bulls-eye.
“Oh, pup. You have no idea.”
The bell rang, and the carnie shouted, “GO!”
I squeezed the trigger. Water sprayed out of my gun and directly onto the target. My little hippo shot up the ladder, and just as quickly as it had started, the game was over. I looked over to King who was sitting back smiling. What was he smiling over? I was the one who won.
“Winner! Winner!” the Carni shouted He unclipped a huge stuffed deer from the top of the tent and handed it to King, who received the prize and then started to walk away.
He’d won? How was that possible?
“Hey!” I shouted, chasing after him. “Why did you get the prize? I won. My hippo was so far ahead of yours that I didn’t even see yours move.” King stopped.
“Pup, you didn’t see my hippo move because I was done before you even began.” He was smiling. A genuine, real–life, swoon-worthy smile that reached his eyes. It was a good look on him.
No, it was a GREAT look on him.
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I shouted.
“Competitive, are we?” King asked, mocking me. “I told you I was good at that game.”
King seemed like any other young man who was taking a girl out on a date. Well, any other six-foot-something tattooed wall of muscle who looked like he could be an underwear model.
I liked playful King.
I liked him a lot.
“You must have played that game before,” I pouted. “Unfair advantage.”
“Yeah, I’ll give you that. This carnival has come here every year since I was a kid. Preppy and I used to sneak in the back. Over there.” King pointed toward a gate in a chain-link fence with a huge padlock keeping it shut. “We’d steal corn dogs from the food stands, right out of the fryer. Although the padlock happened only after they found out how we were getting in.”
I knew Preppy and King were best friends, but this was the first time I’d ever heard any stories from their childhood together.
“I tell you what,” King started. “Since this is a date and all, and guys usually give their dates their prizes, I will let you have my deer.” He held out the stuffed animal.
I didn’t know if he was toying with me. If I didn’t know how to handle ornery King, I certainly didn’t know how to handle nice and playful King.
I snatched it out of his hands like he was going to reconsider his offer, and I tucked it tightly under my arm. King laughed.
“What’s so funny now?” I asked.
“Doe…holding a doe.” Okay, he’d got me on that one. I held my hand over my mouth to contain my laughter.
For the next few hours, we played every single game the place had to offer.
I won none of them.
King made a point of handing me each of his prizes. Soon, I ran out of arm space to carry them all.
“I don’t think we can play anymore,” I told him, gesturing to the huge stack of cheap toys up to my chin.
The bell sounded for one of the games, and I was just about to walk away when King stopped me. “No, wait a sec.”
We watched as a tiny boy tried three times to win a prize against two much older teenagers. After a minute the boy’s dad pulled him aside. “That’s enough, Sam. We can try again another time.”
“But I wanted the stuffed alligator,” the boy complained.
“You’ll get it. Maybe, next year when you’re a little bit bigger.” The dad smiled.
King plucked a stuffed penguin from my arms and approached the boy and his father who were walking away from the game, the boy’s bottom lip set in a pout. Tears welling up in his eyes.
“Excuse me,” King said, getting their attention. The father looked alarmed and pulled his son into his leg.
King ignored the dad’s reaction and bent down to the boy, holding out the penguin. “I know it’s not an alligator, but penguins are just as cool. As a matter of fact, they’re cooler. They live in the snow, and they’re the only bird that doesn’t fly. Did you know that?”
“No, I didn’t know that,” the boy said, with a thumb in his mouth.
“They also slide around on their bellies on the ice.”
“Cooool,” the boy said, staring at the penguin.
“Now, you take good care of him, okay?” The boy nodded and took the penguin.
“Thank you.” The boy’s dad mouthed to King.
He nodded, and they disappeared into the crowd.
King made his way back to me. “You’re up next,” he said as he approached.
We stood behind the games and gave out my prizes to kids who lost their games one by one until all I had left was the deer King had given me first.
We ate cotton candy. We ate corn dogs. We ate fried Oreos. We laughed like kids. We rode a gravity ride that locked you to the sides as it spun, and for ten minutes afterwards, I thought all the food was going to come back up.
