Addicted for Now (12 page)

She frowns. “But, you’re not done with work yet.”

“I quit,” I tell her.

Her face twists in so many emotions. “Not…not for me, right?
Lo, you can’t.” She points to the muffins. “Go back.”

“Lil,” I say softly, bringing her to her feet, my hands at
her waist. “I’ll explain everything in the car. But you have to trust me that
none of this is because of you, okay? It’s my choice.”

“Did Rose…?” She looks over my shoulder, ready to dart
towards her sister and convince her that I should stay. But she has it
backwards.

“Rose wants me here. I don’t want to be.”

Lily processes the words. “Okay…okay, so we’re going?”

I nod.

“You promise you’ll tell me why? And you won’t lie to me?”

“No lying,” I assure her. We have to be honest. It’s the one
thing we need to be good at.

She leans over her keyboard, closes out Excel, and shuts
down her computer.

As Lily steps forward, she whips her head from side to side,
paranoid that someone can see straight through her—that they can tell just how
aroused she is. They can’t. But I sure as hell can.

I swoop in behind her, my hands planted on her waist, and my
lips brush her ear. “Want a ride?”

She brightens almost immediately. I don’t wait for her to
say yes. I crouch a little in front of her, and I lift her up on my back. She
holds tight around my neck, and I keep my arms underneath her legs, willing to
carry her as far as she needs to go—just like when we were kids.

Some things never change.

***

I finish telling Lily about the phone call between
Rose and their mother about the same time that we reach the parking deck. Lil
still clings to my back like a koala bear to a tree, and I wish I didn’t have
to set her down. But I drop her onto her feet while I search my pockets for the
keys to her car.

“I’m glad you told me,” she says, no judgment in her eyes,
just complete understanding. I’m about to kiss her, but I remember that she’s
aroused, her eyes glazed for something more than just a peck on the cheek.

She holds onto my belt loop with two fingers, silently
tugging me towards her body. I don’t even think she realizes that she’s doing
it.

Right as I fish out the keys and unlock the doors, she lets
out a sharp breath and scuttles behind my back.

“Hide me,” she whispers, gripping the hem of my shirt and
using my body as a shield.

“What?” I frown and scan the dark parking deck.

“Is that Lily Calloway?” a guy says, not even twenty feet
from us. He just opened his Jeep door and climbed out, a couple spaces to the
right of Lily’s vehicle. He walks towards us, and I spot a Penn soccer sticker
on his gas cap.

The guy looks vaguely familiar. He has tan skin, more
Spaniard than Italian, and his trim build matches soccer players. But I can’t
place him. Not yet. He’s swimming in a fog.

Lily reveals herself now that she’s been sighted. “Hi…”

“Do you remember me?” he asks, his eyes briefly flickering
to me and then back to Lil. I know, just by the way that he’s looking at her,
that they had sex.

If I was tense before, I’m wired now, my muscles tightening
into taut strands. I’m used to being the one who knocks on Lily’s door in the
morning and escorts her one-night stand out of our apartment. I’d even grab the
poor guy a cup of coffee. But he’s not a face that I remember being charitable
to. I don’t think he ever stepped foot in our old apartment.

“Yeah,” Lily says, reaching for my hand. She holds it
tightly, and I do her one better. I wrap my arm around her shoulders. She
relaxes only a little, and the guy—well, he acts oblivious to my claim over
her. Do I really need to wave a giant flag that says BOYFRIEND in his fucking face?

He nods. “I was just thinking about you the other day.” His
eyes rake her body. Is he serious? I’m standing right
here.
I glare so hard that my eyes start to burn.

“Lo,” Lily says, “this is Mason Nix. Remember that frat
party we went to our freshman year?” We went to a lot of parties when we were
eighteen. I feel like I’ve shelved this memory so far back that it’s going to
take an hour to find.

“Right,” I say vaguely, still drilling holes into Mason. He
meets my gaze but looks completely unaffected by my warning. What’s this guy’s
deal?

“Anyway, it’s funny that I’m running into you, Lily. I was
going to call you yesterday—”

“You have her number?” I question.

“Yeah,” he says, his lips rising. “And I have yours. Loren
Hale, right? She gave me your number too, said something about how she always
loses track of her phone.”

