Page 42 of Chaos

“I’m not The Grinch, Finn. I like people.”

He snaps his fingers, pure smart ass. “That’s who you remind me of.”

I make a noise. Not a laugh, but something that could maybe in some uncertain terms be described as amused. Something I blame on my not-bad morning.

Shaking my head, I hang my arm out the open window and prop my feet up on the dash, muddy boots and all, just to be a pest. “Fuck you.”

I get a bad, bad feeling the very moment we start down the Webers’ drive. Kind of like when you walk down a narrow alley late at night and your instincts go haywire convincing you every noise is a footstep, every shadow is a stalker. Except instead of constantly glancing over my shoulder to check for an attacker, I keep glancing between the wing mirror and out the windshield, tense as I wait for something ominous to appear in either, or both.

“You been here before?”

“No.” Not really. Notherehere. I’ve lurked in the far recesses of the land, where me and some of my classmates used to go to drink and smoke and do other angry, teenage things. But the ranch-style house and the big barn that looks a lot like the one at Serenity are uncharted territory to me.

Oh, how I wish I could say the same about the guy standing a stone’s throw away from where Finn parks.

Even now, I consider the night I let Carl Weber take my virginity to be a genesis of sorts. The beginning of a spiraling shit-storm. I wasn’t perfect before, God knows that, but I was…manageable, I guess. The anger and the frustration and the semi-permanent urge to scream, I had it handled. I bottled it.

And then along came Carl. Twenty-one to my seventeen. He smoked. He wore a leather jacket. He was the slightly more tolerable older brother of the dipshits I went to school with, and he liked me. Or at least he told me he liked me. He liked what was between my thighs, I know that much, he told everyone that much, and once he got it… well, I don’t like thinking about the ugly aftermath.

I wish I had, though. I wish, before I hopped into Finn’s truck, that I’d considered thehewould be here. I add ‘distracting me’ to the top of the list of things I have to kick Simon and Charlie’s asses for, but there’s nothing I can do about it now. There’s nothing to do but follow Finn as he strides towards the first thing I’ve ever truly regretted, and act like I don’t want to dry-heave.

Finn greets him with a handshake and I want to punch him for it. Carl holds his dirt-stained hand out towards me, yellow-tinged fingertips wiggling, and I want to punch him too. I want to wipe the slimy smirk right off the face that looks a lot older than it is.

Instead, I shove my hands into my back pockets and scowl.

Unphased, Carl retracts his filthy paw—filthy like the way he ogles every inch of me, and I hate him all the fucking more for making me wish there weren’t quite so many bare inches to ogle.

“Charlotte Jackson,” he mouths my name like there’s something inherently dirty about it—and I guess to him, there is. “Didn’t know you were back in town, babe.”

I say nothing. He doesn't even deserve the breath it would take to snap that I’m not hisbabe.

In my peripheral, I watch Finn’s head snap my way. I feel his eyes burning into the side of my face, and when I glance aside, I get a real good look at that hard expression. He’s got a tone tomatch too, quiet but firm as he practically commands, “Wait in the car.”

It’s a knee-jerk instinct to ignore him, but it’s fucking survival that has me turning tail and hiking it back to the truck without a word of protest. Sitting sideways on the passenger seat with my legs hanging over the edge, I track the guys as they walk into the barn and wonder if they’re talking about me. Is Carl telling Finn everything? Probably. He’s a sleazy brag—that’s his prerogative.

I don’t want to know what kind of shit he’s spouting. Or rather I do want to know—I just don’twantto want to know. I know Ishouldn’tknow. I know hearing that same ol’ explicit story he just loves to recite will make me murderous and nauseous and a hundred other things that are in no way good for a girl’s sobriety.

Blowing out a breath, I flick on the radio and crank it all the way up in the hopes that the old alt-rock album Finn let me put on without complaint will distract me.

Which it does.

Too much.

So much that I don’t notice someone approaching until they’re touching me.

I jolt. My gaze flicks away from the barn and to the unfortunately familiar face hovering way too close for comfort, then drops to the hand settled way too high on my thigh. Teeth gritted, I make sure I look Clint Weber right in the eye as I promise more than warn, “You’ve got five seconds before I take that as an invitation to break your hand.”

The former classmate from hell waits until the fifth number I count aloud to do as I say. Although, him gripping the edge of the door isn’t much better. He still has me boxed in, but at least his groin is one wrong move away from getting real friendly with my knee.

Clint has always been a little shit. A jealous, vindictive asshole who didn’t like that I wouldn’t touch him with a ten foot pole. He was never exactly nice to me, but after everything went down with his brother, he was cruel.

Evidently, not much has changed.

“Lottie.” Compared to his older brother, my name sounds more like a curse coming out of Clint’s mouth. “Almost didn’t recognize you off your back.”

I can’t help it—I laugh. “As if you ever got to see me on my back.”

“Heard enough.” The corner of his mouth quirks meanly. “I can paint a pretty good mental picture.”

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