She studied me for a moment before responding. “I understand.” She finally said. “We’ll talk later. Good luck with everything.”
Her voice had lost the pip it usually carried, and her smile was slighted and tight as she glanced once more before turning and walking out to the waiting cab she must have called for some time before dragging me outside.
Watching the taillights disappear, I exhaled and looked up to the sky. I wasn’t ready to go back in the bar. My parents’ house was only an eight-minute walk, and the thought was tempting. Before I could commit, the door was opening, and Dare and Evan stepped outside to join me.
Calum
How’d Tai take it?” Dare asked as Evan fished a cigarette tin out of his suit’s chest pocket. Opening it with a flick of his thumb, he pulled out a rolled joint and lifted it to his lips.
Looking askew at Dare, I replied. “She took it.”
Evan flicked his lighter open, the smell of cannabis permeating the air as it burned. He drew in deeply, pulling the smoke into his lungs before releasing it with a cough. “Cal.”
He held it out to me, and my eyes dropped down to it. Seven days ago, I wouldn’t have thought twice about taking it. In this industry, drugs were everywhere. Cannabis was the tamest thing available to us. We could get our hands on anything if we wanted. I’d tried coke a couple of times at parties where everyone else was doing it, and I thought it’d numb things. It always amplified it, which is why I stuck to cannabis and whiskey.
But tonight, I needed my head on straight.
I shook my head, refusing it. Feeling the guys worried eyes on me, I had no choice but to explain. “I have to be somewhat sober for the conversation I need to have with my parents.”
Dare placed a heavy hand on my shoulder and sent me a sympathetic look. “If you need a couch to crash on, you know Mama Deen can spare one.” We’d taken to calling Dare’s mother, Nadine, Mama Deen when we were in middle school. Evan and I had spent a lot of time there, jamming in the garage.
“Thanks,” I said, a slight weight lifted off my shoulder. One problem solved. I didn’t particularly feel like checking into a hotel if things turned sour later on, and the possibility that they would was incredibly high. I knew my father, and I knew myself.
“Don’t know why you don’t crash on your baby mama’s couch. Harper’s even hotter now.” Evan remarked, pausing to smoke. A gray cloud puffed out of his mouth, as it split into a wide grin. My brows pinching together, I scowled at him.
“Watch it.”
“I’m just saying. You couldn’t have picked a more perfect woman to nut into!” He laughed. “Fuck, with my luck, I’d knock up some ugly groupie.”
“You with a kid, now that’s a terrifying thought,” Dare said with a shiver. “Besides, I think the ugliness would come from your contribution.” Evan laughed richly, undeterred by the razzing.
“Exactly. No glove, no love man. The pull-out method just ain’t effective, right Cal?” He said, flashing me a goofy grin.
“Shut the fuck up,” I growled, and Evan’s teasing tone vanished.
“Sorry, man. Just trying to lighten things up.”
I breathed in, trying to calm down. Evan was just being Evan; finding a joke in every situation was kind of his thing. And fuck, he was right. I’d always lived by that same rule; until Harper.
She’d gone on birth control shortly after we met, and she was studious about taking it on time. Every morning at eight o’clock sharp, she’d take it. We used condoms, but sometimes—a lotof the time—we’d get carried away and wouldn’t have one.
Like the night I’d left.
After leaving my parents’ house that night, I tossed my bag and guitar in the back of my 1999 Jeep and drove straight to Harper’s. I parked down the street, my hands still trembling with adrenaline, and stared up at her bedroom window.
It wasn’t the first time I’d shown up in the dead of night, seeking her warmth and light after a fight with my old man.
I called her, and she answered on the first ring, her voice groggy with sleep. Not even five-minutes later, she was climbing into the passenger seat, dressed in her robe and a night gown.
She looked like a fucking angel that night, and I just couldn’t get the words out to tell her I was leaving. She knew something was up—she saw my swollen lip, saw the crushing defeat, and crawled onto my lap. She’d wrapped her arms around my neck and held me close.
One thing led to another. She started kissing me—first my cheeks, then my nose, the ever so carefully my broken lips. Before I could stop myself—my hands slid up her smooth legs, tugging her white nightgown up.
“I am sorry, Cal. You know I didn’t mean it like that,” Evan’s apology brought me back to the present, and I grunted in concurrence. I shoved my fingers through my hair, not caring that I was probably messing it up.
“It’s fine. I need to get back in there,” I lifted my chin toward the bar.
The guys nodded, following behind me as I pulled open the door and walked in. My parents were still where I’d left them, only now, Mom was lecturing him, her brows pinched together.
