“What? You want me to pull over and bawl my eyes out?”
I lower the gun and grip the steering wheel tight, my knuckles whitening as I tense. My heart beats wildly behind my chest, my skin is flushing. I’m hot.
Too hot.
Still, he pushes, still he talks, still he wants me to talk about what just happened.
“I want something, Luce, some sort of emotion. You’re just not—”
“I don’t want to acknowledge it.” The words fly from my lips in anger. “I don’t want to acknowledge it, because acknowledging it means I have to admit I don’t know what to do. It means acknowledging that I’m lost, and that I have no idea how to protect you from whatever is on that sodding hard drive. I know everything I needed to know about this situation when that man betrayed me. I don’t want to acknowledge it because everything I’ve spent years shoving in that fucking box is about to explode out of me.”
I signal and pull onto a side road that leads to a dark carpark that has woods on one side.
I turn off the engine and open the car door, desperate for air. Something thick and heavy fights me, something I’d buried so deep feels like its clawing at my chest, desperate to expel out of me. Desperate to claw its way out of my chest in a messy outburst.
I climb out and I scream into the quietness of the night and let theacknowledgementwash over me.
36
Owen - Age 18
She’snestledintomyside, her soft breath warming my chest as her leg rests possessively over mine. We’re tangled together in her small twin bed, her body fitting against me as if we were made from the same puzzle, always meant to be this close. Always meant to be together.
My fingers trace lazy patterns up and down her arm, memorising her skin beneath my touch.
How can something so wrong seem so unbelievably right?
She twitches in her sleep, and a smile tugs at my lips. But it fades just as quickly when I hear the faint creak of movement outside her door.
“Owen. Get your arse out here.” James’ voice slithers through the crack under the door, low and sharp.
Fuck.
I gently unwrap myself from her, her body turning away from me as if on instinct, her face serene in her slumber. I wish I could stay in this stolen moment forever, but reality is clawing at me, pulling me back. I grab my jeans, pulling them on as I tiptoe silently across the room. My hand lingers on the doorknob, mypulse thudding in my ears as I brace myself for what’s on the other side.
James.
He leans against the doorframe of my bedroom, one brow raised in a way that makes me want to punch it off his smug face.
“So, your night of bad decisions kept going when you got home then?”
“It’s not what you think,” I mutter defensively, though we both know it’s exactly what he thinks. The look on his face says it all—he’s not buying a damn word.
“What I think doesn’t matter right now,” James says, inspecting his fingernails with a bored expression. “It’s what the police think that you should be more worried about.”
Fuck. Shit. Bollocks.
“There it is.” He lets out a humourless laugh. “The realisation.” He pushes off the doorframe with a smirk that makes my fist itch. “Get your shit.”
“What?”
“Did I stutter?” James steps closer, and suddenly we’re chest to chest. He’s still taller, broader, and smells like he’s bathed in stale whiskey and bad decisions. “I said, get your shit. As of,” he glances at his watch, “three hours ago, you’re an adult. And judging by the fact the police are knocking at my door at 3:00 a.m., you’ve well and truly fucked up, son.”
“I’m not your son,” I say through gritted teeth, lifting my chin defiantly.
“And being that you’re no longer a child, you can pack your shit, have a nice chat with the police, and get the fuck out of my house.” His eyes narrow. “Unless you’d like to add‘fucking a minor’to the list of bad decisions you’ve made tonight.”
“She’s sixteen. Last time I checked, in the UK, that’s legal.”
