Steal (Seaside Pictures 3)

“Ang.” My voice cracked. “I can’t ever be your friend.”

She hung her head. “Yeah. I know.”

“No. Not really. Because I’ve never wanted to be your friend, even when I said I did. It was all a lie.”

Her face twisted with pain. “I think I should go back inside now.”

“I would have fought for you.”

“I should have let you,” she whispered.

“Ang, there will never be a day in my life where I think I can ever be anything but your everything — and that’s the truth.”

“What?” She choked.

“I will always…” I licked my lips. “Always, want it all.”

I RAN AWAY.

Again.

This time to the bathroom instead of my doorless room.

I was too confused to keep crying.

Too tired from such an emotional day to even ask what the guy meant when he said he couldn’t be my friend yet needed to be my everything.

And a small part of me wanted to run back into his arms and offer him all that I had and see if he’d bite. See if he’d at least be tempted.

But I had nothing to offer.

Except a dirty past.

A shaky present.

An unknown future.

And guys like Will, they deserved the good girls, the ones with no demons chasing them down, the ones with no scars from needles. The ones who weren’t constantly showering in an effort to clean the sins away.

I started the shower.

And peeled the wet clothes from my body.

The bathroom door jerked open.

Will stood there, shirtless. His intense gaze moved over my skin like he was caressing me with his eyes. I didn’t cover up. There was no point. Because I wasn’t a girl who was ashamed of the current me, it was the past me I had a problem with.

“What if I was peeing?” I blurted.

His lips curved into a small smile. “Then I guess I would have asked if you needed toilet paper.”

I bit my lip to keep from smiling. “And if I was all good on the TP?”

“Then I would have offered to turn on the shower, find you a towel, or just make sure you were okay.”

“I’m okay.”

“No, you’re not,” he said quickly, the beginning of his sentence colliding with my end.

“No, I’m not,” I agreed. “But I will be. And I’m not going to do drugs, I don’t do that anymore. Apparently, the new me is even more emotional and confused than before, and I’m going to feel all the things — even when they hurt like hell.”

“Life hurts, Ang.” He took a step farther, then closed the door behind him, locking us in. “So, feel it.”

“I don’t think I can tell the good from the bad anymore. Everything is alive, like this wire that refuses to stop electrocuting me over and over and over again.”

Will cupped my face with both of his hands, his lips hovered an inch from mine. “So let it burn.”

I sucked in a breath.

And Will Sutherland, the Will Sutherland of my dreams, kissed my tears.

Warm lips grazed each cheek before he pulled back, his eyes alight with something I couldn’t quite decipher, something that I knew if I tried to analyze would most likely leave me even more emotional and confused than before, and I’d already wasted too many of those tears on him.

He didn’t deserve to steal anymore.

“Can I ask you something?” His voice was barely above a whisper, those intense eyes never leaving mine.

“Can it be when I’m clothed?”

As if remembering that I was completely naked, his entire countenance changed. His eyes flashed as he made a sound in the back of this throat, all before taking a step away from me and nodding. “Yeah, Ang, it can wait.”

I turned my back to him.

I still felt him.

The door was still closed.

“Is your plan to stay here the whole time?” I tried to keep my voice light. “I already told you, I don’t have anything in here.”

“That’s not why I’m staying.”

“I won’t slip in the shower.”

“And if you do, I guess I’ll be here to catch you.”

I jerked the shower door open and shook my head, “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

“It wasn’t a promise,” his gaze lowered to my mouth.

I didn’t have time for any more of whatever this was. Already my breathing was heavy, my heart ached, and I was having trouble standing without collapsing again. I stepped into the shower and under the searing spray.

I washed my body.

As fast as humanly possible.

Will wrapped a fluffy terry white towel around me the minute I stepped out, and pulled me into his arms.

“Please don’t be nice to be today if you’re going to be mean to me tomorrow,” I said with a hint of desperation that was impossible to hide with the way my voice shook. “Okay?”

He flinched, lowered his arms, and then nodded. “I’ll see you in the living room.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

I slid to the floor, my back to the door and tried to forget the way his lips felt when they pressed against my cheek, when they did what he’d always promised to do since the first time we kissed.

Make sure my tears never fell far enough for them to drip off my face, he’d always promised to catch them before they could — explaining that they didn’t count as long as he caught them.

I still remembered the very first day they did fall.

Time froze.

“What the hell?” he roared slamming the hotel room door open.

I blinked against the sunlight, my eyes heavy with sleep, heavy with drugs, my body still warm, but not warm enough to make me forget that I wasn’t in his room — that after our fight I’d run into someone else’s arms, someone who’d offered me something to take away the pain, the stress, the rejection.

Andrew.

“What’s up, man?” Andrew made no move to cover himself.

And it was then that I realized that I was just as naked.

Just as guilty.

Even if I couldn’t remember what happened, parts of me were sore enough to prove that I’d done something that I couldn’t take back.

“This isn’t what you think it is!” I yelled. “I’m sorry, I didn’t, it was late.” Every single word that fell from my mouth was a lie.

And all three of us knew it.

Will’s eyes fell to my arms.

Track marks.

Always track marks.

I didn’t even remember loading up my own needle the night before. How could I be so stupid? How?

I wiped my face, my eyes too dry to cry. “Will. Let’s just talk about this!”

“Talk?” He said in a calm voice. “Sure, okay, go ahead.” His arms crossed, his face was steel.

“I—” No words came, I couldn’t talk myself out of it, meanwhile Andrew’s smug grin made me want to puke. “I’m—”

“She chose me, man, plain and simple.” Andrew shrugged.

“Wow, I didn’t even know you were in the running, man.” Will glared. “You know, since we kicked you out of the band last night.”

I gasped.

I’d had no idea.

And suddenly it all became very clear.

I was a pawn.

In Andrew’s jealous game over Will’s continued solo success.

In our relationship.

As the new it couple.

“Don’t worry, man, we only did it once, it’s not like she can’t go running back to you now that you know the truth… she’s all yours.”

That’s when the tears fell.

When time froze.

When my eyes locked with Will’s and he did nothing. No flinch, no breathing, he watched the first one fall.

Catch it!

Catch the tear.

Take a step.

Steal a kiss.

Save me.

Two tears slowly slid down my cheeks, past my nose, over my lips. I had seconds and the tears would slide off my chin.

And Will watched.

Not just two tears collide with the hotel linens.

But so many that he was just a blur in front of me.

And then, he turned his back on me and said, “I hope it was worth it.”