Chapter 19
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
Brooks
“I can’t believe you packed cereal,” Audrey says, giggling beside me.
The bedroom is dark. The only light comes from the moon hanging in the inky sky and the candle burning in the bathroom. I can never sleep, so being awake at two in the morning isn’t new for me. Audrey, though, keeps yawning.
“Cereal is the best food on the planet,” I say, popping a chocolatey ball in my mouth.
The crunch is so satisfying. “You can eat it with milk like a proper meal, or dry like a snack. You can go whole grain bullshit if you want to pretend you’re healthy, or say fuck it and just get the ones with marshmallows. There are hundreds of ways to do it.”
She curls against my side, draping an arm over my chest, and sighs. But she should be happily sighing. I fed her takeout, fucked her twice since we arrived, and fought her in an impromptu self-defense lesson that led to the second fucking of the night. I sure as hell don’t have any complaints.
I’ve learned quite a few things today, none of which I ever set out to learn. I know Audrey loves baths so hot that it practically melts your skin, that her toes look adorable poking out of the bubbles, and I don’t mind bathing with a woman. Who knew?
“I would say the same things about pizza,” she says. “That’s how I put on fifteen pounds my freshman year—solely on pizza.”
“Did you just binge it or what?”
“Pretty much. We didn’t have it a lot growing up, so once I could do what I wanted, I went a little overboard.”
“A childhood without a lot of pizza is something I can’t fathom,” I say, popping another handful of cereal into my mouth.
“That’s about all I ate growing up. Mom worked her second job in a little sandwich shop that served individual pizzas.
They could eat on their shift for free, so she’d bring me a pizza home almost every night. ”
Audrey’s fingertips trace the lines of my muscles. “What’s your mom like? I know you’re close with her, but what does she do now?”
I almost change the subject, because it doesn’t matter, and I’ve discovered the more you know about people, the more complicated things get.
But as I shift topics, I realize I’m still technically right.
It doesn’t matter. And that’s why it doesn’t matter if I tell her about my mom or not.
It can’t hurt anything. Neither of us is under an illusion that this is anything more than a few fun days, so what the hell?
“Mom does whatever she wants now,” I say, crunching another chocolate ball.
“She’s been basking in retirement for the last few years.
I signed a brand deal with a sports drink company for an absurd amount of money, so, I bought her a house, a car, and a money market account that she can use to bake pies, take vacations, or sleep in for all I care. ”
She lifts her head. “That’s so nice, Brooks.”
“It’s respect. She hustled her ass off while I was growing up.
She paid the bills, bought school clothes—all of it.
” The woman never rested, making sure my childhood was filled with good moments.
Card games, board games, and one year we made kites and flew them at the park all spring.
She’s the epitome of selflessness. “One year, I tried to skip baseball because I knew we didn’t have the money for the entry fee and all that shit, and she signed me up anyway. She sacrificed her whole life for me.”
Almost completely.
“She sounds amazing,” Audrey says, resting her head on me again. “I bet you were a handful as a kid.”
I laugh. “There’s a boy, Trent, who comes into Alfie’s a lot. Reminds me so much of myself. He’s a little shithead with a motherfucker for a father. The similarities are uncanny.”
“Can I ask about your father?”
I stiffen reflexively. The thought of talking about him makes my stomach crawl.
There’s no reason he should occupy any of her brain space, but she already knows enough to be curious, and if I don’t end that curiosity, he’ll live in her head without the black line through his name that belongs there.
“I was seventeen when he died,” I say, tossing the rest of my cereal back into the baggie and placing it on the bedside table. “We had a rugby game and got back late. I was supposed to go to Gray’s that night, but something made me change my mind. Something just told me to go home. So, I did.”
Audrey’s breaths come and go in smooth, steady waves. I match mine to hers, hoping it’ll keep my blood pressure from spiking.
“So, I get there,” I say, swallowing a lump in my throat.
“And Dad’s truck is in the driveway. He’d come and go, depending on what drugs he could find, so he was unpredictable.
But he was there that night, and it was just …
off. I went in through the back door, and the kitchen television was on.
This little black-and-white box thing that got like three channels.
But if he was home and worked up, he’d sit right there where you couldn’t avoid him, itching for a fight. ”
She dips her chin, snuggling closer, holding me tighter. She seems to know I need the comfort—something I’ve never considered to be true.
“I flipped it off, and that’s when I heard it.” I work to unclench my jaw. “A thud. The kind of thud that you feel more than you really hear. It just vibrates around in your head, sending chills down your spine.”
I stare into the darkness, memories of that night flashing through my mind. The hatred in his eyes when he looked at me. The streaks of blood coming out of mom’s nose and the corner of her mouth. The smell of pure evil.
A layer of sweat covers my skin as I take a breath.
“I took the steps two at a time and then rounded the corner. The bathroom door was open and … there they are.” I lie back, my heart racing.
“My mom’s dad had a pocket watch that he gave her before he died to give to me when I graduated from high school.
It was the only thing she had worth a damn, but the sentimental value was worth more than the money.
My father had been looking for it, and I knew he was gonna pawn it, and I knew that’d break Mom’s heart.
So, I hid it in one of the bathroom vents. And he found it.”
“Oh, no,” Audrey whispers.
“He thought Mom had hidden it from him and had her by the throat up against the bathroom wall,” I say, my voice oddly detached from the battle happening inside me.
“It was bad. Really, really bad. She was going limp, and the look in her eyes while this is happening to her—while he’s trying to kill her—is to tell me to run.
” I swallow back a sob, pressing my lips together to will the tears not to fall. “I’ll never be able to unsee that.”
