64. Chapter 64
Chump, Billy had said, and she wasn’t wrong. He should’ve asked about the text messages Helen kept getting, and the matching sweatshirts Graham remembered from her apartment.
The men’s deodorant he’d found—and used—in her bathroom that she’d said a cousin left behind after a visit.
From the steps of Not Your Oasis, his chest two sizes too tight, Graham kicked the butt of a cigarette and watched his fiancée talk to her boyfriend beside his car, while a half dozen Desert Demons milled around the bikes, gesturing at Helen and shaking their heads, laughing.
He wondered if one of the leather-bound greaseballs would sell him a joint. He’d trade a kidney for a little weed. The joint he’d stashed in the wagon’s floor console was missing, and last night’s libations weren’t enough to tide him over in this mess.
Finally Nick, the boyfriend, reluctantly got into his car and the powder-blue hybrid drove quietly into the night. Helen approached Graham, the fiancé, with well-placed caution, studying his swollen left cheek.
“Don’t look so concerned,” Graham said. “Lindsey hits harder than your boyfriend.”
“She hit you?” Helen blanched.
“She was pretty offended by our engagement too.”
“We’re still engaged then?”
Graham palmed his chest. Surprisingly, it only felt like a small boulder was crushing it, not the mountain that sometimes cut off his air supply. It was getting easier to breathe now that Nicky was gone.
“I’m sorry, Graham,” Helen said.
“Save your apologies for Billy. They’re still mopping up broken glass in there.”
“You don’t want to talk to me?”
He shrugged. “Talk.”
Helen set her hands on the wooden stair railing. The yellow glow from the single bug-filled light on the porch barely brightened her face. “You were in a relationship when we got together too.”
He huffed out an unamused laugh. “Yeah, that’s really not how you want to go about this. You knew about Lindsey.”
“Knowing hasn’t made it any easier to spend the past few days with her.”
“She wasn’t a secret. I never lied to you about her. Why didn’t you just tell me?”
“Because”—she let out an exasperated sigh—“he didn’t mean anything to me.”
“You obviously meant something to him if he came all the way out here looking for you.”
“I know. It doesn’t make any sense. We haven’t been together very long.”
“Christmas.”
“It wasn’t Christmas.”
“Don’t lie.”
“It wasn’t Christmas,” she insisted. “Over the holidays my family convinced me to sign up for a stupid dating site, and I met Nick. We went out for New Year’s Eve.”
The bar door opened, casting a red glow on the steps while a Demon in heavy black boots and clanging wallet chain plodded out. She waited until the door closed, muffling the cacophony of voices and heavy metal inside.
“Afterwards, I wasn’t interested. He was, so he kept trying. He left voicemails and sent flowers—all that boyfriend stuff.”
“Stalker stuff.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I forgot how it felt to be pursued. Wanted.” She paused. “I let him take me out for Valentine’s Day.”
“You hate Valentine’s Day.”
“I know,” she said. “We started seeing each other off and on then.”
“More on than off, huh? Doesn’t explain why you didn’t tell me.”
“I didn’t think it mattered,” she said, dropping beside him on the step.
“None of it mattered. As soon as I saw you in Austin, I knew it was over. It’s like what you said about her—even if we didn’t get back together, there wasn’t a future for me and Nick.
He was supposed to help me get over you, but he made me miss you more. Miss us more.”
He couldn’t look into those blue eyes filled with such hope and fear, begging him to understand. Graham rubbed his chest, drawing a lungful of cool, dry air.
“When he kissed you…” he trailed off. There weren’t fucking words for the mix of horror and rage that flooded his system watching Nick put his mouth on Helen.
The boulder on his chest was suddenly heavier with the memory.
“Last time I didn’t have to fucking see it.
The guy from the party, that asshole…” He nodded to the road where the dust from that asshole’s car had settled.
“They might not mean much to you, but they mean a hell of a lot to me, and you can’t keep acting like that doesn’t matter. ”
“I know. You’re right,” Helen said. “What can I do? Tell me and I’ll do anything.”
“I don’t know. I need a minute or a stiff drink.”
Helen reached down the front of her T-shirt and came up with a joint.
“Will this help?” she asked.
“Where’d you get that?”
“I bought it from Cammie last night to surprise you.”
He took it from her and spun it between his finger and thumb.
“I love you, Graham,” Helen said. “I won’t let this be the thing that ends us.”
Graham smelled the joint, a mix of fragrant weed and her flowery perfume, and caved. “It’s going to take more than some idiot boyfriend to get rid of me. But, you know, feel free not to test how much.”
He stopped her from leaning in to kiss him. “And so help me, Helen, if you ever kiss another man—”
“Shut up,” she commanded.
They were stopped again by the door opening behind them.
A squealing guitar riff from Graham’s dad’s era cut through the night, and a Demon walked past them down the steps.
He finished the beer he was carrying, chucked the bottle in a barrel tucked into the corner of the porch, and started his motorcycle.
“How did he find you anyway?” Graham asked, watching the taillights disappear into the dark.
Helen groaned. “It was a stupid tracker app on my phone.”
“Told you—stalker.”
“We got it so we didn’t lose each other at a concert a few months ago and I forgot about it.”
“I don’t want to keep making the same mistakes. Do you have any other things that don’t matter that you want to tell me?”
She set her chin on his shoulder. “If I think of any, I’ll let you know.”
“No more secrets.”
Helen nodded and kissed him. He hardly noticed his jaw smart as he opened his mouth to accept her tongue.
“I’m yours, remember,” Helen said, pulling back slightly.
“Good. Now let’s go smoke this and get the hell out of here.”