Chapter 13
Dakota
Shouldn’t have sucked his dick on the beach either, but I couldn’t control that now.
All my memories started rushing back. Him leaning over me, choking me, fingering me, making me feel so good, making me come. My head on his lap, his fingers running through my hair with a gentleness I never would’ve expected from him.
As I leaned my head up, I could see Mason was sitting in the front seat, messing around on his phone or something. When did he move?
“What time is it?” I asked, my voice mumbling.
If he was surprised by me regaining consciousness, he didn’t show it.
“Like eleven-thirty.”
I shot upwards, my eyes suddenly wide open and my heart racing. “What? I told you I didn’t want to fall asleep. Why would you let me sleep that long?” How did I sleep that long? I knew I hadn’t been sleeping well at night recently, but…shit.
“You seemed tired,” he said as I climbed over the center console, maneuvering my way up into the passenger seat, trying not to step on anything with my boots.
I dropped my ass in the seat, my pulse pounding loud in my ears and my hands shaking a little bit.
My bag was still sitting on the floorboards, zipped-up and hopefully untouched.
My stomach growled, reminding me just how hungry I was, and I knew there wasn’t much waiting for me at home.
“Well, don’t do that. I need to be home,” I said, nervous and regretful.
I need to be home.
Quickly, I began to realize just how many problems I’d just caused myself by falling asleep for such a long time. One of the biggest being that the bus didn’t run this late—not the one that went near my home, anyway—and I didn’t want Mason to know where I lived. So he couldn’t drive me there.
Maybe I could afford to order a ride? I clumsily grabbed my phone out of my purse and tried to power it on.
Dead.
What the actual fuck.
“Do you have a phone charger?” I asked, brushing my hair out of my face and trying to breathe.
Mason was so calm, sitting next to me. I felt like I was going to have a panic attack.
I hated the feeling of waking up like this, disoriented and panicked, trembling, sweat cooling on my back. “Or any water?”
Without waiting for him to answer, I jammed my finger on the button to roll the window down, welcoming the rush of cold air in my lungs. I needed more oxygen. Instantly, a shiver moved through my shoulders and down my spine. I tucked my arms against myself, keeping my sweater sleeves over my hands.
It was so dark over the ocean. Dark and vast and unknown.
A smattering of stars was scattered across the sky over the water, and I could see them better the longer I looked, as my eyes adjusted.
There was a flicker of lightning, so far off in the distance that I didn’t hear any thunder. Maybe the storm would roll in tonight while I slept—God willing, in my own bed.
The panic of how I’d woken up kept building up inside of me, like something terrible lurking behind my back, growing bigger and bigger, encroaching on my attempts at processing the situation. Why did I do this? What am I supposed to do now?
Breathe.
I turned my head to look back at Mason, anxiety still winding its way through me.
“Do you?” I asked again about the charger, getting impatient.
“I do. But it won’t fit your phone.”
“You have an iPhone?” I was literally looking at it in his hands, so I knew he did.
“It’s newer than yours. USB-C, not lightning.” He reached into the center console and pulled out a cord, showing me the end of it like I was stupid. I knew the difference between USB-C and a lightning cable, I just…hadn’t been thinking about it. My thoughts were a mess.
“Okay. Well.”
I didn’t know what to say. I had no way of getting home with my phone dead.
The corner of my mouth twitched like I was about to cry. I dug my nails into my palms, blinking back the pressure behind my eyes.
Briefly, I considered asking Mason to drive me to the gas station, because I knew it’d still be open.
Elliot would probably be the one working, since he usually did the night shift.
He wasn’t my favorite person in the world, but I just needed to buy a charger, which wouldn’t take me that long.
He might not even recognize me. I wasn’t sure.
Did I have enough cash on me for a phone charger? Yes. Did I want to spend it on that? Absolutely not. There was a possibility Eric had an extra one in the back office, though…
But I didn’t want Mason to know where I worked.
Maybe he would let me call a taxi from his phone or something. I wasn’t sure what sort of fares actual taxis had these days, but I was not about to put my address into any app on his phone. Verbally telling a driver seemed safer.
“Dakota,” Mason murmured, his face illuminated softly by his phone screen. I tried to look at what he was doing but I couldn’t tell. Texting somebody?
