When Tristin couldn’t find an adequate comeback, she stomped back in her room and grabbed her bag. Maybe Kristen would do them both a favor and take a tumble down the stairs and end up in a comma for a few months.
Tristin had an eerie feeling her sister might be thinking the same thing and whipped around just in time to escape a footless Bratz doll speeding toward her head.
“Are you crazy?” Tristin asked.
“Are you a whore?” Kristen asked with an arsenal of stuffed animals in her arms. The robotic puppy was enough to send Tristin rushing for the front door. She felt bad, but she sure as hell wasn’t about to stand there like a target. Going to Emmitt’s felt more like an escape than a chore given the current company. Perhaps he already knew that.
***
Hannah had deleted her texts, cleaned up her emails, edited her recent calls list, and hid her photo albums. Once she was satisfied with her room, she took a quick shower and covered her bruises. Concealer worked for her wrist and arms, but there wasn’t a tube of body makeup big enough to cover her thighs so she opted for a pair of yoga pants. With her hair pulled back into a bun, she looked like she was preparing for a fight, which wasn’t entirely false. Deflecting Sean’s temper meant being on constant defense.
She still couldn’t believe this was her life now, or that Sean could even do the things he had done to her. He clearly needed help, but what about her? She was the girl who let her boyfriend hit her and now she was covering it up to avoid upsetting him.
The thought of anyone finding out was worse than being hit in her mind. Everyone already knew her as the girl whose dad OD’d in their driveway, and she wasn’t about to add to that list.
The chime of the doorbell almost made her scream. She wished it was a weekend when her mom didn’t have to work, but those were few and far between.
She took a few deep breaths as she headed down the hall, but her pulse spiked with every step. Looking frightened wasn’t going to help her situation so she conjured a smile before opening the door, but it flat-lined the second she saw him.
“Hey,” Sean said nervously, holding a large bouquet of flowers to his chest.
The thought of flowers serving as an apology for the bruises hidden under her clothes was an insult, but she couldn’t tell him that. “Hi,” she said, forcing herself to grin as he handed her the flowers. When he pulled her in for a hug she prayed he didn’t squeeze. “Thank you. They’re beautiful.”
“So are you.” He hesitated before he caressed her face.
Her fear seeped out a little, but she quickly recovered, leaning her face into his palm. She never had to fear her Sean; he was finally back, only there was this tortured look in his eyes. The thought occurred to her that he might have felt as trapped as she did. As awkward as the whole experience felt, she was determined to encourage the good in him. She took his hand and he closed the door.
The slam made her jump, but she held his hand tighter. “Are you hungry?” she asked.
“Just for this,” Sean said, pulling her into his arms.
Hannah sucked in a breath before his lips attacked hers. She started out just playing along, but his gentle touch reminded her of so many good moments that they pushed out the bad. She savored every kiss she shared with her Sean, even though they had morphed into the pleading and pain stricken pecks of a boy she couldn’t forgive.
He gripped her sore shoulder and Hannah pulled away. “We should go…watch TV,” Hannah said, without meeting his eyes. He was silent for a moment with defeated eyes.
She pushed herself onto her toes and pecked him on the cheek, hoping to defuse his mood. It must have worked because he kissed her hand and led her down the hall.
Chapter Four
Tristin/Connor
“Do the words ‘I’m starving’ mean nothing to you?” Emmitt yelled in Tristin’s ear as she entered the diner. She took the phone off speaker as she stepped into the ridiculously long line.
“You are lucky I’m doing this at all. Now what do you want?”
“Get me the biggest breakfast burrito they’ve got and a double cheeseburger and fries.”
“Wow, you really are starving aren’t you? What’s going on over there?”
“Nothing, just hurry up,” Emmitt said before he hung up.
There was something he wasn’t telling her and she was going to find out, that is if he didn’t starve to death before she got there. Dee Dee’s was Crissana’s best hang-out, which meant waiting close to an hour for a seat. Most people just grabbed take out and ate under the covered parking. Tristin was kicking herself for not calling her order in ahead of time. The wait was going to be at least twenty minutes.
“Order up for Connor,” the snarky hostess announced over the speakers.
Tristin looked around and thought it must have been some other Connor, but sure enough he came rushing through the doors with his shirt half hanging off him. For a virgin he got a remarkable amount of action.
“You Connor?” The hostess asked observing his smeared red lips.
“Yeah.” He grabbed the bags and dropped a five in the tip jar, gaining a grin from the otherwise surly hostess. The charming bastard. “You have a good day,” he said before speeding toward the exit. He didn’t even look around to see Tristin standing a few feet to his left. She watched him hop back into his fogged-up car and just barely made out Noelle pulling him into the backseat. The noticeable rock in his trunk made her wonder if he was still as innocent as he claimed.
***
“Noelle, what about the food?” Connor asked as she straddled him.
“I’d much rather taste you.” She bit his neck and he nearly squealed.
“Okay, okay time out. I’m about five seconds from losing it.”
“Then allow me,” Noelle said, gripping the inside of his thigh. Her hand was only inches away from the point of no return, and for a quick second he thought of letting her.
