BROKEN & SCREWED (BS #1)

Book 2 Chapter 6

6

Jesse called two nights later. I checked the time and saw it was after eleven before I answered. “Hey.”

“What are you doing?”

I glanced at my sneakers I was lacing up and my gym bag was already packed. I went to lay on my bed instead. “Nothing. You?”

“You want to do something?”

I grinned into the phone. “Is this my first official booty call in college?”

“No.” I could hear his amusement. “Well, maybe later. Want to go somewhere with me?”

“Where?” I was tempted to tease him and ask if he was going to say his bedroom, but I stopped myself. There was exhaustion in his voice, and my Jesse senses were tingling. Something was up, probably whatever he’d been busy with all week.

“My buddy’s in a band. Sometimes I go and listen to their practices.”

“Sure.”

“Okay. I’m outside your dorm right now.”

“The back door?” I didn’t wait for his answer. “I’ll be down.” I hurried to change my shorts into jeans. My shirt was off next, and I pulled a tank with a sweater over it. Slipping my feet into flats, I grabbed my purse and headed out. As I was locking my door, Kara was coming up the back stairwell with a tall guy behind her. He had brown hair, which was long enough to be teased with some curl, but not long enough to look shaggy. He had high cheekbones, almost as chiseled as Jesse’s, and keen dark eyes. Their hands were interlocked, so I figured this was the boyfriend.

“Oh, hi!” Kara stopped. He stood just inside the doorway with a hand against it to keep from slamming into him. “This is my boyfriend, Derek. Derek, this is Alex. She . . . knows Cord.”

An eyebrow went up, but he didn’t comment on that. “Nice to meet you.”

When he didn’t extend a hand, I was relieved. “You, too. Be seeing you guys.”

“Oh, wait.” Kara stepped to the side, blocking me. Her smile never moved an inch. “I wanted to invite you to a picnic two weekends from now. Are you doing anything Saturday?”

Yes. I had such a busy life. “Studying?”

“You can’t study all the time. The picnic is at Carver Park, eleven thirty. You don’t need to bring anything.”

“Who else is going to be there?” This sounded fishy to me.

Her smile was strained.

I knew it.

She answered, “Tiffany, Chandra, myself, and another girl, Elizabeth Ives are putting it on. There will be lots of guys, if you want to meet a guy. Oh, and I was going to invite Hannah and Beth, too. They have a Frisbee golf course, and I know some of the guys will probably put together a soccer game. Don’t worry, there’ll be other girls there. It’s just for a fun afternoon at the park.”

Derek seemed to frown a bit at the way she was blubbering on, but he didn’t stop her.

“So do you think you’d come?”

“Oh. Uh. You think it’s a good idea for Hannah to come if Tiffany’s going to be there? They didn’t seem to get along so well.”

She waved that off. “They’re always like that. There was another fight last night. So? Do you want to come?” Her eyes were animated as she waited for my answer.

I shrugged as I started to say, “Suu . . .” But I faded. I didn’t want to go.

Kara didn’t care. Her smile stretched from ear to ear. “Great! I’ll come to your room at eleven fifteen. We can walk over together.”

With a pat to my shoulder, she jerked her boyfriend from the doorway and past me. I was left unsettled when they disappeared into her room. When the lock clicked, I shook my head. I felt duped but went down the stairs and to the back door. I’d deal with that later.

I stepped outside and saw the black Ferrari, I was thankful Jesse had his windows tinted. There was a cluster of girls on two benches, which had been landscaped amidst foliage. They were eyeing the Ferrari. With a quick scan, I figured they were freshmen like me. Maybe they hadn’t heard Jesse Hunt drove the same car. I was hoping.

As soon as I got in, he sped away. For some reason, I wasn’t surprised to see he was wearing a black long-sleeved shirt and black pants. The shirt was snug on him. His arm muscles moved underneath, and it accentuated the cut of his shoulders. The warmth from before came back, mingling with lust.