“Here,” King said, pushing a cup in front of me. “Grace says that a ginger ale is the best cure for an upset stomach.”
I slowly sipped the bubbly drink, and I started to feel better almost instantly. King grabbed my cup and walked a few steps to toss it in the trash when I noticed a nearby woman ogling him.
I looked around, and it seemed like every woman at the fair, whether she was with a man or not, was undressing King with her eyes.
“Do they all have to do that?” I muttered under my breath.
“Does all who have to do what?” King asked.
“Do all the women have to look at you like they want to jump your bones?” I scoffed.
King put an arm around me. His lips brushed my ear when he whispered, “Unlike some people, they aren’t hiding what they want.” I opened my mouth to say something, but I couldn’t find the words. “It’s cute that you’re jealous though.”
“I’m not—”
“Time for the Ferris wheel,” King announced. It was getting late, and the crowd had thinned.
“Why did we save it for last?” I asked.
“Because it’s the best part,” King said. “You always save the best for last.”
King helped me into the squeaky cart while the carnival worker closed the little door to the bucket. There was barely enough room on the seat for the two of us. When I shoved my deer between us, King picked it up and handed it to the carnie, along with a bill from his pocket. “Take care of this for me until we get down will ya?”
“Sure thing, man!” He set the deer on the chair next to the ride’s control panel.
King rested his arm on the back of the seat over my shoulder.
Then, we were lifting up into the air. Higher and higher we rose, stopping every so often to allow for other riders to board. Once we were almost at the top, we started to move more fluidly. Round and round we went, watching the city lights beneath us flicker and glow.
“Wow,” I said, watching the people scurry around below. “They all look like ants from up here.” I glanced over at King but he wasn’t looking at the lights of the city or at the crowd.
He was looking at me.
The depth of his stare pinned me to the seat. “Pup, what I learned from being in prison is that we’re all just a bunch of ants.”
“How do you mean?”
“I mean we’re all scurrying around, doing insignificant bullshit. We get this one life. ONE. And we spend too much time doing shit we don’t want to do. I don’t want to do that anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t want to be remembered as the notorious Brantley King.”
“Then, how do you want to be remembered?”
“I don’t. I want to be forgotten.”
“You can’t mean that.”
“I do. I used to want to go out in a blaze of glory. Now, I just want to live in my house, fish on a weekday, and tattoo when the mood strikes. And when it’s my time to go, I want to fade out like the ending of a movie and be quickly forgotten.”
“That sounds lonely.”
“Not if you’re with me, it won’t be.”
“Please, you already told me that I’m gone the second you get tired of me.” I laughed.
King wasn’t laughing. “I’m serious. What if I said I changed my mind? What if I wanted you to stay for real?”
I shook my head. “I wouldn’t know what to say to that. I don’t even know if you mean that or not.” I sighed. “It’s just not that simple. You know that I have to look out for her.”
“Fuck that. Fuck HER,” King said, raising his voice. “As I said, we get this one life. One. As of right this fucking second, I’m no longer going to spend it doing anything other than what I want to do. I don’t want to grow old and look back and realize that I may have had a life, but I forgot to live it.” King brushed his lips against mine. “Are you with me, pup?”
“What are you doing?” I asked, my breath shallow and quick. King leaned into me and kissed the spot behind my ear, his lips igniting my skin. I felt the kiss to my very core, and I trembled.
“After everything, you still have no idea. Do you?”
“No idea of what?” I panted.
No sooner were the words out of my mouth than his lips crashed onto mine. His kiss was harsh and demanding. His tongue parted my lips, gaining entrance into my mouth, licking and dancing with my own. I moaned into him.
I was on fire. King’s hand slipped up under my dress and found the place where I was already wet and ready for him. He groaned and pressed a finger into me, his thick cock nudged my thigh. He ran a hand up my neck and fisted a handful of my hair, turning me up to him so he could gain better access to my mouth while his fingers pushed in and out of me. I clenched around him, my orgasm building, when he suddenly pulled away.
