Strung (Seaside) (15 page)

“No.” She pushed against my chest. I backed up and cursed as her expression turned guilty.

“Sorry, Nat. I didn’t mean to get out of control.” I didn’t want her freaking out. If she wanted to wait we’d wait. I probably wasn’t in the right mind for that sort of thing anyways. It just… naturally happened with me. “Nat, damn.” I tugged the dress back up and set her back. I’m sorry, I’m just used to more. I’m sorry.”

“Demetri, you’re fine.” She kissed me briefly on the cheek and pulled me into a hug. “It got out of hand, it’s fine.”

It wasn’t fine.

She slept in my bed.

Wore my clothes.

Was alone at night with Alec.

Could I trust him? Did I trust her? Even when her mouth made me believe she wanted me — her eyes. Those same eyes that were staring right back at me? They were sad. Almost like she felt sorry for me.

I couldn’t stop shaking if I tried. That was it. All this time I thought it was love — instead, she was giving me pity.

“What’s wrong?”

“I just promised, that’s all.” I cleared my throat.

“You promised?”

I nodded. “Myself. I promised I wouldn’t have sex with another girl unless I knew for sure.”

“Knew what for sure?”

I swallowed and looked away. Hating that I was being such a bastard about it. “You like him.”

“Him?” she repeated.

I rolled my eyes and softly pushed her away. “Nat, I’m not stupid. We’ve alluded to this conversation many times before. It’s always the same. I feel like I’m fighting this invisible battle, and you make it that much worse when you pretend to be ignorant.”

“Alec.” She breathed his name like a kiss. The way she said his name — it was different then the way she said mine.

I couldn’t look at her. “Has he kissed you?”

“Yes,” she mumbled. “But, he told me he wasn’t good for me, he pushed me away, we both decided we were better friends. It was a mistake.”

I watched the waves roll across the shore. “I just don’t get it. I don’t understand why it always has to be like this.”

“Like what?”

I shook my head. “I need to change, Nat. My flight leaves in an hour.” I quickly peeled off my shirt, Nat gasped and reached for me.

“What?” I braced her shoulders. “Are you okay?”

“Your, um, your tattoo.” Well crap. No way out of that one without telling the truth and I’d prefer to be high if I actually had to tell her. “What does it say?”

I exhaled and looked away. “My heart will be yours forever.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “Just like Alec’s.”

Damn it! I’m not HIM! I wanted to scream. Why did it have to be like that? Why did she have to want him? I jerked her against my body until nothing separated us. “I’m nothing like Alec.”

Nat tried to pull away, but I couldn’t let her, she had to understand “Please, Nat. I’m not him, I’m not him.” I closed my eyes and touched my forehead to hers, wanting to cry. Wanting to tell her the truth, begging her to love me even if the truth was ugly. “I was never him. She knew that, but it didn’t matter. I just want to be me. Love me.”

“Did I ask you to be him?” she said weakly.

I tilted her chin and brushed a soft kiss across her lips. “No, Baby. It’s not what you said. This is all me, my shitty baggage. Got it?”

“Got it,” she mumbled.

“You okay?” She rubbed a hand across my face then brought her lips to mine. It was my goodbye kiss. I pushed her against the wall and moved to unzip her dress again. Maybe, if I tried really hard, I could lose myself in her. Maybe just this once, she’d let me see all of her, she’d let me have the parts he hadn’t taken yet, the parts he hadn’t yet stolen. I pushed her harder and slid the dress off of her body within seconds. It pooled at her feet. Without moving my mouth from hers, I lifted her off the ground and wrapped her legs around my hips, grabbing her ass and making it impossible for her to leave me, impossible for her not to straddle me and see how much I wanted her.

I moaned as one of my hands moved to the delicate lace of her bra, pushing harder against her body so that I could keep us fused together. Her skin felt hot — and me? I was cold. Everywhere felt cold.

“Demetri” — she panted tensing beneath me — “What’s wrong? Remember, slow?” My tongue swirled down the side of her neck, grasping at anything she’d throw at me. “Demetri,” she repeated. Ignoring her, my hands moved lower, dipping into her underwear.

“No!” she shouted. The abruptness of her pushing against my chest almost sent her ass sailing to the ground. So that was it. My answer. She’d give him her heart — her body — her everything.

