Author: Nyrae Dawn

I stand there, not sure what to do. That isn’t like me and I don’t like it, but I don’t even understand the space we’re in right now, so I’m not sure how to navigate it.

“I don’t bite…well, unless you want me to.” Part of his mouth quirks up. “I already told you how much women like my mouth—”

“Stop! I swear you’re so disgusting.” But I still walk over and sit on the edge of the bed. I let a deep breath out, suck another one in. It’s the only sound in the room, but I feel the burn of his eyes on me. “Thanks…I…”

Colt sighs. “Don’t. You don’t have to say thanks.”

“You took care of me.”

“So?”

I turn to him, almost needing to look away again because it’s so much harder this way. “For most of my life I’ve never been able to count on anyone. Even when I could, I hated it. I mean, really depend on someone. Not pretend to or play it off. You saw me at my worst…the part of me I hate and I don’t want anyone else to see, but you were there. That means something to me.”

“If that was your worst, you’re good. You’ll be okay, Chey. I don’t doubt that for a second.”

I don’t know why his words make me want to smile. Still, I can’t make myself do it. “You called me Chey…”

“Eh. I had a rough night. I don’t feel like fending off an attack this morning if I called you princess.”

I take him in, the blond hair that always looks like he ran his fingers through it. Those tattoos and the hard edges of his face only softened by the dimples. When I look at him, I see control. I don’t know why because I don’t really have it with him. We fight like crazy, but somehow I feel safe and like I have some kind of power I never knew I was missing.

“There were only a few people in the yard. Fucking potheads and people too drunk to know what the hell was really going on. Adrian talked to them though. I doubt you’ll have to worry about people giving you shit.”

In this moment I’m not thinking about last night. I don’t care who saw or what happened. All I can concentrate on are the curve of his lips. The muscles in his abs and how they ripple.

“Shit,” he lifts his hand and I’m surprised when he touches my hair. “You’re really trying to kill me aren’t you? You’re eating me alive with your eyes.” Then, he pulls me to him, his tongue gently probing my mouth. I open up and let his lips wipe away any residue of thoughts besides Colt and what he’s doing to me.

“Come here,” he says against my mouth and then he’s kissing me again. I climb over and straddle his waist. Colt’s hand weaves through my hair and rests on the back of my head, deepening our kiss. I feel his erection which makes the pressure inside me build.

His other hand slides up the back of my shirt and even though I know it’s wrong and it’s not the right way to deal, each touch masks another thing I don’t want to think about. When he’s touching me, it’s a definite, something I know. His touch is black and white when nothing else in my life is, even when I believed it to be so.

I pull away. “You make me forget. I just want to forget.”

Colt flips us, so he’s on top of me. My legs wrap around him and then he’s kissing me again. “What do you want, Chey?” His mouth trails down my neck. “Tell me what you want.”

“Control,” I arch toward him. “Something I can control the outcome of. To pretend everything is okay.”

“This is all I have. With—I just don’t have anything else to give besides this right here.” Another kiss and then he nips the lobe of my ear.

He doesn’t have to say with what. I know he means his mom. That’s what we have—we’re both damaged with baggage and somehow it works. I never thought something like this would work for me. “That’s all I want.”

This time, he stops his assault with his mouth and looks at me. My breath catches.

“So we trade one charade for another?”

I smile. “Yeah… I guess we do.”

He leans in, his mouth a breath away from mine when a pounding comes from this bedroom door. “Colt! Get your ass out here!”

He groans. “This better be good.” The muscles in his back flex as he gets up and for the first time, I notice a tattoo across his shoulders. It’s another tribal spanning one shoulder to the other. Colt pulls the door open. “What?”

“You left your cell in my car last night, man. Your mom called.”

“Shit,” Colt rips the phone out of Adrian’s hand and dials. The bed bounces when he sits back down, his leg shaking. I don’t know what to do. If this was more than just a casual fling, I could wrap my arms around him. Tell him everything is fine and kiss his shoulder. That doesn’t fit what we are. But he did that for me last night.

My eyes skirt over to Adrian who lifts a brow at me and nods his head toward Colt, but I still don’t move.

“Hey. You okay?” Colt breaks the silence in the room.

I wait as he listens. “I’ll come over.” Another pause. “It’s okay. I want to.” More listening. “Stop arguing. I’ll be there soon.” Colt hangs up the phone.

“Everything cool?” Adrian asks from the doorway.

“It’s alright. I need your car though.”

I guess that means his is still messed up. “You can use mine if you want,” I tell him.

Colt turns to me, little crinkles by his eyes almost as though he forgot I was there. It leaves me feeling a little hollow for some reason.

“That’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”

“Keys are in the kitchen.” Adrian yawns and then walks away.

“I’ll bring you back to your dorm real quick and then I need to go.” He gets up, opens a drawer and starts riffling around for a shirt.

Guilt gnaws at me. What if something is wrong with his mom and he missed the call because of me? “Are you sure? If you’re in a hurry, I can find another ride…or go with you.”

