Beautifully Used (The Beaumont Brothers Book 2) (6 page)

It did sound fun the way I explained it.
Using parts of my real-life experience hadn’t been fun, but the therapy it provided was tremendously helpful. I didn’t go into much more of the plot with Lena. Mainly because, even though I could write it, it didn’t mean I was ready to talk about it. I’d never told anyone about that time in my life. I didn’t think I ever would.

“What’s it called?”

“Giving Everything.”

“Well, we should celebrate. That’s fantastic!”

“Let’s wait a week. Until I decide whether or not I want people to know, okay?”

“Sure. Mum’s the word.”

Chapter 11

I walked into my room having left the bar early. My head pounded from the heat as I walked over to open the window and allow some fresh air into my musty room. It was hot, but the night lit up as a crackling white light streaked across the sky followed a few seconds later by thunder booming through the air. I shut the window realizing it might start raining. It was the middle of June, and for some reason already scorching as if it were July or August. The thunderstorm wasn’t unusual though, and they frequently happened without any rain. It was nine o’clock at night, and my skin gleamed with sticky sweat from the unusual humidity.

The
week had flown by, and I suddenly realized I hadn’t gotten laid the entire time. On top of that, I’d slept in my own bed … alone, all week long. Something was wrong with me. I’d taken my temperature, thinking maybe I had the flu, but I didn’t feel sick. Just, not in the mood for meaningless sex. That thought alone told me my mind needed a serious attitude adjustment.

I pulled my t-shirt over my head and unbuttoned my pants
, letting them fall to the floor in the bathroom. As the tepid spray of water streamed down from the showerhead, I stepped in carefully, closing the glass door behind me. Closing my eyes, water spilled over my face, easing some of the pain behind my eyelids. Maybe the lack of sex was giving me a headache. I tried to imagine a girl I’d recently been with, just to see if it would get me in the mood, but the only female that came to mind was, shit … Gabrielle. Under normal circumstance, picturing Gabrielle was sure to get me excited, but knowing she would never have me left me with little more than a half hard-on and very frustrated.

After finishing m
y cool down in the shower, I stepped out and dried myself off. Tugging on a pair of blue boxer shorts, I headed down the hall toward the kitchen. Towel drying my hair, I bumped smack into Gabrielle. She’d been sipping a freezing cold vanilla milkshake, and the entire contents were now all over my not-so-clean-anymore bare chest, as well as her own tank top.

“
Gah!” I shouted. “What the fuck?”

“Oh my God, Brodie
. I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you.”

“Apparently not,” I said as she grabbed the towel from me and began wiping it across my chest, smearing the
sticky mess around more than drying it up. I placed my hand over hers helping to sop up the shake, her eyes widened and lingered at my chest as her fingers brushed against one of my nipples. I held my breath as her fingertips skimmed down over my stomach along with the towel.

“
You’re all sticky now.”

“It’ll wash off.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said again, still trying to get the stickiness off my chest, but only managing to make my blood turn a little warmer.
I should get away from her. Now
.

“
No big deal. It’s okay. I’ll just hop back into the shower again and rinse it off.”

“Again?”

“Yeah, I just had one, but now you can join.” I couldn’t resist. I know, I was a cad, but she looked so gorgeous standing there, her t-shirt slick with ice cream, smelling of vanilla and being so upset about plowing into me.

She completely ignored
my offer to join me, which didn’t make sense and certainly didn’t seem like the Gabrielle I was beginning to know. That Gabrielle would have come back with something sarcastic, or some vehement refusal. I was sure of it. Instead of sarcasm, she stood there staring, her brown eyes wide with … I don’t know, horror? Jeez. Was I that bad?

I thought it best to
forego my stupid offer, and attempted to cover it up with, “Look, it’s no big deal. I’d barely dried off from the first shower. I can just hop back in.”

She didn’t seem to hear me as s
he stood looking like a scared little girl, murmuring in a small soft voice, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Please don’t be mad.”

