"Then I must be cute whenever we talk about this. I'm always pissed with you about this. Why won't you transfer? It makes no sense to me. You could get a scholarship, Sam. Let's be real here. Do you really want to depend on your mom's help to go to college? Or your dads'? Neither of them has contacted you recently. Have they? And what's up with that?"
A different headache was coming on. It was low and probing. I shook my head. I didn't want to discuss either of them. "I understand why you want me to transfer. I get it. I do. But I don't know if it'll be worth it. I haven't even heard back from Coach Grath. I might not make the team, so why would I transfer schools?"
"Besides not going to school with Douchebag and all his little followers?" He grumbled, "You have no friends over there. They're weak as hell."
"Maybe." They were. "But it's a good school. I've always gone there and my dad—"
I looked away, but his fingers were quick as lightning. He grabbed my chin and kept me from turning away. I started to struggle, but his hold tightened. It was useless. He'd already heard.
His eyes narrowed to slits. "That's why you don't want to transfer, isn't it? Because of your dad. You think it's one way to still see him, don't you?"
I fell quiet. It wasn't because I didn't want to talk about that. It was because I couldn't. My throat swelled and it felt like an elephant was on my chest. It hurt to push past both of those emotions, or ignore how my heart rate skyrocketed.
"Sam."
I shook my head. I tried to look away, but a tear slipped out.
He cursed under his breath and then bundled me in his arms once more. I curled up in his lap as he folded me against his chest so we were both settled against the bed's headboard. Then he brushed some of my hair away from my forehead. His fingers slid down and brushed away more of my tears. I couldn't stop them. I never could when I really thought about my dad. So instead, I tried to never think about him.
Another soft curse slipped past his lips. He pressed a kiss to my forehead. "I'm sorry. I am."
My hands curled into his shirt. I held on with a desperation I never would've shown four months ago. Now I couldn't help myself with him. I needed him. Hell, I starved for him at times.
He continued to brush more of my hair from my eyes. "How long has it been?"
I shook my head. It still hurt to talk.
"If they won't reach out to you, you should reach out to them."
I looked up now. Panic coursed through me. He couldn't be suggesting…
He nodded. "You heard me. You go to them and find out what the hell is going on."
A ragged chuckle ripped from me. It was so easy for him. If people stood in his way, Mason went through them. It wasn't a question if they would stop him. It was a question of how he would go through them, if he would stomp them down, barrel through them, or just throw them out of his way.
Things were different with me.
"Why are you laughing?" He tilted my head back again.
I shook my head. God, it hurt sometimes.
"Talk to me, Sam," he groaned.
I closed my eyes. "It's not why we're here."
"What?"
"We're here to get away from all that stuff. I don't want to talk about them right now. We're here to spend time together, just you and me."
His hand fell away from my hip. "Are you serious?"
I lifted a shoulder, but I looked away. Then I bit my lip. My heart started to pound again. And I waited…
There was a heavy silence between us.
I continued to wait.
"Fine."
Relief flared through me. My shoulders relaxed as the sudden tension lifted from them. I didn't realize how important it was for him not to press the point. I would handle my fathers, the biological one and the one that raised me, one day. I just couldn't handle them this day, but one day… I would have to one day.
CHAPTER FIVE
It was the early when his phone lit up. Logan was the first to call at six in the morning. When Mason checked the time, he cursed and sat upright as he took the call. I listened from beside him, even though I turned my own phone on and saw twelve voice messages from my mother.
"Wait, slow down."
I could hear Logan's excited voice still going strong on the other side. After another minute, a savage curse came from Mason. His shoulders tightened and his jaw clenched.
My heart sank. It wasn't good.
Then I sighed and got up from the bed. It was time for me to handle my mother. Mason and Logan were great buffers, but I was the only one who had the voice to quiet her. As I dressed, I felt his eyes on me. After I emerged from the bathroom, showered and fully dressed, he stood and held his hand over the phone. "What are you doing?"
"We're going back."
His eyebrows went high. "We just got here."
"I know." My heart was in the pit of my stomach. I was tired of feeling it there. I needed to stop hiding from my mother and from the situation. I'd been hiding since our parents found out about us. This had to stop.
"You're sure?"
