by Kylie Walker
He glanced around. “Hello?” It was a long shot, and he was met with more deafening emptiness. He sighed and shrugged as he sauntered over to his kitchen. It had been too much to hope for. He’d pissed her off, and now she was making him pay. Not that he didn’t deserve it.
Damn, why were women always too quick to think the worst? Yes, he’d screwed up, but when he’d said it was nothing, it was because he meant it. Communication was something he needed to work on apparently, or this thing between them would be a constant battle. He grabbed a beer from his fridge and began absentmindedly gulping down hefty swallows of the cold, refreshing liquid. Lucas propped himself up against the kitchen counter and stared blankly at the floor.
The fatigue was settling into his bones and creeping up to his mind. He wanted to relax and enjoy the night. The beer was helping him to slow down his pace and appreciate the moment, regardless of whether Abigail was there or not.
His imagination began to drift. He pictured her walking up behind him and snaking her arms around his waist. He wanted to feel the warmth of her feminine body heat pressed up again him. He wanted to cradle her slender form in his arms and inhale the delicate scent of her silky hair.
He sighed contentedly, aching from the inside out as he wished she were there. Lucas never could sleep after a show. It took him several hours to unwind. Fresh batches of adrenaline continued to pump through his veins. The roar of the crowd still hummed in his eardrums. He relived each show in his mind long after it was over; lying down only to hear a repeat of the tunes in his mind, see the crowd and the lights flashing in his mind’s eye.
Distraction was key until he was so exhausted, he literally passed out.
He wandered over to the couch and turned on the television. There was a rerun of a basketball game on. The Bulls and the Sixers were playing in overtime. Lucas plopped down on the couch and focused his attention on the game. He wasn’t a huge sports fan, but he found himself pulling for any Chicago team, especially when the game was down to the wire like this one was.
So, when he heard a female voice behind him purr, “Hey you,” he thought at first that he was just hearing things. It was probably on the television commercial he was only half paying attention to. He was absorbed into the game and wasn’t giving much thought to his surroundings. He’d already made peace with the fact that Abigail wasn’t there and that he was going to have to spend the night alone in the house.
When the female voice chimed out a second time, he spun around just to prove to his mind that he wasn’t going crazy and that no one else was nearby. There had been no signs of forced entry, and the apartment was in otherwise pristine condition exactly how he had left it. Nothing was out of place, as far as he could tell at least.
When he saw who was standing there in the pass-through to the bedrooms, his jaw dropped in utter shock. “Christy?”
“Hi, Lucas. Surprised to see me?”
There was a twisted grin on her face, and her eyes were hollow. She swayed back and forth and grabbed onto the side of the wall to prevent herself from teetering over.
He shot up like a rocket. “What the fuck are you doing in my house?” He exclaimed. “How the hell did you get in here?”
His eyes frantically darted around the room as if he half expected someone else to jump out of the shadows and pounce on him. He wouldn’t put it past Christy to bring back up. Chances are she’d be too high to figure out how to get in his house without help.
“I brought a friend,” Christy said with a slimy smile that made his stomach flip.
“Who?” He demanded in a hard voice, still scoping his two story-living room.
“Don’t worry,” Christy breathed out peacefully. “They’re gone now.” Her face soured, and her bottom lip jutted out. “I promised him access to your safe, but I couldn’t find it anywhere.”
An icy chill ran through his veins. She’d tried to rob him. Again. He didn’t keep anything here that couldn’t be turned into insurance or easily replaced. He’d learned his lesson.
“Nice try,” Lucas hissed. “I had to learn the hard way when you tried to rob me the last time. I don’t even keep valuables like that in my house anymore because of you. There’s nothing here you could steal to sell for more meth or whatever the hell you’re shooting up these days.”
Christy’s eyes widened, and her mouth hung open as if she was completely appalled that he would even assume that it was her who was doing the robbing, but she didn’t deny that she would spend the money on making herself as high as a fucking kite.
“Baby,” she strutted towards him with a smile. “I’m never the one that wants to rob you. It’s the other guys who need a little quick cash. You know how it is. I’m not like that, baby.” Lucas noticed how her superficial her smile was. Her teeth had begun to fade into a yellowish color. She wasn’t the enticing girl that she had once been, but perhaps he had also been too drugged up back then to notice. Maybe this was always the way she looked, but the high enhanced her features to appear more alluring than they actually were in reality.
He didn’t have blinders on anymore. His mind wasn’t cloudy. He was fully aware of how coked-out Christy was in his apartment, and he was less than thrilled with the prospect of her spending more than another five minutes in his home.
“Don’t call me baby,” Lucas said and took a step backward, away from her. His skin crawled with the hungry expression on her face. How had he ever found comfort and pleasure in her body? God, he needed a tetanus shot just to look at her.
Christy’s hair looked like it hadn’t been brushed in days. Her faded blue washed jeans had holes in the knees, and it wasn’t purposefully done as a fashion statement either. They were worn out and dingy. She moved towards him, swaying her arms by her sides. He swallowed hard and clenched his hands into fists to keep from manhandling her out of his apartment. He’d ask nicely. And then he’d do whatever he needed to, to get her gone.