I reached out to touch her arm and she flinched.
“I’m not mad. Are you okay?” I asked because she was definitely not acting or sounding like herself. There was something going on inside that pretty head of hers, and I wasn’t so sure she was going to snap out of it. I touched her arm again, and she cowered back as if she thought I might hurt her.

She slowly shook her head as though in a daze. “Please don’t make me …”

“Make you do what?”

She seemed so far
away as she stood there mumbling, “I didn’t mean to. Please. I’ll be good.”

“Gabrielle. What’s going on?” She took a step back, shaking her head at me. “
Gabrielle!” She continued stepping away, staring at my stomach. “Gabrielle! Look at me!” I said, taking her arms in my hands. I let the towel drop to the floor and her eyes followed it. “Gabby, please look at me!”

She finally l
ooked up and our eyes met. Hers were glossy with wetness as a tear dripped down her cheek. She swiped at it with the back of her hand. “Sorry.”

“Wha
t the hell is going on? Where did you just go?”

“Nowhere.”
She tugged out of my grasp and took off for the guest room she was staying in. She went inside, shutting the door.

“
What the fuck just happened?” I mumbled and took off for another quick shower.

Chapter 12

After closing the door, I
leaned up against its hard surface and sank to the floor. I brought my knees up to my chest and cradled my arms on top of them, burying my face on top of my arms, not caring that my t-shirt was rather sticky and smelled like vanilla milkshake. Why had that awful vision come into my head? I hadn’t thought about any of that stuff for many years. Except when I wrote the book, but even then, the memories hadn’t been that prevalent in my mind. In fact, I’d felt much better after writing it all down. Giving the story to my characters instead of me had helped relieve my anxieties. Removing myself from the situation and giving the problems to someone else had been something I’d done inside my head many, many times. Writing it as someone else was just as easy. It paid off, I guess, since my new publisher and editor both said it seemed so real. The editor even asked me if it had happened to me. I denied it all, of course. I always tried to see the character as someone else. Of course, I had to be careful and not be too specific in the telling of the tale. According to my editor, nobody wants to read heinous acts like that in too much detail.

Seeing Brodie standing there dripping with sticky
vanilla milkshake only made me remember that horrible time in my life. God, how embarrassing? He must think I’m a complete nutcase. It had been so uncontrollable though. Like someone else had taken over my mind. I didn’t realize it had happened until Brodie was ordering me to look at him.

The room lit up with a bright flash of light
, and three seconds later, thunder boomed through the eerie dark night. I jumped at the sound and wished it would go away. I hated thunderstorms. And thunderstorms without rain? Now that was just creepy.

The outline of the bed in the dark
seemed to dominate the space, making the room seem daunting when the light flashed. The area was small, but I didn’t need much room. Most of my belongings were still in San Diego. All I had with me now were the suitcases I’d brought, and after emptying them, my clothes seemed dwarfed by the wall length closet they hung in.

My eyes hurt. My head hurt from all the thinking
, and it took me several minutes to realize the pounding in my head was actually someone knocking on the bedroom door. When I heard Brodie’s pleas to open it, I swiped away the rest of the tears that had dripped down my cheeks.

“Gabrielle. Please open the door.”

“Please go away.”

“No.
”

I squeezed my eyes shut. “Why?”

“Because, I need to see that you’re okay.”

“I’m okay. Now please leave me alone.”

“No. I need to see for myself.”

I didn’t want to open the door and see him without his shirt. It was too embarrassing.
What was wrong with me? I’d seen men without shirts before. Lain with men without shirts before, but for some reason, the sticky mess on him brought back all the horrible things from my past that I so desperately wanted to be rid of.

“Take my word for it.”

“Come on, Gabrielle. Open the fucking door.”

I stood up and dried my face on the towel hanging on the back of the door
then pulled the door open. “Well, since you asked so nicely.”

