“W-where do you want to come?” Even my teeth are rattling. He is literally fucking every part of me.

“Everywhere. Your mouth, down your throat, all over your sweet little clit, across those perfect fucking tits. I dream about fucking your ass, about making it impossible for you to sit down for a week.”

I am speechless.

“Do you get it, now, baby?” He jerks my head backward by my hair until I’m upright and surprisingly his dick is still buried safely inside of me. “This is how I am. Fucked-up. Rough. Dangerous. This is how I fuck. That shit in Austin, and the pity fuck here a few months ago, that wasn’t me. This is me.”

Nothing hits me quite as hard as those two words.

Pity. Fuck.

I cannot have heard that right.

But I can smell his breath again from here and I know he’s drunk. Actually, I’m pretty sure he’s shitfaced because the Gavin I know would never handle me this way or speak to me like this. I’m not complaining, it’s kind of hot. But not if he’s angry and not if he’s too drunk to use sense.

“Fucking come, Gavin. Get it over with and get the hell away from me before you say something else you’re going to regret.”

A strange manic sound escapes him. He thrusts in hard and deep and holds me there, tethered by my hair, impaled by his cock. “That’s the worst part. I have no remorse, baby. Ever.”

“Fuck you,” I hiss out because I don’t like this anymore. It’s not fun and it feels malicious and hateful. And wrong. “Actually, I’m done fucking you right now. Thank you.”

I slam my elbow backward, catching him in the rib cage and startling him enough that he lets go of me.

As soon as I’m free I run into the bathroom and shut the door hard behind me before sinking onto the cold, tile floor with my sore, bare ass. It actually helps a little.

I don’t know what just happened, or why he behaved that way, but I know now that Robyn is right.

Gavin is fighting his own battle. He has darkness inside him and it is capable of destroying me.

It just did.

14 | Gavin

SHE’S IN THE bathroom. Locked on the other side of a barrier I’m more familiar with than most.

If there is anything lower than scum, like scum that grows on scum, that’s me right now.

It wasn’t supposed to go there, to get like that.

“Mommy? Please come out now. I’m hungry . . .”

Where the fuck did that come from?

“Dixie,” I call out over the uninvited sound of my warped childhood. “Baby, I’m sorry. Please . . . I can explain . . .”

Can’t I? I don’t even know anymore. All I know is I can’t leave like this—having done what I did, hurting her that way.

I lean forward until my forehead touches the door.

“I’m so sorry, Bluebird. I lost myself but that’s no excuse.” And I’m hammered as hell but that’s no excuse, either. The hall spins around me and I am grounded only by my forehead pressed to the wood.

“Please come out, Mommy. I’m scared. Someone is knocking on the door.”

Memories I thought I’d effectively smothered years ago attempt to break through the surface. My mom had a habit of running to the bathroom—sick, high, or to elude the local dealers, she’d run in there and hide—leaving me locked out on the other side. Alone, helpless, starving. Scared for countless reasons. Some nights I slept outside the bathroom door. Many nights.

My own heartbeat throbs inside my skull.

“Dixie, please.” I hear my voice crack and I let my fist bang lightly against the door. “Please don’t shut me out, baby. I am so, so damn sorry. Please. At least let me see that you’re okay and then I’ll go. I promise.”

I fucked her dirty and I was an absolute dick about it. It wasn’t necessary. To take it that far. But I was blind drunk and I lost myself.

I remember seeing her there in the doorway, angelic and innocent with her hair flowing all around her, and me thinking This is how it has to end. She’s too good for me and I have to make her see that.

That was the last rational thought I had. She was warm and soft and wet. The scent of her, the unique salty sweetness that flavors her skin and deepens intoxicatingly between her legs, it overtook me and I was so far gone I couldn’t see my way out.

“Get dressed, Gavin,” I hear her say quietly. “And I’ll let you in on one condition.”

I nod even though she can’t see me. “Got it. Getting dressed right now.”

The entire time I’m putting my clothes on I’m praying the second part of her condition isn’t “get the hell out.”

I don’t know if she’s scared or just royally pissed-off, but I need to know. I was aiming for the second one but I never meant to make her afraid or actually hurt her.

I pull my clothes on slowly and try to blank it out. I can’t. I’ll never be able to no matter how hard I try.

I told myself I’d just pretend she was one of the others, the ones I used to use as if they were disposable. I tried. I tried that but it was so . . . wrong. The girls I used to fuck liked it that way; they asked for it that way and there was a mutual understanding beforehand. Doing that to Dixie, to my Bluebird, to the girl I would cut my fucking eyeballs out not to hurt, will forever be the worst thing I’ve ever done and I’ve done some messed-up shit.

God have mercy on my black soul, I am a fucking disgusting human being. But there it is. I have mommy issues like a motherfucker. Well, wait. No. Gross.

Fuck.

But my mom never hugged me, never wrapped her arm around me or patted me or kissed me. She never showed me any physical affection because she was always high and in her own universe. I didn’t even know I needed it until the eighth-grade field trip to an art museum downtown where Lindy Preston sucked me off in the boys’ bathroom.

From then on, I was an addict, much like dear old Mom.

I think Lindy has a handful of kids now by a handful of different guys. But blow jobs were my gateway drug. Soon I needed more and even after having full-blown sex, I sought sex with multiple girls at once. Surprisingly, many of them were down with that.

It felt so fucking good, to be touched, to be pleasured that way, as if they existed only for that reason. To let go and just feel. I have a relatively large dick and word got around. By the beginning of tenth grade I had fucked every varsity cheerleader at my school and a few from others.

I used to feel proud of that. Now I feel . . . sick. Sick to my fucking soul, and who the hell knew I even had a soul?

Dixie did once, I guess. Even if she’s still questioning it, she’ll soon know I don’t, or not one worth saving, anyway.

The year she was in Houston, I kept picturing her with some fancy college guy, or the maestro of the orchestra taking her to expensive dinners, wining, dining, and fucking her six ways to Sunday. It drove me insane.

In-fucking-sane.

I became obsessed. I was literally waiting for her wedding invitation to arrive in the mail. I’d missed my shot and I missed her. I missed her so much it caused me physical fucking pain.

Missing Dixie was hell. It was the deepest, darkest pit so when my mom left drugs out on the kitchen table or in the bathroom or in the laundry basket, I traded them for blow jobs in back alleys. They needed their fix and I needed mine. Seemed like an even trade-off.

I can tell you exactly where most downtown Amarillo bars’ security cameras are and what they can and cannot see.

Dallas has caught me more than once. He once yanked me out of a very lively foursome while I was butt naked and swinging at him with both fists. He made me get tested and while everything was negative, I’m not going to pretend I didn’t sweat it pretty hard while I waited for the results to come in.

Hence his hesitation about letting me date his sister.

But in a strange way, he seemed to understand. He called me out for self-medicating, said he’d done some similar stupid shit when Robyn dumped him. Though he thought I missed the band, not his sister specifically, and I never clarified.