Everything (34 page)

I nodded. It would be good having her there so that I didn’t have to freak out alone. Tina was about to speak when the doorbell rang. It was almost seven thirty, and we looked at each other with curious stares, wondering who this could be.

“I’ll get it.” Tina got up to go to the door and looked out the side curtain.

“It’s cop,” she said, yanking the door open.

“Oh, hello. My name is Officer Parks. Is Aria or Dacey in?” I heard Officer Parks introduce himself from my spot in the living room.

“Oh,
you’re
Officer Parks. Come in.” She moved aside so that he could enter.

“Call me Justin. I’m off duty now.”

He was indeed off duty, wearing fitted, faded blue jeans frayed at the bottom, worn boots, a fitted black Shinedown
T-shirt, and a worn baseball hat pulled low over his low-cut hair, giving him the bad boy look that didn’t fit with the “I’m a cop” look. I had thought that his uniform was what made him bulky because of his vest, but it was just him. His arms bulged out from the sleeves of the T-shit but not in the gross body-builder way, just enough to show he hit the free weights—or lifted a lot of bad guys.

He turned and spotted me sitting on the couch and came into the living room. Behind him, Tina tilted her head to the side and ogled his ass with an appreciative look. I rolled my eyes inwardly.

“Aria, how are you and Dacey?” he addressed us both but scrutinized me longer.

“Officer Parks,” we said in synchronization.

“Please, call me Justin. I’m off duty,” he repeated.

“Okay, Justin. I’m okay,” Aria said, getting up to offer him her seat.

He sat across from me on the two-seater and fixed his gaze on me.

Tina and Aria exchanged a look.
 

“Aria, can you help me in the kitchen with that thingamajiggy?” Tina asked.

Those bitches, I thought as I plotted their deaths as they slipped into the kitchen.

“Is there something with the case? I thought it was closed,” I asked naively.

“No, I asked your sister to tell you to call me, but it’s been four days and I haven’t heard from you. I got worried.” He looked at me pointedly.

“Oh, I hear I have you to thank for getting me home that night?” I felt my cheeks flame. What the hell was wrong with me? Why did I care what the hell he thought? Chances are I wouldn’t see him again after this, but deep down I didn’t want him to think I was a head case.

“You don’t remember?”

“It’s a bit fragmented, I admit.”

“You were really upset. You looked right past me like you didn’t recognize me.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. I couldn’t get you to respond to me, so I took your phone and dialed the last person that called you, which, lucky for me, was your sister, and she told me what happened, which I’m sorry, by the way.” He gave me a pained look.
 

Just hearing that night retold by him set that feeling in the pit of my stomach again.

“Anyway, I got you in my car, and you only said one thing to me, but you didn’t say it to me, more like to yourself, you said Trevo—”

“Trevor
chose
this, and it was the hardest loss of all,” I remembered. “Yeah, I didn’t mean to say that out loud, sorry.” Just saying his name made my voice falter.

“You don’t have to apologize, Dacey, especially for someone else’s choice, even if it is a dumb-ass choice,” he added as an afterthought.

“Wait, you said my sister told you? How did my sister know?” It hadn’t dawn on me that I never told her, but she somehow knew.

“Your ex found her and explained to her that he had run into you and you took off before he had a chance to talk to you.”
 

I secretly thanked Justin for not saying his name.

“So he found Aria to go after me, but why, if he didn’t love me enough to not break up with me or to not go out with someone else?”

“Hey, I know these things are hard. You’re in double mourning.” Justin’s voice bought me out of my musing.

“What do you mean?” I frowned at the term.

“Well, you were still in mourning from the death of your parents. You didn’t have the time to mourn properly, and now you have to mourn another loss—you’re in double mourning.”

Huh, was that a technical term? It wasn’t just me being fucked up over some guy and broken promises? “I think you may be right. I don’t know that I would have reacted this way if I hadn’t lost my parents or this had happened, say, three months earlier or six months from now.”

He nodded as if he knew. “I don’t know your ex, so forgive me for speaking out of context, but he’s an asshole for doing this to you.” His autumn-colored eyes darkened just a little at his words.

