by Holly Hood
I rolled my eyes. “I’m sure.”
Another girl worked her way over. “Hey there.” She took a seat in Slade’s lap as if it was made for her and not me. “I’ve never seen you here before.” Her hand slid down his thigh, and he watched her every move bringing his hand to her waist. He looked up at her. “I’m not interested.”
She spun around straddling him, grinding parts of her into him that I preferred she didn’t. Slade secured both hands around her waist and hoisted her off of him. “Not my style. Sorry.” He tucked a bill in her g-string and leaned back in his chair. Everything he did was so damn casual.
She rounded the table and took a seat on Kenny’s lap. “I’m glad you came back. We have missed all your insults and lame tips.”
Kenny nodded balling up a dollar and shoved it down the front of her g string. “You fucking love it.”
I cleared my throat. “I need to pee.”
Kenny shrugged. “Then pee. I have to ask Candy a few questions anyways.”
Slade stood up. “And so do I.”
I followed behind him down a dark hallway. “Do you really have to pee?”
He shook his head shoving open the bathroom door. He found the light and looked around. “No. I just want a reason to get you alone.”
He pressed me against the wall using his free hand to lock the bathroom door. He pressed his lip against mine. “I’m glad things worked out.” Another kiss increased my heartbeat. And I jumped up and wrap my legs against him. He planted me on top of the sink sending my ass into the damp water, we both laughed. I let him take my pants off. I didn’t care if they were wet, I was wet.
I undid his jeans and kissed down his neck, sliding my hands down the back of them to get him all the way out. He pressed himself against me.
“Close your eyes,” he said guiding my hands around his neck. I closed them gasping when he tore my underwear off.
I groaned at the feel of him. He filled me, slamming against me without a second thought. We tore at each other like two crazed animals that couldn’t get enough of each other. My head banged against the glass as I bit down on one of the tattoos on his bicep letting him pound me into a satisfying orgasm. We both needed the release.
Slade’s teeth grazed my neck. I caught his bottom lip, licking his lip ring before I enjoyed his tongue. One more kiss was all it took, he tugged me by the hair coming to a stop.
“That was good,” I said with a smile, some of the stress melted away.
We dressed, clean up the best we could in a dirty bathroom and went back out to the table. Kenny was still entertaining strippers and I wasn’t surprised. I was sure it was a usual day in his life.
As I took a seat I was overcome with a huge amount of guilt. It ate at me. But I didn’t say anything because I knew Slade would only tell me what we did was for the best.
“We’re all set,” Kenny informed us. He stood up and finished off his drink before he looked at us. “Do me a favour, go check on your dad while Slade and I take care of my daddy issues.”
I dropped my jaw. There was no way he was telling me to hit the road to make my boyfriend perform some ridiculously stupid spell. I shook my head. “If he goes I go.”
Kenny shook his head. Shit. “No. You are going out to the parking lot to check on your dad.” He pointed toward the door. “We are going to get the bouncer.”
Slade’s hand slipped through the front of my hair. He forced me to look at him. “Everything is going to be okay. I can do this. Just one more step and we can go back home.”
I kissed his lips, running my fingers against the side of his face. He took my hands in his and looked at me one last time. I didn’t look back. I just headed for the door. If I looked at him I wouldn’t leave. We were so close to getting what we wanted. I didn’t want to see it ruined now.
Answers
I don’t have any answers for my dad. And he’s looking at me waiting for one. I had to remind myself if it weren’t for me he wouldn’t be alive. He didn’t have a right to yell at me. He couldn’t get mad, because if we didn’t do what we were supposed to do he wouldn’t be living anymore.
I nervously ran a hand through my hair and leaned forward. I had to say something sooner or later. “How do you feel?”
“I really don’t know how to answer that right now,” he said. “What does someone say after they find out their daughter carted their dead body around for almost a week so she could bring him back to life?”
That was it. I burst into tears. “I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t let you die because of of this mess. A mess I made.” It was true.
He shook his head. “That’s not true.”
“How is it not, Dad?” I asked. I’d did nothing but fail them. But still I didn’t feel bad about loving Slade. I probably should have but I didn’t.
“Nobody is to blame.” He wouldn’t look at me. I knew he blamed himself and he didn’t want to say so. “This has nothing to do with me or you. This is beyond our control.”
