“Aunt Karen is going to kill you if you leave tire marks in her yard.” She leaps out of the truck.
“Your aunt loves me. Ask her. We’re practically besties,” Cal retorts, earning a laugh from Penny as she bounds inside the house.
Before I can get my door open, a strong hand settles on my jean-clad thigh, stopping me. I hate how his touch scorches my skin. As though the devil lives under the guise of a cute, older guy.
“We’re not over,” Cal states. “I have the entire summer to deal with you.”
I smack his hand off my thigh. “Don’t touch me.”
“I’ll touch you if I want to,” he growls but pulls his hand back. “I’ll touch you because you tried to kill Terrence.”
Pain lances through me, shredding my heart. “I didn’t try to kill him.”
“If he dies…” he trails off, scrubbing a palm over his tired features. “He can’t die.”
His torment is suffocating. I ache to reach over and take his hand so I can squeeze it. Assure him that Terrence will pull through. That I’m sorry for what I did. If I could ease his pain, I would.
I can’t.
What’s done is done and he hates me for it.
“I’m sorry,” I choke out, flinging open the door.
In my haste to get out, I slip off the running board, landing hard on my knee. I manage to bite my tongue in the process. Metallic tasting blood floods over my tongue and I spit it out.
“Oh no,” Cal says in a cold, flat tone. “You got hurt.”
His feet come into view as he grabs my shoulders, hauling me to my feet. Instead of letting me go, his eyes bore into mine. Then, he reaches up with his thumb, smearing some blood left on my bottom lip.
“Remember what I said.” His voice is softer now, almost a gentle caress. “I will make your life fucking hell until my boy wakes up.”
How can his words be delivered so sweetly but be so cruel?
“What if he never wakes up?” I ask, tearing up. The thought of him in a coma until he dies is too much to bear.
“Then it looks like you’re stuck with me forever.”
With those words practically spat at me, he abandons me to climb back in his big-ass truck. I manage to get the door shut before he hauls ass out of here, kicking up hunks of grass in our yard.
Aunt Karen is going to kill him.
Maybe then I’ll have a reprieve.
I don’t deserve one.
I deserve every second of his wrath.
Cal
A warm hand on my shoulder wakes me from my stupor. Last night, after leaving Charlotte and Penny’s, I went home and drank my way into oblivion. Seeing Charlotte fucked with my head. The small, feminine hand shaking me tells me I must have found a chick along the way home to bury myself in as well.
I try like hell to remember.
Was it Tayla or whatever the fuck her name was?
All I see in my head is long, blond hair.
I cringe, forcing my eyes open, to face the woman in my bed. Hopefully she’s hot because my dick hardens at lingering thoughts of Charlotte’s hair as I imagine it twisted in my fist.
Fuck.
I need to screw those thoughts right out of my head.
“Yuck, Cal,” the voice gripes. “Put that weapon away. I’m not one of your peasants. I am a queen.”
Oh Jesus.
“Tierra,” I groan. “Why are you here?”
“Grandma sent me,” she sasses.
Of course Rhetta did.
I squint against the sun streaming into my room and take in my best friend’s little cousin. She’s little, but fierce as fuck. At seventeen, she’s already a force to be reckoned with.
“Don’t you have school?”
“It’s Sunday and it’s summer, asshole. Get out of bed and let’s go grab lunch before we see T.”
“Oh, fuck,” I groan. “I promised Dad I’d go check the campground out.”
“Yeah, he’s already done it and come back. I’d avoid his office if I were you. I love your dad, but he’s in a super pissy mood.” She walks over to my dresser mirror and smooths out her black, shiny ponytail. “How are you holding up?”
I cringe. Tierra and I don’t do this. We give each other shit. I try to mess up her hair. She tries to whip my ass in basketball. Or, sometimes, we gang up on her cousin for shits and giggles. We don’t…care. Feelings aren’t our thing.
“Go away,” I mutter.
“I’ll go away as soon as that offensive boner does.” She turns around, cocking her hip out. “Seriously. Did you think I was one of your janky-ass hoes?”
“At least my janky-ass hoes are quiet in the morning.”
“Sick, asshole. I’m not sucking your dick.”
I cringe. She’s like a fucking sister to me. “You’re nasty, princess.”
“Queen,” she reminds me, flashing me a mouth full of pearly whites.
“Is Rockford missing their queen? Maybe you should run along. Who gave you a driver’s license anyway?”
She rolls her eyes and starts rummaging around in my drawers. I make no moves to get up, but thankfully after a few minutes with Tierra, my dick softens. It’s not that Tierra isn’t beautiful, because she fucking is, but she’s practically family. A cousin through T’s and my friendship, not blood. This is Oregon, not Alabama. I’m not a cousin fucker.
“Wear something respectable. Shower. Brush your stanky breath. Grandma says you need to find a job. Momma Kate agrees.”
“You and Mom already been conspiring over me this morning?” I roll out of bed, snagging my clothes up.
“Afternoon, now, lazy. And yes. You’re our favorite subject over coffee and bagels.” She smiles sweetly at me. “You have twenty minutes. Don’t make me come back up here and dress you myself because I will. If your penis starts
