Page 29 of Sinister Hearts
“You still got it.” He smiled, and twirled me around. Flushed and smiling, my chest fluttered like a dragon wing in the wind. Except, I was the wing and Jax was my wind, taking me higher and higher. The music stopped and we stood there in the desert sun beams, sharing breaths, gazes, and heartbeats. That tarot card flashed in my mind, the devil—temptation, seduction.The words rang and echoed in my mind.
I abruptly distanced myself from his tender grasp. “We should go. The sun is out and Birdie will be up soon,” I said, interrupting the intimate moment between us. I tried to seem unfazed by the moment we just shared.
“Don’t let him win, Faye,” he remarked, and stared at me, almost broken.
“What are you talking about?” I replied, immediately on the defense.
“Whatever he’s done, don’t let him take your light. You used to light this town up. Don’t let him take the good parts of you, Robles.” Jax replied with pain in his low, cracked voice.
My chest heaved as tears threatened to gather in my eyes. “I’m not,” I huffed at him, begrudged by his comment.
“You deserve happiness, Faye, eventually you’re going to have to let someone in,” he said, packing up the blankets in the truck.
“I don’t need to do a God damn thing, and you have no damn clue what I’m going through!” I sneered, pacing to the truck and slamming his heavy door.
We drove back to Ma’s in silence, and I felt my heart cave in a deep descent. Maybe Jax was right. Maybe I was letting Vadon win, and that pissed me off even more. Who did he think he was, preaching to me? It wasn’t his business! On top of that I was already pre-warned, and who else better to seduce me than my rebel cowboy ex with a beard and really fucking hot tattoos. That bastard! I needed to keep my eye on the ball and get Birdie and I away from this small little wicked town where I knew we would be safe.
“So you’re not going to tell me what is going on?” he asked sternly, gripping the steering wheel in frustration. “Your car was vandalized, and you have things following you! Will you just let me in? Let me help you, for fuck sakes, Faye!” he stammered, his words hitting me like bricks.
“What did you just say?” I was still stuck on the“things are following you”part. Jax realized his word vomit. “What do you know? Who are you? Answer me right now!” I demanded. Jax stopped the truck rapidly, turning to me.
“I’m the fucking guy who not ever, for one second in five years, stopped thinking of you, wanting you, missing you! Not in Norway, not in prison, not in this fucking realm, have I ever stopped thinking of you. Your entire existence overrules mine. You have hexed me. I think of nobody else, I dream of nobody else. I exist only for you, that’s who I am!” Jax exclaimed, returning back to the road like his words didn’t just slice me in half. I was stunned, I had no rebuttal to his raw admission. “You don’t have to do it alone anymore. Whateveritis, Faye,” he said, his eyes full of remorse and hurt.
I cut him off. “I don’t know what it is, I don’t know anything,” I shouted at him, telling him in complete honesty. I felt a significant loss of my own rationality. His guess was as good as mine. I didn’t know shit about fuck.
There’s one thing that hadn’t changed about Faye and that was for certain—she was still a stubborn brat. It made me both want to spank her perfectly round ass, and kiss her until I took the very breath from her so she would shut up for once. As soon as I felt like I was breaking down one wall, there came another. I saw the look in her eyes when we were dancing. I knew my girl was still in there. Her pain was so heavy, all I wanted to do was help her carry it. She thought her scars madeher unworthy, but had no idea how otherworldly and beautiful they made her. She’s a true diamond built by pressure and pain. Like a painted canvas full of both light and dark. She was meant to be admired and enamored. I loved her darkness just the same. I wanted her darkness to make love to my demons, just to see her shine for me in those blissful and fleeting moments. Moments that still captivated me, moments that still brought me to my knees.
Faye thought her pain would scare me away, but I didn’t scare easily. Not even Odin himself could keep me away from her. I needed to make her remember what it felt like to submit to a man who was deserving, with full trust and certainty. It would take time, but I would do that for her. I would wait for my girl. I’d waited five years. I would crumble her towering walls and make them bow to me. The only tears I wanted to see her ever shed, were the tears she’d shed choking on my cock as I claimed her.
Creed and Avi’s engagement party was today. He asked me to be his best man a few weeks ago and of course l accepted the honor.
