Still, anxiety crawls up my spine like ants over a dead bird.

  Marrin touches my shoulder. I flinch—

  Stop, Damian. Calm down.

  I grab her hand. “Give me a second.” I can’t look at her. Not right now.

  “What can I do?” There’s no judgment in her voice, no hint that she’s freaked out or that she sees me as weak or pathetic. All I hear is profound understanding.

  I squeeze her hand.

  I think about the prescription I keep in the nightstand. About the bottle of whiskey sitting in my kitchen. I don’t need the medication, that’s for emergencies and this is not an emergency. I don’t need the booze because I am not my mother. This will pass, it always does. My therapists have all told me this could happen, that sometimes old trauma can resurface. It’s normal. It happens to people like me. People who’ve survived.

  I take another deep inhale. “Nothing. Just sit with me.”

  She does.

  The anxiety starts to ebb a moment later.

  Another few minutes pass, and I feel normal. A little shaky, a little sweaty, but mercifully normal. I wipe a clammy hand down my face and lay back, pulling Mar down so that her head is on my shoulder.

  “Sorry.” I hold her close, twirling a strand of her hair.

  “What was that?”

  “Something that hasn’t happened in a long time,” I admit. I don’t know what it is about the dark, but I feel hidden—like I can say things I can’t when the lights are on. “Remember when I told you that when I was younger, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be intimate with other people?”

  “Yes.”

  “That right there, what you just saw, is part of it.”

  She’s silent for a moment. Then, as if she knows exactly what I need to kill the embarrassment sloshing around my gut, she shifts and kisses the spot over my heart. Another kiss to my collarbone. She kisses up my neck to my jaw and then to my mouth.

  She crawls over me, straddling my waist and I’m suddenly aware that I’m completely naked and that the only thing she’s wearing is a dress. Her wet center presses against my stomach. She cradles my face in her hands.

  “Let me take care of you, Sir.”

  My cock stiffens and I run my hands up and down the tops of her thighs. She’s not submitting to put our kink back between us, she’s submitting to hand me back my power, my confidence.

  “Okay.”

  Her dress pours over my stomach as she slides back. Her hand finds my erection and she sits up—lowering herself down on me. Her body widens to accommodate my girth, and I lift the hem of her dress a little so I can watch.

  She winces and pulls up before sinking down again to swallow a bit more of me.

  “I’ve got lube, baby. Let me get it.”

  She shakes her head. She bobs up and down on me a few more times before I’m fully inside her. She slips her dress off her shoulders and arms. It pools black around her waist.

  She holds my hands to her breasts. She’s fucking beautiful. Blindingly so.

  Rolling her hips, she moves on me, worships me. Her kiss is gentle and filled with unspoken understanding. She cradles me with her body, makes love to me. She means to erase the past if only for the moment. Means to show me that she still desires me, that what she saw doesn’t scare her, nor does it make her see me any differently.

  I must be a Neanderthal because it’s exactly what I need.

  I lose myself in her, rolling us over and pinning her beneath me, her wrists trapped above her head in my hands.

  When we come, we come together. And when it’s over I bring her a glass of water and we clean ourselves up. Then she kisses me until I nearly fall asleep. She leaves with my spare key, locking the door behind her and promising she’ll return it in the morning.

  I don’t tell her I won’t ask for it back.

  Because I don’t tell her I had the key made for her.

  Part II

  The Miniboss

  In gaming, a miniboss is a computer-controlled enemy that a player must fight, usually in the middle of a level, in order to advance. They are weaker than end-level bosses but more formidable than any of the opponents to player has encountered up until that point.

  12

  Marrin

  Thanksgiving day at the arcade isn’t as dead as I’d thought it’d be.

  I’m working from noon to close with Elle and Conor. Conor’s hanging out by the bar because it’s early afternoon and we allow kids during the day. There are several families that have come in to play.

  Elle and I are dusting the display case behind the bar when the phone rings. My stomach lurches. I jump off the ladder to grab it, but Elle gets there first.

  “Braxton Arcade. How can I help—” Her brow furrows. She hangs up. “Weird. We just got a collect call from a state prison.”

  “Must’ve been a wrong number,” Conor says, pulling Elle’s attention away from me.

  I run my hand over my lower stomach, swallowing back the bile in my throat. It wasn’t a wrong number. It was my mother. She called last Thanksgiving. I didn’t accept the call.

  A kid in a Goonies T-shirt asks Elle for help with one of the games and she leaves the bar. Conor catches my eye. “You okay?”

  “Yeah. I’m going to get some air.” I grab my jacket and head out into the alley. It’s freezing, but I stand there for a few seconds, letting the cold seep into my bones.

  Two years ago on Thanksgiving, Alice went out of town to visit Gavin’s family. She’d invited me to come along, but I didn’t want to spend the holiday feeling like an outsider. My mom had also invited me to dinner at her house in the city. I hadn’t lived with my mom in years. She’d struggled with alcohol and addiction and eventually lost custody when Alice had enough money to take her to court.

