Easy (31 page)

“Your dad isn’t
still friends with them?”

He nodded,
watching my face. “He is. They were my ride home at Thanksgiving. They can’t
get him to come here, so every other year, they all go there.”

I thought about my
parents and the friends and neighbors with whom they socialized. “My parents
don’t have any friends close enough to be incorporated into actual holidays.”

He stared up at
the ceiling. “They were all
really
close—before.”

His grief was so
tangible. I knew in that moment that he’d not worked through it—not at all in
the eight years it had been. His protective wall had become a fortress holding
him hostage rather than giving sanctuary. He might never fully recover from the
horror of what happened that night, but there had to be a point where it
wouldn’t consume him.

“Lucas, I need to
tell you something.” His heart drummed under my hand, slow and steady.

Other than shifting
his gaze to me, he didn’t move, but I felt his withdrawal as he waited. I assured
myself that the disconnection was all in my mind—a product of my guilt and
nothing more.

“I wanted to know
how you lost your mother, and I could tell it upset you to talk about it. So… I
looked online for her obituary.” My breathing went shallow as the seconds
ticked by and he said nothing.

Finally, he spoke,
and his voice was undeniably flat and cold. “Did you find your answer?”

I swallowed, but
my voice was a whisper. “Yes.” I couldn’t hear myself over the rapid thud of my
heartbeat.

He shifted his
eyes from me and lay back, biting his lip, hard.

“There’s one more
thing.”

He inhaled and
exhaled, staring at the ceiling, waiting for my next confession.

I closed my eyes
and blurted it out. “I talked to Dr. Heller about it—”

“
What?
” His
body was like rock against mine.

“Lucas, I’m sorry
if I invaded your privacy—”

“
If?
” He
shot up, unable to look at me, and I sat, pulling the covers up with me. “Why
would you go talk to him? Weren’t the gory details in the news reports
sickening enough for you? Or personal enough?” He pulled on his boxers and
jeans, his movements rough. “Did you want to know how she looked when they
found her? How she’d bled out? How even when my dad ripped out the carpet with
his bare hands—” he exhaled harshly “—there was a yard-wide circle of bloodstained
flooring underneath that couldn’t be sanded deep enough to get it all?” His
voice broke and he stopped talking.

In shock and out
of words, I could hardly breathe. He sat on the edge of the bed, silent, his
head in his hands. He was so close that I could have reached out to stroke the
cross that ran along his spine, but I didn’t dare. I scooted carefully from the
bed and got dressed. I pulled on my UGGs and walked to stand at the foot of the
bed.

His elbows pressed
into his thighs, his hands obscuring his face like blinders. I stared at the
dark hair grazing his shoulders, the flexed muscles of his arm and the ink
circling his bicep and flowing down his forearm, his beautiful, lean torso and
the words etched into his side like a brand.

“Do you want me to
leave?” I surprised myself, uttering the words with a steady voice.

I don’t know why I
thought he would say no, or say nothing. I was wrong, either way.

“Yes.”

The tears started
flowing then, but he couldn’t see them. He didn’t move from his position on the
bed. I couldn’t even be angry, because I’d crossed a line and I knew it, and meaning
well wasn’t good enough. I grabbed my purse and keys from the kitchen table and
my coat from the sofa, ears pricked for the sound of him coming after me,
telling me to stay. There was nothing but silence from his room.

When I opened the
door, Francis shot inside, along with a burst of cold air. I pulled the door
shut behind me before a sob broke free. Gulping the frigid air and wondering
how I’d managed to screw this up so thoroughly, I was determined not to cry
until I was in my truck. I slid my hand along the railing as I rushed clumsily
down the steps, because I couldn’t see through the combination of a moonless
night and my tears. A splinter pierced my hand two steps from the bottom.

“Ow!
Dammit
.”
The physical pain provided the ideal excuse for the sobbing to start. I sprinted
down the long, curved driveway, unsuccessful in my attempt to curb my tears
long enough to get into the truck. “Damn. Damn. Damn.
Fuck
.” I jammed my
key into the lock by feel.

Déjà vu
.
That was the first thing I thought when I felt myself propelled across the
bench seat. That was where the resemblance ended, though.