She must have been drunk. Lil doesn’t usually give out her
number or mine. She said it “promotes stalking”—which clearly seems to be the
case.

My blood ices over, and my hand on Lily’s shoulder suddenly
feels like a weight. So he has her number, and mine. He has the ability to text
us, but he hardly seems vindictive towards me, definitely not enough to
threaten Lily.

He licks his lips and nods to her. “So, I was thinking you’d
want to hookup later.”
What?
“Maybe
tomorrow, around eight. Same frat house, same place. If you want to be fucked
hard, I’m your guy.”

Lily balks. “I…”

“No,” I sneer. “She’s my girlfriend, you asshole.”

Mason lets out a short laugh. “That’s funny.” He looks back
at Lily, waiting for her response.

Am I invisible? Am I not speaking clearly? I don’t fucking
get it?! I step in front of Lily, letting go of her hand. “She’s my
girlfriend.
You’re
never
going to fuck her.”

“I
already
did,”
he retorts.

My jaw locks, and I clench my fingers into a fist.

“So what do you say, Lily? If I’m not enough for you, I can
call up some of my buddies. I know you like that.”

The memory hits me all at once—the one I tried to suppress.
And I have the sudden urge to vomit until I pass out. I can’t even talk about
it. I can’t mention what happened or else I think I may explode. I may beat him
until he can’t stand on two legs. And it’s not his fault for what happened. Not
really. It’s mine for not stopping Lily.

For not holding her in my arms and telling her that I truly
loved her. That I would be enough, and I’d quit drinking so she’d quit fucking
other guys. That’s all I had to do. Choose her before alcohol. And I picked
wrong for so many years.

He tries to step towards her, and I put a hand on his chest,
pushing him back. Things have changed. “She’s with me. She’s not going to fuck
you. If you can’t understand that, then go read a damn book to understand the
English language.”

“And she was your girlfriend two years ago. That didn’t stop
her before. In fact, you waved her towards me.”

I want to strangle my past drunken neck. Our fake
relationship is coming back to haunt me. “That was different. She’s not seeing
anyone else but me now. So fuck off.”

Mason lets out another laugh. “There’s no way that girl is only
with you.” He knows. He knows she has a problem. And I wonder if he sent those
texts. He was thinking about her recently, didn’t he say that?

“Were you really thinking about Lily the other day, or were
you just blowing smoke?”

He smiles as though I’ve given him permission to pursue her.
Over my dead fucking corpse. “I mentioned her to my friends a couple weeks ago.
We were talking about the girls at Penn who give the best head. Everyone agreed
she was the best cocksucker on campus.”

And I can’t help it.

I deck him. Right in the face.

It didn’t feel good. My knuckles are on fire, and Mason
touches his split lip, shocked.

Lily comes up behind me and starts tugging my arm, trying to
lead me to our car.

I follow her, walking backwards so he doesn’t break my sharp
gaze.

And then he says, “I knew it.”

I stop. My face falls because the look he wears—it’s full of
detest, but it’s the kind of hate that’s been there for a while, accumulated throughout
the years. He should be pissed about that punch to the jaw, not something so
deep-seated.

“You were the one who slashed our tires because we fucked
your girlfriend.”
We.
I cringe, never
ever wanting to hear that again.
We
.
Not
I
. Not
me.
Multiple guys.

And I may have popped a tire or two. I was drunk. I was eighteen.
And I was pissed and resentful, more at myself than at anyone else. But I took
it out on this guy. And I buried the memory.

“Have you been texting me?” I glare.

Mason grits his teeth.

Lily tries to drag me off again, but I stay my course.

“Have you?!” I shout. What I did—that was two years ago. But
there are some things that no guy can let go. This is probably one of them.

“Bye, Lily,” Mason says, his eyes only planted on me. “We’ll
hookup soon, yeah? And maybe I won’t tell anyone else what a good little slut
you are.”

I shake off Lily, and I go crazy. I grab him by the face,
pinching his cheeks together with one furious hand, and I shove his back over
the hood of Lil’s car.

He struggles to stand up from my hold, but I pin him down,
my kneecap pressing into his dick.