Neither of us said a word. There was a comfortable silence, and I didn’t want to break it. Closing my eyes, I leaned back and opened the window a bit. The wind raced against my face, calming my racing heart. Being there with him and not needing to fill the silence soothed an edge inside me.

My chest lifted up and down in a smooth rhythm.

When we were nearing the outskirts of town, he asked, “Are you hungry? Did you want some food?”

“I had old pizza. I’m good.”

He nodded and wheeled the car onto the interstate. We were flying away from town with no end in sight. After we had driven thirty minutes, I felt Jesse’s gaze on me. “What is it?”

He gave me a rueful grin. “Do you have an early class tomorrow?”

“Nope, those are Tuesdays and Thursdays. I have a ten o’clock class.” Which I didn’t mind skipping, it was psychology. My head couldn’t take that stuff.

He nodded and went back to the road. “Good. It might be a long night.”

I grinned to myself as I heard that. Pleasure spread through me and the steady boil went up another notch. This addiction to him was like a drug. I was intoxicated. He pumped adrenalin through me and made me feel as if I were living again.

My head went down. My eyes closed.

My chest filled with searing pain.

He was making me right again. I didn’t know what would happen when this was done. Could I go back?

“What’s wrong?”

I shook my head, unable to speak. Too many damn emotions were stirring in me. “Nothing. Are we almost there?”

“Yeah.” He pointed to a small building in the middle of nowhere. “They call it ‘The Shack,’ but it’s just a place they practice. Sometimes they’ll have their friends come and listen and hang out.”

“How did you meet these guys?”

Half of his mouth lifted up in a grin. “A bar. Okay. A dive bar in the wrong area of town. Luke and I were both having a drink when some guys picked a fight. We were sitting next to each other so both of us were pulled into it. Afterward, we shared a few more drinks. I was laying low; he was doing the same. We bonded.” As he pulled into the gravel parking lot and slid to a stop, he laughed to himself. “These guys know sports, but they don’t say anything. I can just be me.”

Getting out, I grabbed my purse, but Jesse took it from me. He opened his trunk, tossed it in, and then took my hand in his. “You don’t need that in here.”

Which was code in Jesse’s world for: please don’t bring your phone. Little did he know that no one called me anymore. He’d been the only one in my history over the last week.

Loud music met us when we stepped inside, but it was dark. The only light was on the stage and pointed at a guy, who was singing into a microphone, leaning forward with it. He had a smooth tone that sounded like a caress to my ears. He was good. Jesse led me to a back table, and we sat side by side. He leaned back against the wall, and he pulled me against him with an arm curved around my waist. We sat there and listened longer, this band was really good.

When they switched to a different song, one that I recognized, I bolted upright and twisted around. “This is Sustain.” Even I knew who these guys were, and I never paid attention, but this band had exploded a year ago. They’d been some of my only company the summer before I came to school. Jesse gave a small smile as he ran his thumb down the side of my cheek before pulling me back against him. Settling back in, his chest lifted as he took in a deep breath.

His hand fell back to mine and interlaced together.

A girl came over and nodded toward Jesse. “You here just to hang out? You want something to drink?”

“Water for me. You want something?” he asked me.

“Uh.” I was battling against being star struck. These were normal guys, just like Jesse. Jesse was a normal guy. That last thought helped calm me down. They were normal, and they didn’t know me. When I jerked my gaze from the stage to the girl, she was grinning. I wondered how often she dealt with girls like me. “Yeah. I’ll have water, too.”

“You guys sure? Luke stocked the refrigerator. We have more than enough.”

“No, thanks.” Jesse’s voice sounded close to my ear, and I shivered. It was caressing. His arm shifted, pulling me tighter to him. “Thanks, Bri.”

She nodded before she walked away with a sexy saunter to her hips.