Not waiting for an invitation, he stepped into the room and looked around. The room was
still dark since I hadn’t bothered with any of the lights. A couple seconds later, lightning struck out again, giving the room a momentary glow, and I flinched as the crack of thunder quickly followed.

He walked over and turned
on a small lamp that rested on the table beside the bed before he sat down on the edge of the mattress, lifting a couple of the pillows and tossing them to the other side.

“Just make yourself at home
, why don’t you?” I said and watched him look around as though he were looking for something. I realized I was wringing my hands together, so I stuck them in the pockets of my shorts. He had a shirt on, at least. So I was safe there. I don’t know why his nakedness affected me so much.

“Where are they?”

“What?” His question took me by surprise.

“Where are they?” he repeated a little louder.

“Where are what?” I asked, completely puzzled as to what he was talking about.

“You know what.”

“No. I don’t. What is it you want?”

“I don’t want anything. I want to know where they
are?”

“Again, where
are what?”

“The fucking drugs.”

“What?”

“The drugs you’re
on. Where are you hiding them?”

“I don’t have any drugs.
Seriously, you think I’m on drugs? Why would you think I had drugs?’

“
There’s something up, whatever it is, it’s making you act weird.”

“I’m not on drugs.”

“Well.” He stood. “Gabrielle, something just happened out there in the hallway and you didn’t seem like yourself.”

“I …
I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“
Yes, you do. You went somewhere. You know it and I know it. You spilled a milkshake all over both of us and then it was like you disappeared and some scared little girl replaced you.”

I leaned against the doorframe, stalling. I didn’t know what to say to him. He walked over to me and took my hands in his
. “Look. You don’t want to talk about it, fine. I get it. It’s none of my business. All I want to know is that you’re okay because a few minutes ago, you definitely weren’t okay.”

“I’m okay.” I thought quickly
of something to explain my weird behavior. “I was testing out the way I thought one of my characters might react in a story I’m writing. So see? No reason for concern.”

Brodie
made some huffing sound, and side stepped around me, stopping in the middle of the doorway, then turned toward me. “Well, that sounds like one hell of a story. I look forward to reading it someday.”

He would? “You would?” I found myself
asking aloud. The idea of him reading my book seemed so … surreal.

He shrugged.
“Sure. Why not?”

“I
don’t know. I never pictured you as a reader. I mean a guy who likes to read novels. I mean … I’m sure you read.” Now I was babbling, but at least we were talking about something besides what had happened, which I wasn’t entirely sure about myself, so there was really no way I could explain it to Brodie, or anyone for that matter.

“I read. Mostly Stephen King,
Tom Clancy, or Michael Connelly. Horror and mysteries mostly. From the way you were acting, your story sounds like it might fall into the horror genre. Is that what you’re writing? Horror? Because you sure scared the hell out of me.”

“Sorry. A little on the horror side, it’s mostly a romance, but with a very dark edge.
It’s a stand-alone, but the main character is one that I had in my other novel.” I wasn’t lying about all that. I was toying with a new story like that. One I actually started writing the other night.

“A romantic horror story. Sounds intriguing. You have another novel?”

“Yeah. I accepted a contract with a publisher a few days before I came here. I told Lena about it this morning, but I told her not to mention it to anyone.”

“That’s really cool. Congratulations. But why did you tell her not to tell anyone?”

“I wasn’t sure if I wanted anyone to know. I was thinking of using a pen name.”

“Oh. Why don’t you want anyone to know you wrote it?”

“Let’s just say it has some stuff in it that I don’t want certain people to read.”

“That makes sense. I guess.”

“I can’t believe you thought I was on drugs.”

“I didn’t.”

“But you accused me of being on drugs and hiding them.”

“I had to ask. You were acting very strange.
We should still celebrate. About the book.” He smiled, but from the way his smile hadn’t reached his eyes, I didn’t think he bought my explanation. Regardless, I was grateful that he didn’t pressure me for any more information.