Page 9 of Beautifully Scarred

“Lilah, are you in there?” I yell back.

“Go away,” she yells and laughs.

Visions of the two of them fooling around assault my brain and I can’t stop myself from jiggling the handle to see if the door is locked. It isn’t, so I open the door.

Lilah is bent over the counter with a rolled-up dollar bill pressed into her nostril while the guy paws at her ass. When she straightens, she looks at me with a smirk, her pupils so dilated I almost can’t see the blue in her eyes anymore.

“What the fuck, Jimmy?”

The guy spins around to look at me, and he’s just as messed up as Lilah. “I thought I told you to piss off?” He steps up to me, puffing out his chest.

“Lilah and I have some things to discuss. Take a hike.” My hands are fists at my sides, clenched so hard they hurt, but I can’t afford any type of scene people whip out their cell phones for, so I decide to try the civil route.

“Not happening. We were just about to get down to the good stuff,” he says with a cocky grin. It takes everything I have not to wipe that look off his face.

“Yeah, we can talk later.” She sidles up to the guy and runs her hand down his chest until it hits his belt buckle and stops there.

“She’ll meet you out in the bar, buddy. Just give me five minutes,” I say.

He looks as though he wants to tell me to fuck off again, but he surprises me when he turns to her. “It’s up to you.”

Maybe I’ve already gained some clout in this town.

She seems to give it some thought before propping herself up on her tiptoes and whispering something in his ear. Whatever it is, he likes it, because he smiles and rearranges his junk.

“I’m gonna hold you to that,” he says before squeezing her ass and sliding by me to get out the door.

I waste no time in slamming the door shut and flicking the lock.

“What are you doing?” Lilah crosses her arms, her hip cocked out to the side.

“Better question is what the fuck are you doing?” I motion to the powder and the dollar bill that’s still rolled up and lying on the counter.

“Don’t start,” she says and tries to make her way by me.

I put my arm out, pressing my hand against the wall and blocking her way. “I’m sorry I didn’t return your calls or your texts.”

She says nothing.

“But what you said… comparing me to your father…” I let the words hang there because she fucking knew what that would do to me.

She glances at me, and her entire demeanor changes. Hurt and loneliness and regret play across her features before she moves into me, wrapping her arms around my waist and resting her head on my chest. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

I knew she’d be sorry as soon as the words left her mouth, but that didn’t mean they didn’t inflict the pain they were intended to.

I cup her head. “I know. I’m sorry too. I don’t want to fight with you.”

“Me either. You’re the only real friend I have,” she says.

I pull back a bit and tilt her head up by her chin. Tears rest in the corners of her eyes, and God, it cuts me to see her like this. All I ever imagine when I see her so strung out is the nightmares she’s running from. The nights I couldn’t be there for her. What did he do to her to make her turn into this person?

“It’s only because I care. You know that, right?”

She nods, biting her bottom lip. Lilah knows what it does to me when she does that. It’s long been my undoing when she presses her teeth into her plump bottom lip. There’s something so sexual and yet so innocent about it.

Our gazes lock for a minute, and the tension in the small room builds to the point that it feels as oppressive as the summer humidity in the deep south.

The weeks away from one another have left my body in a state of want that only she can ever quench. I shouldn’t allow her to seduce me, but my resolve breaks as the sultry, teasing look deepens in her eyes.

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