I peeked to see if Jesse was watching, but his eyes were closed. His chest lifted back up in another deep breath. It was the first time I’d seen him this relaxed and awake at the same time in what felt like forever. He’d brought me along with him to this place. That meant something. I couldn’t hide from that, but he had already told me that no one could mean to him what Ethan and I did.

As the band started another song, I blinked back tears.

Jesse was already doing this to me, and it was only been the second time I’d seen him. My parents had shattered me. I didn’t need to go to therapy to know that they killed a part of me when I read that letter. Over the summer, I had survived. That’d been my only thought, to keep going, but since coming to school, things were better. A little bit better at least. With him, though, they were becoming more than a little bit. But with that new hope, new terror had begun to build with it.

He’d leave. They always left. What then?

I gripped on to his hand as if he were going to go right then and there.

What would I do?

When I wasn’t with him, I was okay. I was broken, but functioning. I could do that and endure college like that. I’d be fine. And when that would stop, whatever it was . . . that searing pain rattled against my chest. It wanted to burst through every part of me, every cell in my body. I wasn’t letting it. I pushed it away and then stopped thinking.

I’d take what I could get. Maybe enough of me would heal so that I wouldn’t be completely shattered when he eventually left.

The band played for an hour. They’d stop and discuss sections of a song, then start over again as they implemented the new changes. It was fascinating to watch. We remained at our table without speaking. When Jesse’s chest started to rise up and down at a steady rate, I knew he’d fallen asleep, but I didn’t move away. Bri came over a few times and had a new water bottle for us. After the third time, I started to ease from Jesse’s arm and stood. Bri was talking by the bar with a guy who was stocky and an inch shorter than she was, but he had a scar that ran across his entire face. It started at one corner of his forehead and ended underneath his chin on the other side. He saw me first and nodded in my direction. Bri turned around with a friendly smile. She looked around me, and her grin softened with fondness. She gestured to Jesse, “Is he sleeping?”

“Yeah.” She wasn’t surprised by that. “Does he do that a lot?”

She shrugged before she slipped behind the bar’s counter. She reached underneath and pulled out a shot glass with a bottle of whiskey. Filling it up, she slid it toward the stocky guy. “Drink it, Emerson.”

He hadn’t looked particularly friendly before, but a small scowl appeared as I watched him. I glanced away. He was terrifying.

He growled at her, “f**k off, Bri. I’m not drinking that shit.”

Her eyes sparkled as a smile lit up her face. She poured another one for herself. “I’ll take it with you. You lost the bet, fair and square. You have to drink.”

He continued to scowl at the shot glass.

“It’s not going to disappear unless you drink it.” Bri winked at me behind her hand, and she held her own glass up. “Come on, you big baby. Luke said you were supposed to take five shots tonight. You’ve got some catching up to do.”

“Luke can kiss my ass.”

His statement would’ve only been heard by the two of us, but the music abruptly stopped right before. Everyone heard it, and the lead singer gripped his microphone. “You lost the bet, Emerson. Take your five f*****g shots.”

The drummer started a roll as he taunted into his microphone, “Em-er-son. Em-er-son. Em-er-son.”

“You can kiss my ass, too, Braden,” he shouted across the warehouse. “Screw all of you. I’m out of here.”

The drummer changed his chant, “Hy-po-crite. Hy-po-crite. Hy-po-crite.”

Emerson stalked toward the door and shoved outside.

“Your boy’s awake.” Bri handed the shot to me and nodded to the table I’d been sitting at. “He looks like he needs this more than Emerson did.”

I wanted to ask her more questions, if Jesse did this a lot? When had he started? If they knew anything about him except his name? So many were burning in me, but I took the shot over to him and put it on the table. “That girl, Bri, said you looked like you needed this.”

Jesse took the shot without argument.

“Hey!” The lead singer came over as I reclaimed my seat. He nodded to me in greeting, pulled a chair out, twirled it around, and straddled it. “I didn’t see you come in.”

