Page 49 of Full Throttle

She blinked as I brushed some of her hair to the side, taking in her beauty. Fuck, she was so damn beautiful. I’d never forget her face. Even if, by some miracle, I met another woman, Nik would always be in the back of my mind.

“What do you mean? Where are you sleeping?” she whispered, her arms coming around my waist. I stiffened.

This was wrong.

I shouldn’t be leading her on like this.

Not when I planned on never seeing her again aside from school. I dropped my hands from her face and gently pulled her away from me. “I have to go.” I brushed by her to get the Jeep keys from the work bench. I unlocked the back door and tossed my duffel inside before turning to load up the tools I’ve collected over the years from the scrap yard.

I felt her eyes on me as she watched me work. Once I was done, I came around to the front and quickly made sure the Jeep was okay to drive the short five miles to the storage unit. When I shut the hood, she came to stand beside me. “Where are you going?”

I turned to her. “Away from here, Nik. I’m eighteen. It’s time to move on.”

She chewed the inside of her cheek as her arms wrapped around her middle. Then, she looked away from me to the house. “You sound like you’ve had this planned.”

“This afternoon—hey, look at me,” I said, grabbing her chin. I couldn’t it stand when she didn’t look at me. “This afternoon, what you saw in there, was not part of the plan. I mean, fuck, I didn’t even know the bitch had a gun.”

She winced. “I don’t like that word.”

“That’s the only word I have for her. Sorry.”

She stared up at me, not saying a word. I didn’t like that. I didn’t like that she didn’t like me referring to my mother like that. That’s what she was, a fucking bitchy woman. It wasn’t my fault Dominique didn’t understand that.

I dropped my hand, shaking my head. “You wouldn’t understand anyways. Not with your perfect family, your nice little house, with your clean clothes and fresh food.”

I took a step back. This was good. It was better this way. She would never understand the hell I’d been through, even though she watched it from a front row seat most of my life.

Nik shook her head. “Don’t—that’s not…don’t talk like that. Of course I understand.”

Anger took over then, something dark and twisted stirring inside me. “No,” I said lowly as another round of thunder sounded off outside. “You’ll never fucking understand, Dominique. You live in a picture-perfect world with your stupid cupcakes and pretty dresses. You know nothing!”

She flinched as another tear fell. “Why are you talking to me like this?”

I laughed, looking away from her. “Damn, you just don’t get it, do you?”

When I looked back at her, even though I’d been driven by anger, I knew that hurting her was the only way to sever this—no matter how amazing it’d been. “We’re done, Nik. I don’t know why you keep fighting for a friendship I grew out of years ago.”

“You don’t mean that,” she pushed out, shaking her head.

“I do,” I confirmed, walking around her to the driver’s side of the truck. “It’s time to grow up.” I yanked open the door, climbing inside. A small part of me expected for her to come to the window and plead for me not to leave.

She shocked the hell out of me when she lifted her chin slightly, wiping away her final tear. Without another word, she walked to the table, grabbed the cupcakes, and walked right back out. I watched, not even bothering to start the engine as she walked across the yard and through the wide gate opening.

She didn’t look back.

My gut twisted, but I ignored that too.

“No looking back,” I whispered, starting the engine.

Chapter Eleven

Nikki

Eighteen years ago. Detroit, MI. The Pit.

“What are we doing here?” my friend, Macy, harshly whispered to me as I put the car in park.

We were in the middle of an empty parking lot at eleven PM on a Friday night. This wasn’t the place two sixteen (almost seventeen) year old high school girls needed to be. These were the kinds of places my dad warned me about when he was giving me the safety lecture after I’d gotten my license.

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