“No, we’ve got to stop,” Connor said, lifting her off his lap. “I’m sorry.”
They both sat, out of breath and clutching hands, but Connor quickly noticed she hadn’t objected once. Noelle was rarely silent, so he took it as a really bad sign. He grabbed the bottom of her tank top, luring her closer until their noses were touching. He didn’t just want to kiss her. He’d done that hundreds–-maybe-thousands-of times. Showing her how much he really wanted her was hard to accomplish without actually doing it.
He looked her in the eyes, taking his time to trace the curves of her hips. She gasped when he yanked her knees apart and that’s when he kissed her with a fierceness that shocked even him. His tongue and hands were better expressions of his desires and even though he knew she wanted more. He felt safe again when her breath became unstable.
“Y-you need to stop,” Noelle whispered.
“Did you already…”
“No. No I don’t want to.” The way she arched herself closer told him otherwise.
“I love you.” Connor kissed her again as his hand traveled up the leg of her shorts. She was trembling and he hadn’t even made it to his destination.
“Don’t,” she said, gripping his wrist. She had never stopped him before, if anything she was at the point where she would be trying to talk him into doing it.
Noelle climbed into the passenger seat and unwrapped her cheeseburger.
Connor was still trying to figure out what went wrong when she handed him his burger. “Are we good?” Connor asked.
He had experienced it too many times before: silence followed by distance, it always ended in a breakup. Connor didn’t want to go through it again, not yet at least. He wasn’t dumb enough to believe Noelle would wait forever, and he wasn’t sure she was the girl he would marry, but he knew that he loved her.
“I’m just wiped out from packing all those boxes. Plus, I feel bad when I—you know—and you don’t.”
“You know I don’t care about that.” Okay, so maybe that wasn’t entirely true, but he really didn’t m
ind giving her what she needed.
“I might want to later, if my mom goes out.” She grinned, and Connor felt a little relieved.
He buttoned his shirt and inhaled his burger as the windows cleared. He was so distracted that he’d forgotten they were still in the diner parking lot. Suddenly, it dawned on him that someone from church could have recognized his car. The last thing he needed was another lecture from his dad about temptation.
A couple of snickering girls passing by his window prompted Connor to hop into the driver’s seat and take off.
“So what do you want to do with the rest of the day? We can go to the movies or take a drive somewhere.”
“How about a shower?” Noelle asked.
The offer made Connor blush.
“I meant I need a shower. Then we can figure out what’s next.”
“Sounds like a plan.” He was trying really hard not to feel disinvited. Maybe they really were growing apart.
As he pulled up to her apartment he idled for a second to see if she would invite him in. Her mom was pretty cool about him hanging out in her room since she knew nothing was happening, and Noelle liked to do little stripteases for him while he waited for her to get dressed.
She unhooked her seatbelt and it looked like she was going to ask him something, but she paused when his phone vibrated. Conner wanted her to say that he should park and come inside. He wanted her to still want him, or more like he needed her to. Having a girl as beautiful as Noelle throwing herself at him was bigger than an ego boost; it was his way of getting some gratification.
“Hello,” Connor answered his phone.
“Help!” Kristen shouted. “I’m stuck under a mattress and no one else is answering their phone.”
“Where are you?”
“At the bottom of my stairs. Can you please come help me?”
Connor didn’t want to bail on Noelle, but he couldn’t not help Kristen.
“Go,” Noelle said digging her keys out of her purse. “I’ll call you when I’m ready.”
“Connor, are you there?” Kristen asked.
He wasn’t sure if it was another one of Noelle’s tests. She didn’t really get along with his friends, especially when she found out that he and Kristen dated. “Hold on a second,” Connor covered the mic to his phone. “I’ll only be like twenty minutes, I promise.”
“It’s cool,” Noelle said kissing his cheek. She didn’t look upset.
“I’m on my way,” Connor said before ending the call.
He grabbed Noelle’s hand as she tried to get out of the car. “I’ll be thinking about you,” he said with a grin to let her know he meant her in the shower.
“And to think I was just about to invite you up to help me undress.”
She would never know how at ease the statement made him. Any concern he had about their relationship immediately banished and now he couldn’t wait to get back and spend the rest of the day with her.
He would have watched her until she was safely inside if Kristen weren’t waiting to be rescued. She was a total klutz, but he bet it had more to do with Tristin. Kristen didn’t deserve Tristin’s cruelty, which was why he didn’t speak to her in the diner. Emmitt was the one always playing Switzerland, Connor just couldn’t do it. And then Tristin had the nerve to tell people that he was homophobic, which was bull. He could careless who she decided to sleep with.
What Connor hated was seeing people mistreated, especially by their loved ones. He cared about Kristen and Tristin too much to condone the way they treated one another, and hoped they’d eventually grow out of it, but they seemed to only be getting worse.
Mariah’s burn kept flashing in his mind when he thought back to Hannah crying on her porch. His stomach was in knots by the time he pulled into to Kristen’s driveway, and he decided enough was enough. Hannah was his best friend, and he was done lurking around waiting for the right time to talk to her. He decided to go knock on her front door and demand she let him in, just as soon as he was done helping Kristen.