And again. I’d be left with nothing.

“You need to go, Nat.” I kept my back turned to her.

“What the heck was that?” she yelled.

“Nothing.”

“Demetri.” She walked up behind me and wrapped her arms around my stomach. “Talk to me.”

“I just wanted you first.” Honest truth. I wanted to be the guy who made her smile, who made her laugh, who held her when she cried. Instead, I got nothing. Story of my life.

I turned and glared at Nat. She blinked those hellishly long lashes, “First?”

“Before everything happens.” My muscles were so tense I was convinced I was going to have a seizure or something.

“What are you talking about? Are you high? On drugs? Before what happens?”

I was exploding. From the inside out. My shoulders collapsed, unable to hold my body straight anymore, and I was in pain, not just emotional pain but physical pain. Pain so severe that I couldn’t stop myself from wincing. It came from every direction. The car crash, the drugs, my brother, my ex-girlfriend, the son he lost, the life I lived, the rejection. Over and over again it hit me like the waves of that damn tide outside. Without realizing it, I had reached into my pocket and lifted a pill to my lips.

I took it.

I took it and prayed it would work, and a part of me? Prayed it wouldn’t, so that I would have an excuse to do it again.

“I’ll always love you,” I whispered.

“Demetri, I love you.” Funny, I hadn’t realized until this day that there were different types of love. Sucked that the one she felt for me didn’t hold a candle to the way she felt about him. What sucked even more? I knew every dirty secret. I may have an issue with drugs — but at least I didn’t kill anyone, at least I didn’t steal from my little brother — yeah, she was choosing the brother who was the villain, she just didn’t know it yet.

“I know.” I smiled sadly and exhaled. “I’ll see you in another week or so, okay?”

“Okay.” She shivered, went and put on her dress

“I’ll miss you,” I croaked. She nodded and caught the fact that I’d just thrown another pill in my mouth.

“What are you taking?”

“Pain killers” — I rolled my eyes — “Because I’m in pain, Nat.”

I threw the pills onto the bed, not caring that she saw them, not caring that she would probably tell Alec and grabbed my bag.

“Gotta go, Nat.” I opened my mouth, to apologize, to tell her I loved her, to tell her I needed her more than she realized, instead, her eyes darted behind her as the door slammed shut. Alec was home. Well fancy that. “I’ll text you.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Alec

I’D BEEN TEXTING
Demetri all day. He left for the airport without saying anything other than ‘thanks’ and that he’d see me in another week or so.

Just like that, he left.

On Sunday I texted him so much that my battery died, finally he responded.

Demetri: Have you been on TV?

Me: On TV?

Demetri: Nevermind. Has Nat seen TV?

Me: We don’t live together. Why don’t you text your girlfriend and ask?

Demetri: Hah, you made a joke. So Angelica Greene…

I almost choked. I did not like that girl. Hell, I hated that girl. If there was one girl I could actually say that about it was her — after all, she had the power to ruin my life. She was the last person Demetri needed to be mixed up with.

Me: Yeah?

Demetri: You ever talk to her?

Me: No. I don’t negotiate with terrorists.

Demetri: Pictures of us together.

Me: Bad?

Demetri: Define bad…

Me: Breakup bad?

Demetri: Is that what you want? For them to be so bad that Nat and I are no more?

Me: Of course not.

Demetri: Whatever. They’re terrible. Now you can have Nat, maybe by the time I come back you’ll be married with another kid on the way. Wouldn’t that be nice? After all, you deserve it. You deserve her.

Me: WTF?!

Demetri: I gotta go.

He didn’t answer my texts the rest of the night. When I flipped on the TV it was to see Angelica leaving Demetri’s hotel room. Well great.

A loud knocking on the door interrupted my irritation. Shit. It was either Nat or a serial killer.

Was it wrong to hope for a serial killer, maybe an Ax?

I couldn’t deal with her. Not now. Not when I was worried sick about my brother having a drug overdose or finding out my dirty little secrets with Angelica. Hell, my life was messed up, spinning out of control.

I jerked open the door. “What?”

“What the heck is his problem?” Nat roared, stomping into the house like a woman on the edge.

“Good evening to you too,” I muttered behind her. Was it too much to ask for her to have not seen the ONE glimpse of Demetri with Angelica?

