Page 60 of The Puck Chase

“Are the rumors true? Did he murder someone?” Archer pushes on, probably not realizing what it does to me to be asked that question.

Did he murder someone?

Someone?

As if my father didn’t take the only ‘someone’ I ever truly loved.

“Yes,” I snap, offering up no more information, but clearly it’s not enough.

“Who did he kill?” he asks, but the bottle is already at my lips, anticipating his question and erasing the answer I don’t want to give, and to my surprise, Archer only nods, pushing on with a new question. “Was he the one who marked your body?” Another nod from me, as I note the tightening of his jaw, as he grits out another question. “And what about your brother? Why don’t you talk to him?” I can tell from the tone of his question that he must think my brother hurt me too, and he did, just not in the way Archer’s presuming.

“Because he left me in the house with our father,” I admit truthfully, probably the easiest answer I have given so far, and like a moth to a flame, I can see Archer trying to piece together my trauma like a damn puzzle.

“Did your father hurt Jasper too?”

I nod, my throat aching to down the entire contents of the bottle in my hand, and maybe even go out and find something stronger, but with his blue gaze on mine, I take a deep breath and reply, “Yes, until Jasper turned eighteen he was the focus of my father’s rage, and then he left home and I took his place.”

I thought my answer might placate him, but he only looks angrier, as he demands, “Why didn’t you leave?”

I take a deep swill from the bottle this time, and despite his words from earlier, I know he is pissed off at what I’m saying, but even more pissed off at what I’m not saying.

“Is your father the reason you don’t like to be touched?” His question sounds desperate now, like he hurts for me, and I fucking hate it, but I hate even more that he noticed.

“I mean, I’m no therapist, but I think it’s a safe bet.” I tip more of the liquid into my mouth, needing the courage to continue.

“But you let me touch you,” he replies in wonder, and though there is no question in his tone, it’s still there, I still hear it.

“You’re the exception,” I admit for the first time, and not just to him, but to myself, too.

“To what, touching you?” Archer asks, his face now looking as if he’d wait another three fucking years for my response to his taunts, questions, and requests, and I almost choke on my need for him.

“To everything,” I tell him, silencing any more questions he might have wanted to ask, but he wouldn’t be him if he wasn’t pushing my damn buttons.

“Have you ever fucked a guy before?” he asks, a different look crossing his stare now, and I can feel the tension in the room almost choking us.

“Yes, a couple of times,” I drawl, sipping from the bottle slowly now, as his eyes track my tongue, as I lick some remnants of the liquid from my lips.

“How was it?”

I can understand why he would want the details, yet all I can do is shrug. “I’m sure it was fine, I don’t really remember much of it.” I don’t bother adding that the only sexual encounters Ichoose to remember, all involve him. It would only inflate his already oversized ego.

“You don’t remember?” He chokes out, looking confused, as if I might be lying, and I take another damned drink, knowing what I am about to admit.

“After my father was arrested, I fell into a dark hole,” I tell him, giving him information that only Josh possesses, yet knowing he needs it. “I was drinking a lot, taking anything I could get my hands on, to try to help me forget what had happened, and oftentimes it led me to sexual encounters with partners I have no desire to remember.”

He goes over my words in his mind, sipping his own drink slowly, before he asks, “Were you high the night we met?” There is no anger and judgement in his tone, only wonder, and I see no reason to lie, not to him.

“Yes.”

He nods, as if he had already realized the answer, yet still he pushes on. “Did you feel something that night?”

Again there is no point in lying, I think we have both done enough of that already. “Yes,” I admit freely, still able to feel the moment we first locked eyes on one another, and I felt something shift inside of me.

“The same thing you feel now?” he asks, but I’m already shaking my head.

“No, it’s more now,” I sigh, knowing those four words aren’t enough to convey my meaning, but not sure I know the ones that would. “When I first saw you, I thought you were just another jock looking to get his dick wet, and I was pissed because you decided to do it on my bed, when all I wanted to do was lock myself in my room and snort another line,” I tell him honestly, and he seems surprised by my level of candor. “The girl, whoever she was, invited me to join and I thought fuck it, another kind of high to chase away my demons,” I shrug, knowing howdisrespectful that makes me sound. “Then I was fucking her, watching myself sink inside of her, and waiting for the high to hit, but it wasn’t coming,” I breathe, feeling sick at myself for admitting that. “And then you groaned,” I add quietly, shaking my head, as if I can still hear the sound even now. “You groaned, and it was like the sound vibrated off every bone in my body, like I was asleep and it finally woke me up, and when I looked up at you, you were already watching me. Your eyes,those fucking eyes, so insanely blue, they met mine, and everything else just disappeared, and I’d never had that before. No one had ever made me feel like that before.”

Archer takes another pull from his bottle, before capping it back up and discarding it on the floor, as he sits up and asks, “And do you want to fuck me?”

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