Chapter Five
Tristin
Tristin hadn’t even gotten in the window before Emmitt ripped through the bag of and grabbed his burrito. It had only been a couple of weeks since she’d seen him, but his sunken face and raccoon eyes looked as though it had been months.
“Thank you for bringing this,” Emmitt said with his mouth full. “I’ll totally pay you back.”
“Don’t worry about it. What’s going on with you? You look like you haven’t eaten in days.”
“I would have been able to eat if you’d returned my calls.”
“Is that what you were calling me for?” Now she felt horrible that she’d been avoiding him. “I thought you wanted to chew me out over the Brian thing.”
“That too.”
“Can we not? I’ve got enough going on without adding a lecture from you.”
She searched his bookshelf for his hidden stash of playboys, not that she believed there was anything in the pages that could help her. She found one tucked behind his encyclopedias, just as Emmitt groaned.
“I think I ate too fast,” he said, stretched out on the floor with the empty wrappers beside him.
“If you were that hungry why didn’t you call Connor?”
“He was busy.” Emmitt groaned again and rubbed his stuffed belly.
Tristin huffed and stomped into the bathroom. She came back with a wet cloth for his head, deeply resenting her maternal instincts. Connor would have seen Emmitt was in a trouble if he wasn’t busy with his tongue down his girlfriend’s throat.
“Here, put this on your face and relax,” she said dropping the rag on his chest. “You could have texted me.”
“I did,” Emmitt said covering his face. “You’ve been ignoring me.”
“I didn’t want to talk about it. I still don’t.”
“That’s because you know you were wrong. How’s Chelsea?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Tristin said as she aimlessly flipped through the magazine as she stretched out across the foot of his bed. “She isn’t talking to me.”
“So talk to her. Drive up there and surprise her. Unless—”
“Don’t start.”
“Look. I’m not judging you. I just wanna know what’s going on, and don’t tell me it was just twin drama because I won’t believe it.” If there was anyone who could see through her lies it was Emmitt. At least she knew the truth was safe with him.
“All right fine. You know how Kristen and Brian met, right? “
“Wasn’t it at the mall or something?”
“It was the state fair, and it wasn’t Kristen who he met first.”
“Hold on,” Emmitt said sitting up. He was still a bit winded, but he managed to climb onto the bed and lay beside her. “So you’re telling me you’ve had a thing for Brian for a year and you never said anything.”
“I didn’t have a thing for him. I was just saying that, technically, I met him first.”
“But does Kristen know that? And even if she did, there’s the little matter of his gender. Unless that’s not an issue anymore,” Emmitt said touching her leg.
Tristin had to remind herself that he wasn’t feeling well or else she would’ve decked him. It didn’t stop her from flipping him off the bed though. She was relieved to know at least some guys still creeped her out. “You’re a real perv, you know that?”
“Can you blame me? If you were looking to experiment you could have done a hell of lot better than him.”
“It wasn’t an experiment.”
“Then what was it?” Emmitt asked.
“I don’t know, okay. I don’t know what’s going on. I went into it with every intention of knocking Kristen on her ass and now…I don’t know.”
“Well, let me ask you this. Do you have feelings for him? And be honest.”
“I don’t know.”
“What about Chelsea? Are you still attracted to her?”
Tristin scowled at him. “How many
times do I have to tell you I don’t know?”
“Until you can make me believe it. I’m not buying for one second that you don’t know how you feel. You might be confused by it, but you know.”
“Would you stop pressing me? I didn’t come here for a damn interrogation.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, would you rather have a tea party and braid each other’s hair? Since when did you become such a girl?”
Tristin had been called a lot of names over the years, but Emmitt only used the g-word as an insult.
“The same time you became a jerk. I’m out of here.” Tristin snatched up her bag and moved toward the window, but Emmitt blocked her way. “Move before I punch you in the stomach and reintroduce you to your breakfast.”
“No. You’re going to sit here and figure it out, or I can beat it out of you.” Emmitt grinned.
“I’m not playing.”
“Neither am I.” His scowl even looked weak. This wasn’t the Emmitt she was used to going ten rounds of slap fights with, and it was scary to see how fragile Ellie’s death had left him. It was part of the reason she’d stayed away so long. He was usually the one to dig her out of messes, and now that he needed her, she felt completely inadequate. Choir boy Connor had experience with grieving people, he should’ve been here. And where the hell was Hannah? Emmitt practically camped outside her bedroom window when her dad died, where was she? Okay, maybe they’d all been shitty friends lately. However she felt about Brian, her best friend was more important.
“Let’s talk about you.”
“I’m good.” He said as he sat on the window seal.
“And you expect me to believe that?”
“You don’t have a choice.”
“That’s it,” Tristin said as she tossed her bag to the bed. She pulled her hair back into a bun and Emmitt lifted his chin to suggest it was on. They gripped their right hands and stared intensely into each other’s eyes.
“You lose, you buy me dinner,” Emmitt said.
“I win, you tell me what the hell is going on with you,” Tristin whispered.
“Same, if I win.”
“You can’t make two bets.”
“Oh, stop whining,” Emmitt said as his hand connected with the side of her face.