  It’s a long story, but when I was younger, I used to dance at this studio in the city. Alice paid for my classes because my mom couldn’t afford it. I loved dancing and spent as much time at the studio as I could. My ballet instructor at the time, Ms. Marie, knew enough about my home life to know I was unhappy. She kept an eye on me for Alice.

  When I was sixteen, my mom’s new boyfriend insisted I was too old to not have a boyfriend of my own. The whole idea was fucked up for a lot of reasons but made worse by the fact that my mother agreed with him.

  She always picked her boyfriends over me.

  Next thing I knew, a middle-aged man, a friend of my mom’s boyfriend, came to pick me up from dance class. Ms. Marie took one look at the guy and flat out refused to let me leave with him. He blew up, but she didn’t care. She called Alice, and Alice called the cops and Child Protective Services. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Alice so mad. She was twenty-three at the time and that was the day she decided to fight for full custody of me. My mom eventually went to rehab and we didn’t hear anything from her for a few years.

  Then, fall of my freshman year of college, she started calling. She told me everything I wanted to hear. Said she was sorry for what happened, for being a bad mother, sorry for putting her boyfriends before me. She asked Alice and me to come over for Thanksgiving. Alice couldn’t go, but I said yes.

  I spent the night at her house, met her new boyfriend, a creep named Frank whose biggest accomplishment in life was his stupid red truck. I spent Thank
sgiving Day alone in my old house, waiting for my mom and Frank to get off work. I’d started making some food, but got all sweaty in the tiny kitchen, so I’d decided to shower. I’d brought a robe and a change of clothes into the bathroom with me because I wasn’t about to walk around a house I didn’t live in half naked. When I got out of the shower, I dressed and left the bathroom.

  I was halfway to my old room when Frank grabbed me. He was home early and thought me wearing pajama shorts was my way of coming onto him. That’s about when the screaming and fighting started, and it only got worse when my mother walked in the door.

  November air fills my lungs and I rub at phantom pains in my lower abdomen. I hate Thanksgiving. I pull out my phone and text Damian.

  Marrin: Have you left yet?

  Damian: Getting in my car now. Pray for me.

  Marrin: LOL. Text me when you’re back?

  Damian: Of course.

  I turn to go inside and glimpse a red truck driving past the far end of the alley. I stop.

  Frank went to jail for attacking me two years ago and my mom went to prison. But when Frank got out, and my mom was sentenced, he started following me around in his red truck. Bastard is the reason I’ve moved three times in two years.

  I swallow my paranoia and go inside.

  By six o’clock, the Arcade is dead. I play and watch Sorry, Wrong Number on the projector (it might be Thanksgiving but it’s still Film Noir Thursday), while Elle and Conor have an intense Tetris battle. They’re hunched over the controls staring at the screen. The most noise either makes is the occasional angry curse.

  The movie ends around nine and I make the decision to close early.

  I lock the front door and start closing out the register. Elle and Conor finish their battle and help with the rest of the closing procedures.

  The phone rings. This time I get to it first.

  “Braxton Arcade. How can I help you?” There’s a muffled noise, but no answer. I hang up.

  “Who was it?” Elle asks.

  “Our mystery butt dialer I think.”

  We finish what we need to do then grab our jackets and head to the back door. I punch the alarm and grab the garbage before we exit. We say goodbye and I head to the dumpster to toss the bag. Walking to my car, I press my hands to my pockets, finding my keys and…

  “Shit.” I forgot my phone. I swivel around and head to the front door because the back door is an emergency exit and locks from the inside.

  Conor pulls up beside me and rolls down his window, Elle’s in his passenger seat. He must be driving her home. “What’s up?” he says.

  “Forgot my phone. You can go. I’ll be fine.”

  Conor hesitates but eventually drives off. I unlock the front door and disarm the alarm. I flip on the bar lights and find my cell next to the register. I grab it and jump when the shrill ring of the arcade’s phone barges through the silence.

  Something uneasy settles in my stomach. I blame it on having watched Sorry, Wrong Number. That film will make anyone wary of phones.

  I head to the back door. In the corner of my eye, a flash of red passes the Braxton. My head snaps to the front of the arcade. It’s almost entirely ceiling to floor windows. I see nothing.

  Get it together. You’re freaking yourself out.

  I flip off the lights and head to the back door. I punch in the code then head out.

  I’m three steps from the building when an old red truck pulls into the alley.

  My heart starts racing.

  The high beams kick on, sharp and blinding. The engine revs. Exhaust clouds the air. Stinks like diesel fuel.

  Fear clamps down on me like the jaws of a great white. Adrenaline commands my feet to move. My car is too far away.

  I scramble backward, flinging my arms out to grab the door handle. It’s inches from latching closed. I haul it open. Rush inside.

  But it’s an emergency exit door—it’s made to open easily and close slowly.

  It also doesn’t have a handle on the inside, only one of those locking push bars. I grab it and yank it toward me.

  A truck door creaks open. Slams shut.

