Smother (10 page)

“Always.” She moved a hand behind her, felt him through his pants, and empowerment floated over her like hot lava when he groaned.

The stranger swung her around and grabbed her hands, lifting them above her head. “Look at me.”

Reese did, seeing eyes blackened by desire and an unshaven face contorted with it. His mouth swooped in and kissed her in such an expert way she found herself enjoying it, letting him take over to better experience the pleasurable sensation. His hand dipped down, touching her where she needed, and she instinctively flinched, even though his touch was almost too gentle.

He went still and his eyes found hers in the dark. “What is it?”

“Nothing. Keep touching me.” She shoved his hand down the front of her costume, simultaneously craving him and repelled by him. It was a constant war with her, one she had yet to win.

He did, but the desire had cooled, and she couldn’t stand that. He had to still want her. She was desperate for it. His mouth went back to hers, the lips supple, not hard enough. She needed it rough. None of this mushy shit that seemed more like a commitment to a relationship than a quick screw. She bit his lip and he reared back, cursing and touching the small drop of blood forming on his lower lip.

“What’s your deal?” he demanded.

Reese unzipped the suit all the way and tugged her arms from it, pushing it down to her knees. Her skin pebbled as she waited. There was a chance someone would meander this way and find them, but if anything, the idea of being caught helped rekindle the desire. She wordlessly watched him, seeing the passion return to his eyes as he looked over her naked body.

He lifted his gaze to hers as he studied her for one, charge-filled moment. “You’re messed up.”

She shrugged, knowing it was true.

Not wanting to further that conversation, Reese wound her finger around a belt loop of his pants and jerked him to her. She unfastened the button. Her hand went down, finding him hard, and closed around him. He twitched against her, hot and full. His head fell back, exposing a prominent Adam’s apple, and he sucked in a sharp breath.

“Condom,” she said through cold, numb lips.

He quickly fumbled in his back pocket, producing one, and rolled it on. He opened his mouth, and she slapped a hand over his lips, a warning in her eyes as they met his. She didn’t want words, she wanted action. He entered her smoothly, going still as a shudder swept through him. Reese moved against him, refusing any contemplative gestures. No savoring, no lengthy enjoyment. There should not be anything sweet or considerate about this.

Her body was warm for him, though every other part of her was brittle, dead. The sound of their bodies meeting, the friction, the scent of their skin, all of it combined and took her to another place, a dark memory—so many bad instances that merged into one black cloud over everything she remembered. Reese squeezed her eyelids shut, bit her lip, and tears trickled from her eyes to coat her cheeks. At some point her mask fell off, leaving her more exposed than she cared to be.

She didn’t know for how long he didn’t move, but when she finally became aware of it, she opened her eyes to find his on her.

Confusion marred his face. “Are you crying?” He sounded incredulous, disgusted even.

“No,” Reese whispered. “Just keep going.”

He started to pull out and she clenched her thighs hard, refusing to let him go. Not yet. He had to love her in this way, he had to hurt her as well.

“Let go of me!” He angrily shoved at her, hard enough to send her head smacking into the wall. He dragged his pants up over his swollen erection. “You’re fucking crazy, you know that? Find someone else to screw.” He stormed away and the streetlamp illuminated his tall frame as he left.

They always left.

Reese felt the cold once more as it seeped into her bare back and ass. With unhurried, trembling fingers, she put herself back together on the outside. She was aware how unnatural her reaction to sex was. She used it as a weapon and let herself be used. She hated it. Craved it. It was disgusting and she couldn’t stop it.

She sat on the pavement and the muffled sounds of music reached her, faint vibrations pulsating through the wall against her back. Her cell phone rang. She didn’t bother seeing who it was. It was probably Amber, wondering what happened to her. The ground was frozen and hard, and the trembling of her body turned to an all-out jerking motion the longer she sat there. She wrapped her arms around her knees and placed her head against them.

Where was the knight to rescue her from this, the one to save her from herself?
‘Can’t save you, can’t fix you. I can only tell you, you’re worth both.’
The tightness in her chest lifted into her throat and made it hurt to swallow. Fighting the tears never worked. They always came eventually. She let them win, retracting into herself as she cried. The guy was right—she was crazy. Reese didn’t want to be, but she was. Too crazy for anyone to love, too crazy for anyone to want. Too crazy.

Reese slowly walked home, arms around her midsection as though to keep the splintered pieces of herself intact. There were too many different parts of her—the hopeless girl that fought the hopeful one. There was the blackness inside that craved all she shouldn’t, and there was the bat shit crazy one—the piece of her that crouched inside her, tearing hair from her scalp, screaming incoherently, wanting to ruin everything she touched.

That part of her won most of the time.

Streetlights sporadically broke the black around her, her breaths coming out in puffs of winter air each time she exhaled. Reese was limping by the time she reached the apartments. Most of the windows were dark, the people inside them probably sleeping. They had their homes, their place in life, and their loved ones near them. What did she have? An empty apartment.

She turned to the left and her eyes reached upward until they found the light in Leo’s window. Her chest tightened, then expanded. What did he do up there all the time? As far as she knew, he hadn’t dated anyone in the time she’d been employed by him. That didn’t mean he wasn’t having sex—it just meant he didn’t habitually see anyone. The thought of his body wrapped around another woman’s sent spikes of pain through her and she shook her head at her futile wants.

The light flickered off, the sudden dark pouring out and over her. She turned away, knowing an encounter with him right now would not be good for her. Reese saw her imperfections much too clearly whenever she was near him.

Reese was to the door when she heard another open and close, her back stiffening. Her pulse reacted, picking up its tune. She wanted to see him, but she didn’t want to know what he had to say, short though it would be. Shame wanted to take a place inside her. She should not be seeing him like this, not with her brain in its current hell, not when she had just had another man inside her.

