Page 60 of Love Me

“Ev’s gone for the weekend,” I say, referring to my roommate.

She visibly relaxes. I lead her into my bedroom and wait for her to sit on my bed before I turn on the lamp on my desk.

Monique doesn’t say anything as she remains on the side of the bed. I kneel in front of her, looking over how she clasps her hands in her lap. A couple of her nails are broken, with chipped polish.

She never lets the polish on her nails chip before she changes the color.

Without asking, I reach for the scarf around her neck. I know she’s hiding something. It’s springtime. Not cold enough for the scarf and heavy hoodie she’s wearing.

I pause when she flinches away from me.

“I need to see it,” I tell her. I don’t move my hands away, but I wait for her to give me the okay.

When her head dips slightly on a nod, I slowly unravel the scarf. She blanches a little as if she’s in physical pain.

I drop the scarf on the bed next to her and sit there and stare at the red marks that stretch around her throat.

“Did? When?” The words come out strangled. White hot fury clogs my throat.

My father and uncles have taught me multiple ways to take a man’s life. It’s a fact among the men in my family. Right now, I’m envisioning using the most dangerous and painful ways to end Slater Cullen’s life.

“He did this?” I finally manage to squeeze out through the anger.

She turns her head away.

“Tell me what happened.” I need to know to decide just how painful his death is going to be.

“It’s my fault.”

Those three words are like a punch to my stomach. All of the air races out of me. I don’t know what happened. Truthfully, I don’t need to know to know that whatever that motherfucker did is not her fault.

“Don’t, Mo.” I can’t help the ice-cold tone that comes out of me. “What did he do to you?”

She grabs the scarf and begins twisting it around and around in her hands. I don’t say anything partly because the anger still has a hold on my entire body, making it too difficult to speak. The other reason is because she needs me to be patient.

She came to me because she knows she’s safe with me. I don’t want to scare her off.

Instead of speaking, I run my hands up and down her legs in an effort to comfort her. Eventually, her breathing slows, and she looks me in the eyes.

“We went to a party at one of the frat houses.”

My stomach twists into knots. Nothing good ever started off with a sentence like that.

“It was all good for a while. He started drinking too much, and I got annoyed so I went to talk with some other people.” Pausing, she looks off toward the corner of the room.

“I guess he didn’t like me ignoring him. He started to say I was flirting with a friend of his. I tried to ignore him and went upstairs where some of my friends were hanging out.”

Her fingers tighten around the scarf.

“It was fine for almost an hour. Then he came upstairs and told me he wanted to apologize. I could smell the alcohol on him, but I thought he sobered up a little. We went into one of the other bedrooms.

“Instead of an apology, though, he started to kiss me. I pushed him away. He started to talk crap about how lucky I am to be dating him. How his family wouldn’t even approve of him dating a Black girl and … Diego!” she yells after me.

Before I can let her finish, I’m on my feet, keys in my hand and halfway to the door.

“Where are you going?” She runs in front of me to ask like she doesn’t know.

“Stay here,” I grit out.

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