“You touch her, you even
think
about her, and I’ll have you in the ground before you can say
thank you, Loren Hale.
You go to the
media, the press, and I will ruin you, starting with your soccer career. You
don’t even know who I am, you motherfucker.”

He spits in my face, and I throw him off the car and onto
the cement.

I think he’s about to come back and tackle me, but he
staggers to his feet.

I don’t give him the last word. Lily physically pushes me
into the passenger seat, knowing that I’m too crazed to drive right now. And
she rolls up the window while Mason begins yelling again. We can’t hear him in
the car, but he smacks our hood with two fists as we pull out.

And then we drive off, his middle finger in the rearview
mirror.

My hands shake, and my heart pumps a mile a minute.

Lily says nothing. She stares faraway at the road, the
silence blanketing the car. I need a drink. I need a goddamn drink right now. I
run my hand through my hair, and then I glance back at her, checking her state
of mind…and body.

Her eyes glass, but her knees are locked together, and her
leg bounces. Fuck. I forgot. We’re on our way home to have sex. I lean back,
hitting the headrest with an exasperated sigh. Everything is just so far out of
my control.

When we’re stuck in traffic, bumper to bumper, Lily finally
breaks the quiet. “You slashed their tires?”

I rub my mouth. “I may have…” It was a long time ago. We
just entered college. There were more guys for her to fuck. She was gone almost
every night, and I worried about whether or not she’d wake up crying. Whether
I’d find her bruised and disposed of. It was horrible.

She nods to herself, letting this sink in. “What if he
wasn’t the guy texting us?” she asks. “You just made him angrier.”

“Yeah…I see that.” I didn’t think running into her one-night
stands would be this hard. I also didn’t think they’d ask to sleep with her while
I was present. That sucked.

Lily breathes heavily.

“Hey,” I say, leaning towards her. I slide my hand on her
leg. “It’s okay. We’re going to be fine.”

She nods, trying to believe it as much as me. If I don’t
find this guy soon, I’ll lose my mind. I think I’m about there.

She turns on the radio, and we listen to music all the way
home, our breath slowing together. Sometime later, we finally reach the house
and pull into the garage. Lily snaps off her belt and turns to me.

“I don’t need to have sex anymore. I’m okay now.” Her words
sound practiced, like she’s been reciting them in her head for the past hour.

“I don’t believe you,” I tell her.

Her face pales. “No, really Lo, I’m fine.”

My eyes fall to her legs, her thighs pressed tightly
together. “So if we’re not having sex anymore, what are you going to go do?”

She shrugs, her shoulders tense and locked. She’s so fucking
aroused.
Just admit it, Lily
.
“Maybe…take a shower.”

“And masturbate?”

Her eyes widen. “No-no,” she stammers. “No, just shower.”

I lean forward and finger the button on her jeans.

“What…what are you doing?” she asks. Her chest collapses
with a heady breath, something that has my need building.

“I’m checking.”

“For what?” she asks in a small voice.

I unzip her, and I watch her eyes plant on my hand as it
descends down her pants and underneath her panties. She grabs my wrist as I
slip my fingers inside of her. And she contracts around them, wet and eager and
so ready.

“You’re not aroused?” I ask again.

Her head tilts back, her eyes closed, her hand gripping my
wrist so I don’t move. “No,” she breathes.

“You’re a little liar.”

“I’m not.” She gasps as I push deeper, in and out. “Lo,” she
cries. Her back begins to arch, trying to drive my fingers further inside.

We need to move this upstairs. I disentangle from her tight
clutch and slip my fingers out. “Go upstairs,” I tell her. “Take off all your
clothes, lie still on the bed, and I’ll make you feel better.”

She nods wildly, wanting nothing more than for me to take
her mind off of what just happened. She opens the door and then hesitates. “Are
you not coming with me?”

“I’ll be there in a second.”

“Lo—”

“I just need a minute.”

She glances at the raw skin on my knuckles, and then she
nods again and heads into the house. When the door closes behind her, I grab my
phone and dial a number.

The line clicks after the third ring. “Hey. How was the
first day on the job?”

I can’t speak. I shouldn’t have called him. I’m about to
hang up.