“Rise and shine, bitch. It’s noon, and I can’t keep avoiding Amira’s calls. So get up, brush your fucking teeth, shower, and go home. Deal with your shit before you regret how it ends up.”
“It’s a little early for a fucking lecture, dad,” I groan, turning my back to him on the couch so I can bury my face in the uncomfortably hard cushions.
The rings on the curtain rod shriek against the metal pole as Ash pulls them open, letting more light into the already blinding room.
“Get the fuck up.”
“What is your fucking problem?!” I growl, swiveling around on the couch, coming face to face with his sneering expression.
“You have a woman at home who’s called you over thirty times. I can’t tell you how many voicemails I had to listen to of her just fucking crying! You had a fight; big fucking deal. Go home and handle it.” He throws my shoes onto my lap as I sit up.
My head fucking hurts, and my throat is still bleeding raw from the wails I let out last night, but all that pain is dull in comparison to the weeping ache I feel in my chest.
“If you’re so fucking worried, why don’t you go check on her. She told me to leave, remember. She obviously doesn’t want me there,” I growl, staring at him through heavy, swollen eyes.
“She’s not mine, and her pain isn’t mine to carry. It’s yours. So be a fucking man and go to her. You don’t even realize how lucky you are to have her….”
I want to punch him in the throat for his honesty, for the longing I hear in his tone whenever he talks about Amira. I know he doesn’t feel anything for her, but sometimes it’s really fucking unsettling how easily he can put his love for Yasmine onto her. But regardless, he’s fucking right. I am lucky to have her.
She’s my everything. But she doesn’t want me.
She wanted me to go.
Amira would rather have me fuck someone else than touch her…
How do I go back to that?
How do I walk through the door and act like I’m not torn apart over everything she said?
I run my hands over my face before spearing my fingers through the tangles in my hair, swallowing back the vile taste of acid as it shoots up my throat.
My thoughts keep returning to our argument; how easy it was for her to lump me in with bastards like Gabriel and Liam.
And Tommy.
I’m nothing like them.
I fucked up by continuing to kiss her when she said stop, but I would never have hurt her. I would eat a bullet before I ever laid a fucking pinky on her precious skin that she didn’t want there.
“She called me Tommy,” I rasp, bowing my head, so Ash doesn’t witness the tears filling my gaze. He saw some of that weakness I hold so close to my chest last night. He doesn’t need to see it again.
I hear his booted feet creep over the dingy, murky green carpet, stopping at the tips of my toes. His hand wraps around the back of my neck, and for some reason, that pressure makes breathing a little more bearable.
“You’re nothing like that piece of shit, and Amira didn’t mean it. She was just… angry.”
No, she wasn’t just angry. Amira was finally expressing her honest thoughts. She feels I am no better than my immoral rapist brother, and she’s right. I may not have committed his crimes, but what I’ve done is no better.
“I went to prison to protect my brother from having his name torn apart… I fucking covered a group of men who abused and raped my fucking girl! I did that!” I shout, shoving him away from me when I stand from the couch. “Whether I knew it at the time, that’s exactly what I did! And Amira fucking knows it, and she fucking hates me for it!”
Pacing in front of the worn, tattered wardrobe in the corner, I clench the material of my shirt around my abdomen and pull, feeling too restricted by the clingy fabric.
It doesn’t help, which only incites my sudden onset of claustrophobia even further. Finally, growing frustrated, I slam my fist against the cabinet door, splintering the wood. I dig my knuckles in deeper, wincing as the fragments get caught in the open wounds in my skin.
“I’m gonna have to pay for that,” Ash says, sighing as he wraps his hands around the back of the sofa.
“I’ll pay,” I say, sinking down onto the floor, my head in my hands as I press my back against the rickety wardrobe.
“It tears me apart, what I did… every fucking waking second I think about that night and how I should have told the truth.”
