Being With You (The Redemption Series)
Read Being With You (The Redemption Series) Online
Authors: Hazel St James
Tags: #bondage, #sex, #Romance, #BDSM, #Erotica, #Rough
Book Two of the Redemption Series
By Hazel St James
Copyright © Hazel St James 2013
Kindle Edition
Cover Models Justin Coale and Alyssa Graham
Cover Photography by Sean Gomes
Special Thanks To:
Cover Design: Melissa Stevens
Editor: Michelle Kowalski
Formatter: Paul Salvette
Beta Readers: Susan Foulkes and Courtney Wray
Author Stylist: Lachelle Ingvalson
Author Photographer: CLP Studio
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events of locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
There are several copyrighted names used in this story. Credit is given to:
Jeep owned by the Chrysler Group LLC
Vans Skater Shoes owned by Vans, Inc
Jack Daniels owned by the Brown Forman Company
Southern Comfort owned by the Brown Forman Company
Friends owned by NBC
NCIS owned by CBS
Mack Truck owned by Mack Truck, Inc.
Mr. Clean owned by Procter and Gamble Company
Dedication
Oh, where to start this time…
First and foremost, I wouldn’t be where I am today without my loving and loyal fans. You make my job enjoyable and for that I am forever grateful.
My kids have become accustomed to the lack of mommy and the mess that is called our house. I hope that you don’t ever feel like I took more away from you than the love I gave back in spades…
Matt…you complete me. In every sense of the words. How ‘bout that?
Justin…you can’t begin to imagine what it feels like to know you will always be there for me, no matter what. I would give everything up if I couldn’t do this with you by my side.
(P.S. The hustle never sleeps, but he sure takes a lot of cat naps….)
Courtney….once you and I end up on the same land mass, the devil is gonna cuss. Because I don’t know that we could stay out of trouble, even if we tried. And I know there is a bar somewhere where we can dance and drink and tell stupid jokes and laugh about furry boats and not get hit on by sleazy guys that drink our waters……
My fellas….thanks for all the laughs when I needed them the most.
To my captain…don’t give up on me, yet. I’m gonna make it, you’ll see….
This story deals with mental and physical illnesses in its untreated and treated forms. I am not a medical or mental doctor…I make no claims that the information in this book is “medically appropriate,” and/or should be used as a guideline for such. I also am loosely using medical terms dealing with different afflictions of major organs…again, not a medical doctors, and should not be taken as medical advice, diagnosis or a checklist of symptoms.
Hazel St James
Connect with Hazel on Substance B
“P
lease, Daddy. I’ll be a good boy. Please stay,” the little boy sobbed.
It was happening again…the nightmare. Tristan was stuck between two different realities as his mind returned to that day. Even in his catatonic state, he knew that he was sleep-speaking the words again and again. “Don’t leave me!”
“Tristan, I love you. Never forget that.” The last words he ever heard his father say. Slowly replaying in his brain like they were on repeat.
The slamming of a car door…the gravel crunching underneath the tires…his own whimpers as his grandma held him tight on the front porch.
Then the slow dripping of the bathroom sink…
Empty…cold…his mother quietly humming, “Baby mine, don’t you cry.”
The woman looked up at him, and Tristan saw the tears streaming down her sunken in face, instantly knowing that she was his mother. “Come here, Tristan,” she said in a distant voice as she reached for him. Her hand held his arm and he flailed about wildly trying to get her off him. “Nooooooooo!”
Tristan sat up in bed, gripping his chest as he panted and screamed against the fear clutching him. It took a few minutes and countless deep breaths before the ache inside started to ease. The last inhale he took deep into his lungs burned and made him gasp; pain lanced down his right arm, and trembles raced across his skin.
Closing his eyes tight, Tristan tried to calm himself.
Just a dream…just a dream…
he chanted in his mind over and over. His body was feeling a bit more stable as he tried again to pull a full load of air into his lungs, but it was met with fierce resistance and he sputtered. A dull, throbbing ache started in his neck and rushed to his head, making him clutch his eyes together tighter.
Fuck
…he thought as his panic attack raced out of control. Logical thought was near impossible, especially in the dead of the night, but Tristan had been going on auto pilot these last few weeks and he knew what he needed to do.
One step in front of the other
…His new mantra for his pathetic life was all he had to cling to as he stumbled out of bed and into the adjoining bathroom. The light above the sink would only trigger an automatic migraine, so he used his hands to find the plastic cup by the sink and fill it with water. His spare bottle of anxiety meds was in the cupboard and he choked out a laugh at the mere single tablet that lay inside. His days of only needing one or two pills to pull him back from the brink were long gone…he needed at least three of them to knock himself out again after his full-blown panic attacks of late. Or a full bottle of Jack Daniel’s.
