Darker Water (31 page)

In the morning, he lifted me up and carried
my useless body into the bathroom.

“What are you doing?” I whined, still
seventy-five percent asleep.

“After you become a famous artist, you can
lay around in bed all day. But until then, you have to lie around
where I want you to, and I want you in the bathtub.”

A half hour later my fingers were pruney, and
I’d never cared about anything less. The tub was so comfortable
that I wondered it Carson would let me move into his bathroom. The
tub could be my bed and... Yeah, that was all I needed.

He adjusted himself behind me, pulling me a
bit higher. If I tipped my head all the way back I could rest it on
his shoulder. His fingers drew lines in the water, little trails
where the bubbles didn’t follow.

His lips grazed my neck. “So you didn’t tell
him he was doing it wrong because you didn’t want to hurt his
feelings?”

“Yes, but when you say it in that
condescending tone, it doesn’t sound as nice.” I was jostled by his
laughing.

“How is it nice to lie to the idiot who
thinks he’s doing it right? You considered staying with this guy,
right? Like marriage and all that?”

“As nauseating as the idea is to me now,
yeah, marriage and all the rest of it.” I swept bubbles towards us,
and he popped them.

“You didn’t have a problem knowing for the
next fifty years you were going to get sub-par head and would only
orgasm when you did it yourself?”

“Well, when you say it like that...”

He laughed again. “There is no possible way I
could say it to make it not sound completely stupid.”

“Shut up.” I swatted his knee, splashing
water into my own face. “If you weren’t such a selfish prick, you’d
understand.”

“Even if I wasn’t a selfish prick, I’d still
be a man. And no man thinks he’s being selfish during sex,
especially not when he’s telling you what he wants. I guarantee
that if you weren’t as good as you are, Mr. Frog would’ve told you
about it.”

“Would you?”

“I’m a selfish prick, so of course I would.
But in a non-pricky way because most of it is about intent. And
what’s worse than a woman giving you a blowjob when she’d rather be
doing anything else?”

“When she actually
does
anything
else?”

“You’re very, very smart.” He spoke into my
neck, his voice gravelly, his lips torturous. “And very, very
naked. And very, very sexy. And very, very,
very
about to
practice giving a man detailed instructions on how to give you the
best orgasm of your life.”

He’d already given me the best orgasm of my
life. He’d already given me every orgasm I’d put in my top
thirty
.

He pulled the drain plug. “Detailed
instructions. You need to practice saying it out loud and giving
orders. I’ll pretend to be one of the totally clueless frogs you’ve
slept with. Not Kevin though, ’cause I can’t do that to either of
us. But for this experiment, I’ll
only
do what you tell me
to do.” He forced me to stand. “Up.” He got out first so he could
help me.

“I swear I can do it myself, Carson.”

“Sure, and then when you slip and fall you
can sue me for all I’m worth. I know what kind of woman you are.” A
fluffy white towel hit me in the face, blocking me from seeing his
huge mocking smile.

“Sorry.”

“Doubt it.”

“Why are you so slow? We have work to do.” He
wrapped his towel around his waist, then pulled mine out of my
hands and dried me off. The heat coming off him helped.

When I was kind of dry, he tossed my towel
over the shower door and took my hand.

“If we have time, we can cross a few more
things off your list. Come on.”

I got one more quick glance at the tub before
he dragged me out of the bathroom. It would’ve been much easier to
be mad at him for making me leave if he wasn’t about to make me
come.

I left for my shop late, determined to spend
all night there if I had to. If I worked for someone else, I’d have
been fired weeks ago. On the flip side, if things didn’t get
finished on time it would be solely my fault. And blowing my first
art gig that Carson worked moderately hard to get for me would be
beyond stupid.

My footsteps faltered when I saw Kevin
leaning against the shop’s roll-up door. How long had he been
waiting? And why?

“What are you doing here?” I called without
slowing down. Once he realized he couldn’t push me around like he
used to, he’d leave me alone.

“I wanted to smooth things out. I think we
both got a little testy the last time we saw each other.”

“I’m pretty sure that was just you,
actually.”

“Okay, I’ll accept that. I shouldn’t have
said that stuff about that guy. He’s Carson Bennett, isn’t he?” I
didn’t respond. The last time I’d answered one of Kevin’s leading
questions, he’d thrown it back in my face. “Fine, don’t tell me. I
know he is.”

“Then why did you ask?” I snapped, before I
could stop myself. The more I said to him, the longer he’d
stay.

“Because no matter what happens between you
and me, I want you to be happy, and I don’t think Carson Bennett
can make that happen.”

I wasn’t sure what bothered me most—that
Kevin had made the effort to find out who Carson was, that he still
didn’t understand that
nothing
was going to happen between
him and me, or that he presumed to know what could make me
happy.

