Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
I clench my jaw so fucking hard it hurts.
She steps around me, forcing me to turn.
“Everyone whispers about you like you’re a vampire or something,” she says, “But I think you’re probably just a little dumb. Can you talk, huh?”
I grab her arms and press her into the wall, bearing down.
She drops her hands, brushing a tit with her thumb. “Is this what you want?” she coos. “You want to make it with me? You didn’t have many girls in the psycho ward, did you?”
Fucking bitch.
I reach to the left of her head and grab the bookshelf, yanking it away from the wall. My brother’s books spill, the furniture toppling over.
I punch the door on her right and spin around, whipping the nightstand across the room.
“Oh, there’s the man of the house now,” she sings. “What a big man, you are.”
I charge her, holding her fucking little head in my hands, and all I have to do is twist.
“Come on,” she goads, but I can feel the shaking in her body. “Get it over with. Hurt me! I know you both want to. Hurt me!”
“I don’t want this to hurt,” I growl in her face. “I want this to be over for you very quickly, in fact.”
I don’t notice her hands are hooked around my biceps until she curls her fingers deeper.
We hold each other, and I wait for her to beg. To cry. To explain.
To apologize for what she did to him because the Falls always thinks that we’re shit to be dumped on and discounted.
But as I hold her and she holds me, I can feel it in her body. The heartbeat. The pain. And a head full of secrets, just like the rest of us.
But her pride, her ego, and her fucking mouth…
Why did my brother love her?
“How could anyone love someone so ugly?” I ask her.
She goes still, and when she speaks I hear the sadness in her voice. “They don’t.”
She doesn’t cry, and I almost drop my forehead to hers.
No, they’d don’t. No one wants damaged people.
I lower my hand, fisting the hem of her panties, and she doesn’t pull away. Her breasts graze my chest, and I curl my other hand into her hair, wanting her upstairs. In the attic. Tied in my bed.
But I kiss her forehead and release her. “Go to sleep.”
I walk out of the room, slamming the door behind me and leaving the house to stand in the rain.
“Did you see the blonde here the other night?” Deacon asks. “Quinn, they called her?”
The headboard upstairs has gone silent, but no door opens yet.
“I thought it was her from a distance,” Deacon says.
But it’s a joke because he knows it wasn’t Winslet.
I take his cigarette and suck off a drag. “She owns that bakery connected to Carnival Tower.”
I blow out the smoke and walk to the kitchen, extinguishing it under the faucet. I throw the butt into the trash can and see coffee grounds in the bag. She’s using the groceries I bought for her.
“She’ll be home again in May,” he says, knowing Frosted is only open in the summers.
I avoid his eyes, opening the stairwell door and pressing the panel to reveal the basement stairs.
“I want to get involved in this,” he begs, like he has a monkey on his back. “I want to play.”
“She’s too young.”
“Not as young as Winslet,” he points out, “and you had her crawling into your bed before school and after.”
“That’s enough,” I bite out.
We hear a door close upstairs, both of us staring at the ceiling as footsteps cross the hall and close another door.
“It’s not enough.” He lowers his voice. “I want more. And more. And more.”
I grab him by the collar.
“Our story’s not over,” he pleads, pushing me back.
I plant my hand over his mouth and wrap my arms around him, pressing him into the wall to shut him up.
Goddammit.
I listen for Dylan and the boy, not hearing anything coming down the stairs.
I stare at Deacon.
I’ve been able to keep him in check, but these fucking kids are opening up all of our boxes. It was kind of fun when Hawke found the tower. It was even nostalgic to see Weston get a girl in the exchange, especially with the kids here carrying on the legend. Like Winslet will live forever.
But…
Deacon wants to lurk. He wants to dial it up, and he wants to be seen.
He hums behind my hand, bobbing his head back into the wall. I release him and pull him away, so he stops.
He stands there, eyes locked with mine, and I notice his middle finger is threaded through the shackle of a padlock as he buttons his suit jacket. A chill climbs my skin, and I watch as the snake of a smile curls his lips.
“On Knock Hill, there goes a knocking, knocking,” he sings in a whisper, “and in the attic a rocking, rocking…”