My Sweet Demise (Demise #1) (25 page)

The smell of books hits me immediately when we step inside of the library. I pause and stand there, inhaling deeply. The smell of old pages, words that change lives, and magic that exists only as far as you search for it—that’s what books smell like to me. Peace settles over me. My father’s screams fade away and the sound of my mother’s tears can’t penetrate the magical haze.

When I open my eyes Kent is staring at me. His mouth is slightly open and his eyes are lost.

“You’re kind of beautiful, Rain. You know that?”

His compliment tightens around my heart, where I’m adding more and more of Kent.

What will I be in a month?

Still beautiful or a memory?

Chapter Eight

“I’ll see you tonight,” Kent announces as he pulls up out front of the apartment.

“Are you going out after school?”

“Do you want me to?”

“I’d rather spend time at home. With you,” I add, looking out the window. “Unless you’d rather not. It’s okay if you don’t.”

“Rain.” He sounds stern. Still, I don’t look at him. “We can hang out together tonight. I think I want one last night with you before your sister gets here.”

I smile at my reflection in the window. “I’ll miss your penis.”

“Why?” he asks warily. “Because your sister’s going to shoot it off?”

I open my door and grab my purse. “Thanks for the pancakes.” When I turn to him he grabs my face and brings me back inside for a kiss.

“I’ll be seeing you and this smart mouth later.”

I nod against his lips, kissing him just a little more. “This smart mouth can’t wait.”

“Me neither. Now get out before I test out your backseat.”

I glance in the back and he laughs, shaking his head at me. “Go, Rain.”

I don’t want to admit this to myself, because it means things that might not mean anything after a month, but the second he drives away my stomach drops. Kent has a life and so do I. My mother’s revolved around my father’s and that means I’ll have to do the opposite. When I get inside of the apartment with his keys, I set my purse down on the coffee table and gasp. It’s still an atrocious mess. The smell has had time to ferment, creating a toxic bomb when I step further inside.

I immediately locate a garbage bag under the kitchen sink and set to cleaning. I turn the stereo on and flip through Kent’s CD’s, locating a Janis Joplin record. Becca loves her. I put it on and listen as I clean up the mess Kent’s friends left behind.
Some friends
…I wonder if they’re part of the problem. How can Kent change when his friends are still doing the same things he vows not to? He was tempted once. He may be tempted again. What if there’s someone else out there with a smarter mouth?

What if Kent isn’t done punishing us at all?

When the apartment is clean I decide to do laundry next. Most of my clothes are dirty and my sheets need washing after Samantha and Trevor made good use of them. As I’m putting quarters in the washer a woman comes in. I immediately recognize her as Arissa, Kent’s clinger. Her brown hair has golden undertones and when she walks certain parts of her bounce. I imagine Kent on top of her and decide not to like anything out of her mouth. My Kent meter is running out.

She pauses when she sees me. We both make disgusted faces and turn back to our washing machines. I eye her little sexy purple thong as she puts it into the washer. Did Kent take it off? He does have a certain finesse when it comes to taking panties off.

“He’s not worth it.” She looks me right in the eye. “That son of a bitch is why women lose their shit.”

“I haven’t lost anything,” I assure her icily.

“You think he loves you? I thought he loved me too. We were together for a week!” she screeches.

In that moment I sympathize with her. Kent and I haven’t been around each other much longer and my fall has been just as swift. At the same time I know Kent and I aren’t together. I don’t love him yet. I like him, and like has the tendency to become love, but love is not where I am. My common sense whispers obscenities at me. I can’t love him. We barely know each other. I don’t love him.

“Did he tell you he loved you?”

She blinks. “No. He told me he didn’t do the love thing. But we had sex every chance we got. That’s love. Now he likes to pretend I don’t exist. Did you two have fun in the pool the other morning?” She looks at me like I’m disgusting, as if I’m lower than her top.

I turn back to my clothes without dignifying her with a response.

“He’s going to leave you the same way he left me. Men like Kent only want one thing from you. Once you have sex with him he won’t want you anymore.”

“Thanks for the advice.”

She grabs my wrist. “You think he loves you back? You’re not even that pretty.”

“Don’t touch me.” I fling her hand off of me.

