Текст книги "Before & After"

“You ok?” he asks, and I glance at him. I’m reeling from what Lindsay told me.

She was getting married. I was her best friend, the maid of honor, the only person in Austin she really cared about besides Scott and Rike. It was us four against the whole world and we were fucking winning.

It was us two, privileged debutantes, and them, bad boys with tattoos and a past that made me cringe. And we made it work. We thrived.

And then it shattered.

Sometimes, the fairy tale is too fucking good to be true.

That was the only time Lindsay sounded bitter. And she had been. She’d been furious. I get it, though. She was on the edge of having it all—and something as senseless as a distracted cab driver snatched it away.

I might recover. I might get my memories back. But Lindsay would never walk away from the devastation of the accident.

“How is Scott?” I ask. His gaze flicks to me, startled. I shrug. “What’s happening to me doesn’t affect just you, and his fiancée is in that hospital still. How is he dealing with everything?”

Rike blows out a breath and flicks the blinker on, hitting the highway and speeding up. “He’s a mess,” he says honestly. “He should be on his honeymoon, and riding the wave of his band’s success. Instead, he’s spent the last month figuring out how the hell to keep her from leaving him and how he’s going to take care of her.”

I jerk around, staring at him. “Why the hell would she leave him?”

“Because she’s scared. Because she wants what’s best for him and always has. She won’t think that’s her, now that she’s in a wheelchair. Lindsay—she’s the best thing that could have happened to Scott. But it’s not easy being with him, and she won’t be the person to make his life harder unnecessarily.”

“But she loves him,” I protest shrilly.

His gaze slides to me and a bitter smile tugs the corner of one lip up. “Sometimes love isn’t enough, Peyton.”

He hits the blinker again, swerving for the exit, and I clutch at the door of the truck. We’re getting off the highway, and I glance out the window.

“Where are we? I thought we were going to get lunch.”

“We are,” he say.

The house he pulls up to is in a well-cared for neighborhood. The grass is a dirty green, and the flowerbeds a little overgrown, but there’s a wraparound porch with comfortable looking patio furniture, and a privacy fence hides the backyard.

I look at Rike, confused, and he grins at me. “I didn’t say where we were going, sweetheart. But this has been your favorite place to have lunch since the day we moved in.”

“This is our home?” I whisper, even though I knew. Of course it is. What else could it possibly be?

There is a tiny part of me, staring at this gorgeous house, that wants to race inside and soak it all in. Remember everything. Lie in the bed where I was happy.

A bigger part—the larger part—is terrified, and for a moment, I’m stuck to my seat, staring.

Rike pulls open the door and holds out his hand. His eyes are hopeful. And before I consciously make the decision, I put my hand in his and let him pull me from the truck. Against his body, all hard and hot against my own.

“Are you going to behave if we go in there?” I ask huskily, and then flush. I can’t believe I just asked that.

A slow smile curls his lips. “Do you want me to?”

I laugh, and step back. Because I’m a little terrified about how much I really don’t want him to.

“Come on,” he says, handing me the crutches and pacing me up to the door. I kinda love the way he’s so carefully attentive, his hand on the small of my back to brace me as I make my way up the three stairs to the front door before he swings it open.

The house is messy—not terribly surprising considering that I’ve been in the hospital. And it’s huge. I glance at Rike. “Did we live here alone?”

“No. It was originally a house with an apartment, and we thought it’d be perfect for us. The apartment has a small kitchen, so when we want privacy, we just go upstairs. And your studio is in the garage loft. Scott and I keep most of our shit in the garage, and that’s where he’ll practice with the band when they’re just fucking around. Lindsay works downtown, so she didn’t get an office, but we all have our space. And when we don’t want the space, we’re together.”

His eyes are bright and almost stupid happy as he talks about it and I can see it, can picture the life he’s painting out.

“Where is our room?” I ask, softly.

His eyebrows go up, and he points toward the back of the house.

“Do you want to see it?” The question is soft and very vulnerable.