“I used to feel sorry for him. He told me this story about not knowing what love was and he was never in love with me because he didn’t know what it was, and I fell for it. God, I was a fucking idiot for falling for that shit. Then I see him with her and he’s...They’re...I don’t know what I feel for him now.”

“He said that?” Justin asked, seemingly disgusted.

I nodded and hung my head, trying to hide my face.
 

He moved to the couch where I was sitting and placed his finger under my chin, bringing it back up. “Don’t ever be ashamed of love. He’s the fucker for lying to you. It’s his fault, not yours.”

I was a little taken aback by the fierceness of his words and the closeness, but I slowly nodded, and he put more distance between us on the couch.

“Where do you live?” I asked, changing the subject. I was uncomfortable with the conversation. I didn’t want to talk about he-who-must-not-be-named anymore or else I was going back to my cave, and I didn’t think Justin...I didn’t know. I just didn’t want him to think anything bad about me.

“Orlando.”

“So you drove, what, forty-five minutes? Why not just call?”

“Because that has worked out so good these past four days.” He smiled, showing off a dimple in his cheek.
 

Hum. “Okay, point taken. I was...haven’t been myself these past four days.”

His brow furrowed. “I know.”

I was about to ask him how he knew when the doorbell sounded again. My house felt like Grand Central Station this morning.

“Excuse me.” I got up to see who it was, expecting Riley for Aria.

I opened the door, and my stomach dropped to my feet when I came face-to-face with Trevor.

Fuck.
As all the air was knocked out of me, I stood there like a dumb ass with the door open.

“Dacey, I was driving by and I saw the cop car. I thought maybe something had happened. I was just checking to see if everything was okay.”

If I could have answered him, I didn’t get a chance. A pot came flying by my face and hit Trevor square in the chest.
 

Stunned, he looked at me, then realized I wasn’t the culprit.

“Get the fuck away from the sister!” Aria was coming out of the kitchen armed with utensils and another pot in her hands and started throwing them with precise aim.
 

I had just enough time to duck before a wooden spoon clocked him in the forehead.

“No, no, you don’t get to talk to her! Do you know what she has been through these last four days? Go away you...you diphthong!” She threw another utensil.
Diphthong?

Tina came around the corner, and if I didn’t know any better, I’d say she had...

“Tina, no, no, no!” I went to grab her arm before she threw the knife. If Trevor were smart, he would have turned and ran at this point.

Justin, being the think-fast cop that he was, was on his feet when he saw the knife in Tina’s hand at the same time I did, but he went for Trevor, shoving him back outside and closing the door behind them, shutting out the screams of Aria and Tina.

“Are you fucking insane! You could have actually hit him with that thing!” I yelled at Tina.

“Duh, that’s the point! I told you if he hurt you I would kill him. Besides, it’s just a steak knife. Stupid muthafu—”

“You can’t kill him, Tina! Yeah, he’s a dick and what he did sucks, but you can’t go to jail. Think about it. What if he presses charges?”

As I said it, I was already on my way out the door. Fuck, what if he did press charges? It’s not like he and Tina were BFFs.

I looked back and pinned Tina with a stare that said, “if you love me, really love me, you will stay here.”
 

She held her hands up in surrender, one hand still clutched around the knife.

I went outside to find that Trevor was rubbing the knot forming on his forehead from the spoon, and Justin was watching him closely. Walking over to the driveway where they both were, I went to Justin, who turned to me and studied me closely before speaking.

“Are you okay?” he asked, worry in his face, clearly not giving a shit about the guy who just got attacked.

I nodded. “I don’t want him to press charges on them,” I whispered in a panic.

He nodded his understanding but didn’t seem concerned. “I’ll take care of it.”

Trevor noticed me then and made to walk toward me. On instinct, I backed up a step, but Justin stepped in between us.

“That’s far enough, Mr. Martin.”

Trevor eyed me, then eyed Justin.

“Why do you have a cop protecting you, Dac?”

It hurt to hear him say my name so affectionately. I closed my eyes and tried to swallow the lump in my throat. I had to get this over with. “I don’t. Justin is a...Justin is a friend.” I couldn’t really explain what Justin was. I hope he didn’t get offended that I called him that, but I was acting quickly.

