Chapter 19
Charlie barely felt like herself. She was tired all the time.
Sleeping all the time. Crying all the time.
She just wanted to make the pain go away.
She was walking around with this pit in her stomach and it made her weak.
It was like losing Demi made her feel all her past hurts too.
It all came at her at once. She carried her guitar case into the club.
He had said to go. To show up. To not go would seem suspicious, so despite her fleeting nerves, she walked into the building.
She expected to see the blood still staining the floor, but it was clean. It was like the night before hadn’t even happened.
“Hey, Charles,” Justin said.
“Hey,” she greeted, her eyes never leaving the spot on the floor.
She wondered if Demi had killed Frankie.
Every time he called, she couldn’t bring herself to answer.
The way he had beaten Frankie the night before had terrified Charlie.
Deep inside, she knew he was dangerous but seeing it.
.. Charlie just couldn’t shake her fear of him.
“You heard from Frankie? His car’s here and the door was unlocked when I got here but he’s nowhere in sight,” Justin said.
She shook her head but couldn’t quite find the lie she was searching for.
Her face was pale, and she was sure she would throw up. The room was hot.
“Charles, you okay? You look kind of...”
Before Justin could finish his sentence, she was falling.
“Whoa, Charles.” He caught her and Charlie clung to him as he scooped her off her feet.
“Can we just get out of here?” she asked.
“This place makes me sick.” It reminded her of Demi, of the way his fist had crashed into Frankie’s face, of the way his eyes had gone completely blank, of the sound Frankie’s hand had made when Demi broke it.
If she stayed, she may reveal something she shouldn’t.
She was grateful when she heard the clang of the heavy club door open and felt the sun on her face as Justin carried her to her car.
“You good to make it home?” he asked as he put her in the driver’s seat.
She nodded. “Yeah, it’s been a long night. I don’t feel that great and I just don’t feel like being here.”
Justin looked back at the club and then toward the car pulling into the parking lot. The rest of the band was arriving for rehearsal.
“Get home, Charles. Get some rest. I’ll check on you later after I get these niggas together in rehearsal, if that’s okay with you,” he said.
Charlie nodded. “Yeah. I could use a friend right now. I’ll text you the address,” she agreed.
She felt everything as she drove home. Fear, regret, anger, disappointment.
Her life felt like it was spiraling out of control.
In hours, heaven had become hell and the man she loved had become the man she hated to love.
She just wanted to go back to not knowing him, to not needing him.
It was hard to believe there was a time when Demi hadn’t been hers.
The craving was too strong to be new. She walked into her shiny new condo that her shiny new man had purchased her but the perfection of it all made her sad.
Without Demi, it felt like she was visiting.
It didn’t feel like home. She wished she had somewhere else to go.
Anywhere. Her old place, even her father’s home, but she couldn’t.
She had given it all up. For love. For Demitrius Sky.
She had never felt so lonely, even in her darkest times she had always been able to find a light. All she saw was darkness.
Charlie dropped her purse at the door and didn’t bother taking off her shoes, a spite to Demi, as she made her way to the kitchen. Liquor. Charlie needed liquor. The brown shit because it would get her fucked up faster and she just wanted something to take the ache in her tummy away.
She helped herself to Demi’s fifteen-hundred-dollar bottle of cognac and downed a shot. He would have gone crazy had he seen her because he sipped the expensive liquor slowly. Charlie poured another and took it to the head.
The knock at the door startled her and Bails barked at the intrusion.
“Good boy,” she said as she went to answer. His loyalty was unmatched because Bails was right on her heels. She pulled open the door and the sight of Justin standing there made her eyes pool with tears.
“I canceled rehearsal,” he informed. “I had somewhere better to be.”
Charlie stared at him for an awkward beat. She didn’t realize a tear had escaped until he wiped it away.
“You know every man I’ve ever loved has chosen someone else.
Am I that bad?” she asked. She was so sick of this shit.
This hurting. This curse of the side chick that Demi had put on her.
Women in her position never won. She knew it.
The problem was she hadn’t known she was in second place.
She hadn’t even known it was a competition.
