Luis was left alone in the room with his thoughts and the leftover stirrings of unsatisfied arousal.
Cassie was going to love this story.
Chapter Fourteen
Luis yawned as he put the car into reverse just before two in the morning. After Julien had returned, there’d been apologies that Luis had mostly waved off, and then they’d gone to the bar as usual. Now with both vampires safely back in their house, he was feeling the late hour.
Luis yawned again as he turned into his apartment complex. The excitement of the evening had exhausted him, but in a good way. Luis pulled the car around the building to where his parking spot was, and slowed.
There was a car in his spot. One he recognized.
His mother’s blue Toyota Corolla.
He stopped his car and scrambled to pull his phone from his pocket. He hadn’t looked at it after playing Words with Friends with Karim at the bar.
But sure enough, there were dozens of texts and at least six calls clogging the notification screen.
Oh fuck.
Quickly, Luis pulled into a visitor spot nearby and parked the car. Had something happened? Or was this just her last straw of him ignoring her calls and texts?
But she never came to his apartment.
It was two in the morning now. How long had she been at his apartment waiting for him?
Fuck. Whatever the length of time, him rolling in at two in the morning was only going to make it worse. She knew Cassie was away at school, so he couldn’t even use her as an excuse like he usually would. Cassie was just about the only excuse his momgave him a pass on, because she still had hopes they would fall in love and settle down.
Ugh.
Luis sat there for a long time in his still car staring up at his apartment building. The light was on in his place. Part of him wanted to just turn the car back on and drive away. Leave whatever this was for Later Luis. Ask Julien and Karim if he could crash in their guestroom. They’d probably say yes.
But wasn’t he trying to be better? Stop taking the coward’s way out. He couldn’t ignore this long enough that it’d go away. He needed to deal with it. Put boundaries up. Do what Cassie had been begging him to do for years.
And maybe he was finally ready to.
Luis made himself get out of the car and march his leaden legs to the building.
His apartment door was unlocked when he got to it. His mom had a spare key, because she’d demanded one when he’d first moved. He regretted it now.
Cassie had even told him not to, but he’d been too weak. He’d given in.
“Mama?” Luis called as he stepped out of his shoes in the front entrance.
There was a sound from the direction of the bedroom, but it registered secondary as he caught sight of his apartment.
It was ransacked. There were bills and other mail scattered about his table and onto the floor. Kitchen drawers were open, their contents haphazardly pulled out on the countertops. In the living room his laptop was open, an angry alert pop-up on the screen about repeated incorrect password attempts. His CDs and Blu-rays were a mess on the floor, some left open.
Anger overran the dread.
“Luis, where have you been!” His mother came out of his bedroom. In her hand was his guitar.
Luis saw red.
“What the fuck are you doing?”He spat.
“I was so worried!” His mom stepped forward and pulled him into a one-armed hug. She squeezed him tight, and Luis forced his arms between them to push her away. His skin crawled from her touch, disgust rocketing through his whole body.
“Worried about what? What the fuck did you do to my apartment?” He demanded.
