Chasing Magic

  But an addiction that was impossible to let go, because even through her misery and the awful certainty that the right thing to do would be to end it before she caused him any more pain, she couldn’t. Even as she stood there feeling guilty and sick, even as she still felt Lex’s hands on her no matter how hard she’d tried to scrub the sensation away, the rest of her begged for Terrible’s arms around her, to hear his voice, to be near him so he could make everything okay, the way only he could. It was like magic, being with him, and she couldn’t give it up no matter how much she knew she should.

  So where was he?

  She’d check Bump’s quickly. Maybe he hadn’t gotten her text. Yeah. That’s what she’d do, and then maybe she’d send him another text or give him a call.

  Edsel was still busy showing his potential customer an array of different animal bones, but he looked up and nodded when she told him she’d be back in a minute.

  More people seemed to be pouring into the Market every minute, and with every one her nervousness increased, although once she was away from Edsel’s booth and actually doing something she felt better.

  He appeared beside her just as she reached Bump’s front door. “Hey, Chess.”

  Relief sagged her shoulders, relief and warmth combined with the drugs making their smooth, sweet way through her bloodstream so she could smile instead of crying. “Hey! You didn’t answer my text.”

  “Said you was comin here.”

  Something was wrong. Wasn’t it? He didn’t meet her eyes, no, but they didn’t do that in public: too easy to get lost. He didn’t stand very close to her or touch her, but they didn’t do that in public, either. And his voice rolled over her skin like always.

  But something was wrong just the same. She felt it.

  Of course, that could be the fact that he’d been in a fuck of a bad mood over Lex’s little friend when he’d left her earlier, and she didn’t think the few hours that had passed in the interim would have changed that. It could also be her guilt and the knowledge that she’d have to tell him where she’d been. Maybe that was it, actually. Maybe it was her.

  Or maybe not. He twitched his head to the side, indicating she should follow him into Bump’s place. The door opened under his hand; he must have just come from there. Had he been waiting for her?

  Instead of heading to the right, toward Bump’s uterine living room, he turned left, led her around a corner and back down another hall. She’d never been in that part of Bump’s house before. Maybe it was where he slept when he stayed there?

  Probably. Almost definitely, because he opened a door on the right-hand side and ushered her into a small room, barely big enough to hold the sofa and TV in the middle of the floor. Another door connected to it; she guessed that was the bedroom—if there was one—but he didn’t open it.

  Instead he closed the door behind them, casting the room into almost total darkness; a thin line of light came from under the door and the one of the adjoining room, but that was it. Fuck. Something was definitely wrong.

  She waited for him to turn on a light. He didn’t. Didn’t move, either. Didn’t kiss her, didn’t reach for her. He just stood there, his body a large black shape looming against the fuzzy pale outline of the door behind him.

  A thought occurred to her, something she could say to fill up the space growing wider between them by the second. Something to keep him from saying what she knew he was about to say, what she deserved to have him say. “Hey … were there more people tonight? With that speed, I mean, did we have more—”

  “Went over Lex’s place, aye?”

  Well, shit.

  At least she’d already planned to tell him where she’d been. At least she could remind herself of that as she tried to hide her surprise. And at least she could give him the respect of not trying to deny it or of asking how he found out about it. “I guess you know I did. I was going to tell you. I came here to tell you.”

  “Ain’t gotta tell me. Knew it soon’s I drive by you place an yon car gone.”

  “I just wanted to—”

  “Gave him the ask pull he man, aye?”

  She hadn’t even finished opening her mouth before he continued. “What the fuck, Chess?”

  “I didn’t—I’m—”

  “You don’t think I can beat him.” He leaned against the wall. For a moment the high wild flame from his lighter cast his face into bright relief. When he clicked it shut, the image remained, his outline dull red on the backs of her eyelids as she blinked to try to clear it. “Aye? Thinkin he’s got me.”

