Page 10 of Killer Kiss

I shoved my hand back in my pocket and retrieved her money. “Here.”

She shook her head fiercely. “No. You take it. You deserve it.”

I didn’t. I’d done the bare minimum. Barely even that. I pushed the money toward her and grabbed my gym bag from the floor. “Go home. Work it out with him. Or don’t. Whatever. But this isn’t where you want to be tonight.”

I opened the door and put one foot out onto the leaf-littered grass.

“Can I at least drive you home?”

But there was relief in her eyes already. She didn’t really want to take me back to Saint View. She wanted to drive away and forget this had ever happened.

So did I. Because the longer I sat in this fucking car, the longer I felt like shit about it. It was too small and cramped, and I suddenly craved fresh air like I needed my next breath. “Don’t worry about it. I could use the exercise.”

She drove off so quickly I didn’t have a chance to change my mind. Her tires spun on the dirt road, leaving me behind in her dust.

I was stranded in the middle of Providence without a way of getting back home. Not that I’d have that home for much longer since I would probably be evicted.

I really needed that five hundred dollars.

Fuck.

The trees around me shook as a strong breeze picked up, bringing the scent of seawater from the nearby ocean. Hoisting my bag onto my shoulder, I found my way back to the main road, which was mostly quiet at this time of night except for the occasional set of headlights that flew by, zero consideration given to the loser standing on the side of the road with his thumb sticking out.

Should have known the fancy, rich assholes in Providence wouldn’t stop to help someone else out. They always had their heads shoved so far up their own asses.

Whatever. Wouldn’t be the first time I’d had to walk. If I turned to the left, I’d be headed in the general direction of Saint View.

But my brother’s McMansion was only a couple of streets away. Even though the whole town pissed me off with its perfect lawns and overpriced properties, without any conscious decision from me, my feet took me deeper into Providence until I was staring up at his place.

To my surprise, there were lights on in two of the upstairs windows, a soft glow spilling out from behind gauzy curtains. The walls behind were a bubble-gum pink, telling me it had to be his daughter, Luna’s, bedroom.

Figures moved around behind the curtains, faces not clear from this distance but easy to assume it was my brother and his partners, probably tucking their daughter in after a bad dream.

I’d done that once or twice for Banjo after I’d gotten him out of the foster care system. He probably didn’t remember because he was so young. Or maybe he’d even blocked out those years around the time he’d come to live with me.

The things he’d seen in foster care were traumatic.

But I’d been there in the middle of the night, holding him while he’d screamed. I actually hoped he’d forgotten, because I couldn’t forget all the times I’d woken up in the same way but had nobody there to hold me.

Just a foster parent to scream, “Shut the fuck up!” Or one of the guys I’d buddied up with on the streets before I’d managed to secure a shitty little government-assisted house in an even shittier neighborhood.

After that, anytime I’d woken up screaming I’d quickly tried to muffle the suffocating feeling so Banjo wouldn’t hear.

I wanted to go to his door now. Beg him for forgiveness. Ask to be a part of his life again.

I even took a step down the path, drawn in by the sweet family scene taking place in that upstairs window. Then I caught a glimpse of myself in the side mirror of one of their cars and remembered what I’d been about to do with that woman. She’d been about to cheat on her husband, and I would have let her, as long as I’d gotten paid.

Remembered how Banjo had looked at me when he’d told me to get out of his life.

Remembered how the last time I’d cared about someone, she’d been taken. Hurt. Maybe even left for dead.

All of that was on me.

I was the darkness that brought bad things to the doorways of good people.

I was the one who ruined everything he touched.

I turned around and headed back to Saint View, knowing that was where I belonged.

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