Page 91 of Wicked Devotion
The burning filterof my cigarette sears my fingertips, snapping me out of my trance. Pain, felt or inflicted, always helps to redirect my thoughts, something I learned after Red forced me to get clean. It gives me moments of peaceful silence inside my head, but they never last long.
It’s funny. When Lily held my hand earlier, it was quiet, too.
Normally, I would lash out at her and Max. Would storm off after, take the keys to his truck with me, and just disappear for a week or two. But for whatever reason, I just tuck the burnt cigarette away and lie down on my towel, closing my eyes.
I try to focus on the breeze blowing through the leaves, telling myself that there is no way Lily has said it on purpose.
Yes, she had been in my office, and she could have seen the shirt, but she doesn’t know the backstory. And while Max can be dumb, he would never disrespect my boundaries by telling her.
I wish I knew when or how it happened, but at some point, I got tired of fighting. Probably because it’s fruitless either way.
The moment my thoughts go from screaming to the usual background noise, they make way for me to hear Max talking to Lily. It’s a conversation I would have gladly ignored, but then he says my name.
“There’s no me without Logan,” he says, holding onto Lily. “Of course, it’s hard sometimes, but without him, it’s unbearable. And then you came along, and now two people hold my happiness in their hands…“
I roll my eyes at his overdramaticness, as if I wasn’t the one holding a gun to his head because I am so fucking scared of losing him.
“And maybe it’s too soon to say it, too dumb, too Max, but I lo—“
“Your phone’s ringing, sunshine,” I yell over to them.
After taking a deep breath, Max carries Lily back to our spot. He puts her down on her towel before he checks his phone while Lily keeps glancing over at me. For the sake of everyone, I decide to act like she didn’t almost send me into a spiral.
“Logan.” Max is doing this mom-stance, hand on his hip, while he looks down at me.
“Sorry, sunshine,” I say, refusing to meet his gaze. “You know my hearing’s a bit fucked up.”
“You know what else is fucked up,” he mumbles, but suddenly, Lily is talking over him.
Her hand hovers over my arm like she’s waiting for permission to touch me. “I like your tattoos. That’s the Virgin Mary, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Lots of skulls.” Her fingers dance over my stomach, featherlight touches that force me to suppress the urge to swat her hand away.
“I like ‘em.”
“I can see that.” She smiles at me, and the urge to push her away becomes a little less prevalent.
“What’s this one supposed to be?” Lily asks, pointing at a small tattoo on the inside of my left arm, right at the height of my heart.
“Go ask the stray what it’s supposed to be,” I say, groaning when Max comes over to take a look.
“You did not.” He gasps, straddling me before I can turn away. “Logan Cabrera, you didnot—“
“That’smybite mark?” he finally manages to get out, his voice full of disbelief.
“No, I let some rando bite me and decided to get it tattooed because his teeth looked nice.”
I give him a soft slap on the back of his head, wishing he’d get off of me so I can take a nice, long walk. Alone. I could just live in the woods, befriend a bear or something.
“When did you get it?”
“A while ago.”
For your birthday, but I don’t say that. It’s embarrassing enough I got the tattoo in the first place, and once it was healed and I wanted to show it to Max, the whole thing with Lily started. I was too pissed to give him his present, apart from the fact that it’s fucking ridiculous, and I still don’t know what possessed me that day.
“Shows how much you can’t stand me,” he says with a grin, stealing a kiss.