I nodded. I knew I had the resolved face on and Mason removed his hand from the phone. "Hang on, Logan. We're coming back."
It didn't take long to pack our stuff. We hadn't packed anything to begin with. As for the break from reality, this one had been a short one. A part of me was pissed that we had even come. Enough was enough. I wasn't going to be harassed through phone calls by my mother. And I wasn't going to hear her threats through other people anymore.
Stuart held the door for us as we left. The Escalade had been pulled up, waiting for us. The smile on Stuart's face slipped a bit when he caught my eye, but he gave Mason a hug before he drove off. After a quick stop for breakfast and coffee, we were on our way back. The ride was passed in silence, tense silence for me. I glanced at Mason, but he seemed relaxed. Then again, this was his lifestyle. He didn't relish confrontations, but he didn't fear them either.
I wished I had that same quality. Sparring off against a catty girl was different from going against my mother, a mother that I knew I should've respected. I should've followed her rules from day one, but to be truthful, if my relationship with her had been better than my relationship with Mason, things might've been different. I bit my lip as I admitted to myself that I might not have slept with him. I loved him. I needed him, but I had been alone. I had been hurting. And I had been wasting away. He came at the perfect time, but things changed because of him. I was stronger now.
I had to be.
It was a few hours later when Mason took my hand in his. "You ready for this?"
The words couldn't come. I watched as he turned into the driveway. My mom's car was there. Logan's Escalade was beside hers and there was an SUV that I didn't recognize.
"I can turn around again. You don't have to go in there."
"I do." The words ripped from me and came out a hoarse whisper. I was terrified of my mother in that moment. This wasn't going to go well.
"Sam."
His voice stopped me when I was going to reach for the door. I looked back and melted. A soft plea was in his eyes.
His hand took mine again. He held on tight. "Don't let her ruin this."
I nodded, but there was a ball in my throat. The tears were about to spill.
"I can't promise what I'll do if your mom fucks with our relationship anymore. If she ruins this…" Raw desperation slipped from him, but it was mixed with a deadly warning as well.
I rushed across the car and pressed against him. My lips found his, and I tried to give him everything in that kiss. I wanted to give him my soul so I didn't let the kiss end. When he was about to pull away, I held on tighter.
"I won't let her change anything." I couldn't.
As we headed inside, the raised voices carried over us. I was sure the neighbors could hear when my mother shrieked before something shattered in the next room. My feet froze in place. My heart lurched into a stampede and a wave of dizziness swept over me. Good god. I was transpor
ted back to another time when my mother threw a fit. She screamed bloody murder that night, so long ago, as she tore pictures to pieces. She threw plates across the room. A bat was taken to the China cabinet. All the dishes had been destroyed. At the end of her fit, four hours later, there had been nothing left intact.
"You did this!" she raged as she pointed her finger at me.
But that'd been six years ago. I was a month away from turning into an adult. I swallowed those emotions and pushed them down. I hadn't been haunted by them for so long; I wasn't going to start now. She wouldn't have that power over me.
"You okay?" Mason tugged on my hand with a frown.
Sweat broke out on my forehead. Heat flared inside of me. He couldn't see me like this. I had kept it together for so long; I didn't want him to see how that night had left me broken. So I swallowed all of it and nodded.
I tried to remember that I was seventeen. We were in a different home. We had a different life now.
"Sam."
"Yes?" The word ripped from my throat. I winced as I heard how hoarse my voice was. But then I was taken aback when he lifted his hand and brushed away some tears. His hand was cool against my skin. I breathed his touch in. It was soft, tender. I needed at that moment. Hell. I needed his strength. My mother had taken all of mine in that one second.
"Hey, hey." He stepped close to me and framed my face in his hands. He peered down with concern. "What's wrong?"
I shook my head and pulled away.
"Stop."
I brushed his hands away.
"She did this to me!"
I jumped back from the ferocity in her scream. There was a rage there that I thought she had lost it so long ago, but I was wrong. I wondered if she'd kept hidden from James? Had it been there the whole time?
I swallowed a breath. My shoulders lifted up and rolled back. I knew what I would face in the next room, and then I stepped forward. I was ready for it.
Logan laughed before he ended it with a snort. "Are you fucking with me? No wonder she ran away from you."
"Logan!"
