“Such a romantic.” She rolls her eyes sarcastically. “Come on, Romeo. You promised me a story.”
She leads me out of the room where Bastian is leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest. “We need to talk,” he grunts as he eyes Quinn’s and my joined hands.
“Later,” I tell him and keep following Quinn.
“Now.” He grips my arm with a scowl.
I look at his hand on my arm then athim with a snarl. “No.” I shrug out of his grip. “I promised the lady a story. You can wait.”
We walk into the room and shut the door behind us.
“You could’ve talked to him,” she says as she grabs a pair of shorts from the dresser.
“I could have, but I didn’t want to.” I watch as she pulls on the thin cotton over her legs. “I told you I liked you better without them.”
She smiles with a shake of her head. “No, sir. I was promised a story. I don’t want you to have any distractions.”
“You think those little shorts will keep me from getting distracted?” I arch a brow in question.
She ignores me, pulling me to the bed. Climbing onto the bed, she tugs me with her. “Not helping with the distractions, darlin’.”
“You’re incorrigible. You know that?”
“Oh,absolutely. Incorrigible, irredeemable, habitual, reprobate. That’s me perfectly.” I lean back against her headboard with my hands propped behind my head, waiting to see what she does.
She crawls beside me, curling into my chest. It catches me off guard. Really off guard because once she’s there, I realize I don’t want her to be anywhere else.
I run my hand through my hair at the thought. I want her, but I can’t have her. I can’t fall for her, but I think I have. I’ve fucked up. I’ve fucked up thoroughly.
My only saving grace is that she hasn’t fallen for me. I can take a broken heart, but I can’t handle breaking another. It would be inevitable if she did.
“Now tell me the story.”
“All right, canary, I’ll tell you.”
“Canary?” she raises her brows with surprise.
“Yep. You’re a tiny, yellow, singing bird. Canary.”
“I don’t sing.”
“You did for me,” I remind her of moments ago. The exact moment I fell.
“Don’t get used to it, Romeo. It was a one-off because I couldn’t stand seeing you suffer. Now tell me the story.”
Her words hit me hard. She couldn’t stand to see me suffer. If she only knew.
I suppose it’s as good a time as any to give her a glimpse into the darkness inside of me.
I start at the beginning, right after returninghome from my expulsion. Dad had me on lockdown. He was disappointed in me again, but this time I didn’t care. I accepted his disappointment because if I gave him what he wanted, he would’ve been even more so.
I just couldn’t tell him why I beat the shit out of O’Dell. Dad knew something was up. Said until I told him the reason I wasn’t allowed to leave the house. I took the punishment, and my dad stopped speaking to me.
A few weeks later, I was lying in a hammock in our backyard since I wasn’t allowed more than fifty feet from the backdoor with my guitar in hand when a shadow fell over me. I looked up to see a face I hadn’t seen in months.
March 2010
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