His head snaps back to me at that and I know he definitely doesn’t like that idea. It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him to go to hell. That if he can kiss me he shouldn’t be embarrassed to have me around his mom, but then I start to get it. That’s not what this is about and it feels almost too personal.

“Never mind. Scratch that last part.”

Colt pulls the shirt over his head. “It’s not you…it’s just fucking weird, ya know? I mean, seeing someone you don’t know like that…”

My mind flashes to what Mom’s bones must have looked like in the woods. “Yeah…Yeah, I get it.”

He unbuttons his pants. “Unless you want a show, you need to get out of here. I’ll be ready in about two minutes and then I gotta bail.”

I move toward the door, but he grabs my arm before I can walk out. He opens his mouth, closes it again, all sorts of thoughts playing in his eyes. “We’ll hook up later, yeah?”

A large breath pushes out of my lungs. “Yeah.”

~CHAPTER SEVENTEEN~

Colt

I get two texts from people who are looking to buy as I’m on my way to Mom’s. I ignore them, and toss my cell in the passenger seat of Adrian’s car. I’m not in the mood to deal with it right now. They’ll still be there after I check on Mom.

Fuck. I can’t believe I left my cell last night. I don’t do that. It’s always on me and I went a whole night without realizing it wasn’t there.

It could have been a whole lot worse and I wouldn’t have been there.

I accidentally grind the gears on Adrian’s piece of shit. I’m shaking as bad as Cheyenne was last night which is completely screwed up.

I pull into Mom’s apartment complex and park. Little kids are running around the place, right outside her window and I want to tell them to chill out because she might be resting, but I don’t. I know she always says she likes hearing the little kids play.

“Hey. How ya doin’?” I ask when I get inside. She’s sitting in her wheelchair, in her robe even though it’s warm in here.

“I told you, you didn’t have to come over, Colton, but I’m glad to see you.” She gives me a smile and I lean over and kiss her bald head.

“Most people are.” I wonder sometimes if she knows I’m faking it with her. If she knows I’m disintegrating inside, but just don’t say anything. “You shouldn’t try to get out of bed by yourself, Mom.”

A twenty-one year-old shouldn’t have to scold their own parent. There’s something really fucked up about this situation.

“It was just a fall.”

“You can’t afford to hurt yourself.”

She sighs. “I’m dying anyway. Sometimes, I just want to do it with a little bit of dignity. A woman should be able to get out of bed by herself.”

My hands tighten into a fist. Yes, I know she’s fucking dying, but that doesn’t mean I want to hear her say it. It doesn’t mean something wild and crazy can’t happen. Cheyenne thought her mom bailed on her and she hadn’t. Maybe the opposite can happen here. People get better all the time.

Which I know is a lie. It won’t happen, but damn I want to pretend.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s been a bad day.” Mom closes her eyes and I immediately feel like shit. She doesn’t have a lot of bad days. She’s optimistic. The cup is half full, sunshine and flowers and I try to act like I agree, but really I’m pissed someone dumped out half of my drink.

“It’s okay. It’s not your fault. I was up late helping this girl last night so I’m on edge.”

At that she opens her eyes and looks at me and I realize my mistake. I don’t mention girls in front of her, probably because I don’t do more than screw around with them. Now I brought up Cheyenne (which is fucked up in itself) and she’s going to latch onto that.

Maybe I should give her something to latch on to.

I scratch that idea because we’re already too tied together. Our lives are becoming too intertwined and that’s the last thing either of us need right now. We’re both too screwed up for that. She’ll end up okay though. People like her always are.

“Is this a girl you’re…?”

“No.” I turn away from her.

“Are you sure? Why won’t you look at me, Colton?”

I hear the smile in her voice and it makes me want to do the same. It isn’t often she’s able to give me a real one—with happiness and hope and it’s about a fucking lie because there is nothing real going on with Cheyenne.

I turn to face Mom. “Because you’re being ridiculous. Are you hurt? You said there’s a bruise on your—”

“Stop changing the subject.”

I fall onto the couch. “I’m pretty sure that’s you.” There’s a part of me who actually wants to keep this going. It’s like what we used to have. I’ve spent most of my life with it only being the two of us and she’s always been one of those hands on moms. If she could spend time with me—if she wasn’t working, she wanted to be with me. We’ve always been close and it feels like that now. Like before when she wasn’t bald or fell when she tried to get out of her bed alone.

I want to hold onto that.

“You like this girl!” It’s the most animated I’ve seen her in a long ass time. She wheels the chair closer to me. “Colton…”

“I don’t like her, Mom. Jesus, you make it sound like we’re twelve.”

“Who is she?”

I don’t know. Who are any of us, really? Do we ever really know someone else? Hell, do we know ourselves? I can’t answer that way though. “She’s a friend,” I shrug. Which I guess she is, which is weird as hell. “It’s nothing. She’s a girl from school.”