“A friend,” Trevor mocked.

“Look, what are you really doing here? My house is not on your way to anything, so cut with the lying, for once.”

“I was worried. You haven’t been at school.”

There was only one way he could know I hadn’t been at school.

“Got that from your new girlfriend?” I said strongly. On the outside I was bitch, but on the inside it shattered me to say it, to even form the words.

“Dac, don’t. It didn’t happen like that.” He went to move toward me again, and again I moved back. Justin moved closer to Trevor, ready to intervene if he got too close, which I was tempted to see. I had no doubt that Justin could take Trevor. Justin was taller and had more muscles than Trevor. Plus, Justin took out jerks and assholes for a living and there was one right in front of him begging for it.

“Look, that’s not why I came out here. I just want to make sure you’re not going to call the cops on my sister and Tina,” I said, ready to be done with this.

“They assaulted me,” he accused.

“And why the fuck do you think they did that, Trevor?” I shot back.

“All right, fine. I’m the bad guy—I get it.”

“No, you don’t get to try and make everyone feel sorry for you! Yes, you ARE the bad guy...You know what? You’re also the asshole who broke my heart, made all these promises to me, and then left me after I just buried my fucking parents—my parents, you dick! So no, you don’t get to play the martyr to the whole town like woe is me. Fuck your ‘woe is me,’” I said, feeling marginally better. There’s something to be said about yelling your lungs out at the person who fucked you over. It was somewhat cathartic.

He looked at me, shocked, for a minute, then rubbed his forehead again. “No, I’m not going to press charges, although something tells me even if I did, it would just get lost or something anyway,” he said, eyeing Justin.
 

Justin crossed his massive arms over his chest and had leaned on his cruiser in a casual but ready-to-pounce kind of way.

“I never meant for it to go down this way. I really didn’t. I’m sorry if I hurt you. I never intended that. Maybe I’ll see you around. We can be friends?” he asked hopefully.

Justin chuckled and shook his head as if to say, “Man, you got some balls,” but stayed out of it.

“I don’t think so, Trevor. My heart can’t take seeing you anymore.” I told him the truth.

Trevor looked at me, then got in his truck and drove away.

Justin came over and ushered me by my elbow back into the house because the second Trevor was out of sight, the weight was threatening to crush me again and Justin must have seen it.

“What did he say? What happened?” I was bombarded with questions the second we walked in, all of which I ignored. Aware I had company, I went to the living room instead of my cave again.

Justin joined me on the couch, sitting a little closer than he had before, but at this point, the proximity didn’t bother me.

“He’s not going to press charges, on either of you. But even if he had, I could have gotten them taken care of. I know people,” Justin was saying to Aria and Tina.

“I just saw him there, and I couldn’t risk her going back to the way she was before. I had to get him away from her. I can’t stand to see my sister like that,” Aria was explaining.

“Don’t apologize. If I had a sister, I would have done the same thing.”

“Best friend,” Tina said by way of explanation, which I guess explained it all for Justin as he just nodded.

Aria knelt down in front of me and whispered, although it was loud enough that Justin had to have heard too. “Please don’t go back, Dac. Please. I can’t handle it if you go back. I need you.”

I looked into her eyes and touched her cheek with my fingertips.
 

“No, kid, I won’t go back. Besides, we have a road trip tomorrow, right?” I smiled at her, hoping that convinced her.

“Yes, we do. Orlando, here we come,” Aria said. “Come on, Jussy, let’s pick up our assault weapons and put them back.” Aria grabbed Tina’s hand, picking up various utensils and pots and headed into the kitchen, leaving us alone, again.

I was seriously thinking about making them some Ex-Lax-flavored brownies for this.

Justin cleared his throat. “When Aria asked you not to go back...what did she mean?”

If he didn’t think I was asylum material before, he was going to think so now. “That night, you know, the one you found me...this is the first time I’ve been out since then.” I let out a breath and waited for his response.

“You mean outside the house?”

“No, I mean outside my parents’ room.”