Nothing But Trouble (Malibu University 1)

He places a kiss on my fingers and I slide off his lap, stroke his thighs as he watches me with heavy-lidded eyes. I unbuckle his pants and he slides off the hood of the Jeep.

Looking into his eyes, I slip my hand inside his underwear, palm his erection, fully hard already, and cup his balls. He grunts, gripping my shoulder for support as his chin falls forward. I push his pants down his hips, far enough that I can wrap my fingers around the base of his shaft. Bending, my mouth covers the head and he gasps. His grip on my hair tightens.

“Is this okay?” I hear him ask in a husky, broken voice.

I run my tongue up and down his perfect penis, suck on the tip. “It’s okay,” I tell him. I play with his smooth balls and he widens his stance. “Is this okay?”

“Fuck yes,” stammers out.

I swallow down the urge to laugh. Those are the last words we exchange for a while.

Two nights later, I wake up to find his side of the bed looking mauled. The sheets twisted and sliding off. A cold, empty dent in the mattress. It looks like the pillow suffered the worst of the unprovoked attack.

No need to guess where he is––I can hear the water splashing as soon as I step into the hallway. From the edge of the patio, I watch him swimming slow laps. He doesn’t notice me watching. That’s not unusual. Lately, he’s often lost in his head, far away from me. I’m trying not to push him to talk. I’m trying to give him the time he needs to process his emotions, but it’s starting to worry me.

He comes to a full stop in the middle of the pool, sucks in a deep breath, and goes under.

I’m lost in this love for him. His pain is my pain. I feel it acutely, a weight sitting on my chest growing heavier every day as I watch him slip further and further into depression. I don’t know how to make him believe that it wasn’t his fault. That his brother’s blood is not on his hands.

Jumping in the water, I sink to the bottom and open my eyes to see the blurry outline of him illuminated by the pool floodlights. He’s sitting cross-legged at the bottom. I take his face in my hands and he opens his eyes. Together we kick to the surface and come out of the water sputtering.

“You’re scaring me,” I whisper.

The stricken look on his face makes me feel even worse. “I’m not trying to hurt myself if that’s what you’re thinking…” He takes my silence as a sign that I don’t believe him. “When I was younger and the trouble with Brian started, I used to do that a lot…it helps to block everything out.”

“It’s dangerous,” I point out. “People have blacked out that way and drowned.”

“I know,” he murmurs quietly and brushes the water sliding down his face off. With his arms around my waist, he pulls me closer and in turn I wrap myself around him.

“Your mother keeps blowing up your phone. I don’t know how in the world she got my number, but she even texted me to have you call her.”

“I’m going to block them. I don’t want to see or hear from them again.”

I understand where all the animosity is coming from. His parents sunk to a new low at the funeral. I also know that carrying a grudge isn’t going to do him any good. I save that discussion for another day, however. All that toxic emotion won’t allow him to hear what I have to say.

“I don’t think my father ever wanted me and Brian,” he murmurs absently. “He loves my mom, worships the ground she walks on. He’d do anything for her…I think he had us because she wanted kids.”

He sounds heartbreakingly certain of it.

“He’s always treated my brother and me as a burden, a chore…I can’t remember a single moment that he looked happy to see us.” A bark of dry, humorless laughter comes out of him.

“I guess he just got what he wanted.” His gaze returns to me, taking in every detail of my face. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. You know that, right?”

I fall deeper, faster, harder.

“I have to say this…” I suck in a deep breath, summon all the strength I can scrape together. “I know you feel responsible. But Brian was in danger every day he lived on the streets. Every day he used.”

His face morphs into intractable determination. “I insisted he wear those sneakers. I was actually worried he would sell them for smack,” he says with force and shakes his head. So much self-inflicted blame. “They killed him. He kept his promise to me and he died because of it.”