Page 69 of Of Saints & Savagery
“This asshole left my girlfriend on her own,” Angel says, not turning to me. “One of us is going to stay here with Heath, and since he’d rather it be him, I’m sending him with you.”
I bristle. “I don’t need a fucking escort.”
Angel levels me with his coldest snake eyes. “You’d better fucking pray she’s snug in her bed, fast asleep when you get there.” His nostrils flare, and he purses his lips. “If she is… You can kneel and worship her for me until I get there.”
“Can I—” Maverick starts, but Angel cuts him off.
“No,” he says. “Stand watch until you hear from me.”
“I’ll go too,” Annabel Lee says, standing gracefully from where she sat in a pool of black ruffles.
“The fuck you will,” Mad Dog growls.
“She’s my friend,” Annabel Lee protests, looking to me.
Even though she lives on campus, I don’t know her any better than Angel’s other cousins, so I just shrug. I’m in enough trouble. Mercy may be my sister, but she’s Angel’s girlfriend.
Mad Dog fixes his sister with his unnerving stare. “Sit your ass down.”
She glares, her jaw clenching, but she tucks her skirts and obeys.
“He’s just trying to protect you,” Manson tells her, wrapping a protective arm around her shoulders and pulling her close to rest his temple against hers. “Not that there’s anything to worry about. I’m sure Mercy’s fine.”
Mad Dog turns and strides out of the waiting room.
“You should go,” I say to Angel. “She’s your girlfriend.”
“And?”
“And she won’t want to see me,” I grit out, shame racing through my veins when I remember the way I treated her. The look on her face when she walked in and saw Ronique in my bed. The way it turned me on.
“That’s why you should go,” Angel says. “Besides, you don’t deserve to be here if Heath wakes up. You’ll just do the same thing to him that you do to her.”
“I didn’t see the messages,” I grit out, my hands fisting at my sides.
“That’s not what I’m talking about, and you know it. Now go make things right with her while you can.” He softens at last, just as I’m about to turn away. “I’ll text if we hear anything,” he says. “Keep your phone on this time. And text when you get to Mercy’s.”
I follow Maverick outside, and we climb into Mad Dog’s car, which is waiting at the front. A few minutes later, we’re back at Thorncrown. We hurry across campus toward the girls dorm. I think of what I’ll say to Mercy.
I think about the tears on her face when I said those things to her as I fucked her, the way she came with them still dripping down her cheeks. The way they tasted on my tongue.
My pace quickens.
I’ll tell her the truth. That it gets me off to see her cry, sick as that is. That I know in some way it gets her off too. That’s why she cums so hard when I fuck her, when I tell her what a dirty little whore she is.
I want her to bemywhore. To show me how wet it makes her when I call her that. I want to fuck her again, raw and dirty like I did in my room. This time, I want to do it alone, with no audience. We haven’t had nearly enough time together without anyone else there. Time to sort things out, to come to an understanding.
She told me she loved me, but I couldn’t say it back. Not with the priest right there. I couldn’t lose face, look like a pussy. I didn’t want him to know I cared. And maybe I didn’t want her to know, either.
But she should know.
She should know she’s my whole world, that it kills me a little more each time I see her happy with another man. That I’m a selfish bastard, and I want her to be my girlfriend, not just my sister. I want her to be my everything. She already is. I just have to tell her.
I hurry up the steps of her dorm, already formulating the words I’ll say to her. My footsteps echo down the third-floor hallway as I increase my pace, almost running to her.
But when we reach the door to her room, it’s hanging open. Inside, the room has been ransacked, and there’s no signof Mercy. I stand there for a long minute, my hands gripping the doorframe on both sides to keep me upright. She’s gone.
Mercy is gone.
I sway on my feet, not hearing the words that Angel’s cousins are saying behind me, not seeing anything except the disheveled bedsheets, the quilt and throws in a tangle like they’re not lovingly made with her own hands. She would never leave her bed that way. That’s what I’m thinking. She would never leave her cat, the grey cloud of Dr. Jekyll that’s now cowering in the furthest corner under her bed, staring out at me with round, frightened eyes instead of running to me like he usually does. And then I see the little end of her bear, the bear I gave her a decade ago, tossed facedown on the floor halfway under her bed, and something inside me snaps.
I fall to my knees, calling out for a sister who is no longer here. For a sister I destroyed.
Breaking her destroyed me too, but losing her shattered me into a million pieces. I will never be whole, never rest, never fuckingbreathe,until she’s safe in my arms again.
I pray that it won’t be too late. But I’m afraid it already is.
