Page 53 of Mason
I cross the road and follow behind Lennon, moving at a slow pace. This is no meandering walk. It would seem she has a destination in mind because she makes a beeline, cutting a diagonal line off the established path, weaving through the gravestones.
My forehead creases hard right down the center as my brows snap together. It seems like she’s heading directly for the Hawthorne family plots. What the fuck? I continue to watch her from a distance. Nope, I’m not wrong.
Lennon comes to a stop at Juliette’s gravestone and kneels down in the grass next to her.
Juliette died the year before Tristan and Nikki got married. As far as I’m aware, Lennon and Duke met at some point after Tristan and Nikki were dating, if not engaged. I don’t quite remember. So, it makes no sense to me why Lennon would know Juliette at all. There must be some other connection because holy shit, she’s talking quietly, using her hands to gesture as if she’s having a full-on conversation with her.
I move closer. I need to know what the hell the connection is, even if it makes me feel like an absolute creeper. Coming as close as I can, I stop, leaning against a tree, and strain to hear.
“Such a prick.” She rubs her hands over her face. “I used to think he was a nice guy, picking you up at Stella’s after work. And now…”
She says something else I can’t quite hear, and I curse inwardly, realizing I’ve missed something.Stella’s.Wait, is that the name of that little dump of a diner across town? Stella is Duke’s nickname for Lennon—and I think he means it as an insult. The synapses in my brain must not be firing because that makes no sense to me. Is Lennon saying she and Juliette both worked there?
What the hell would Juliette fucking Hawthorne be doing working in a dive like that? My brows knit together, my confusion reaching epic proportions. If she’s saying she saw Duke pick her up, then he knew about it. Interesting bit of information to have. Not sure what good it’ll do me, but I’ll tuck it away to ask about later.
As Lennon finishes, her voice lowers to a whisper, and the only word I can confidently make out is “slut.”
A visible shudder rolls through her entire body. She sniffles and swipes her fingers under her eyes. Shaking her head, she lies down in the grass and curls up on her side.
Seeing her like this, so clearly in distress—I don’t want to feel a fucking thing, but it does something to me. A gaping, sucking chasm opens in my chest. I don’t know how long she intends to stay, but it’d take a nuclear bomb going off to get me to leave her like this.
Quietly, I open my backpack and pull out a sketchpad and a charcoal pencil. The pencils aren’t my favorite to use, as they’re a little waxy in texture, and it affects how I get my ideas on the paper, but they’re more practical to carry with me. My preference is compressed charcoal sticks—soft, like the ones I’d used to draw on Lennon’s skin. I dampen my lips thinking about how gorgeous she’d looked with my work on her. I pull out my phone and scroll to the photos I’d quickly snapped. So. Fucking. Hot.
Blood flows south, and I groan, having to readjust myself before I lean back against the tree. Breathing slowly, I attempt to ignore my still-hard cock and begin to sketch out an image that comes to mind. I never draw directly from life, it’s always a memory or something in my head—in this case, it’s a sad, lonely girl kneeling among flowers, hands covering most of her face. Tears snake around her fingers to drip down over her hands. It’s almost like she’s trying to keep the tears inside, but they’re overflowing—and she can’t do anything to stop them.
I pause a moment to rub my hand over my tightening chest. The girl’s hair is swept into a messy bun on the top of her head, a pencil jammed through it to hold everything in place.
If I hadn’t known I was drawing Lennon, I do now. A shuddering sigh escapes me. Once I have the basic sketch down, I go back in, adding detail, fine-tuning the shape of her hands, and adding depth and dimension to it.
While I work, my tongue plays with the split in my lip. Fucking Duke. I’d laid into him good. After we’d gotten out our aggression, I’d offered him a drink. And that turned into many more. I smirk, not knowing if Duke remembers our entire conversation. He was wasted by the end of it.
“What the fuck were you thinking, drawing all over her? Sticking your dick where it didn’t belong.”
“Did it occur to you that she was a willing participant? You know, you could have just watched if you wanted—or joined in for all I care. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time, would it, Duke?”
“You’re fucking crazy.”
“No, you’re the one who acted like a complete psycho tonight, dickhead.”
I grit my teeth and go back to work, every few minutes looking up to make sure Lennon is where I left her before going back to the version of her on my sketchpad. She’s coming along nicely.
It must be an hour or more that I sit there under the tree before a shadow falls over me.
“What are you doing here, Mason?” The unsteady softness of Lennon’s voice catches me by surprise.
I draw in a breath as my head and my heart war over how to handle her. Do I concede that she’s suffered through enough at our hands in the last twenty-four hours? My hands specifically. Or do I continue to punish her for something that gutted me? Her in that space. My space. Where I go to deal with the chaos in my head.
She hadn’t so much as flinched. She’d looked and looked until I thought I’d go out of my goddamn mind. Nothing on those canvases made her turn and run. And some of it… it’s pure, undiluted rage in its rawest form. I know it’s awful to look at, and even worse to consider what type of person would be messed up enough to create anything like that.
It’s me.
With her eyes watching my every move, I carefully close the sketchpad and set it aside with the pencil.
“I like it here. It’s quiet. Why areyouhere?” She doesn’t need to know I followed her in. Probably better if she has no idea.
The emotions she’d been sorting through by talking to Juliette are still evident on her face—pink cheeks, red nose, tired eyes. She steps close enough for me to reach her, and I follow my instincts. My hand darts out to grasp hers, and I tug. Caught off balance, she stumbles and falls right onto my lap, just like I’d hoped she would.
“Mason,” she hisses out, her voice full of exasperation. “What are you doing? Stop.” She begins to extricate herself from the slightly awkward position.
