Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 76780 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76780 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
He yanks me to him for a tight hug that I’m unable to escape from. For a moment, I breathe in my brother’s familiar scent and relax in his hold. Getting that shit off my chest doesn’t help. All the pain and darkness still drags me under. His comfort is only a reprieve that’ll be over all too soon.
“I want you to see someone,” Dante rumbles. “A therapist.”
Yanking out of his arms, I scowl at him. “Just forget it, Dante. Jesus. I said I’m fine.”
“You’re not. And…” He trails off, hazel eyes turning sad. “And I’m afraid that you’re getting worse.”
“Tell me how you really feel,” I snap as I grab my wallet off the end table.
“Callan.”
Ignoring him, I push past him and out my bedroom door that sits right next to the one he shares with Jax. Unfortunately. I’d much rather share Zak’s garage apartment, but I’m not that much of an idiot. I can endure listening to my brother and his fiancé’s sex noises if that means I’m not making the same ones with Zak. My best friend already reads too much into our sexual activities as it is. If I played house with him, things would definitely get fucked up.
Zak is waiting in the living room, head bowed. I feel like absolute shit knowing he heard what I said about him. It’s not like I haven’t told him a million times, though. That we can only be buddies who fuck around. Jax gives me a grim smile.
Fuck.
I have to get out of here. If I had a license and a car, I’d take to the open road and not look back. With each new day, I feel more suffocated by the combination of their concern, my grief, and the ever-growing cloud of darkness hovering above me.
Something has to give.
I can’t continue to live this way.
I don’t want to live this way.
I’d rather not live at all.
Atlas
I’m right back where I started.
Hell.
And I willingly chose to come back here.
Fucking idiot.
“You’re going to wear that?” Brie, my little sister demands. “It’s so…” She trails off, frowning as she runs her eyes down my outfit.
“What’s wrong with my clothes?” I demand, my voice gritty and rough from lack of use.
“You just…” She gnaws on her bottom lip. “How do you expect to find a woman looking like you crawled out of a dumpster behind a Seattle grunge bar in the year 1996?”
What the fuck is a grunge bar? I don’t think even Brie knows.
“I thought we were going to dinner together,” I grunt out, “not looking for a hookup.”
“A hookup?” Brie cringes, her blond ponytail bobbing with the movement. “Ew.”
I shrug, glancing at my reflection in the darkened sliding glass door. Sure, my dark jeans are old and holey, but they fit well. My black Doc Martens are worn but have been my favorite pair of shoes for the past couple of decades. The black Mother Love Bone shirt is sporting a hole in the armpit, but I hide it under a dark gray flannel. Hell, I even fixed my hair. Thankfully, I don’t have the golden Barbie look going on like my sister. I take after our father and have dark blond hair with auburn strands sprinkled in. I’d say I look good enough to get laid.
“What about that pullover I got you from Bean’s? I sent it at Christmas,” she reminds me. “It was navy. Reminded me of your eyes. Go put that on.”
That pullover that came in the mail was about three sizes too small. I’d given it to my buddy, Holden, who ended up giving it to his girlfriend, Lucille.
“Maybe I shouldn’t go,” I grumble, turning from the glass door and starting for the couch where I’ve been sleeping for the past week.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” Brie sasses, smacking me on the shoulder. “You’re back home finally. It’s time for you to settle in and meet some people. A lot has changed since you left.”
It feels like another lifetime ago.
When I was a teenager, I’d been desperate to leave this fucking place. I spent the better part of two decades traveling for the military and never really settled in anywhere. Being back home feels like a setback, not a new start.
“I doubt much has changed,” I mutter under my breath.
Dad’s still a controlling sonofabitch, and my mother is his biggest cheerleader who sees nothing wrong with the way he is. My parents are just one of the reasons I fled this fucking town.
The deciding factor of why I ultimately left this town is essentially the reason I’m coming back.
Jaxson Bell.
Well, not directly him. His father. Mayor Dean Bell. The guy used to ride my ass when I was a teenager, and he was the sheriff, pulling me over every chance he got. The last time, though, went beyond a general dislike of the rebellious teen who was always running into trouble. It was hate. I knew why, too. He’d seen me with a guy at the bowling alley. I’d been drinking that night, but it wasn’t like I was driving or anything. I can’t even remember the guy’s name I’d been with at the time, but I had no problem shoving my tongue down his throat for all to see.