“First he’s all trying to take advantage of me at your house, then spouting nonsense about you and me, and then…” Her voice rose to hysterical proportions. “He said that he wanted to be first. Of course, that was after his second attempt at getting me out of my dress and into his bed, and then he wouldn’t let me go, and then he got all weird and I saw pills and freaked. It was like he was saying goodbye. More like,
Sorry Nat, but I’m gonna go screw some movie star instead!
” Her eyes brimmed with tears. While I was still trying to figure out what the hell to do. Pills. Bed. Sex. Shit! “I’ve been heart-broken for almost forty-eight hours thinking I’ve done something tragic to him and he’s, he’s—”

“Nat,” I interrupted, my voice severe. “Stop.”

“No!” She whipped around and charged toward me, poking me in the chest. “You don’t get to tell me what to do! You rejected me! Twice — wait, three times!”

I rolled my eyes. “Listen, Nat. As much as I’d love to sit here and listen to you complain about my brother’s shitty decisions and lack of love for you, I’d rather not. Everything he’s done has been for you, and you repay him by coming over here and talking shit? Really?” Yeah I was so calling the kettle black but whatever. She was making out Demetri to be the monster when we both knew who currently held that title.

“How is him cheating on me doing me a favor? Because I’m dying to know. This ought to be good.” She crossed her arms and sniffed.

“It’s complicated.”

Her head snapped up. “Of course it is. It’s always complicated with you two, and you never tell me why! I don’t know why you’re here, I don’t know why you chose my mom out of all people to see, and I don’t know why you have the same stupid tattoo!”

“Get out,” I snapped, pulling at her arm. She could say whatever she wanted about me, but not about the tattoo, not about shit she didn’t know about, not even about Demetri. We brought her into our lives and all we did was invite more drama. So even though it hurt like hell to kick her out of my house, maybe it was better for everyone if we both cooled off.

“I didn’t mean it was stupid, just that—”

“Out.” I gently pushed her out the door. “Nat, go home. We should never have involved you in the first place.”

“What are you saying?” Her lower lip quivered.

“I’m saying goodbye.”

“You’re shutting me out,” she said numbly, her face going pale

I closed my eyes and whispered, “Family comes first.”

“And I’m not family.”

Silence.

“Right.” She choked back a sob and ran away from me, breaking my heart with each step. I wanted to chase after her, to apologize, but again, I was paralyzed in place. My desire to love her, to care for her, to be with her, it was never going to trump my desire to be the brother Demetri deserved. If he slid back into old habits, I needed to know. Nat didn’t understand. How did someone who’d never done drugs understand the pull they had on you? You don’t even realize you’re sunk until it’s too late. The most dangerous time to relapse is right after rehab, your body’s clean but you still take the same dosages before, it’s how people die!

I quickly dialed the number to another one of my body guards and of course our manager. I needed them to send someone over to Demetri’s hotel room… immediately. I couldn’t fly there in time.

An hour later — and I knew for a fact that Demetri had been passed out in his hotel room — sleeping. Big shock there. But had been sharing a few drinks with Angelica.

Did he sleep with her? Would he be that stupid?

I spent the rest of the night tossing and turning. Regretting every single thing that had flown out of my mouth when I’d talked with Nat. Fear had a way of making me overreact. And I owed her an apology. Which was why I was going to attach myself to her person all day Monday at school. People were going to be ruthless, especially considering they knew Demetri and Nat were together.

So it was up to me to make sure she had a good day at school. I may not be the man she deserved; I may never be that man. But I had today. And today I could protect her. Today I could do everything within my power to make her smile.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Demetri

IT WAS OVER.

We were so over.

I scrolled through the texts that Nat had sent me. She said Alec made her eat soggy fries — sounded like him. Swear the guy was obsessed with people eating. Actually, it had more to do with his insane need to control everything within his grasp.

My hotel room was dark. I was supposed to be returning back to Seaside in less than twenty-four hours. But I didn’t want to go.

Because Nat was there and I didn’t know how to face her. You know that feeling — where you have so much going on, you’re so overwhelmed that you don’t even know where to start? I had so much shit going on in my head that it was overwhelming to even breathe — let alone try to explain to Nat why I did the things I did.