“No,” I say. “Not today.” He nods and steps into the large kitchen. Pulls a bowl of soup from the fridge and starts heating it, and pouring us both tea. He’s efficient and brisk in his movements, a graceful poetry in motion doing something so simple and mundane.

But there is nothing simple or mundane about Rike. He’s gorgeous, with his shaggy black hair and the beard that is growing on me. The tattoos curving on his long, strong arms and licking across the skin over his fingers.

He’s everything I never expected to want, but this feels familiar. He’s who I chose. This unconventional, beautifully confusing life.

Scott and Lindsay.

They are the life I chose.

“How did we get here?” I whisper, and Rike’s gaze snags mine. I shake my head, helplessly. “This isn’t what I pictured, Rike. This is nothing like I imagined my life. And I understand that it’s what I chose. But I don’t remember, and I can’t reconcile it.” His expression falls, and I make a tiny noise, reaching for him. “I am trying, Rike. I just—it’s a lot.”

“I know,” he whispers. “I want to help, but I don’t know how. I don’t know how to give you the space you need when all I want is to bring you home.”

I reach for him and catch his hand, twisting our fingers together. He stares at our fingers, until the microwave dings and it jerks both of us out of our thoughts.

The soup and crusty bread he brings out is delicious, creamy potato broth with a spicy sausage. But the tension between us strings tight and uncomfortable, and it makes my stomach twist, until I finally put the food down.

Rike is waiting, because as soon as I stop eating, he shifts, gathering the bowls and taking them to the sink.

“There’s some stuff in your office. I think you should look at it. Will you come upstairs with me?”

I nod, and he grins, shifting over to me and lifting me up from the chair.

“What are you doing?” I breathe out as he cradles me against his chest.

His eyes are so close, so blue I could get lost in them, and I have to look down, because I can’t get lost. Not yet. Not until I’ve found myself.

“Stairs, sweetheart. I’ll carry you up.”

The loft is captivating. Half-finished canvases sit on easels, a sketch and tiny cut piece of papers waiting to be assembled cover a large table, and sculptures clutter a corner in various states of finish. A stained glass window filters light in, beautiful and ethereal, and I feel like I’m in a church. Like this is where I am supposed to worship, and where everything is right. Rike sets me on a deep red leather chaise lounge in a corner of bookshelves and I shiver. The table next to the chaise holds a notebook.

He follows my gaze. “You wrote constantly. Sometimes it was things you’d share with me or Linds, but it was usually just for yourself, and it was incessant.”

“Do you think that reading the journals could help me remember?” I ask.

He nods without hesitation. “Yes. And they’re yours. Please. Go through them.”

I nod and shift back, getting comfortable against the chair, and he smiles, his eyes soft. “I remember when I bought that chair for you. It was right after we moved here, and we had been out, downtown. You saw it at this tiny place that sold art and you fixated. Brought it up every few days for weeks. So I went down and picked it up one night after I finished a pretty big piece on a client. Surprised you with it. It was like watching a kid on Christmas morning. I fell in love with you a little more that day.” He laughs, a little, at himself. “I fell in love with you a little more every day, Peyton.”

I make a tiny noise, and his gaze snaps to me.

Later, when I think about it, I’ll be sure he moved first. But the truth is we moved at the same time. I reach for him at the same time he wraps a hand around my neck, lifting me up.

His lips meet mine, and the world explodes. Everything is about him, about the rough urgency of his lips against mine, and his hands that shift me, just the right angle to my head. His tongue licks over the seam of my lips and I gasp, and he’s everywhere, his tongue tangling with mine.

He’s not just kissing me. He’s devouring and conquering, claiming me. And I make a tiny little noise, almost a mewl, and let him.

His body comes down, knees on either side of me, and I want more of his weight, more of that maddening lazy tongue, more of his clever fingers, brushing over my skin, everywhere and nowhere.

“More,” I gasp, and he grins against my lips.

“More what, perfect girl?” he murmurs. “Tell me what you want.”

