Page 191 of Only With You

“You’re not. You’re so brave.” He kisses my forehead and embraces me. “You’re so brave,” he repeats gently.

“I don’t feel it. It happened two years ago and I still can’t seem to let it go.”

“It doesn’t matter how long ago it was. That piece of shit touched you. Do you want to talk to the police?”

I shake my head. “Who’d believe me? It happened so long ago and there’s no evidence he did anything. Plus, his father is a district attorney, so I’m sure you’ll know how that’ll go.”

He goes quiet for a moment, teeth grinding. “It was the guy from Liquid, wasn’t it? Cole?”

My chest constricts. “Yeah.”

“And he’s the one who gave you the drink?”

I think back to that night and shake my head. “No. He was nowhere near me or his friends. Matter of fact, I wasn’t near any guys. I was surrounded by my sorority sisters and I watched them pour my drink.”

I deflate every time I think about it because I’m still not sure how I could’ve gotten drugged. I had my hand over my cup and kept my eyes on it and close to me.

“And where the hell were they if you were with them?”

I pathetically shrug. “I don’t know. One minute, they were there, and then, they weren’t.”

Fury brims in his eyes, the tension evident in his shoulders, but then his expression softens. “I’m sorry this happened to you, Love, but thank you for telling me.”

“I should’ve said something, and for so long I wanted to, but sometimes I’d question whether it really happened. Sometimes, I’d wonder if it was all a figment of my imagination because it’s hard to grasp how it happened.” I interlock my clammy hands in hopes that they’ll stop shaking, but it only gets worse until Landon takes my hands in his. “But then the nightmares came, and in every one of them, I was trapped in a dark room, I’d hear the click of the door, and then he was on me. When I’d wake up, I could feel him, smell the alcohol on his breath, the sound of his zipper as he…” My voice quavers and cracks.

Licking my lips, thinking back to all the times I’d wake up in the middle of the night and shower in boiling hot water and scrub my body raw. I remember keeping the lights on after the first nightmare because I was terrified that he’d appear out of nowhere and actually do what he planned.

“That’s why I need the lights on, why I need to have an exit plan. Why I’m afraid, because he’s still out there and he taunts me because he knows I can’t remember that entire night. He knows I never said anything. It might also be that he doesn’t think he did anything wrong. At least, that’s what he said to me when we first ran into each other after it happened. And every time after that.”

Landon’s silence stretches, his face becoming scarily stoic, then a beat passes and he blinks.

“He’s not worth it,” I say, acknowledging what he’s thinking. “It’s been two years. No one is going to believe me.”

“What if I can get him to confess?” Anger douses his deep voice.

“Th-that’s not going to happen. He-he”—I hate how I stumble over my words, but Landon stares at me with nothingbut patience—“he won’t admit anything. Especially now that we’re dating. He’s not going to say anything to you. Even if he does, how will that make a difference? I don’t think the police will do anything, and please don’t do anything to him. He’s not worth it.”

He hugs me, one hand cupping my head like he knows I need the pressure to stop my headache. “You’re worth it and I don’t want someone making you feel the way you do. I don’t want you to hurt, because when you do…Ifuckinghurt.”

An abundance of overwhelming emotions grips me, but not like the kind I was just experiencing. This is different, and when I look up at him and he down at me, I want to say those three words, but I swallow them back.

“How would you even do that? I don’t think he’d willingly open up to you.”

He satirically chuckles. “You’d be surprised. But I won’t do anything you don’t want, so if you don’t want me to do it, I won’t.”

I think about it for a moment. It might not make a difference, but maybe it’ll make a difference in another girl’s life.

“Do it.”

53

LANDON

John.

I grimace at my phone and tuck it back in my pocket and descend the stairs.

His calls have become more frequent since the night he almost hit me. And have gotten worse after I ignored him at the Portland Invitational. I know he’s annoyed I didn’t acknowledge him, and I don’t understand why he’s surprised. If I didn’t do it at his house, I’m not sure why he assumes I’ll do it out in public.

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