  “What? No, fuck no, I—”

  “Don’t fuckin lie to me, Chess. You—”

  “He’s—he’s cheating. That’s why I went there, that’s why I told him to stop. He’s using me. He’s putting me into—”

  “Aw, I dig. Thinkin I ain’t can keep you safe. Ain’t smart enough to catch him, an—”

  “Damn it, will you— That’s not true, you know that’s not true.” Didn’t he? Her hands twisted at her waist, wanting to touch him but afraid to try. “He’s not playing fair, Terrible. He’s playing this fucking bullshit game and he’s using me to play it, and—”

  “What offer you gave him?”

  “What?”

  Another flash of his profile as he dragged off his smoke; the cherry flared, then dropped to his side again. “What offer you gave him. To call off he man, dig. Ain’t had the thought he do it just causen you ask, aye? Guessin you offer he a trade. So wonderin what it were.”

  It wasn’t a lie to say nothing. Technically. Technically it wasn’t a lie. “Nothing.”

  Disbelief came off him in waves. Not only disbelief, either. She’d been right that his mood hadn’t improved much since earlier—of course it hadn’t—and Edsel had been right, too. Terrible had been collecting while she was at Lex’s, breaking bones, bruising flesh. Violence and aggression, some of it leftover and some of it not, filled the small space in which they stood. “Aye?”

  “I didn’t make him any offers. I didn’t. I didn’t offer him anything.”

  He didn’t answer. Fuck. What should she … How the hell was she supposed to handle this, what should she do, what did people in relationships do?

  The fact that she didn’t know, had no idea how to deal with relationships—at least, not in ways that didn’t involve trampling them under her feet like discarded party decorations on a hangover morning—was no excuse, either. No, she didn’t know how to do that, not really. But she knew Terrible. She knew him.

  Which was even worse. How could she have been so fucking thoughtless? Of course he’d see it as her doubting him. Of course he’d think she believed—fuck, Lex was right. She was right, to doubt herself. She didn’t know how to love him, didn’t know how to make it mean something.

  But she stepped closer to him, anyway, lifting her hand to touch him, because the space between them hurt, and the only way to make it hurt less was to make it smaller. She stepped closer because she had to try.

  His fist snapped shut around her wrist, yanked her arm to the side so she spun, off balance, stopping only when her back slammed against the plaster. It happened so fast only the jolt of pain told her it happened at all, the pain and the heat of his body in front of hers, his rage vibrating against her skin.

  “Gimme the tell.” His grip on her tightened even more, hard enough that she felt the bruise threatening to form under her skin. His cigarette was gone—she didn’t know where, but she knew it because his other hand grabbed her other wrist and pinned it to the wall behind her, too. “What happened. All of it. Look so fuckin guilty, you tell me why.”

  Her brain felt numb. Her hands were definitely numb. For the second time in as many hours, she was pinned to a wall with her heart trying to smash itself into pieces against her ribs, and she couldn’t fight it—couldn’t fight him—even if she wanted to. “I told him to quit using me. I told him to—”

  “What fucking happened.”

  “I told him I—”

  His
grip switched from her wrist to her throat, forcing her to look at him. Her eyes had adjusted enough for her to see how close he was to losing control. “Did you—did you fuck him? Just fuckin tell me, did you—”

  “No!” The fact that she could answer that one with Truth should have made her feel better. It didn’t. “No, I didn’t, I swear I—”

  “No—no fuckin more, Chess, can’t fuckin take it more. Tryin give you trust, but—”

  “No, you’re—”

  “Ain’t—just fuck this, fuckin thinkin on him touchin you. He shows up you place like he fuckin belongs there, an I gotta see it again, you an he, an you still fuckin—still let he show up, still getting you needs off him, letting he—”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. Shit, she’d never … It had never occurred to her that she wasn’t the only one who remembered that night in the graveyard, who remembered the way Terrible had found her with her hand stuffed into Lex’s jeans, trying to convince him to take them off right there on the cold hard ground. Of course she knew he remembered it, but she hadn’t realized—she’d never even thought—that he would still see it in his head, keep replaying that moment, keep hearing her trying to talk Lex into fucking her on the frozen dirt, talking about how they’d had sex two nights before, the night Terrible had opened his soul to her. How fucking dumb was she?

