Page 46 of The Boy I Loved
The music grew louder when we reached the top of the stairs, voices mixing with the bass of the melody. My stomach twisted with unease once we reached the bottom and there were no signs of any of the guys—not even Rodney and this was his fucking party.
“Shit,” I muttered under my breath.
Hazel glanced over at me in confusion. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I murmured, glancing around the room as I tugged her toward the front door. “I think the guys left without me.”
It wasn’t a complete lie. I had no idea where they’d gone. It was possible that it was my own paranoia. I wasalwaysparanoid, constantly looking over my shoulder like something might have jumped out at me.
I ushered her toward my vehicle, opening the door for her. She slid inside with reluctance, her eyes bouncing from me to her surroundings as if my own paranoid nature triggered her own. Once I was in the driver’s seat, I whipped out my phone, glancing down at the screen.
Nicky: Call me when you’re done being a whore.
I scoffed, a small smile tugging at my lips. Nicholas was the least likely to be a dickwad. I didn’t know a whole lot about him, just that he was roped into our world, too. He kept his personal affairs private and never spoke much about his emotions. I wasn’t a fool though. If Clay told him to jump, he’d jump.
Placing the key into the ignition, I twisted until the engine roared to life. Hazel rubbed at her arm, a series of goosebumps rising along the flesh there.
“Are you cold?” I asked, putting the vehicle in reverse.
“A little.”
I reached forward and turned the heat on, reveling in the warmth it provided. My heart raced as I pulled out onto the main road, checking all the mirrors available to me. When I was certain no one was following, I relaxed a bit, blowing out a soft breath of air.
Neither one of us spoke. My head was too much of a mess to answer any of her questions, and she probably didn’t want to know the answers to begin with. My only reprieve was that I got to have her one last time, even if it destroyed us both.
When I pulled into her driveway, emotion clogged my throat. There were so many memories here, so many things I wished we could just … go back to. Her family welcomed me like I was an extension of them, and my parents loved them equally. We’d all become united, until my father died and everything went to shit.
The passenger side door opened, snapping my attention from the house and to the girl at my side. I reached out, grabbing her small arm in my large palm and tugged her back toward me.
“What are you—” she began, turning to look at me. But I didn’t give her the luxury of a response. Instead, I gripped her face between my hands and crushed my lips against hers, kissing her like I’d never kissed her before, kissing her like I’d never have the chance to again.
Hazel went limp between my hands, her lips parting to give me the access I needed and craved. She was the only girl on this Earth I’d never tire of. She was fuckingeverything. Her soft sigh drifted through the gap between my lips, and I swallowed it down eagerly, wanting to take every sound she offered me and let it consume me whole.
“I love you so fucking much,” I muttered against her mouth. “I’m sorry.”
“I love you, too, Dom.”
A ragged breath escaped me and with all the strength in the world, I released her. She stared at me for a few moments, her lipsraw and swollen. If she stayed a second longer, I wasn’t sure she’d ever get out of this car. Fortunately for me, she turned back to the door and pushed it the rest of the way open before climbing out.
I waited, making sure she’d made it in the house safely before grabbing my phone again and dialing Nicholas as requested. It took a few moments, but he finally answered.
“Hello?”
“What’s up?” I replied, putting the car in reverse and backing out of her driveway.
My palms were sweaty around the steering wheel, a sense of foreboding washing over me and settling deep in my veins.
“Clay is requesting your presence,” he explained. “I covered for you as much as I could, but he’s losing his patience.”
I swallowed thickly, pulling to a stop at the intersection. “I appreciate it. Do you know what he wants?” He usually didn’t call for us this late unless something had come up, and by the way Nicholas was acting, it was easy to assume that was exactly why Clay was wanting us there.
“He said he’d fill us in when you got here.”
My teeth scraped together in frustration. “Got it. I’m on my way.” With that, I ended the call, tossing my phone on the seat beside me before adding more pressure on the gas.
As long as Hazel and Alice remained safe, I’d do whatever they wanted me to. Clay knew that, and it was something he’d threatened me with a lot over the years as a means to keep me in line. So many times I’d thought about kidnapping my sister and Hazel and fleeing the country—anything to protect them and get me out of the screwed-up situation I was in. For a while, Clay knew that—at least … I was fairly certain he did. Which was why he’d put me on grunt work until he trusted me enough to do what he needed me to.
Grunt work was my own personal Hell. He made me clean up shit, piss, vomit, and semen. He had me on trash and bathroom duty, and I was responsible for guarding the cafeteria where the girls ate.I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t contemplated taking my own life on more than one occasion. The only thing that kept me going during times like those were thoughts of Alice, Hazel, and my mother. They wouldn’t want this life for me, but they wouldn’t want me dead either.
