Page 93 of Soulless Saint

I’d never felt more alive.

…how broken did that make me?

Hot tears burned in my eyes, but I refused to let them fall, jerking the fabric of my black dress down to cover the mark on my leg I would probably need cosmetic surgery to remove. Cosmetic surgery that I couldn’t afford.

A knock at the door had me jumping out of my skin, digging under my pillow for the taser I hid there, an image from a vivid drug induced dream slingshotting into my head. Of amputated limbs, twisted and coated in crimson.

“Holy shit, is that a taser?” Toby asked, spry as a fucking summer daisy, and I dropped it to my lap, breathing heavily as I shook the macabre images from my head. “Can I see?”

“What the hell did you give me last night, Tobes?” I asked him, the pain returning to my head with a vengeance.

He shrugged as he sat on the edge of my bed and tugged the taser from my hands, pressing down the button with a sound of glee. “It was just Molly. Bad trip?”

I pressed my palms into my eyes. “You have no idea.”

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news,” he sing-songed. “But your shift at the cafe starts in, like, fifteen minutes.”

I groaned, remembering I picked this shift up for him because he had a choreography rehearsal this afternoon.

“Toby…” I trailed off, pleading, giving him my best puppy eyes. “Look at me, I’m a mess, I can’t go anywhere like this.”

He pushed out his lower lip. “Oh, hunny, I’m sorry you had a bad trip and I promise never to share my drugs with you again—scouts honor—but I have to go to this rehearsal. It’s worth a third of my final grade or some shit. Now come on, get up.”

He tugged me out of bed, and I wobbled unsteadily on my legs, clutching the bed rail for support. Toby winced. “Okay, we can fix this. You go put your sad self in the shower, and I’ll make you my famous hangover smoothie. You can drink it on the way.”

* * *

It was kind of difficult to eradicate all thoughts of Hardin and Kaleb St. Vincent—erotic or otherwise—from my mind when they seemed to be taking turns brooding in the cafe. All week, they were there from the moment I started my shifts to the moment I finished them. Hardin was just as quiet as ever, maybe even quieter, which made it easier to ignore his presence and pretend whatever happened between us was all just a figment of my apparently very vivid imagination.

Kaleb was a different story, though. He kept pestering me about having dinner with them and their parents. As if I wanted to share a meal with the most dangerous man in all of SoCal who also not-so-coincidentally happened to be the man who inadvertently got my mother killed, and his two twisted sons.

After everything that’d happened in Thorn Valley, I’d learned through personal experience and from watching my bestie, that it wasn’t really Damien St. Vincent’s fault. Not really. And I’d put those ragey feelings aside, for the most part, but that didn’t mean I wanted to be face to face with the man.

Share fucking lasagna and laughs.

No, thank you.

But by Tuesday night, I was ready to beat Kaleb senseless with the cash register if he didn’t shut up about it.

And then on Wednesday, I just didn’t have the energy anymore and my resolve was fading. I started to wonder what Damien St. Vincent was like. Why my mom was ever drawn to him in the first place. Why she couldn’t seem to stay away from him despite the danger she knowingly put herself in by remaining close at his side.

By Thursday, I decided I would do literally anything if Kaleb would just shut the fuck up about it. That day coincidentally, was also the day he casually reminded me that it was him and his brother who got me home safe after the concert.

I wasn’t sure about the ‘safe’ part, but I definitely woke up in my own bed. Apparently, I’d been put there by none other than Hardin.

Hardin, who’d removed my shoes and tucked me in.

Hardin, who set water and ibuprofen next to the bed and plugged in my phone on the nightstand.

Hardin, who somehow managed to lock the apartment door on his way out.

How could that man be the same man who told me to run that night at the concert? The same man who was now giving me the silent treatment every day at the cafe, sitting there drinking his drip coffee, brooding at nothing. Like he was waiting patiently for me to come to him, like he knew he didn’t have to chase me anymore. Back to being my Mr. Dark and Gloomy.

No.

Not my.

Never mine.

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