Buck shut the door
behind him and slapped the automatic lock. His weight immobilized my lower legs
and he had my left wrist in his hand before I could make out who he was, though
I knew. “Good enough to spread your legs for anybody but me, huh Jackie?”

Chapter 26

On my back, with my head at an
awkward angle against the passenger door, I jerked at my arm and struggled
without success to move my legs. “Get off!” I yelled the words, knowing they
would be meaningless to him. I was parked in the street—too far for anyone else
to hear me. “Get out of my truck!” I’d dropped my keys onto the truck floor
when he’d shoved me into the truck, and I searched the floor with my right
hand, intending to use them as a weapon.

“I don’t think
so.” He grabbed my right wrist and shook his head like he could read my mind.
“You’re not going anywhere until we’re done talking. You and your lying cunt friend
have
ruined
my fucking
life
.”

And then, I heard
Ralph’s voice in my head.
Your body is already a weapon. You just need to know
how to use it.
Abruptly, I stopped struggling and took stock: I couldn’t
kick. I could possibly get my wrists free by rotating and jerking them straight
down, but then what? He would just grab me again, immobilize me further.

I needed him
closer—the last thing I would naturally seek. I turned my eyes away.

“
Listen
to
me when I’m talking to you, goddammit!” He grabbed my chin roughly, his fingers
digging in as he leaned over me and forced me to face him.

Right hand free
.

While shoving my
hand between us, grabbing and twisting his balls and yanking up as hard as I
could, I slammed my forehead into his nose with as much force as I could manage
in a straight upward trajectory.

The night in the
frat parking lot, everything had happened so quickly that getting my bearings was
impossible until it was over. This time, everything was in slow motion—so for an
impossibly stretched space of time, I was positive that nothing I’d just done
had worked.

And then he
screamed, and his nose started gushing. I had never seen so much blood so
close-up. It poured out of him as though I’d opened a faucet full-blast.

Left hand free
.

He was listing to
the side. Still yanking up on his balls, I raised my left knee and turned into
him, shoving his shoulder with my left hand. He fell sideways into the cramped crevice
in front of my truck’s bench seat. The feeling rushed back into my legs,
tremors wracking through me, and I went for the door, shoving it open so
violently that it almost bounced all the way back.

Just before I
cleared the door, his right hand shot out and grabbed my wrist, like the never-quite-dead
psycho in a horror movie. I spun and smashed my fist down on the sensitive spot
on his upper forearm, inches down from his the crook of his arm, and he
released me, bellowing angrily and attempting to flail himself into an upright
position.

I didn’t wait to
see if he succeeded. I vaulted from my truck and ran.

This would have
been an ideal time to scream, but I could barely gasp breaths. I heard his footsteps
pounding unevenly behind me and I focused on Lucas’s door at the top of those
steps. I was halfway down the driveway when Buck lunged from behind and grabbed
at my hair, yanking me to a stop painfully. I yelped as we went down,
immediately turning onto my side as Lucas had taught me, dislodging him.

Suddenly, Lucas was
there. Like a dark avenging angel, he yanked Buck away from me and
threw
him,
and then installed himself between us. I scrambled backwards, crab-like. He
spared me one glance, his colorless eyes flaring in the dim light cast by the
flood lights at the side of the house, before he turned back to Buck, who’d
rolled to his feet. Blood coated the space between his nose and mouth and was
smeared on his chin, but there was little on him aside from that.

A second floodlight
at the corner of the house popped on, illuminating the scene.

Panting, I glanced
down at my chest and started. My pink and white knit shirt was stained dark
from the neckline to the top of my belly. Because of our positions when I’d
slammed Buck’s nose, my chest had caught the majority of blood that gushed from
his face.

I battled the urge
to rip my shirt off in the Heller’s front yard.

Crouching, he
tried to circle Lucas. Rather than turn with him, Lucas moved sideways,
remaining with his back to me, blocking Buck from getting any closer to me.

Buck’s voice was a
gruff snarl. “I’m gonna bust that lip wide open, emo-boy. I’m not fucked up
this time. I’m stone-cold sober, and I’m gonna kick your ass before I fuck your
little whore nine ways from Sunday—again.”

Lying bastard
.