“What happened to us?” Christy said in a shaky voice.
Lucas expelled a frustrated sigh. “I got clean. You didn’t. The end.”
He eyed her up and down as if it didn’t take much to take that hint or prove his point.
“I would be good for you,” Christy said and tried to make herself seem sensual, but Lucas wasn’t buying it. “I could make a good home for us. Just like before.”
He huffed. “We never had a good home. You destroy everything you touch. I want you out of my house, Christy.”
“I wouldn’t hurt you.” She jutted out her bottom lip and batted her eyes as she peered up at him.
“I’m asking you for the last time to leave on your own. Otherwise, it’s going to get ugly.” The dominance in his tone was loud to his own ears. His hands itched to manhandle her right out of here. The only thing stopping him was her reaction. She’d run to whoever would listen that the big, bad rock star had tussled her up. The press would come knocking so fast his head would spin. She’d threatened it in the past, but he’d been able to redirect her. There was no telling if he’d have that same influence again.
She reached a hand out as if she was going to run a finger down his chest. “Don’t you want to play first?” Christy asked. Her attempt at being sexy wasn’t giving Lucas any kind of physical reaction except repulsion.
“No,” he said and stared at her blankly.
“I can rub your back like old times,” Christy offered. “Give you a massage, just like you like.”
Lucas heard the desperation in her voice, and he was right pissed off. “You broke into my house. Do you not realize how serious that is? I could call the police right now and have you arrested for breaking and entering. You’re trespassing on private property. How the hell did you get past security and get up here?”
“I took one of your keys,” Christy admitted with a sheepish blush. “No one even noticed me.”
“What?” He shook his head, confused. The security guards were paid to monitor the building and question anyone who didn’t seem to belong
. Apparently, a strung-out hooker fit right the fuck in.
“The last time we saw each other. I swiped it off your counter.” Christy wouldn’t meet his gaze, but her smug smile said it all.
Lucas tried to remember back to when that could have been. “The last time I saw you, you came down to the bar downstairs where I was having a drink. It was nighttime, and you didn’t come upstairs with me. I brought you home. You were so strung out you don’t remember.”
“It was the time before that,” Christy said and cleared her throat. She vigorously scratched the back of her head and shifted her weight uncomfortably.
“Give it back,” Lucas hissed. “Or it’s just another thing to tell the cops. Do you really want me to go that far?”
He suddenly remembered how he had purposefully given Abigail a key. Would she take advantage of the offer? What if she walked in now and saw him with another woman in his house? He felt like he was already skating on thin ice with her over the Meghan incident.
He didn’t know how much Abigail would tolerate from him, but he figured she was probably the type to call first before coming over. He knew her to be respectful and courteous, unlike the monstrosity standing directly across from him.
“Fine.” Christy was pouting like a sullen child not getting her way.
She took the extra set of keys and threw them at him. He caught them in one swoop and clutched them protectively in his hands. There weren’t any other sets of keys for Christy to swipe. He had given the only other spare to Abigail.
“It’s time for you to go home now,” he muttered. Sudden fatigue ate at his bones. He was so over this shit. The vibe in the room had turned chilling and awkward. A niggling warning played in his mind that she wasn’t done fucking with him yet.
“I don’t know what happened to you Lucas.” Christy shook her head and narrowed her eyes darkly.
“What is that supposed to mean?” He scoffed, even though he didn’t want to open the can of worms with her.
She shrugged and wandered around the room. She touched his trinkets and made him squirm as she strutted around. “I don’t know. You just used to be such a hard ass. Now you are soft. For money.”
“I improved my quality of life, unlike you.”
Christy gave him a sideways stare. “We used to be good, you know.”
Lucas shook his head defiantly. “No, we used to be a train wreck. And we always will be.”
There wasn’t a single part of him that wanted to reopen that chapter of his life with Christy. He had moved on. He had Abigail now. She was beautiful inside out, and he only wanted her.
“I can change that baby,” Christy insisted.
She was close enough now that he could smell how dirty she was. She probably hadn’t bathed in a couple of days. It wouldn’t be unusual for her when she was high and passed out.
She reached out and clamped her hand over his belt and tried to fumble with it to loosen it up. That was the last straw. He yanked her by the arm and pulled her towards the front door. She could go out kicking and screaming for all he cared. She was the one who had broke into his house after all, not the other way around.
“Go quietly, or I’m calling the cops,” he said firmly.
He opened the door and gently nudged her into the hallway. He didn’t want to hurt her, but he had to be forceful or else she would never leave. Calling the cops and bringing attention to himself was the last thing he wanted.
He closed the door in her face as she gawked at him. He sighed and leaned up against the door. That was more stress than he cared to be involved in when he was at home and trying to relax.
He wandered over to his kitchen and pulled out another beer from the door. He twisted open the cap and chugged the entire bottle in only a few sips. He wasn’t really a stress drinker, but adding on the spat he’d had with Abigail and now Christy, it was doing him in. Lucas’ head was spinning. He didn’t know how to wrap his head around the fact that Christy just wouldn’t leave him alone. She was like an infection that was spreading. He was going to have his locks changed, again. Just in case.