  But then … no one had ever been jealous over her like that. No one had ever wanted her like that, as more than just an available and willing body, and seen the fact of her sharing that body with them as more than a few hours’ entertainment. And jealousy from her had never been part of the game, either; what did she care what they did when she was done with them? “I didn’t—”

  “The fuck I gotta do? How the fuck I can stop, stop seein that, get him out my fuckin head, outta yours, him tryin kill me an you ain’t even— How? How can I fuckin stop it?”

  “I don’t—I love—”

  “You make you a choice. Now. Me or him, aye? Me or—”

  “You.” The word flew out of her mouth, propelled by her panting breaths. He was so close to her and he buzzed with energy, with power and anguish and the deep burning anger of lust, and she burned along with him because just having his hands on her skin, holding her in place in that familiar way, made her temperature soar. Because just then he was in pain and so was she, desperate furious pain, because she was killing them both and couldn’t stop. Didn’t want to stop. She wanted to jump on that death-train and ride it harder, faster, all the way into whatever damnation awaited her, and if she had to pay for it later she’d get everything she could from it now. “You, I swear, I never—I love you, I—”

  His grip didn’t change. He still held her throat, his fingers digging into the back of her neck, but he raised his hand, forcing her to her tiptoes while his mouth took hers. While his mouth attacked hers, hurting her, cutting off her breath.

  He let go of her other wrist; she only realized it because her hand—both of her hands—found his neck, his head, twining into his hair, pulling it. Had she thought earlier that Lex was a flame, that she could burn herself? She’d been wrong. This was a flame. This was throwing herself into the inferno and letting the pain of it, the roaring heat, sear every cell in her body. “I—”

  “Mine, Chessie.” Cold plaster hit her ass, quickly replaced by his palms; he’d shoved her skirt to her waist. Her panties were gone, she didn’t know where. She didn’t care. Couldn’t think when he kept kissing her like that and making the world spin. He gripped her hips to pull her to him even harder, grinding against her so she could feel the thick outline of his erection through his jeans. “Aye? Fuckin—mine. Not his.”

  “I’m not his, I wasn’t—”

  “Shut up.” His teeth sank into her neck. He twisted her hair while his other hand kept moving, up under her shirt, over her breasts. “You—fuckin done, done with this, seein him. Done takin pills offen him, him pushin you down—no fuckin more.”

  “Yes. Never, never, I won’t—”

  “Mine.” It was a snarl, low and harsh in her ears as he spun her around, his hand on the back of her neck forcing her to bend at the waist while she tried in vain to grip the wall.

  “Yes.” It was true, and she knew it was true. And thank fuck it was, because at that point she would have said anything he wanted, done anything he wanted. She would do anything he wanted, as long as it meant he didn’t stop, as long as it meant the fingers now slipping between her legs stayed where they were. “I lo—”

  “Shut up,” he said again. She didn’t know when he’d gotten his jeans open, but he had, and he slammed into her so hard that her knees buckled and only his hand on her hip and his pelvis flush against her behind kept her from falling.

  Again. And again, and again, while she bit her lip to keep from screaming. He fisted her hair and yanked it down, arching her back so it hurt, so it shook. Every muscle in her body shook. She couldn’t help it, couldn’t stop it, especially not when he kept driving himself into her harder and faster and his fingers kept moving, doing exactly what he knew she wanted him to do, exactly the way he knew she needed him to do it. His voice, harsh gasps filling the room, his hands on her bare skin, his body forcing hers to his will … It was too much, all too much. Her legs almost stopped supporting her weight. Her fingers scratched uselessly at the faint ridges in the plaster.