“Brooks, I’m so sorry.” Audrey’s voice breaks. “I can’t imagine. I’m sorry for bringing it up. Oh, my God.”
“I grabbed a lamp from the hallway and busted it over the back of his head. He dropped her and came after me.”
“You wanna piece of this, you little motherfucker? Come on then. Get it!”
Stairs. Blood. The sound of knuckles hitting bone.
Sirens. The glass on the back door smashing against the floor.
Hours later, the police showing up at Mom’s hospital bedside and telling us they found his dead body.
“Anyway,” I say, exhaling the stress out of my body, “now you get it.”
She sits up with sleepy eyes, messy hair, and the softest, most concerned look on her face. It steals my breath and damn near stops my heart.
I’ve never shared that with anyone—not in that detail. I’m not sure how I feel about it floating around in the open, but I’m glad if I shared it with anyone, that it was Audrey.
“I think you’re incredible,” she whispers.
“Then you must have a very low threshold for incredibility.”
“No, sir. My bar is exceptionally high. I’ve known a lot of incredible people in my life, and not one of them could endure what you have and kept a heart like yours.”
Her compliments soften the edges of my past minutely, but when the edges are so rough and pointed, even the slightest relief helps. This isn’t what I want to be doing with our time together, though.
“Okay, enough about me,” I say, turning over onto my side and getting her to lie next to me. “Tell me about your parents.”
She sighs. “I’ve painted them in a bad light, and I feel awful about that. They’re great people.”
“People can be two things at once.”
Her bottom lip tugs between her teeth as she seems to consider that. “That’s true, I guess. I just wish I could be more like you and blow off the things that bother me and live my life.”
“Is that what you think I do?” I chuckle.
“This shit eats me up. I’m still consumed by it.
I think about him every day and wish …” No.
Don’t go down that road. “I may not care what other people say about me, but I’m still controlled somewhat by what happened that night—and the years prior to it.
I don’t like to get too close to people.
I stay in my lane. I let a lot of shit go that probably deserves more attention. ”
Like the shit that I know your brother is doing to me. I never should’ve brought us here knowing what I do about him.
“I wake up every morning and check my bank account,” I say in disbelief that I’m sharing this with her.
“I have enough money to last me a long time, and it’s not like I couldn’t go get another job doing something.
But my checks from the NAFL equal freedom to me.
And no matter how much I know down deep that isn’t true, I can’t shake it. ”
She looks up at me like a bulb has gone off in her head. I kiss the tip of her nose in hopes she forgets her epiphany, because I’m sure it’s about me, and I don’t need to be analyzed.
“You now know about my dysfunctional family,” I say. “Tell me about yours.”
“Oh, boy. Um, where do I begin?” She sighs. “Well, I’ve never questioned our parents’ love for Drew and me. But they’ve always treated us very differently in a gender bias meets sexism way. He can do whatever, but I’m expected to be …” She frowns. “Perfect. And I’m not.”
I bring her head against my chest and hold her against me. She’s perfect just as she is, and I don’t know if I hate it more that she doesn’t believe that or that her parents make her feel this way.It also makes sense why Audrey is so genuinely lovely and he brother is a complete dick.
“I don’t want to sound like a brat,” she says. “But the pressure has nearly broken me. I woke up one day after a traumatizing rejection from a guy who, on a related note, is invited to my father’s birthday, so yay me, and realized that I needed to … bloom.”
“Wait. A guy rejected you?”
“Yeah. It was humiliating.”
“For him,” I say, snorting. “I don’t give a fuck who he is—I guaranfuckingtee that anyone who knows you and has heard of this knows he fumbled you.” I laugh. “What a fool.”
She smiles against my side. “I’m going to have you record a bunch of these things so I can play them when I go back for Dad’s party. My own personal affirmations, courtesy of you.”
“Your brother will love that.”
She shrugs, but the rigidity of her shoulders tells me she doesn’t feel nearly as nonchalant as she wants me to believe.
Although she’s frustrated with her family, she loves them deeply.
It’s obvious in her tone and the words she chooses and the emotions in her eyes when she shares things about them.
Coming from a broken household, I know the pain of having a rift—or a gorge, in my case—with the people you love most. I wouldn’t wish that on my biggest enemy, and I especially wouldn’t wish it on her.
Or Drew, as ironic as that may be.
“He did help me check off another thing from my list because I’ve officially disappointed someone, even if it’s me.”
“Does it help if you’ve made me exceptionally proud?”
“Yes, it does,” she says, giggling. “You’re my personal confidence coach.”
I take her hand and place it on my hardening cock. “Lesson three is available to be downloaded whenever you’re ready.”
I barely get the words out of my mouth before she rips the blankets off us. My lips part in surprise as she kneels beside me, waiting for instruction.
“What are you waiting for?” I ask. “Tell me what you want.”
She bats her lashes. “Can I just climb on you if I want? Or do I need to ask?”
“Get over here and ride this dick,” I say, gripping it at the base.
She sinks onto my cock, wincing just a bit but moaning all the same. Her breath shudders as she fully seats it inside her and stills, giving her body time to adjust. That’s fine by me because having her wrapped around me—skin on skin, no less—is a good time any way you cut it.
Finally, she begins to move in slow circles.
“I think when I go back, I’m going to get a hotel room,” she says, raising her arms to tie her hair back with an elastic.
The way her body looks in the moonlight is unreal.
“They just opened a Ruma hotel not far from where the party will be held, and those rooms are super nice. It might be fun to give myself some space, grab a massage, that kind of thing.”
“Great plan.” I hold each of her tits and flex deeper into her. “Great tits, too.”
She laughs, leaning down to kiss me.
And I’m certain—this is heaven.