“Hm?”
“Breathe.”
“Mason, I—”
“I’m taking you to a drive-thru and then I’m taking you home.”
“No.” I shook my head vehemently, my chest getting tighter. That same feeling was rising again, the one that made me feel like crying. “I’ll figure something else out on my own.”
“If you get out of the car, I’m going to follow you.”
A cold ribbon of fear streamed through my blood, my throat getting tight.
The logical part of my mind was screaming at me, screaming that I needed to get away from him. But at the same time…another part of me wanted him to come closer. To come so close that I couldn’t breathe without touching him.
Prove to me how I’ll never be able to push you away, even if I try.
Be nice to me. Be mean to me.
“I don’t like this,” I said, trying to keep the tremble from my voice. I was shivering now; it was too cold outside and my window was still all the way down.
“I’m sorry. You don’t really have a choice.”
“You did that!” I snapped before I could stop myself, venom burning my tongue and heat prickling my cheeks. “You put me in this fucking situation, Mason! You took the choice from me!”
“No. I didn’t.” He leaned towards me, encroaching into my space like the storm he was.
Eclipsing me, covering me, taking over me.
His scent drifted lightly off of him and I squeezed my eyes shut, nervous.
“I didn’t make you fall asleep. I didn’t make you stay asleep.
You looked exhausted, and I was content to sit here and let you rest. Don’t hold that against me. ”
I’m not stupid like that. Not anymore.
“You’re trying to manipulate me,” I gritted out. My eyes slid back open. I wanted to scream. I wanted to slap him, to hurt him.
I thought of the way he’d held me down in the back seat that first time. His hand over my mouth. His fingers inside of me.
Today, his fingers pinching off my air. My knees on the sand.
I imagined worse things, too.
Him forcing me to take it, grabbing me, pushing my head below the surface of the ocean and keeping me there until I almost drowned, grabbing my jaw and angling me to watch him while making me wonder if he was really going to do the worst thing.
His face through ripples of water, looking down at me, maybe liking what he saw.
Maybe I’d like it, too.
Instead of responding, Mason pulled open the center console again. I heard the click of something releasing, then he was pulling a handgun out and setting it on my lap. The weight of it on my thighs made me a little lightheaded.
“Glock 17. It’s loaded and there’s no safety, just pull the trigger and it’ll fire. Hold that and see if you feel better. We’re going to get food.” His tone was firm, no room for argument. He didn’t seem nervous at all that he’d just handed me a loaded gun.
Then again, why would he be? He knew I wouldn’t use it, because he knew I was sick in the head. He knew I was resisting him in part because I was trying to be safe, but also because I wanted him to push back, to show me just how much he cared about me.
It was fucked up. This wasn’t care.
But it felt close enough to me.
“You want to play music?” He held his phone out to me, unlocked. I eyed him warily, then snatched it out of his hand.
Mason backed out of his parking spot and accelerated onto the road.
As we sped up, I could tell he wanted me to shut my window, because it was making the air all wonky in the car, the wind off the ocean bending and warping in my ears.
But I didn’t want to give in to him, didn’t want to concede a single other thing after he’d already taken most of my choices away.
I was proving a point.
It didn’t take long for him to roll his window down too, making it colder and more tumultuous in the car, but stopping the wobbly feeling in the air. A small victory in the scheme of things.
I navigated to his music app, trying not to be too obvious with my curiosity about his playlists and listening history.
To my surprise, there was only one playlist, titled Playlist, with about two-hundred songs on it.
When I briefly scrolled through it, I didn’t see any obvious overall mood for the music, or really any coherence at all between songs.
Now I was even more confused by him. Intrigued.
Who are you?
What’s your real first memory?
Not spending any more time trying to discern things about his personality from his music taste, I put on one of my favorite songs: Digital Bath by Deftones. A tiny spark lit up in my brain when I saw he also had the song saved, probably somewhere on that single playlist.
His expression didn’t indicate any opinion on the song when it started playing, though. I cranked the volume knob up so that the music was blaring over the obnoxious noise of the wind, the drums pounding a rhythm into my bones and the guitar strumming some part of my soul.
Mason accelerated a little more.