He wasn’t kidding. We were in the mess because of Kenny. Not to mention Hutch. If I ever saw him again I was going to punch him in the face for everything he did.
I leand back and brought my legs up wrapping my arms around them and sighed. I hadn’t slept in a really long time.
“So what happens next?” Dad said.
I looked up. I still had that same sense of relief when I looked at him. “Dad. If you knew the wrong thing was about to happen, what would you do?”
He scratched his head. “I would fix it the best that I could, if I could.”
I dropped my feet to the floor and opened the door. “You’re right.” Before I shut the door I looked at him. “I’ll be right back.”
I didn’t know what I was doing, I was making it up as I went. I got past the bouncer and inside the strip club. My knees were shaking. I didn’t see Slade or Kenny, just a lot of flesh and money stuffed into G-strings.
And then someone hit me. I hit the ground before I knew what was going on. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been face down on the floor but it took every muscle in my body to pull myself back up.
I threw the table off of me and stood up. There were people crouching in corners. Tables overturned and broken glass underneath my feet. I pulled something from my hair. I still didn’t know what was happening. Or why my ears were humming.
The music slipped back into the moment like someone hit play. And people scrambled for the exit. And as soon as I saw the giant beast bounding toward me like some rabid bull I knew why. I threw myself against the wall before he plowed me over. He went out the front door.
Slade grabbed my arm before I could go after him to see where he was headed next.
“What are you doing in here?” Slade moved my hair from my shoulders looking me over, every inch of me. He did a really great job of making sure I was okay. It was cute.
“I was going to stop you.” I admitted, touching his face. “I know, it’s for the best. But it feels so wrong.”
He shook his head. He was tough, he’d been through a lot but the one thing I knew every time I looked into his eyes, Slade wasn’t as dark as he pretended to be. He cared and had feelings like I did. And he didn’t have to tell me it bothered him for me to know it did.
“Let’s get out of here,” Slade said. He took my hand and we wove through the overturned chairs to get to the door. Kenny was out in the parking. I hated to think we had to put up with him all the way to Cherry. But I kept the comments to myself and climbed in the back seat.
“My guys barely got him in the trunk,” Kenny said.
Slade didn’t respond he just stood there next to the driver side door and waiting. For what I wasn’t sure.
“I’m a man of my word.” Kenny handed over the keys. “You did your part. Get the hell out of here.”
Dad and I looked at each other. Relief started to slip through my veins. Glorious joy turned my inside into butterflies and formed a smile on my lips. We were leaving.
I cli
mbed over the seat and took the passenger spot. “That’s it we can go?”
Slade grinned, looking into the car at me. “I guess so.”
Kenny leaned down, his grin on display as he looked at me. “I’ll take things from here.”
“Promise this is the last we will see you?” I said.
“Of course, I got bigger things to destroy now,” he said. It was a bit morbid.
“Promise now that we did what you wanted you leave us out of this?” I asked. I really want to know it was the end of Kenny and anyone else in his family.
Slade interrupted him before he could answer and climbed into the driver’s side. “Let’s go home.”
I wasn’t about to argue because going home was the one thing I’d been looking forward to for almost a week now.
The welcome mats suck
The ride home was long and silent. We all were quiet for various reasons I was sure. Dad slept the majority of the ride home. Missing out on the rest stops and the poor gas station coffee Slade inhaled every chance he got to stay awake.
I didn’t ask him why he didn’t cast some spell to keep himself awake. To me it would have been a lot easier and less toxic on his insides.
With Jersey behind us and California in our sights I was mixed with a bit of fear and happiness to be back. I wanted to smell the salty aquatic smell that slipped past my nose when I was on the boardwalk.
And the seagulls, they were from another world. No matter what time of day, they were always in distress even when they were gracefully gliding through the air.
I looked over at Slade. “You look sexy when you drive.” I grabbed his hand holding on to it for dear life. We had been through the ringer and to feel him and see him sitting next to me was a relief.
I took in the clouds, the different shades of grey hardly gave me what I wanted which was the sunshine on my skin when my feet hit the ground. But I settled for the dreary homecoming because my mind was just as clouded and dark.