  I throw my weight back, foot braced on the wall. Sweat makes the push bar hard to grip, it slips through my fingers.

  Footsteps sound.

  The door is inches from latching closed.

  A dark, unmistakably male figure is backlit by the truck’s high beams.

  A scream rises in my throat—

  The door clicks shut and I crash backward into the wall.

  The door rattles and shakes as someone pulls from the other side.

  I cower on the floor. Tears blur my vision. Panic clogs my throat. Each breath too shallow. Too short. I put my head between my knees feeling my blood pressure drop.

  Frank pounds on the door. I know it’s him. I know it. He’s come after me—again.

  Oh God, oh God, oh God.

  Silence permeates the air. Everything stills. I wait.

  My heart is a bass drum in my chest. Each beat reverberates through my body. Pounds in my ears. I hug my knees to my chest as the room shifts between the Arcade and the living room of my old house. It smells like alcohol and my mother’s perfume. My stomach churns, bowels liquefy.

  You’re not there. It’s in your mind.

  The pain in my stomach is excruciating, I’m going to vomit.

  Don’t do this. Don’t let this in.

  My hands are numb, cold. Fingers tingle, pricked by a thousand invisible needles. All my

  war

  mth

  lea

  ks onto the floor in a dark red puddle…

  Shrill beeping pulls me to the surface. I’m in the Braxton Arcade. The alarm is about to set. I find my feet and edge toward the security system, arming it to stay.

  I’m not sure if I should call the cops. I could call Alice, but she’s hours away having dinner with Gavin’s family—

  Phantom pain stabs my abdomen. I need to calm down. Catch my breath. Stop crying.

  With a hand on the wall to steady myself, I walk back into the main room. I grab a bottle of water and slide to the floor behind the bar. I call Alice. It goes straight to voicemail. I call twice more and get the same result. I think I leave a message, I’m not sure.

  I text her. I text her again. No response. I text Gavin. No response. Everyone I trust enough to call is either out of town or isn’t someone I can have pick me up because if Frank is waiting outside, what the fuck are Priya and I going to do?

  Frank is too big and too strong. He’s like the boss in a video game, and I don’t have the skills to face him. Hell, I don’t have the courage to face him. Every time he comes around I run. It’s what I’m good at. Oh God, I should just call the cops—but what if I’m overreacting and it’s not Frank?

  Why the fuck is my phone dying?

  My chest rises and falls sharply. Tears spill down my face. I call Alice a few more times and leave a message. I have no idea what I say.

  The Braxton’s phone rings again and a new wave of fear rises in my chest. Maybe Frank is the mystery butt dialer?

  Stop it. Stop it right now.

  Thinking like that isn’t going to help me. I need a plan.

  I could call Conor. I should. But I don’t want Conor. I want Damian.

  I wish Damian were here.

  I don’t give my brain a second to talk me out of it.

  Marrin: I need help. I’m scared.

  Damian: Where are you?

  Marrin: The Braxton.

  Damian: On my way.

  A strange calm settles over me. I don’t let myself think about how needy and pathetic I must be. And I don’t give myself a second to think about what a gargantuanly bad idea it is to bring Damian into this. I hug my knees to my chest and wait.

  Damian is coming for me.

  He’ll be here soon and everything will be all right.

  13

  Damian

  The drive to the lake house takes about two hours. Someh
ow, I manage to squeeze an extra thirty minutes out of it. I pull into the driveway and sit in my Jeep. I recognize my brother’s BMW but I’ve never seen the black Rolls-Royce parked next to it. Unless my mom got a new car, it must belong to her new boyfriend.

  Or is it manfriend?

  At what point does a guy become too old to be called a boyfriend?

  I’ll have to save the deep thoughts for the drive home. Begrudgingly, I get out of my Jeep and walk up the ridiculous staircase to the front door. It swings open and Declan appears. A rocks glass in hand.

  Great, it’s going to be one of those Thanksgivings.

  “Thank fuck,” he declares, pulling me into the foyer and slamming the door.

  The mansion is just like all my parents’ houses. Expensive, shiny, and cold. It reminds me of a museum or a house you see in an architecture magazine. It’s made to be looked at and admired, not lived in. It’s a place that contains things used to make the act of living look prettier, but nothing about it can actually sustain life.

  It’s a façade.

  “How much have you had to drink?” I ask.

  “No more than what dad would’ve let me have.”

  I suppress a groan. Declan’s barely eighteen. My parents are the kind of people who think it’s fine to drink with their kids on special occasions.

  Before I can say anything, heels peck across the floor, growing louder with each quick step. My mother comes into view. She’s wearing a severe dress, the color of which compliments her flawless light brown skin, and her dark hair is pulled into a bun as tight as her smile. She’s the definition of polish and poise. She could give Victoria Beckham a run for her money.

  She stops at the opposite end of the foyer. “Damian.”

  “Nadia.” I’ve been calling her by her first name for years.

  Her face tightens imperceptibly. A blond man wearing a spray tan and a designer suit steps into view. “I’d like to introduce Richard.”