“Why did you stop?” I asked, flustered, my legs still parted for him.
“Because, pup, the ride’s over.”
I hadn’t even noticed that we were at the bottom. The carnival worker came over and let us out of the bucket. I adjusted my dress and stood on shaky legs while King retrieved my deer.
We walked to the parking lot in complete silence.
We passed some sort of tool shed on our way to the bike. King suddenly grabbed me and dragged me into the shadows, pinning me hard against the wall of the shed.
“This is the last time I’m going to ask you this, pup. Do you want me?” King asked, his lips finding mine again, asking the same question with his demanding kiss. My skin came alive and danced with anticipation. “I can’t stay away from you anymore. I tried, and I can’t do it. I want you. I need you to tell me all that hesitation bullshit is over and that I can have you. Stop being alive, and start living.” He pulled a hairs’ breadth away and sought the answer in my face.
“Yes,” I answered breathlessly. Because it was true. Every part of me wanted him. I’d been fighting it for too long for reasons that the longer I was around him seemed less and less important. “I want to be alive.”
“I want you so fucking bad,” King said, pinning me to the wall with his hips pressed against mine. His erection hard and ready against my core. My dress was up around my waist. Only his jeans and my panties separated us.
“Why do you call me pup?” I asked breathlessly while he lifted the sides of my dress so his hands could dip into the back of my panties. He dug his fingers into my ass cheeks and I gasped.
“Because when I first saw these wide, innocent eyes, you looked like a lost puppy dog.”
I was disappointed with the comparison to a puppy, especially after Preppy had called me a stray.
“And,” he continued, “I knew at that very moment when you stood in my doorway, that I wanted to keep you.”
He emphasized his statement with a thrust of his hips. I let out a guttural moan, and he laughed softly into my ear, his tongue licking and sucking along my jaw line and back to my mouth.
“Not here” he said, pulling away from me and adjusting my dress back down to cover my ass.
He led me back to his bike, making quick work of putting on my helmet. When I hopped on behind him and wrapped my arms around him, I felt him shudder under my touch. I let my hands slip just under his belt onto the bare flesh of his abs, and I heard him groan over the roar of the engine.
He wanted me.
Whoever that was.
And I wanted him.
As crazy as that was.
At least for the night, I wasn’t going to think about what the girl with the memories would do, the girl who I tried to please on a daily basis. I was going to be selfish, and I was only going to think about what I wanted.
Who I wanted.
I’d made the decision to live.
Chapter Twenty
Doe
When we pulled up to the house, I didn’t expect to see a party in full swing. Bikes lined the street, blocking our entrance to the property. King drove past them and turned onto another small dirt path I hadn’t noticed before that led us right up to the garage.
King parked the bike and cut the engine. I took my helmet off and passed it to him so he could set it on the seat.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“It seems my hospitality is being taken advantage of,” he muttered. King dragged me into the house by my hand and up the stairs to the main floor. In the living room, we passed a bunch of bikers standing around, watching an older, dark-skinned woman bounce up and down naked on the lap of a boy who looked younger than me, his pants around his feet. The patch on his vest read PROSPECT. His face was turned up to the ceiling, his eyes hooded in ecstasy, his mouth partially open.
“King!” Bear shouted, motioning to him. “Come over here, and watch this. Billy’s just popped his cherry.”
“What the fuck, Bear! What is all this?” King growled. His fist was clenched at his side, and the hand that held mine grew tighter and tighter. I could feel his pulse racing in his wrist.
Bear smiled and held out his arms. “Dude, it’s a party. It’s Saturday. We used to throw ten of these in a seven day week. Didn’t think you’d mind.”
“Don’t go anywhere. I’m coming back down. You and I need to talk.” King pointed at Bear then dragged me upstairs to his room.
“I need you to stay in here while I talk to Bear. I’ll be right back.” For once, he wasn’t barking orders at me. It sounded more like a plea. “Close the door. Keep it locked.”
