Fuck! This is bad.
I absolutely meant to shoot that evil thug Brock, I really did, but I didn’t know I had it in me. And not in front of Kasen of all people. The lost boy I grew up with. Who’s apparently not so lost anymore and is most definitely more of a man.
He moves to stand over me, peering down in a way that makes me shiver. No, not a man, more a ferocious beast with the strength of an MMA fighter and a body that looks like it stepped right out of one of my wet dreams. Over the years I imagined the kind of man he would have grown into, what he might look like, but never in my wildest dreams could I have pictured the man standing in front of me.
Blinking a few times, I try with all I have left to get my heart to stop racing before I have a heart attack. But the truth is, I never thought I would see Kasen Throne again. Last time I did, I was one of them. Part of their crew, or at least they let me hang with them. A girl could never really be one of the Deadwater Bay Crew, his daddy would never allow it. But I knew all their secrets, and they knew mine.
At least I thought I did, until the night I didn’t.
That was ten years ago. Overwhelming grief washes over me, and I dig my fingernails into my thighs, trying to keep me here in the present and not slip into the grief of the past. I can’t go back there. It broke me last time, and I won’t let Kasen or anyone else do it to me again.
I flinch as he reaches out and trails his warm hand down the side of my face, his eyes scanning over my features as if he’s inspecting every fine detail. His eyes are dark as the night; it’s like the warmth and light they used to have has been drained out of them.
“Is it really you, Dove?” As he speaks, blood drips from his busted lip, and his eyes darken further as he flicks out his tongue and licks it like a feral animal. I’m not sure if the act is supposed to scare me, but the involuntary whimper that comes from me is anything but fear.
I get the sudden desperate urge to throw myself at him, taste his blood, his pain. Know why he’s changed so much he’s almost unrecognizable. It could be so simple, I could reach up and run my fingers through his neat hair. It was once worn long and unruly, but it’s short now, businesslike, even with just a little length at the top. I bet it wouldfeel good to dig my nails into his scalp. But there is something in the depths of his soul that stops me.
A shiver runs up my arms when I realize what it is. He’s the spitting image of his father. Cold, calculating control all wrapped up in a handsome package, disguising the truth. I drop my head to hide from his gaze. Nothing good can come from staring into the devil’s soul.
“Don’t be scared of me.” His voice is low, almost a whisper as he reaches for me, fingers tangling into my hair softly, delicately. He brushes my hair away from my eyes and tucks it behind my ear. I must look a total mess, my hair tangled from where Dax dragged me, my T-shirt covered in blood and sand and God only knows what else from the fight I put up against them.
“I’m not scared of you,” I murmur back, but my voice is so low, fresh pain radiating through my chest as I try to force the words out. If only it was so easy, if only he was the boy I once knew and I could take comfort in his warmth, but I know better. He’s not mine anymore. This life isn’t. Now that Brock and Dax are out of my way, I need to get the hell out of the bush before one of the Southern Breakers discovers I had anything to do with killing their president. If they do, my fate will be so much worse than being dragged back to Breakers Point to work for them. The gun is heavy in my hands. I have no clue what to do with it. It’s evidence, a link to pin their murder on me. And those boys had friends in high places, the kind you don’t want to be on the wrong side of.
Kasen nods. “Give it to me, birdie,” he says, holding a hand out for the weapon as if he can read my mind. It was always scary how he could do that.
My eyes widen, not so sure that’s a smart idea. I need to throw it off the closest cliff, yeah, that’s what I should be doing. Not sitting here frozen, trapped in Kasen’s vortex. From the day his brotherintroduced us, he had this all-consuming power over me. At the time, I knew it was dangerous. I could tell by the way my body lit up from just a subtle expression or light touch. I worshipped the ground he walked on, much like every other girl in town.
His head dips low, his fingers trailing down my arm, sending a shiver through me that reminds me of his power over me even after all this time. “I’ll take care of it for you. Make sure no one finds out what you did.” His words are soft, kind even, but they’re just words.
What? Why would he help me? I stare back at him, blinking a few times as I try to get my body to catch up with the program, knowing I should be able to say those words out loud, but I can’t. My tongue is heavy, and I can’t force the noise to come out of my mouth. I can hardly breathe with the pain thumping through my ribs and the swirling in my head. I think my body is shutting down, but now is not the time. Not here with him.