I struggled in the mirror with my bolo tie, my thoughts racing about a certain brown-eyed beauty. A thief who took up space in my hollow heart. My suit was fitted and tailored to my tall muscular frame, but I cuffed the long sleeve button up so the tattoos on my forearm peeked out. I was proud of my ink, yet haunted by it most times. A suit really wasn’t my style, but I’d do anything for my little brother.Fucker owes me for this. This whole engagement ball idea was Selene’s. We weren’t evensurprised. The woman threw all the events in town, and to no one’s surprise she outdid herself every time. Avi hired Selene to take care of all the planning. She was too busy for party planning when she was constantly working and taking care of her parents.
I was happy for my brother, but it all seemed sudden. He had me out here looking like a bearded Viking Ken doll. I tousled with my suit and groaned. Maybe it was my nerves. Maybe I was jealous of my brother. Marriage was a strong, unbreakable bond, and a promise in our bloodline. A vow, a bond I had yet to make to anyone, knowing I’d want that bond with one person only.My little light.
I brushed my dark auburn beard in the mirror. Today was the day. I knew Faye would be at the engagement party, and I had been looking forward to this day for months. Not just to see my brother celebrate, but also because I knew my little tinkered light would be there. There were so many things I wanted to say to her, I just didn’t even know where to start. What did you say to the girl you fell in love with six years ago who you hurt, and who hurt you right back, then sent you into a dark spiral?
Oh hey, sorry I was such a shithole?That would probably be a good start, I thought to myself. She hates me when I’m not making her come, and I couldn’t blame her. Something about seeing her car vandalized sent an eerie alert in me that jumbled my insides. It wasn’t unusual for the bible thumpers to do pranks like this, especially this time of year. But I saw the trepidation in her eyes.
This was different, and I think she knew it too. It seemed like both our closeted skeletons were busting loose. Except I’d learned to own mine, to alchemise mine. A lesson that had to be learned, not taught. A lesson my girl was on the brink of and I wanted nothing more than to take the burden on her. I was too wise to be so ignorant—knowing the dark night of the soul was crucial for anyone’s becoming and healing process. It wastrue when they said ‘feel so you can heal’. The problem with feeling was some souls got so caught up in the darkness, they never made it out. I had been at the pit of that very hell. A hell I had to endure behind bars for two years, mainly keeping to myself. Some inmates were mortal, some not so much. Including the corrections officers. You could tell which ones had their allegiances, too. Especially the inmates with certain capabilities and wealth. Those two years were still not nearly as bad as the two years in those mountains in Norway. Nobody was capable of touching me. Not here, not in prison, not anywhere I was a Grimwood, my last name alone ranking above all else. I could live with myself and the things I’ve done, it was my honor. But the question was, could she? The mere thought of rejection tugged at me, ready to be on the brink of my destruction.
I walked out to the overly themed ball engagement party, wanting to choke myself with one of these damn hanging linens. I sat down at my reserved seat with my brothers and Pop when I saw her walk in, taking the very breath right out of me. Her olive skin was luminous in the sunset, her dark hair pinned up in loose curls. Her dangling earrings were simple yet gorgeous, just like her. The necklace she wore was a dainty chain that wrapped around her neck, accompanied by a dark crystal, wrapped in gold swirls. A necklace I’ve noticed she’s worn ever since she got here. I’ve never felt jealous of a piece of jewelry before, besides at this very moment. I wanted to wrap my hands around her dainty neck and kiss it. Melt into her skin… into her. But it was always her exotic dark eyes that got me, and those heart-shaped lips. My gods, what I wouldn’t give to kiss those sensual lips again.
She wore a long black fitted satin dress.How fitting, I thought. The last thing she probably wanted to do was be at an engagement party while going through a divorce. I glanced down to her boots, chuckling while drinking my whiskey. You can take the gal out of the country, but can’t take the country out of thegal. I was impressed that even then, even now, after everything, deep down she was still that small town girl. I sniffed the air to catch her scent. I yearned for her so deeply, groaning in arousal. She smelled like home. Like mine.
Faye sat at the table with her mother and Birdie. I don’t think I’d ever seen her this dressed up and it made my cock swell in my dress pants. I tried to adjust myself in my seat. I needed to calm down. It wasn’t until I watched her light up while talking to her daughter and then get lost in a candle’s flame that was on the table’s centerpiece, that my dick went limp. I knew that look. My girl was somewhere, but not here. One minute she was vibrant and the next she was gone again. Her expression blank, her eyes hazy. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Where was my little light? I was going to flame her embers, and add more coal to her weakened flame.Where did you go, baby girl?
