“No, she’s not.” Cedric gripped my hand and held it.
“Help me protect her, Cedric. Please. I won’t ask anything else of you.”
Cedric moved to the seat next to mine. “You know I will. But I can offer you peace from this. There’s a fast solution.”
And there it was. An offer to rid Amber and me of our burden. I had no doubt Cedric could get it done and was as capable of Daniello. The skip of my heart told me I could never be the one to make that call, even though it would simplify everything.
Cedric read my hesitance. “You still love him.”
“No, no I don’t.” I pulled my hand away. “He almost killed me. I can’t love that monster.”
“It’s not the monster you love. It’s the memory.”
I thumbed the glass pipe and rolled it as the red flame produced sweet smoke. I inhaled deep and felt a quick release from the throb in my veins.
Release. Escape.
My phone lit up, and I turned it over before taking another hit. My skin began to crawl with adrenaline as the high built. My high was my home.
Amber: Met with the lawyer again. She thinks it will take another two months. But she says I’m doing everything right. We will get him back.
Trust. That’s what it all boiled down to.
My own mother refused to let me take Joseph this morning. She told me she didn’t recognize me anymore, that I looked nothing like her son. But she had stolen mine.
My. Fucking. Son.
And he was growing used to being without his mother and me.
Joseph made me nervous. I never told Amber that, but in a way, I was too afraid I’d fuck him up. I couldn’t be hands on with him. He was too pure, too much of a good thing. But leave it to a fucking Ellison woman to ruin the only good thing in my life.
He was all I had left. So, the question was, did I trust Amber?
I rubbed the scar on my leg that I knew was underneath my jeans. I’d spent years tracing its location with my fingertips. It was the evidence of her sister’s betrayal. Taylor thought that the years between us would give her a pass for what she did to me.
But everything I did back then was for her, to protect her, to help her and her sister escape that house.
Ungrateful bitch.
She was every inch of the woman I thought she’d grow into. Fierce, strong, and beautiful. And she was fucking some foreign piece of shit, who I knew wasn’t legitimate.
How the hell was he any better than me?
I would never forget the satisfaction of seeing her afraid of me that day at our spot. I wanted to kill her, but first I wanted to fuck her so hard it hurt. Hurt to the point she would never forget who her rightful owner was. She was meant to be mine. Always. We had promised each other.
“Laz, stop it!”
“Come on, you know you love it.” I smeared the sugar all over her lips as she fought me.
“Damn you, stop it.” Taylor pushed against my chest as I leaned in and began to lick up my mess from her face and neck.
We were at our spot, next to the pond. It was one of those days where the trees remained still even with the cool breeze beneath it and time lasted. Taylor brought strawberries and sugar for dipping, and I managed to get a bottle away from my mother’s house. It was the first time in months we’d been in the sun together. I’d smoked a foil before we left the hotel and Taylor made me promise it would be my only one for the day. I was hitting the bottle hard to fight the urge as I watched her take a dip in the pond. The itch subsided with each pass of drink through my lips, and every time she looked over at me and smiled, it was a reminder. I didn’t need anything but her. I loved her. I’d told her so many times lately, I feared she’d never say it back to me. She wanted me sober. That was her reason for keeping the same words to herself. My chest banged from the rattle of my heart as I feared I might never get those words to pass her lips. I was done denying my addiction, and she knew it too.
But Taylor was my air, the only thing that kept me going, the only thing I looked forward to. The drugs were distracting me, but getting clean meant creating a different plan, and we didn’t have time for a plan B. We were getting close to leaving Dyer and everything behind us.
She lay beneath me in the warm sun and fought for air as I smothered her with my kiss. I tasted her sweet tongue and pulled away as she looked up at me with eyes the color of jade stone.
“Laz.”