Tristan tried popping the pill into his mouth, but his shaking hands were fighting against him and the tiny pill went fluttering across the bathroom. “Fuck!” he cursed, unable to do any more than that as he leaned against the doorjamb, still violently shaking.
A light flipped on in the hallway outside his room, and a gruff voice called out, “I’ll get the other bottle from your coat. Hold on, big guy.” Gabriel didn’t even need to come in to Tristan’s room to see the state he was in; the man was all too familiar with his nightly ritual and he’d probably been woken up when he was screaming in his sleep like usual.
Living here with Gabriel wasn’t bad; in fact, it was a great improvement from his loft over his Uncle Morgan’s garage. Not that he had much choice when he left…Morgan didn’t give him many options when Tristan had found his meager belongings in garbage bags in the driveway. But truth be told, he was surprised that they weren’t thrown in a dumpster, or even set on fire somewhere.
He knew the day was coming, because he hadn’t agreed to go back to J-View Plastics and work for Morgan. But coming home from closing down the bar at Gabriel’s Supper Club at one in the morning to find the locks changed and his things out front was a pretty good indication that his employment choice had his uncle a tiny bit pissed off. Not that he cared…not even one iota of remorse played through his thoughts. The man was a fucking asshole who was trying to play gangster in the middle of Colorado, and was on the verge of imploding his own business.
Morgan must have pissed in the wrong person’s pool so to speak, and was up to his neck in investigations by numerous departments from the state of Colorado. Hence, needing Tristan to come back and help with some of his “private” dealings, but there was no fucking way the man was going to be able to bribe, steal or threaten his way out of this one.
Either way, it didn’t matter to Tristan…even if he would be making a hondo an hour, there was no amount of money out there to get him back into that disgusting man’s grasp again. Tristan needed a simple and easy-going life; where money was earned through fair, hard work and you knew where you stood from day to day. Slinging drinks and shooting the shit with the regulars at Gabriel’s Supper Club wasn’t a lifelong dream, but it was a good solid job that made him decent money and kept him out of trouble.
Plus, he was finding Gabriel to be as close to a best friend as Tristan ever had…maybe even more like a father figure in some sense. Especially when Tristan asked if he could crash on his couch for a few days until he found somewhere to live, but instead Gabriel insisted that he move in to the spare bedroom for “however long you need…”
Tristan’s heart was pounding against his ribcage as he stood there with his thoughts racing back and forth. As fast as he could rationalize one obstacle in his life and tell himself that things were okay, another fucked up part of his world would immediately pop up and his thoughts would scatter about to the winds. His breathing was labored and his head was throbbing as he stood in his bathroom, hoping and praying that just this one time, his panic attack would subside without having to dope himself up. But those thoughts just brought out his fear of being dependent on these fucking medications, and a whole ‘nother set of worries shot through his brain.
“Here you go, Tristan,” Gabriel brought him out of his disjointed thoughts about his life as he stepped in front of him, holding out his hand with three tiny pills. Without a word, Tristan grabbed them and popped them into his mouth, swallowing them quickly. His body was on autopilot as he grabbed the cup with water sitting on the sink and downed the glass in one swallow, pushing the meds into his guts so they would dissolve double-time.
Not able to do more than grunt his appreciation, Tristan stumbled back to his bed and sat down on the edge. There was no need to lay back down for a while, he wouldn’t be going back to sleep anytime soon. A normal nightly panic attack took a good fifteen minutes to ease out of; longer if he didn’t act quick enough to stop the flood of repeating thoughts.
“You got it, Tristan?” Gabriel said around a yawn. “I’ll go in and open the restaurant for the lunch crowd at ten, so you can sleep in.”
Tristan wasn’t used to such kindness from anyone in his life, but he was becoming accustomed to it with Gabriel. From the first moment they’d met, he’d been overly giving of himself and everything he owned. From the jeep he gave Tristan to the job without so much as a single reference. Even when Tristan would show up for work with only a few hours of sleep under his belt and huge bags under his eyes, Gabriel would find a reason to take over the bar and send Tristan to the small bedroom at the back of his office for a nap. The man was everything a father would be to a son and more. It was too bad that the man didn’t have any children of his own anymore; not even a significant other. Gabriel was a good man who had a whole lot to give to someone more deserving than Tristan.
“Buddy? You still with me?” Gabriel asked with a tiny shake to Tristan’s shoulder.