Lucas tossed the empty beer can into his recycling container next to his trash can. He walked to his bedroom and closed the door. He needed a hot shower. Perhaps the steam would give him some perspective.
On some level, maybe he felt like he had to cleanse himself of that encounter with Christy. It was certainly as if she were stalking him and it rattled him to his core. He had to find some way to make her leave him alone once and for all, but for now, his mind was too tired to brainstorm anything worth hanging onto.
Lucas lingered in the shower until his back felt raw from the heat of the water pelting him from the rain shower type of nozzle overhead. He reached for his towel and dried off. He could barely make it over to his drawer to slip on a pair of boxer shorts before he collapsed face down on his pillow.
The next morning, he cracked one eye open and then the other. He saw the brightness of the morning sun spilling in from the windows. He had left the blinds open the night before.
He groaned and sat up in the bed, rubbing his bleary eyes. He stretched and yawned. He would need some coffee before he was able to really start moving along smoothly in his day. He reached for his phone off the bedside table and began absentmindedly scrolling through his news feeds to see what his friends and family were up to.
That’s when he heard a female voice sigh contentedly beside him. He spun around, not entirely sure what to expect. Had Abigail wandered in during the night and laid down beside him to keep him comfortable?
He would never get that lucky. His jaw dropped in horror when he realized that Christy was lying beside him in the bed. She was sprawled out like a starfish, and her arms and legs were outstretched across the king-sized mattress.
“What the fuck?” Lucas exclaimed and shot out like a firebolt out of bed.
Christy raised her head and craned her neck. She squinted at him with a dazed and groggy expression on her face. “Huh? Why are you screaming at me?”
“Why the fuck are you in my house, and more importantly, my bed?” Lucas shouted.
Then it suddenly dawned on him. He had forgotten to lock the door the night before after he had kicked her to the curb. She must have quietly crept back in. She was a conniving minx; he would give her that much.
“I just wanted to keep you comfortable. Your eyes looked lonely last night. I didn’t want you to get cold. You only slept in your boxers.” Christy’s eyes trailed down curiously to the bulge in his shorts.
Lucas instantly recoiled and jogged over to his closet to retrieve a pair of jeans from the rack. He practically jumped into them.
“You snuck back into my house?” Lucas asked. He was acutely perplexed.
Not only was he appalled, but he was utterly baffled about how casual Christy was acting about the whole thing. His gaze was drawn to something shiny on the nightstand by his bed. His heart leaped into his throat. Heroin needles were scattered across the surface. Lucas felt his blood boiling. Livid was an understatement. “You brought heroin into my house?” He growled.
“I needed a bump before bed,” Christy shrugged as if it was no big deal. “You know that.”
“Get out of my house,” he said and shoved the needles at her. “And take these with you too.”
He was careful to make sure that there were no needle marks in his own arms, but if she had shot him up while he was sleeping, he would be seriously feeling the after effects, and he would be hungover as hell. He hadn’t used in years. He tried to calmly remind himself that he would know it if she had drugged him. Besides, he wouldn’t have been able to sleep through that anyway.
Christy’s eyes glazed over. He knew that look anywhere. She was getting ready to pass out again.
“No...” he trailed off and shook his head. “No, Christy, wake the fuck up.” He slapped at her shoulders. She was naked except for a tiny white t-shirt that looked like it was supposed to be fit for a toddler and not a grown woman.
> Then, his heart stopped. He heard the sound of his bedroom door opening. He quickly glanced at his phone. He had a missed call and a text from Abigail. She was on her way over.
No.
She was already here.
Chapter Fourteen
AGAINST HER BETTER judgment, Abigail walked into Lucas house unannounced. She’d tried to reach him via text and by calling him, but he hadn’t responded to either one yet, and she really needed to talk to him. He’d given her the key for a reason, so she might as well use it.
After thinking about it all night, she concluded the kiss between Lucas and Meghan had been a true mistake. Meghan had apologized until she was hoarse. Abigail believed she’d meant no harm. It could have happened to anybody who’d drank as much as she had. It rubbed Abigail wrong that Lucas had hid the interaction from her, and she’d made it clear that he was never to do something like that again. Expectations were important, especially if they were going to be in a real relationship. And she wanted to. She wanted that with him. So, she was going to tell him that she was willing to give him another chance.
Abigail didn’t want to miss her window of opportunity. What if Lucas said to hell with her and moved on? It wouldn’t be difficult for him. He was handsome and rich. He could score any girl in the world that he wanted. He probably wouldn’t even remember her after next week. It wouldn’t take long for him to get over their fling. Well, it was easy to tell herself that even if she didn’t believe it deep down.
A nagging voice in her mind told her to go to his house and talk to him. She knew that he wouldn’t have offered her a key to his house if he wasn’t serious about exploring their relationship further, and that had to count for something.
She wanted to clear the air with him, and it felt urgent to do so. She had a compelling sensation that kept rising in her gut. She couldn’t wait any longer, so she had gotten dressed and taken the train over to his side of town.