Analise screamed again before something shattered once more.
Logan cheered, "Do it again! Do it again, Psycho Woman!"
"Logan, shut up!"
"Oh, come on, dad. Look at her. She's crazy—"
I stepped around the corner, with Mason right behind me. The amusement fled from Logan as he took in the sight of us, or me. I couldn't have looked normal as my heart was pounding. My gut was telling me to run away from her. But I didn't. Mason brushed his hand against mine as he stepped around to shield me.
James swallowed when he looked up, but I couldn't take my eyes from my mother.
Analise was in her bathrobe with her hair done up. She looked like they had gone to a formal event the night before and she had gone to bed with her hair and make-up still done up. But there were black splotches on her face from where her mascara bled and her eyes were wild. Some of her hair stuck up, and she never calmed the strands. A plate was in her hand, but she lowered it as she raked me over with her eyes. They were cold, so cold. A chill went down my back.
This was the mother I feared from so long ago. She was back.
"You," she seethed.
I scrambled back a step before I realized what I was doing, but it was too late. Triumph flared in her depths. She still had that power over me, and her chest swelled up. As I watched her, I could see the power swelter inside of her. She thrived on it, but then Logan jumped to his feet. He had been sitting on a chair in the back. He cursed now.
She sucked in her breath and turned. I knew she was ready to blast him.
"And you want to know why we took off?" Mason's icy tone stopped everything. He gestured towards his dad and then swept a hand towards Analise. "Look at her. She's off her rails, dad. I don't want Sam near her."
Analise's eyes widened. Her hand clenched around the plate again.
I was frozen in place. Mason's hand reached behind him, and he pulled me close so I was pressed against his back. Then I closed my eyes. I was supposed to be the one fighting. I knew it had to be me, but I rested my forehead against his back. She had taken all the strength from me that I had accumulated over the last five months. She sucked me dry, and I was left trembling like I had when I was eleven years old.
"Samantha," she said in a sharp tone. "Look at me."
I trembled.
Mason laughed at her. "Fuck that."
"Screw you." This time it was Logan. His voice rose, as did his anger. "Who are you to talk to her like that?"
Analise sucked in her breath. "She is my daughter. I am her mother. That's who I am."
"Then act like it," Mason's tone was savage. He had stiffened to stone before me. "I don't know who raised you, but my mom and dad would never talk to me like that."
"Maybe they should've," she proclaimed.
My eyes clasped tighter, but I could see her in my mind. I knew her chin was in the air, her eyes were brazen, and she was open to a fight. My mother was a beautiful woman with dark black hair that was straight and sleek. She had a slim build and when she was dressed in form-fitting dresses, she looked elegant. A classic sophisticated look clung to her and made her seem angelic to men. I always knew when she wanted something because she would put on her soft-pink dress and cozy up to David with an endearing smile. She would use caresses over dinner to get what she wanted, and it always worked. He folded every time and from what I had witnessed, James Kade wasn't any different. She could've beaten me up and she would only need a trembling lip, a few tears, and remorseful eyes to pull him back in.
Analise might've been crazy, but she had power over the opposite sex. She used it as a weapon.
"Analise!" James scolded her this time.
I sucked in my breath. My hands were now fisted into the back of Mason's shirt.
"What—James?"
Gone was the rage. Her voice softened. She had stepped wrong. I started the countdown in my head. 3…
"You can't say things like that, not about my own children."
2…
Logan snickered.
1…
"Oh, honey," her voice melted. "I didn't mean it like that. I'm so sorry. I am. It's just—I've been worried about my baby. He took her away from me, and I'm losing her, James. I can't lose my daughter."
Cue the sniffles.
She whimpered, "I just love her so much, James. You can understand that, can't you?"
"Oh my god." Logan's disgust was evident.
"Logan," his dad barked, but he had already softened. "It might be best if you leave the room. All of you."
"Are you kidding me?" Mason gutted out. His hands rose in the air, in fists. "She's working you, dad. You're falling for this?"
James sucked in his breath. Then he delivered with cold disdain, "Your mother called today. She would like for you and Logan to spend your break with her at the Malibu Estate. I think it would be best for everyone to leave as soon as possible."
He cursed. "I'm not leaving Sam here. If I go, she goes."
"What—"Analise started.