She steps closer. She’s got a couple of inches on me but I don’t back down. Right now I think she might need to.

“You think he’s your man now? You think because you gave him some pussy he’s going to forget about all the other girls who gave him some first?” She shoves me backwards.

“Don’t touch me!” I growl. “Why don’t you back off? Just because Kent doesn’t want you doesn’t mean he doesn’t want me. I would never wear that shirt, but I’m sure you love it.” I smirk, knowing I’m riling her up. “It’s all about preference. He prefers me.”

She clenches her teeth and bunches her fists. “You little whore. You’re just a whore to him.”

“What were you?”

I try and block her hit, sensing it coming, but she’s too fast. Her fist flies at me. I’ve never been in a fight before. For one brief second I’m stunned by the pain. And then I’m pissed off. With a scream, I launch myself at her. I smack her across the face and she grabs my hair, flinging me into the washing machine. It hurts my ribs but I ignore it. I reach up and hit her in the side of the face and she releases my hair from her grasp. She’s a cat, pouncing on me with her claws out. Her fist connects with my mouth. I cry out, tasting copper on my tongue. She pulls my hair again and we both fall down on the ground. I refuse to let her get on top of me. I kick and connect with her chest. Scrambling to my feet, I run at her with my fist balled. The moment I nail her I feel better.

“Kent does want me!” I scream at everyone who doesn’t believe me, losing what little control I have left. “He has better taste than you thought. You want more?” I spit some blood on the ground with my fists raised.

She puts her hands up.

I step back, breathing hard, blood dripping down my chin. “Leave Kent alone. Next time I won’t wait for you to throw the first punch.”

I grab my empty basket and take it upstairs, heading straight for the freezer. I need something cold. I grab a bag of frozen blueberries and hold it to my mouth. It hurts. I can’t stand physical pain. Unable to calm down, I pace the apartment as I grow madder, so damn mad I can’t help the angry tears falling down my cheeks.

When Kent gets home he’s laughing about something on the phone. I’m stalking the living room and holding the soggy blueberry bag to my mouth. He looks at me and his eyes light up. But his smile falls when he sees my face. “I’ll call you back, Jake.” He tosses his phone on the couch and stomps over to me. “What happened?”

“Don’t touch me,” I order, holding my hand up to stop him.

He pauses. “What happened?”

“One of your couch participants fought me in the laundry room.”

He looks confused for half a second. Once he understands his eyes ice over and fury dances in his gaze. He heads for the door.

“Kent, don’t,” I beg, and break down. Tears fall down my face.

His face softens and hardens at the same time. He pulls me over to the couch and sits down, pulling me onto his lap. “Let me see.” He removes the bag from my mouth and growls. He tenderly touches my puffy swollen lips, kissing me softly. “I’m so sorry, baby.” He wipes my tears and then touches my eye. “I’m sorry.” He kisses my eye. “I’m so damn sorry.” He kisses my cheek. “What happened?”

“You.” I shove at his chest. “She said you were going to leave me too and you didn’t want me. But she’s wrong. You want me.” I touch his handsome face and scrape his stubble.

“I want you,” he promises forcefully. “It’s her ass I don’t want. I’m so sorry, baby. I can’t believe she did this to your beautiful face.”

I lean forward until my head is on his shoulder. “Promise me you won’t say anything to her.”

“Rain.”

“Promise me or I’ll listen to my common sense.”

“What’s it saying?”

“You don’t want to know.”

He sighs and rubs my back. “This is what I get. Everything I ever did wrong to all those women is coming back on you. The one girl I don’t want to hurt, I’m hurting more than anything. What can I do for you?”

“You can let me up. I have to go switch my load to the dryer.”

“I’ll go do it. Go lie down in my bed. I’ll find some aspirin.”

“No!” I shout. What if Arissa is still there? I don’t want him anywhere near her.

“Go lie down.”

“Let’s go together. I need help carrying my load of clothes anyway.”

Relenting rather ungraciously, Kent follows me downstairs. Sure enough, Arissa is talking to someone on the lawn between the apartments.

When she looks over and sees Kent her face pales and she takes off.

“Kent, no!”