Avi and Creed’s engagement party was perfect. A gothic ball daydream, with different shades of black and off white, and black lace linens that covered the round tables. The tables each had a center piece of fresh black flowers, and a picture of both of them on the hiking trip where Creed proposed. Their celebration was set up on the Grimwood farm, and Selene being as brilliant as she was, had huge party tents up, all of them decorated with string lights and black tapestries. There were even balloons andflower arches as you entered. It was beautiful. It was everything I had imagined it would be for Avi. She deserved this moment and I was so happy for her. Although, the last time I was at a wedding it was my own, and it took me back to that day. A day I had lived to regret. Mesmerized by the candle flame, my memories transcended me into a different time. A time when I no longer wanted to be alive.
Five years ago-
The candle flame burned on the center piece. Everything seemed to be perfect. So why did I feel so much dread? I had never imagined myself pregnant on my wedding day. Or even a wedding day at all. Did you dream of being a bride when you were a child? Did you dream of a big wedding and a princess dress? I dreamt of running wild with horses. I dreamt of freedom, a love so tender I never flinched at it. I had failed. I picked at the beads on my wedding dress, eyeing my reflection and my swollen belly. I turned the shower water on so I could process it alone. This was supposed to be the happiest day of my life, wasn’t it? Wasn’t this what us girls dreamt of? A big lavish wedding, a wealthy husband.
Black mascara tears rolled down my pink, blush cheeks. I fought my cries so he wouldn’t hear me. How could I have everything, yet feel so empty? Did I perhaps entertain the idea that after we wed, maybe that raw connection and passion would set into place? I laughed at myself as I looked up in disdain at myself in the shower mirror. “You foolish fucking girl,” I whispered to my idiotic reflection. I was four monthspregnant with Birdie and my dress was so tight I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to rip out like The Hulk. The overly beaded dress suffocated my lungs. Everything was suffocating, including my life. Everyone gushed at how beautiful the wedding was. Then there were certain family members who I could hear snickering about me—I tried to ignore it all night. A part of me just wanted the night to be over, and thank fuck, it almost was. Shouldn’t I be over the moon? Making love to my husband? The single thought repulsed me. Vadon walked into the hotel room, annihilated like he always was. His drunken ruckus in the hotel room was heard over the shower stream, and my skin instantly crawled in disgust.
I stepped out of the bathroom carefully in my wrapped towel, after my long anticipated shower. Vadon sat there on the bed with a deadpan face as if he was just waiting for me. His dark, obscure eyes peered up at me. Vadon just sat there in complete silence, scaring me. I knew Vadon was gone. I knew now I was dealing with a different man, a demon. One I had gotten to know very well. Vadon sober was a gambling, possessive, controlling person. But Vadon intoxicated was something else entirely. He was my worst nightmare. Just two months prior to the wedding, he went on a drunken binge and didn’t come home for days. It was the second time he’d done it to me and both times it was a different story. How all the guys went four wheeling, how he’d stayed over at his best friend Mike’s, instead of coming home.
The first time I believed him. But each time it was becoming more difficult to be so naive. This second time, I was pregnant with Birdie, and he’d come home the morning after, telling me he fell asleep in his friend’s car. I could smell the liquor tainting his pores, still a stain on his breath. I knew he was lying, so why didn’t I leave? I would drown in shame those nights. While he snored, I would swallow my tears and my self worth. I knewI had made the wrong decision, to leave the only place I ever felt safe. That feeling of love and safety was now so foreign. I hadn’t felt genuinely happy in so long, yet I still married him. Was I too stubborn to go crying back to Ma’s, that I’d rather suffer in silence, than to have all the townspeople say, “I told you so.” To laugh and make a mockery of me, knowing that I failed miserably. I rubbed my swollen belly. I had really done it this time, hadn’t I? Yet, I was still here in this lavish resort with this drunken enraged man. I was a caged bird before, but now the cage had locked me in and I had no one to blame but myself, feeling so stuck and confused. I wanted to just disappear, I wanted the pain to end, I wanted to crumble.