She just wanted to be first. Only. Charlie wanted to be someone’s only.
Even if it was temporary. Even if it was just one night.
“The nigga’s stupid, Charles,” Justin said.
“Is he? Or am I just expendable?”
Justin stepped across the threshold and Charlie’s breath hitched as he caressed her cheek.
“You’re gorgeous,” he whispered. Charlie’s eyes closed as he came closer.
Peppermint. She could smell peppermint on his breath.
He had popped one before knocking on her door.
It flattered her. The simplest act of wanting to smell good before she let him in.
Demi had done the most and been a disappointment.
She wondered if Justin doing the least would make him the exception.
Would he be like all the others or would he prove different?
Charlie surprised herself when she leaned into Justin for a kiss.
Cognac and mint were the flavors they made and as soon as their lips touched, Charlie felt their chemistry ignite.
He liked her more than she liked him, and tonight, that was okay.
He picked her up, kissing her as they made a trail made of mistake and resentment all the way to the kitchen island.
Her shirt. On the floor. How did it get there?
He had to be a magician because before her very eyes her jeans had disappeared. Her heart screamed.
Bitch, you don’t want this!
Oh, but her head...her head was filled with pride, with ego, with resentment, with pain and it screamed,
“FUCK THIS NIGGA GOOD!”
Justin slid her thong down her leg like he was a professional panty-taker-offer and then he went down like he was a professional pussy-licker-upper.
Charlie bucked so hard as he ate up her clit.
He was exactly like she thought he would be.
Amazing. Justin was a pretty-ass, hippy-ass nigga who had been on national tours playing guitar for artists for years.
He wasn’t new to pussy and Charlie could tell.
The way he pulled back her hood, exposing all of her before diving in like he had been thinking about it for months, told her he was sexually fluent.
Musicians always were. It wouldn’t be her first time with one, but the way Justin was ravishing her, he made her want to make him her last. She came.
Hard and loud as she pressed his face into her wet, drowning him.
Die down there, nigga. Somebody had to pay for her pain.
Why not him? He swam, though, all through her waters, pushing his tongue so far into her that he pushed her legs backward so he could go deeper and deeper.
Goddamn, orgasm number two she didn’t even see coming.
When he stood, the way his dick bulged through his denim made Charlie blush.
“You sure about this, Charles?” he asked as he placed a hand on his dick and biting into his bottom lip. “I ain’t plan on none of this, so if you want to hit pause, I’m with that.”
She shook her head and Justin picked her up, kissing her, sharing the taste of her as he took wide-legged steps through the condo.
“Mmm… the bedroom is in the back,” she whispered. She hopped down. “Wait... give me a second.”
She rushed back to the kitchen and took the bottle to the head.
It burned a path straight to her heart, making it ache, making her remember that this drink was a numbing agent.
.. if she was honest with herself, so was Justin.
He was attractive. He was attentive. If she had to guess, he was good in bed, but as she stood there with the bottle in her hand, her chest hollowed.
He’s not Demi, though.
It took two more shots to make her feet move toward him and another one to get her to lead him to the bedroom.
By the time she was on her back in her bed, staring up at him, the room was spinning.
The smell of latex filled her nose as Justin ripped open a condom with his teeth and then he was inside her.
Sex with Justin had Charlie coming for hours.
He pleased every inch of her body, and by the time he was done, she could barely lift her head off the bed.
She felt the kiss to the nape of her neck, and she was grateful for it.
He had handled her with care, and it was needed.
She didn’t know if he was staying or leaving and she didn’t have the strength to ask.
Sleep captured her, and before she could overanalyze anything, her eyes closed.
Charlie groaned as Demi infiltrated her dreams. She smelled him.
His signature scent filled her mind, and it was so potent that it felt real.
Her eyes fluttered open and the room instantly felt like it was on an axis.
The hangover hit her full force as she groaned.
She reached over, rubbing her hands over the wrinkled sheets, before grabbing the empty condom wrapper that laid under the pillow.
“Fuck,” she whispered, remembering the mistake she had made repeatedly the night before. The condom had broken by the time they were done.
I’ve got to get to CVS.