He drops my basket and takes off after her, running so fast she barely gets around the corner before he’s on her. He grabs her by her arm and pushes her against the wall. I can’t hear what he’s saying but she turns her face to the side and tries to pull away. He grabs her arms and pushes her back, holding her in place.

“You don’t really want her, do you?” Arissa cries.

Her face is swollen and red and tears stream down her cheeks. She reaches up and touches his face tenderly.

He shakes her touch off. “What goes on in my life is none of your business, Arissa. I am not yours. We hooked up and then you went psycho on me. Leave me alone. I don’t want you. Do you get it? I don’t want you!” he shouts.

She flinches but tries to touch him again. “What we had was beautiful.”

“We didn’t have anything! I fucked you. That’s it.”

She starts to sob uncontrollably. Even Kent can tell something’s wrong with her. He lets her arms go and grabs her chin. “Look at me, Arissa.” His voice softens.

She does so unwillingly.

“I’m sorry I treated you the way I did. You didn’t deserve that. I’m sorry. I used you for the wrong reasons and that wasn’t right of me. But Raina didn’t do anything to you. No one hurts her. No one. I’ve done it enough.”

“If you’re sorry, show me.”

“How?” He sounds tired.

“Kiss me,” she begs.

“You need help. Get help, Arissa. You’re sexy and from what I can remember you were feisty and knew how to have fun. You can have any guy you want. You don’t want me, do you? Some asshole who uses you? You deserve a man who loves you; someone who’s happy to see you. Don’t you want to be loved? I want to be loved again. Don’t you want that too?”

My throat thickens when she starts to cry heavily. She wraps her arms around his shoulders and sobs into his neck. His arms come around her as well and he rubs her back soothingly, whispering things in her ear. She nods against him.

“Go upstairs, Rain.” Kent doesn’t look at me as he leads her away.

I don’t want to see anymore. Most of me can acknowledge he’s trying to help her, so I trump down the part that doesn’t and start picking up my clothes off the ground. I take my basket to the laundry room and switch loads, putting my sheets in the drier. On my way out, Kent is coming around the corner alone.

He can barely meet my eyes. Together we walk back upstairs in silence. When he closes the door behind us he looks me in the eye. His face is sallow and he’s having a hard time keeping eye contact.

“What’s wrong with me? Did you see her? She’s got serious emotional issues. Why didn’t I see them before? All I wanted was sex. I didn’t even stop to see maybe she was hurting too.”

“She hit me. You can feel sorry for her. I’m not the one who did anything wrong here. And I’m not going to talk to you about how you treated other women. You did that on purpose,” I remind him. “You hurt her knowing you were hurting her. What makes me different?”

“If you have to ask me that…” He can’t even finish. He stomps around me and then stops suddenly. “No. I’m not going to storm off. I always do that. If you have to ask me that, then what are we doing, Rain? What are we doing?” he repeats sadly.

“We’re trying,” I remind him feebly. “I want to know what makes me different. I don’t understand why I’m more special than Auburn Hair, Samantha or Arissa. Why me, Kent?”

He shakes his head. “Because you’re different, Rain. You are. You’re just going to have to deal with it. You’re the first woman since Willow I can see myself with. You make me forget I ever felt like shit. You make me laugh when I don’t think I can. I’m not going to explain why. You’re going to have to trust me. But I think you’re going to have to trust yourself more.”

I am suddenly exhausted. I hurt emotionally and physically. To make matters worse Becca is coming home tomorrow and everything I have right now, this man and our fragile bond, could be gone. She’s not going to budge on Kent. Why am I arguing with him when I’ll have to fight for him tomorrow?

“Trusting myself?” I laugh uncomfortably and walk into the kitchen to get a fresh bag of something frozen. “I thought that’s what I was doing.”

His phone rings before he can respond. He sighs at the caller ID like this is the last thing he needs right now. “What’s up, Dad? I’m busy. Spill it. I didn’t spend that much on the credit card, did I?” He rubs the back of his neck and whistles. “Oh come on, Dad. That’s bullshit. You’ve been waiting for an excuse to drag me home for my damn birthday. I don’t want to come. I’ll celebrate here. No. Dad!” he snaps, and I can hear his dad snap too. “Do what you have to do.” Kent hangs up and glares at me. “Can you believe him? He’s threatening to cut me off if I don’t come home for my birthday.”