She turned. Ice was in his eyes, that non-expression in place. The white tee shirt tightened on his chest as he inhaled and exhaled, the cold apparently knowing enough not to bother with him. Black lounge pants and unlaced boots completed the outfit. His hair was tousled, either from sleep or running fingers through it.

It was unusual for her to be so interested, and so fixated on anyone, but especially this man. She didn’t understand his appeal, not for her, and yet, there was no sense denying what the beat of her heart shouted, fiercely and strongly.

Reese waited, sure whatever he was about to say was going to piss her off. Her shoulders hunched in preparation for it. The wind picked up, shooting clear into her core and freezing her from the inside out. He didn’t speak as his eyes slowly moved over her, from her face to her feet, and back again. He had to know she’d been crying. She wasn’t a pretty crier—her eyes turned red and puffy and her face swelled.

When she was unable to take the silent scrutiny any longer and ready to snarl something rude and vulgar at him to send him on his way, he spoke. “I wanted to make sure you got home okay.”

“Yeah, well—” Her words dropped off as he turned and strode away, back into his tattoo shop. The door closed firmly, a solid barricade against her. Leo and his damn walls, figuratively and otherwise. No lights turned on, no sounds were heard.

She snapped her teeth together. As Reese walked up the stairs to her apartment, her steps slowed. Leo was abrupt in some ways, honorable in others, but there was no pretty, delusional covering over him. Yes, he was quiet and secretive, but he was the way he was, and deep down, she respected that, even liked it. He didn’t pretend to be something he wasn’t.

Reese put a hand to her door and briefly lowered her head to rest against it. He’d waited up for her. Something unfolded inside her, something frail and easily shattered. Something she didn’t want to face. She dug the single key from the pocket of her costume that also housed her cell phone, and unlocked the door, kicking it shut behind her upon entering the apartment. She fought her way out of the formfitting cat suit and tossed it in the direction of the washing machine. The boots came off next, a sigh of relief leaving her at their absence.

Naked, she ran water for a bath. Reese glanced at her reflection and made a sound of disgust. Her face looked like a caricature of its normal features, bloated and out of proportion with red, squinty eyes. She shrugged, telling herself she could be the most beautiful woman ever born and it still wouldn’t mean anything to Leo. Reese sank into the bathwater. It was so hot it singed her skin and turned it red, but at least it would match her face. She closed her eyes and let her mind drift.

She sat on the toilet seat, chattering away. “I’ve been watching Mom braid your hair and I think I know how to do it. Want me to try?”

Morgan sat huddled in the bathtub with her blond head bowed. Her arms were crisscrossed around her chest, even though there was nothing to see. She slowly nodded, not looking up.

Reese talked faster. “And maybe we can go for walks now after school. It’s warming up. I bet Mom would let us go to the park over by the donut shop.” She inhaled quickly, the words coming forth like bullets from a gun. She had to keep talking, she had to fill the silence. She had to reach her sister.

“I have some money left from my birthday. I’ll get you a donut if I have enough. Would you like that?”

Morgan glanced up, a flicker of interest in her blue eyes. “Yes.” Her voice was quiet, meek. It wasn’t her voice, but it was. It was her new voice—the voice she’d used since their mom’s boyfriend moved in. Reese despised her new voice, but she couldn’t tell her that. Morgan barely talked as it was.

Her chest hurt and she swallowed around it, wanting to keep her sister as far from their mom’s boyfriend as she could, and not sure why. He smiled too much, especially at her, but she’d seen him smile at Morgan too. She didn’t want him to smile at them anymore. She’d told her mom and she’d laughed, telling her she was silly.

Water filled her nose and Reese propelled to a sitting position, sputtering as she rubbed water from her face. She must have dozed off, sinking into the water as she did so. Reese sat with her head bowed and arms wrapped around her chest, much like her five-year old sister had. She didn’t allow herself to brood, shooting to her feet so violently water crashed over the side of the tub and onto the floor to soak the bathmat.

She quickly dried off and dressed in a yellow tank top and gray lounge pants. She went to the bed and crawled into it. Lying on her back, Reese stared at a black ceiling. It was a Saturday night, not even eleven, and she was in bed. This spoke ill of her popularity. She’d never been particularly social, not in school, not in any context.

Sleep eluded her, nightmares slicing her up whether or not her eyes were closed. Reese grabbed her cell phone and threw on a fleece jacket. She put the phone in a pocket and zipped the jacket up before she unlocked and climbed through the window that brought her closest to Leo. She stared at the building, wondering what the man inside was doing and thinking.

Reese wanted to throw something so far, and so hard, that it shattered his window. She wanted to scream at him that she wasn’t okay, that she would never be okay. She wanted to be invisible to anyone but him. She wanted to jump from the roof and fly, even if only for a moment to catch that carefreeness and freedom she never knew, just before it was all painted in the badness once again. She didn’t care about the fall—she just wanted to fly.

Instead she lit a cigarette as she huddled, shivering, and watched the building across the street. Her cell phone buzzed in her pocket and she pulled it out. Her stomach swirled as she saw Leo’s number. “What?”

“Go to bed.”

“Stop telling me what to do.”

“Stop going out on the roof.”

“No.”

“Then no.”

She stared at the darkened apartment above the tattoo shop. “Are you watching me?”

“Go to bed.”

The phone call ended.

Reese shook her head, muttering obscenities. She even gave the building her middle finger, in case Leo was watching her, but then, when she turned to go inside, her lips twitched with the need to smile.

Leo Chavez made her smile. She never would have seen that one coming.