Page 29 of Wicked

“He stayed the night Friday. In my bed. He didn’t make a move on me, Shephard. Wetalked.”

“So that’s it? You refuse to be with me, so you go for the next best thing, a younger version of me? That’s fucked up, Harper.”

He untangles from her hold, and the scene unfolds before my eyes like I’m going through a mind-blowing, out-of-body experience.

“It won’t work between us.”

“Why the hell not?” He thrusts his fingers in his hair and yanks. “Why the fuck can’t we give it a try?”

“You’ve seen me at my lowest. How can you ever see me any other way than on my knees with—”

“Don’t fucking say it, Harper.”

He grabs her arm, yanks, and pulls until she’s flushed against his body, looking up at him, balanced on the tips of her toes.

“Don’t dredge up the past. We buried that part of our lives years ago.”

He crushes her to his chest. I can’t move. I’m a captive audience, a stupid insect caught in their web of what-the-fuckery.

“Did we? What were you doing in Chicago?”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Everythingto do with us and home is.”

She wrestles out of his hold, ducks under the ropes, and lacing her fingers through mine, she, unbeknownst to me, declares a war of will and of the heart.

“I belong with him. Don’t ever question my choice again. Ever.”

Part Two

Wicked.

She’s as wicked as they come.

Tempting me with hair dark as night.

Eyes as blue as the ocean waves.

Wicked, her coy smile.

Her teasing.

She’s as wicked as they come, and I will crush her soul until she squeals her come.

12

Harper

Ilurch up in bed, gasping for air, drenched with sweat, reliving my nightmares of being confined and humiliated over and over as they took turns holding a gun to my head.

It’s stifling inside my bedroom. There’s no a/c. I don’t dare open the windows above my bed.

He comes to me in my sleep. They all do. The guys who hurt me. Though three of them are buried six feet underground, I’m scared their ghosts will slip inside a cracked window.

An incandescent glow lights up the room. I lay back in bed and fumble for my cell on the nightstand. Squinting, I glance at the screen. It’s another text message from Shephard. A string of apologies. My cell rings. Too tired to refuse him, I answer.

“Harper, please—”

---