Tell him what I want? How the hell am I supposed to do that? I shake my head and his lips skate down my jaw, over my throat in wet, nipping kisses that have me aching. He pushes my shirt, a blue button-down over a white, lace-trimmed cami, aside, and his fingers are on my breasts, circling and circling, endless torture. “Do you want my mouth here?” he murmurs, and I flush.

Why can’t he just fuck me? Why must he hear it? His fingers ghost over my nipple, pinch sharply, and I gasp, “Yes.”

Rike makes a low growl and yanks my cami down, shoving aside the pale pink bra cup and I moan as the wet heat of his mouth closes over me, pulling hard on my nipple. His teeth rake over it and I almost come off the damn chaise. His hands are moving, one cupping my breast through the clothes, the other skating lower, sliding under the hem of my shirt to play over my torso. His tongue circles my nipple, slow and lazy, and I jerk on his hair, pulling him up and kissing him. He groans, and I can almost feel him fighting to pull away. His gaze is clouded and hungry when he demands, “What do you want, Peyton? Do you want my fingers”—he brushes against me over my jeans with his fingers and I shiver—“or do you want my tongue?” I shudder, my head falling back. A low chuckle rolls over me. “Tell me, sweetheart. Tell me what you want. Tell me how bad you want to come riding my lips.”

I shake my head and he unzips my jeans, and slips a hand inside. I scream as his fingers slip through me, playing over me, and his thumb rubs over my clit.

“Say it, Peyton,” he demands hoarsely. “Say what you want.”

“You,” I whimper.

He curses. “Not enough. Tell me you want me to tongue-fuck you. That you want to taste yourself on my lips when I’m inside you. Tell me.”

His fingers move again and I growl, “Fucking do it or don’t. Get me off or don’t but don’t fucking toy with me. Yes, goddammit, I want you to eat me out until I come.”

He grins, and moves, faster than I can really process. One second he’s hovering above me, and the next he’s between my thighs, my jeans hanging around my ankles as he lowers his head and then nothing matters. There is only the glide of his tongue against me, the fluttering pressure as he tongues my clit, and the slow thrust of his fingers. He licks at me, the tip of his tongue circling, until I have my hands in his hair and my body is moving, writhing against him as he uses lips and tongue and teeth to drive me fucking insane.

My whole body is tight, and I gasp when he thrusts into me with his tongue, my vagina clenching down when he pinches my clit, a delicious agony.

His fingers are against my ass, smoothing over my cheeks as his tongue fucks into me, and he slaps me, a sharp hard slap, and I splinter, screaming as I come, a wave of sensation that rips through me. He’s rising before my heartbeat slows, and he kisses me.

And despite the tiny voice screaming at me to stop, I lick at his lips, at the taste of me on his tongue.

He slams into me while we’re kissing, and my body goes tight, arching off the chaise against the delicious pressure, the exquisite fullness of him inside me. He groans, and drops his head down against mine. I fucking love the feel of his beard bristling against my breast as he struggles to catch his breath.

“You’re fucking tight, baby,” he whispers.

I shift, my hips moving in a tiny circle and he groans. “Don’t,” he begs. “Go slow.”

“Fuck slow,” I snap. “Fuck me.”

It breaks whatever control he has left—his hand catches in my hair and he pulls my head back, kissing me hard, a bruising kiss that has my head spinning as his big body thrusts into me.

He knows my body. Knows just how to fuck me. Each thrust ends on a tight twist of his hips, hitting a spot deep inside that I didn’t realize I had, until I’m panting, begging as he fucks me. “Rike,” I groan, and I reach for him, all the achy need in me bubbling up.

I bite him. Hard. And he grunts, a deep hungry noise. Shoves me down and fucks me hard, until I’m tossed into orgasm, my body writhing against his mindlessly.

“Yeah,” he groans, “just like that. Fuck me just like that, baby.”