Jesse grimaced. “Yeah, to get away. You know.”

The guy nodded, slid his gaze to me, and held his hand out. “Luke Skeet.”

I took his hand, which was firm and polite, nothing more. “Hi, Alex Connors.”

He nodded, there was no recognition, no speculation, nothing. He turned back to Jesse, his gray eyes were alert. I felt slightly zapped by this guy’s attention, and I could understand why so many girls had fallen in love with the lead singer to Sustain.

I glanced at Jesse underneath my eyelashes. He was friends with them, and he came here to get away. That told me these guys were either important to him or they understood him in a way that no one else did.

Luke was saying, “There’s a Feast this Saturday if you and your girl want to come.”

I tensed, not really knowing what I missed in while I was zoned out. I knew I was waiting for Jesse to say the inevitable “she’s not my girl,” but he only shrugged.

“Maybe. Some of the girlfriends are throwing a picnic for the team. You guys should come to that.” He grinned to himself. “Tiffany would drop bricks if you guys showed up. She wouldn’t know what to do.”

Luke’s eyebrows furrowed together. “Is there going to be food?”

Jesse’s grin turned into a smirk. “Lots of it. You guys should come, the whole band. Brielle, too.”

A smile had been growing on Luke’s face, but it froze at the last words. “Why Brielle?”

Giving me a tired smile, Jesse seemed oblivious to the sharpness from his friend. “She’s part of the band, isn’t she?”

“Since when do you care about who’s in the band or not?”

Jesse turned, frowning. “What?”

“Nothing,” Luke bit out, taking a deep breath and loosening the tight grip he had on the table. “Nothing, man. Sorry. Yeah, maybe we’ll check out your picnic.”

Jesse started to chuckle.

“But only if you come to the Feast that night.” Luke glanced at me. “And bring your girl.” From how he stressed that word, he was either fishing for information or he wanted to remind Jesse that he was taken. My eyes slid over his shoulder to Brielle. She was behind the counter again, trying to pour drinks for the band, but the drummer kept poking her in the shoulder. She would swat at him, but he’d dance back two steps, and when she went back to pouring, he’d poke her again. After a few more pokes, she set down the pitcher of beer and whipped around to face him. Her fist was c****d, and she punched him in the shoulder. Howling, he fell back, but he still couldn’t contain a wide smile. She rolled her eyes. When he poked her again, she went back to swatting at him. The rest of the guys ignored the commotion. But then Brielle glanced at us, and her features tightened for a moment before falling back into a friendly grin.

I lifted my hand in a wave.

Luke caught the motion and twisted around to see who I was waving at. When he did, his shoulders stiffened and his hands clenched around the table in a death grip.

Jesse frowned as he saw the same reaction and gave me a questioning look. Luke was still turned away, so I jerked my head in Brielle’s direction. Understanding flooded him, and he jerked his shoulder toward the door. I knew what he meant so I started to stand as he spoke up, “Luke, I think we’re going to head out.”

The lead singer turned back and stood with us. His gray eyes had darkened, but the easygoing smile on his face never gave anything away. He patted Jesse on the shoulder. “It was nice seeing you. I’ll let you know about the picnic, though, knowing how Braden works, we might just show up.”

Jesse shrugged. “Good entertainment for me if you do. My buddy’s girlfriend is something else. She wants everything to go how she wants, but if your band showed up, she couldn’t kick you out. Damn funny to watch.”

“And we’ll see you for the Feast.” He nodded to me. “Your girl, too.”

Jesse nudged me out the door with a hand in the small of my back. “See you then.” When the door closed behind us, I told him, “I don’t think they would mind if I didn’t go. I think he was only pushing that ‘your girl’ part so you’d stay away from his girl.”

Jesse flashed me a grin as we got into his car. “Nah, he was trolling for information. He probably wanted to hit on you.”

I didn’t think he was right, but I let it go.