“Okay,” I said, stepping into the room and shutting the door. It was the first time he’d told me to do something that I didn’t feel the overwhelming need to argue with him.
Three hours later, there was still no sign of King, and the music seemed to be getting louder and louder. I’d read for a bit, clicked through some channels, and done my best to distract myself, but my curiosity was getting the best of me.
I didn’t want to disobey him, but maybe, I could at least change locations. I figured going into the tattoo studio in the next room wouldn’t be disobeying his orders too much. Besides¸ King’s sketchbook was in there, and it could help occupy me until he came back.
I crept out of the room. The party downstairs still raged although none of the party-goers had made their way upstairs like last time. I pushed open the door and stepped inside.
I wasn’t prepared for what I found.
My jaw fell to the floor along with my heart and any faith I had in King and his promises. My heart disintegrated in my chest.
It was dark in the room except for the neon lights beating in time with the bass of the Nine Inch Nails song playing on the iPod dock. King was perched on his chair with his eyes closed, a joint at his lips. His jeans were down around his ankles. A topless brunette was down on her knees in front of him, reaching for the waistband of his boxers.
“What the fuck,” I gasped. I was going to be sick. The asshole was just toying with me the entire time. He hadn’t meant a word. Maybe, that was the revenge he’d been wanting since Nikki stole from him. Maybe, that was his game the entire time and now that I was humiliated my debt had officially been paid.
King’s eyes opened suddenly, and I half-expected an apology for walking in and catching him in the act. At least, I expected an attempt at pulling up his pants. But it was my fault for thinking that way. Somewhere between the tattoos, the sandwiches on the dock, Grace’s house, and the carnival, I’d forgotten who I was dealing with.
This was the man who held me against my will. Handcuffed me to his bed. Threatened my life.
Killed his own mother.
He was the fucking devil himself. And all it took was a slutty brunette on her knees to remind me of that.
“Get out,” he barked. He took a long drag from the joint, then tugged on the brunette’s hair, tipping her head back. He leaned over until his lips were almost touching hers and made a show of blowing the smoke directly into her mouth.
I slammed the door and ran down the hall. I grabbed a bottle of something off of the kitchen table and headed outside to the dock, ignoring catcalls from some of the bikers I left in my wake.
I walked past the raging bonfire and toward the water.
I sat down on the end of the small pier and dangled my legs over the edge. I tore the cap off the bottle and tossed it into the water. I held up the bottom of the bottle and chugged a few mouthfuls of the amber liquid. It tasted like pure gasoline mixed with pine-cleaner, burning my throat and stomach on its way down. I took a breath and kept on drinking, swallowing one horrible tasting mouthful after another. I didn’t stop until I felt the hazy warmth begin to spread through me.
I wiped my mouth with my wrist and looked out onto the water.
I may not have known who I was in the past, but I knew who I didn’t want to be, and who I didn’t want to be was someone weak.
I’d fallen for it. His words. His body.
I’d fallen for him.
I may have set out to be a whore, but I sure as shit wasn’t going to allow myself to be treated like one.
He may have been the notorious Brantley King to everyone back in that house and everyone in that town, but to me, he just became the asshole. The asshole who just minutes before had broken my fucking heart.
Things were so much easier when I hated him.
“This seat taken?” A deep voice asked. I shrugged. Bear sat down next to me and lit a cigarette. “Something bothering you, pretty girl?”
“Nope,” I lied.
“I may not know shit about shit, but I can tell you that when a girl goes running from a party with only a bottle of whiskey for company, something is most definitely bothering her. In my experience, that something usually has a cock attached to it.” Bear exhaled the smoke.
“Well, you’re not completely wrong,” I admitted. Turning up the bottle again, the liquid no longer burned when I swallowed.
“Easy, girl,” Bear said, grabbing the bottle from me. He took a swig. “What’s going on between you and King, anyway? You his now? Cause he sure looks at you like you are. And seeing as he didn’t kill you and all, I’m thinking what he