Ever so softly his hand closes over mine, the gun transferring almost without me even realizing what he’s doing. With a self-satisfied smirk he tucks it in the back of his dark jeans, then his hands come back to mine, inspecting the place where my wrists were bound together. “If he wasn’t already dead,” he growls almost to himself. Then his eyes rise back to mine as he laces our fingers together. It’s like no time has passed at all. It’s us back in this clearing, ready to play a prank on some tourist kids here just for the summer holidays.
His other hand slides around my back, and he helps me up to stand on my shaky-as-hell legs. I shouldn’t let him touch me, shouldn’t still be here. I know better than to stick around. I can’t trust him, not after what he did. But I’m frozen as well, wishing I could go back to a time before he broke what we had.
His touch is light, gentle almost. It’s jarring when I just witnessed him destroy a man with those same hands, his blood still smearedover Kasen’s T-shirt. “What happened to you?” he murmurs, his eyes running over me with detailed precision, I imagine taking inventory. His knack for observing every detail in his surroundings was always remarkable.
My head swims, and I try to focus on staying in the moment, not the overwhelming pain surging through me. I might have been able to trust him once, but that was shattered the night my life fell apart. Him saving me from these two thugs tonight got me out of a terrible situation, but truth is, I don’t owe him shit.
His hand comes around my back, holding me firmly. “Dove, what the hell? You disappear for ten years then turn back up with…” he looks back at them, “whoever those thugs are, looking like death.” His eyes darken, his face more serious now, looking at me like I owe him answers. “Talk to me,” he demands.
Answers I can’t give him. So, I do the only logical thing I can when being held by a man twice my size. I bring my knee up, aiming for his junk.
“For fuck’s sake,” he spits out, pulling back from me long enough that I have time to slip from his grasp. He shouldn’t be surprised, he was the one who taught me how to fight, and knee to the junk was lesson one.
I’m running before he has time to catch me, sprinting down the path and back through the bush as fast as my bare feet will take me. I’m not scared of him, but I don’t need a complication like him in my life either. He broke what we had, and I will never forgive him for it. Running is the only option, especially when I know how powerful he is in this town now. The beach trail leads out of the bush and over fallen branches and twigs that cut up my exposed flesh as the fresh scent of eucalyptus assaults my nostrils and I wind closer to the beach.
“Dove, get back here,” Kasen calls from behind me, he’s far enough away I know he can’t catch me. And I’m not stopping for him. I didn’t come back to this town to have him turn my world upside down on day one.
As the old gum trees thin out and sand squelches between my toes, waves crashing on the shoreline and salt air licking at my skin is a welcome cool change. This town used to be our playground. We grew up in the water, the sand, salt and ocean so deeply ingrained in our beings we didn’t need anything else. But today, my legs feel like jelly as I try to outrun him up the beach.
Deadwater Bay used to sit in the lower socio-economic range, mostly made up of housing commission and working-class people, until the summer holidays hit and it turned into a cute holiday location for Sydneysiders to relocate to. But the charming weatherboard holiday homes I remember lining the beach have been replaced with multi-story apartments and fancy high-rise hotels. When I arrived here earlier today, I was surprised to see my family home still standing in amongst all the development, alongside just a few others of its kind. It was once one of the most prestigious homes in the town, fit for the mayor, but now even I can see it’s a developer’s dream. It looks so out of place next to all the steel and concrete. The creepy steel fence surrounding it is plastered in Throne Developments branding, enough to tell me it’s only a matter of time before it’s transformed into someplace just as hideous as the other accommodations.
My head spins, and I grab hold of the fence as I suck in harsh breaths, fighting the need to dry retch from the sharp pain coming from my chest. I have to keep going. I didn’t come this far to give up now.
With blurry eyes, I push through the metal builders’ fence with signage that reads “Demolition zone keep out.” I clammer throughthe half-rotted white picket fence and a crooked pale blue front door that I painted with my mum the summer I turned twelve. It’s certainly seen better days. I shove it out of the way and collapse inside, praying that Kasen was too far behind me to see what house I disappeared into or he just gave up the chase because he didn’t care enough to follow me.
My head swims, pain coming from all over. It’s overwhelming, but I have to ignore it. I have to keep going. Our house is cast in shadows and smells of mold where the windows have been boarded up some time ago, but if I try hard enough, I can imagine what it used to look like when my family lived here. Back when I had a family. By the rundown state of it, and the furniture and items still strewn around the place, I don’t think anyone has lived here since. I have no idea how that’s possible, but I think it is. Like my therapist Talon says, I try to take myself to a happier place. I see my beautiful mum’s face as she walks into the living room. She’s singing along to the radio. My heart constricts, the memory bittersweet.