I’m clinging to him, my nails in his shoulders as I meet his thrusts, the orgasm spinning on and out and then he groans, a long noise, goes still and tight above me. His face drops, so I can see him through the shaggy hair and the beard and—

He’s fucking beautiful. Gentle, and so fucking vulnerable, as he comes inside me with a low groan that I can feel in my toes. Staring at me while he comes.

When it’s over, he falls to the bed next to me, and gathers me into him, sighing. A content noise.

I lay awake for a long time after he’s asleep, wondering just how badly I’ve fucked things up now.

Chapter 15 : Before

Here’s what I learn, reading the journal she left with me:

Who she was doesn’t matter.

Facing the truth is fucking painful.

She is the bravest girl I’ve ever met.

It takes me three days to get through the journal because it’s hard as fuck to read. There are a few times, reading it and looking at the pictures, that I have to bolt for the toilet before I throw up.

How did she go from this shell of a girl, this walking corpse, to the girl who is so vibrant and alive, whose passion and daring make my head spin? I am trying to wrap my head around something that makes no fucking sense.

I realize, with almost sickening quickness, that I loathe her family.

Seeing her past on paper, seeing the demons she fought and how much she hated who she was being molded into–I've never met them, and part of me hopes I never do. I don't know how to be in the same room as someone who had the chance to care for a girl like Peyton and who fucked it up so completely.

"I want to sing tonight," I say, staring blankly at the photo clipped to the inside of the journal.

Scott glances at me, at the picture, before he nods. "Do what you think is best, man."

I offer him a sick smile and shove to my feet.

"She trusted you," he says before I leave the room. "Are you going to return the favor?"

I look at him. I know what he's asking. "It's not only my story to share," I say carefully.

"Don't hide behind that," he says. "Do what you think needs to be done. I want you to be happy, Rike. Whatever that means. And this girl—she makes you happy. In a way I haven't seen since we were eight."

When we were eight we had been living in a group home, and he'd been the shit head who picked a fight. We beat each other senseless, but when it was time to take the fall, neither of us was willing to throw the other under the bus. It was the first time in my life someone had my back and I never forgot it.

We were separated a year later, tossed into separate foster homes that got progressively worse. But for that six months, we had each other. We weren't so fucking alone.

We were miserable little shits the world didn't want, but we were fucking happy.

I let out the breath I’ve been holding and nod at him. "Thanks, Scott."

***

The crowd is high on the music. Scott played through our first set, setting the tone and getting them riled up with anthem after anthem, an ode to the summer that is fading away. Lindsay is swaying in the corner booth, next to a pale Peyton in a tiny dress that's driving me to distraction. She's got a drink in front of her, but she hasn't touched it.

Scott flicks a look at me when the song ends and his eyebrow lifts in question. I nod, and hit the cymbals. The girls on the dance floor sway and scream, and he laughs, a low, husky noise that will have them squirming in their skirts.

Fucking player. If he's not careful, Lindsay will rip his balls off and feed them to him.

I laugh at that thought.

“We’ve got a treat for you tonight. My boy Rike has been working on a new song. Most of the time, he lets me do the singing, but I think it’s time to remind you all that the boy has mad skills that don’t involve the sticks. So. Give it up, ladies. Rike it’s all you, brother.”

I come out from behind the drum set and Scott wraps me in a quick, rough hug. “Kick ass, bro,” he mutters before dropping off the stage.

I let out a breath, and sink onto the stool. Adjust the mic. I can feel the entire room, all of them waiting for me to say something. Anything. But I can’t see past the glare of the house lights.

It doesn’t matter. I don’t need to see to know where she is and that she’s watching me with big, sky blue eyes. I close my eyes, picturing her.

And I sing.

I’ve always been good at creating and shit at saying what I feel. Maybe because of how I was raised. But tonight, I’m trying my best to let go of that.

Perfect girl,

She sits and listens,

And I can’t help but see everything that she’s hiding.

She’s beautiful and broken,

Tears she tries to hide,

And I can’t help but wonder what’s on the inside