Lucas didn’t rush
him, and didn’t respond at first, and then I heard his very controlled voice.
“You’re mistaken,
Buck
.” Never shifting his eyes from him, Lucas
unzipped his leather jacket, shrugged it off and tossed it aside. As he shoved
the sleeves of the dark long-sleeved t-shirt above his elbows, I noted the worn
jeans he’d pulled on earlier and the shit-kicker cowboy boots he grabbed when
he was in a hurry, because they didn’t require the time-suck that lacing his
black combat boots involved.

Buck threw a wide
punch and Lucas blocked it. He tried again with the same result, and then
rushed forward to pin Lucas in a hold. One kidney punch and left ear cuff
later, and Buck staggered to the side, pointing at me. “Bitch. Think you’re too
good for me—but you’re nothing but a
whore
.”

Lucas tracked him,
staying between us. When Buck jabbed, Lucas grabbed his forearm and turned,
wrenching Buck’s arm in a direction arms aren’t meant to go before turning him
to deliver a quick uppercut to the jaw. Buck’s head rotated so far he was
almost looking backward over his shoulder. He turned back and Lucas snapped
another blow straight into his lip. Holding his defensive stance and cocking
his head once to each side, Lucas’s ghost smile took on a menace it didn’t
imply when he turned it on me.

Buck roared and lunged
forward, and they went down. Height-wise, they were evenly matched.
Weight-wise, Buck had a clear forty or fifty pound advantage, and he used it to
pin Lucas, punching him in the side of the head twice before Lucas twisted,
tossing Buck onto the top of his skull. Flopping onto his back, Buck shook his
head twice, like he was trying to clear it.

Lucas tackled him,
held him down, and slugged him four times in quick succession. The sound made
me think of dad texturing steaks, and my stomach turned. Buck’s face was
quickly becoming unrecognizable, and though I couldn’t feel sorry for it, I was
afraid Lucas was crossing into what might be construed as deadly force.

“Landon! Stop!”

Dr. Heller was tearing
down the driveway.

He pulled Lucas
off Buck, who wasn’t moving. For a split second, Lucas fought back, and I was
afraid Dr. Heller was toast, but I’d underestimated my professor and his Special
Forces background. His arms a band around Lucas’s chest and arms, he barked, “
Stop
.
She’s safe. She’s safe, son.” When Lucas sagged, Dr. Heller loosened his hold.

Lucas’s eyes found
me instantly and he lurched in my direction. Sirens sounded in the distance,
closing in quickly. I heard them turn down the far end of the street at the
same time Lucas dropped to the grass beside me. He was shaking violently, the
adrenaline still pumping through him with nowhere to go. Breathing heavily, he
stared at me, lifting a hand cautiously, like he was afraid I might recoil.

My jaw throbbed,
and I deduced from his expression that it must have looked bad. His fingers
grazed over it and I flinched. He snatched his hand back and I came up on my
knees.

“Please touch me.
I need you to touch me.”

I didn’t have to
ask twice. His arms came around me, pulling me onto his lap and cradling me
against his chest. “His blood? From his nose?” He pulled the shirt away from my
chest, and it stuck, the blood already drying, to the bra underneath, and my
skin.

I nodded,
disgusted.

“Good girl.” His
arms slid around me again. “God, you’re so fucking amazing.”

I thought of
Buck’s blood on my skin and I pulled at the shirt as my stomach heaved again. “I
want it off.
I want it off
.”

He swallowed.
“Yes. Soon.” His fingers moved gently over my face. “I’m so sorry, Jacqueline.
Jesus Christ, I can’t believe I sent you out the door like that.” He choked up,
his chest rising and falling. “Please forgive me.”

As he caressed me,
I turned my head under his chin, folding into him as small as I could get. “I’m
sorry for looking her up. I didn’t know—”

“Shh, baby… not
now. Just let me hold you.” He pulled me tighter still after grabbing his
jacket from the grass nearby and draping it over me, and we stopped speaking.

An ambulance
arrived, and the EMTs roused Buck, who at least wasn’t dead. Arms crossed
dispassionately, one of the officers monitored his care as he was transferred
onto a stretcher while his partner conferred with Dr. Heller over the
altercation.