Page 57 of Wanting More
Hayden reached over her shoulder and shoved Joel on his. "Don't talk shit about her mom, man."
Sapphire held up her hand. "It's…it's ok. I mean, she is my mom, and so I think it will always sting a bit, but trust me, I understand."
Joel took her hand in his and swiped his thumb back and forth across the back of her hand soothingly. It was such a juxtaposition, from the rough calluses of his thumb against the smooth skin on her hand, that she stared. Actually, she couldn't stop staring. Up and up, her gaze traveled up his thick wrist and along his wide forearm. She wanted to reach out and run the tips of her fingers along the slightly protruding veins as if she was reading braille. How far did they go?
"Hey, I'm sorry," he whispered, his soft tone coaxing her straying eyes back up to his. "I just can't stand that woman. Hell, for the very brief time I knew her back then, she nearly got me sent back to a detention facility and-"
"And now you have me to take care of," she finished for him with a shrug. "I get it," she said in a sigh and let her head fall back onto the couch cushion behind her. She looked up at the wooden beams and metal pipes crossing the ceiling high above and thought about the woman. "My mom is…she's self-absorbed. I can't tell you how many times I would wake up to a twenty taped to the fridge along with a note that said she would be back in a few days. Of course, a few days always turned into a week and a half."
Hayden stiffened, and she looked up at his dark expression. "Fucking hell, are you serious?"
Sapphire smiled softly and looked back at the drink in her other hand. "Yeah. Or having to buy a mini-fridge and a toaster oven for my room because she would let her random boyfriends just eat up all the food. She…she just really didn't think about anything other than herself and what she wanted. It was like she had some sort of goal in her head that I never knew about, and she was determined to get to it no matter who got thrown under the bus in the process."
Hayden sat forward in his seat and down the rest of his beer in one gulp. "I take back what I said," he said with a gasp and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand before settling his hard gaze on her. "Your mother is a selfish bitch. Who the fuck leaves for more than a week and expects their kid to get by on twenty dollars?"
"You would be surprised how far I can make twenty dollars stretch at the dollar store," she bragged.
"Don’t be proud of that, dammit!"
Seeing her hurt expression, Hayden's eyes softened, and he laid his heavy hand on her shoulder and squeezed. Sapphire nearly groaned. His thumb rubbed directly into the spot where she kept most of her tension. Seeing the quick flutter of pleasure in her eyes, Hayden gave her a knowing little smirk before letting his thumb dig deeper into the overly stiff muscle.
This time Sapphire could not hold back the tiny sound of pleasure.
Relaxing into his touch, her muscles responded to the dominant force of his hand. She looked down at her hand still in Joel's, and words that she never felt the urge to say began to buzz along the edge of her lips. It scared her just as much as the need and comfort to be right here in this spot pulled at her. This feeling of safety between these two men was pulling the painful secrets she had always made sure to bury deep in her heart back up to the surface.
Gathering herself until she was sure she didn't let out any of those restricted out of their cage and past her lips, she spoke again. "I’d much rather had been left alone, to be honest. Preferably with more money, but it was better than when she came home with a new guy."
She felt their large bodies tense on either side of her, but they said nothing. Their hands on her did not pull away. Gently Joel's hand held hers as his thumb passed lazily back and forth over the back of her hand while Hayden moved his hand to her other shoulder, bestowing it the same treatment. Not risking taking a peek up at them, she continued.
"It didn't take long for me to learn to stay in my room after the first time. Before I had gotten the makeshift kitchenette for my room, I would naturally come out of my room late at night when I thought everyone was sleeping and get some water or maybe something to eat. I didn't think that…I don't know why but I just didn't think that I would be…someone to be messed with." Even after all this time, she still found the words for what happened that night very hard to say. "I was much younger then. I had been trying to get some water when he came up behind me," she paused as both of their hands on her stilled at once.
Shame and regret immediately spiraled in her chest. She shouldn't have shared this. This was way too much. No one wanted to hear this baggage. The night had been going so well; why would she even bring this up? Panicking, her body tensed. Shifting her legs, she fought with the urge to just stand up and laugh it all off and escape to her room and—their hands began to move once again. Blinking, Sapphire realized she had been staring sightlessly at the bottle she clutched in her other hand.
Hayden's hand on her shoulder deepened its touch, and she closed her eyes again.
They weren't judging her, they wanted her to speak.
"He tried to pin me against the wall and kiss me." She paused, taking a breath. "I tried fighting back and even screamed, but I'm not sure if he was high or what he just seemed…" Frightening, she thought. She hadn't thought of the incident in a long time, but even now, the man's dead, emotionless eyes to her fear and frightening expression made her feel cold inside and out. "Thankfully, my mom came in, and she hit him with one of those cast-iron stove trivets that were on the burners. She kicked him out and then yelled at me for leaving my room."
Both Hayden and Joel blew out a heavy breath.
"Fucking hell," Joel rasped. Running his hand through his hair in agitation, he abruptly stood up. "I'm going to need something stronger than this. Hold on."
She watched him walk toward the kitchen area, noting the few tattoos covering his broad back. He grabbed two shot glasses from the cabinet and a bottle of vodka from atop the fridge before grabbing another wine cooler.
Coming back over, he handed her the wine cooler and sat down heavily next to her, and began pouring his and Hayden's shot.
"I was just saying I understood," she said with a rueful smirk as she watched them pass the small shot glasses across her. "I know she can be pretty bad. It used to make me so mad when kids at school used to complain about their parents arguing." Sapphire let out a dry laugh. "Sign me up for two parents arguing any day. At least they're there and not running off or bringing perverts home."
Both men knocked back their glasses, draining the tiny glass of the clear liquid. Joel reached for the bottle on the coffee table and looked to Hayden in silent offering. Hayden shook his head. Leaning back on the couch, he brought his arm back around her shoulders, this time pulling her until she was leaning fully into his solid frame. The spicy, clean smell of his soap drifted to her nose, and Sapphire couldn't help but take a deep breath. He smelled so good.
The jarring clap of the shot glass hitting the table stole her attention, and Sapphire looked over to Joel was scowling openly at their position. There it was again. That pressure in the air that surrounded them whenever one man touched her and the other wasn't. Sapphire had felt it before, the charge in the air when the men glared in secret at one another. She tried to pretend it wasn't happening. She tried not to examine the odd twisting and intrusive feeling that expanded in her chest each time. It didn't feel right. Excitement and shame spiraling together in a double helix, fighting within her. Some base, almost primitive part of her flared to life at the brief possessive look in either man's eyes but was always quickly drowned in the ash of shame. How could she want that? To see their anger for one another because of her, no, she couldn’t want that. That would be something her mother would want.
Sapphire would never be anything like her, she vowed.
Reaching out a hand, she met Joel's gaze and watched as the anger in his eyes dampened. Looking down at her hand as if considering it for a moment, he reached for it once again.
This time she pulled his hand to her and laid it on her lap, covering it gently with hers. His hand twitched against her thigh as if he wanted to grab her and stopped himself. She let her gaze travel up his long fingers and strong tendons, following the line of one pulsing vein in particular until it disappeared into his arm. With his back against the sofa now, Joel faced her with a comfortable silence.