  His fingers disappeared; she couldn’t hold back the sob bursting from her lips. Was that too loud? Like she fucking cared. Anyone could be standing right outside the door, anyone could walk in and see them any second, Bump or one of his women or anyone, and she couldn’t bring herself to give a shit.

  He left her then, his hand in her hair the only contact between them as he wrestled her farther into the room, into the darkness. She stumbled, banging her toe, but fear dwarfed the pain. Fear and arousal; her body still throbbed, still shivered and clenched and twisted inside from wanting his back so bad.

  He spun her around again, practically throwing her down onto the couch and landing half on top of her, taking her mouth with as much violence as before. “You … so guilty … Shows up all the fuckin time and you letting him, keeping you place—an how many pills, Chessie, how many you took, hidin em from me, shit—just … fuckin … can’t, I can’t—”

  “It won’t happen again,” she managed. Her voice broke. That made sense, didn’t it, because everything was broken, she was broken, he’d crushed her beneath his heel so all the empty places showed, and she knew he saw them. And she needed him to fill them again. Needed him to fill them because he was the only one who could, the only one who ever had. She clutched at him as if he were a raft in a stormy sea, twisting the fabric of his shirts between her fingers so he couldn’t suddenly slip away. “I’m sorry, so fucking sorry, it—”

  “Not sharin no more. An not— No more fuckin hiding. No more lockin out.”

  His weight lifted from her. His hands gripped her thighs. What was— Oh. Oh no, he wasn’t, he couldn’t, not—

  She didn’t finish the thought. It came too late, anyway, because that was exactly what he was doing, something that scared her, that felt too much like yanking out her soul and handing it to him. Something too intimate to share with the nameless one-nighters who filled her past, something she hadn’t been able to share with him despite his attempts.

  Her bare skin scraped the rough fabric of the sofa as he shifted her, muscling her thighs onto his shoulders. She grabbed his hair and tried to pull his head away; he twisted her wrist, hard, and smacked it against the back of the couch. This time she felt the pain shooting up her arm, felt above it all the thrill of panic and fear and something else, something dark and greedy that blossomed when his mouth started moving against her, so slowly, so gently, so … careful.

  He paused. Paused just long enough that she understood what it was, what it meant. One last chance. He’d let her say no if she really wanted to.

  It might mean losing him, but he’d let her.

  But somehow knowing that?
??having that chance, that pause—made something else rise in her chest, over the frantic need, the love and the anger and the panic and fear and shame and everything else. It gave her strength. It reminded her of trust. Yes, she was scared. But no, she didn’t have to be. She never had to be, not when he was there. So she could let him keep going, she could. She could do that for him. For herself.

  So she did.

  Oh … fuck. She’d been right to be uncomfortable, to think it was too intimate. Right to have her only memories of that—her only knowledge of it—be of violations and humiliation, of vulnerability and shame. It was intimate. It was vulnerable. It was as if he was looking all the way into her, all the way down where the hidden things were, so he could see them all, could see her.

  But … it was also as if that didn’t matter to him. Because he kept going, his breath hot on her sensitive skin, his fingers curling into her thighs and sliding up her rib cage under her T-shirt to caress her breasts, and he found her hand fisted at her side and forced his into it, forced her to entwine her fingers with his and squeezed, and suddenly it didn’t feel scary anymore. It felt right.

  It felt like he loved her.

  It didn’t stop feeling that way when he shifted her again so her hips had room to move and her head fell back over the arm of the couch. The dizzy grayish ceiling above them shook as she shook, looked farther and farther away with every second as her vision blurred when he kept going, teasing her, caressing her, delving into all of her hidden places until she could hardly breathe.

  Panic roared back into her chest, into her head, panic and pressure and heat. Panic from the pressure and heat, and her hips were moving on their own, and the high walls around her twisted and turned when she tried to focus on them.

  She was going to scream. She was going to scream, she was going to cry, white heat spread through her body and she couldn’t control it, couldn’t control either of them. This was too much, it was too much and she was too scared, she couldn’t do this.