I was down because I knew what was about to happen. Nona would want answers the minute she saw us. And I couldn’t imagine what Elliot and Easton would say the second they were able to unleash their teenage mood on us. Part of me didn’t blame them if they were mad because a week was a long time to be away.
They weren’t babies anymore but they still needed Dad around just like I did when I was heading into sweet sixteen territory.
When Dad opened his eyes and sat up in the backseat I was filled with questions I knew only he could answer. So I asked.
“What are we going to tell them?” Maybe getting the boys to let things go would be easy but we both knew Nona was a totally different story and she would never settle for a simple answer.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Dad said. “And I think the best thing to do is be as vague as possible.”
Slade and I looked at each other. Slade didn’t offer any suggestions he just turned back to the road and kept right on driving.
“I can’t see that working,” I told him. “Nona is going to want answers.”
Dad sighed. “I’m a grown man. I don’t have to give my mother answers. I don’t have to tell her anything if I don’t want to. But I will tell her something.”
I tossed every ridiculous idea around in my head, until it finally hit me. “You and I went to visit Griffin.”
Dad shook his head. “Your mother would be the first place she called if we went missing.” Dad took in the ocean as we neared our street. “We’ll tell her I was having a hard time and needed to get away.”
Slade came to a stop in front of our house. He turned the car off and undid his seatbelt. “I think your dad is right. She’ll believe that.”
I crossed my arms. I wasn’t so sure. “And where were we all this time?”
Slade tilted his head thinking about it. “I took you to meet my family. She’ll eat that shit up.” He slapped a hand down on my thigh and hopped out of the car.
I wished he would let me meet his family. So I could get a closer look at what created someone like him. While I was busy worrying about Nona he walked around like life hadn’t changed drastically, like we hadn’t went up against death and survived. But maybe it was normal for him—he had been there a few times before.
I shut the door to the car and headed up the steps following behind Slade and my dad. Dad checked the door before he looked at me for a key. I shrugged, because in all the chaos I hadn’t remembered to grab a single thing from our house.
“Nona has an extra set,” I told him hating the idea of going to her house. I wasn’t ready to explain anything.
Slade tapped on the door, and when nobody answered he hopped the railing and went to my bedroom window. He pressed both palms on the glass and sure enough it slid open.
Dad shook his head. “It doesn’t surprise me that window would be open.”
Images of the morning when Dad busted into my room came to mind and I hated to think about my dad knowing anything about what my sex life looked like. He had seen it all. Every inch of Slade’s sculpted body.
Slade opened the door driving away my embarrassment and post traumatic sex flashback.
“I don’t think anyone is here,” he said. “House seems like it’s been empty for a while.” He let me go in first. He was right, food dishes were still in the sink and the mail was in the same spot on the table from where I left it.
Dad sat down at the kitchen table and let out a small sigh of relief. Like me, I was sure he was glad to not have the boys or Nona jumping down his throat the moment he walked through the door.
I started setting up the coffee pot.
“We will have some coffee and then we will go down to Nona’s,” I told him.
That’s when Slade stood up. “While you’re doing that I will run home and tell everyone I’m back.”
I stuck out my lip pouting. “You mean you don’t want to be there when shit hits the fan?”
He rubbed the back of his neck, his muscle in his arm straining against the fabric of his t-shirt. It was hot and making me less angry at him for taking off. “It will be alright. Just keep it simple and she will forget anything even happened.”
I wasn’t so sure. “The entire town probably knows what happened. What do I say if she knows more than we think?” I started chewing on my lip something I hadn’t done in some time. But my nerves were starting to get the best of me.
“Keep it simple.” He moved in kissing me on the lips. “When you’re done I have something I want to show you.”
I squeezed his arm, trailing my fingers down his tattoos. “Are you keeping things from me, Slade Andrews?”
“Some things are worth the deception.” He bit down on his lip ring. “Now take care of Nona and make sure he gets some sleep. Call me in a little bit.”
I watched him walk away enjoying the view.
“Well, Dad.” I turned around. “Let’s get this over with.”
***
Nervous wasn’t a fitting word to describe how I felt standing at the door of Nona’s house. I wasn’t sure what I felt. I knew I wanted it to go away and for everything to be normal again. I didn’t think that was too much to ask for.
Dad looked at me. “Ready to do this?”