“Remember all those months when we didn’t
speak to each other or try to run each other’s lives?” I walked
around him, sorting through my keys. “I think we should go back to
that.”

He put his hand on my shoulder. “I loved you,
Laney.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“I could have.”

I laughed at something that would have
crushed the old me. “No, you couldn’t have.” Because he would
always think of me as the girl whose only goal in life was to marry
a doctor and keep him happy. “You could never have treated me the
way I deserve to be treated.”

“Oh, and Bennett does?” he spat, yanking his
hand away from me as if I’d be sad to see it go. “The guy who
helped you figure out how you want to be fucked? How to give a
great blowjob?”

I groaned. What a dickhead. Maybe he was
pissed because he thought Carson was now the recipient of all the
subservience
he
used to enjoy.

“Sure, he loves you, Laney. He loves how you
give head and how you spread your legs.” Unbelievable. Kevin was
used to getting what he wanted, but this was more than that. This
was a spoiled brat wanting something that he’d thrown away months
ago only because someone else had taken it out of the trash and
fixed it.

“If that’s the way you ‘deserve to be
treated,’” he said, “then I’m in. I’ll even take turns with him, so
he can have a couple nights off you during the week.”

Wow. I looked at him, disgusted. This wasn’t
the guy I’d known or been with. Even when he’d broken my heart, he
hadn’t deliberately tried to be cruel.

“Go away,” I said slowly. “And don’t come
back.” I opened the shop door and went inside, but he stopped the
door from closing. “I’m not listening to any more of your shit,
Kevin. Go away!” I pushed against him, slowly realizing his anger
wasn’t just manifesting in what he said. Even when I put my entire
weight against the door, not caring if it cut off one of his
fingers when it slammed, it didn’t budge.

“I shouldn’t have said that. Damn it, Laney!
Come on, I just want to talk.” He was stronger and angrier and more
unpredictable than me. And each second I fought to shut the door
made me more nervous.

“You don’t understand, Laney. I want us to
give it another try. We owe it to each other.”

I didn’t owe him anything, but I didn’t want
to argue. All I wanted was for him to leave me alone. “Kevin,
enough. That’s enough.” If I let go for even a second, he’d be able
to come inside, and then where would I go? “You need to leave
now.”

“Brittany was cheating on me,” he whined.
“The whole time.”

Why did he think I cared? “I’m sorry to hear
that, but it’s not my fault. You’re starting to scare me, Kevin,
and I know you don’t want to do that. So you need to let go of the
door and walk away.”

“She was cheating on me while I was cheating
on you. When we got married, I stopped but she didn’t.”

“Let go of the door.”

“And then I realized what I’d done to you.
How I made you feel, and it’s not okay. It’s not okay, Laney. I’m
not that kind of person. I was… I don’t know… I was confused, and
Brittany screwed with my head.” So it was Brittany’s fault now. “I
want to make it right. I screwed up and now I want to make it
right. I didn’t know what I had when I was with you. Laney, you’re
the only one I have. Please, talk to me.”

He was delusional if he thought he ‘had’ me.
And he was insane if he thought I was going to let him into my shop
to talk about it.

“I can do better. I can
be
better.
Better than Bennett. I’ll treat you so much better than he does.
One more chance, Laney. Please.”

“Kevin, leave me alone!”

“Goddamn it, Laney! Just give me a fucking
chance!” There was no more apology in his tone, no desire to redeem
himself in my eyes or in his own.

“Go—” The door slammed into my face and sent
me tumbling onto my back, my head smacking on the cement floor.
Disoriented, I saw him come inside, reach down, and haul me up to
my feet.

“Damn it. You’re bleeding, Laney. Your nose.
Shit, are you okay?”

Everything was so blurry, so confusing. I
started crying because I didn’t know what to do to make my nose and
head stop hurting so much and make him go away. I didn’t know… Oh
god. I couldn’t find my balance, so how was I supposed to protect
myself? I shouldn’t have had to. I didn’t do anything wrong.

“That wasn’t my fault,” he said. “You know
that, right? All I wanted was a chance to talk to you. If you
hadn’t been right behind the door, it wouldn’t have hit you. I
didn’t—”

“Kevin, you can’t do this. I can’t
concentrate right now. Please, just leave.” As my eyes refocused,
tears dripped off my chin and onto my shirt. They were red. I
needed help, but not his. “Go away.”

“Stop crying. You’re fine. It’s not broken.
Let me see it.” He wiped my face, only causing more pain because he
wasn’t careful—he was desperate and cruel, as if he could wipe away
what he’d done if he got rid of my tears. “Quit fighting me, so I
can look at it.”

I swiped at his hands and pushed at his
chest, and it did nothing. It didn’t stop his hands or the asinine
words coming out of his mouth that had nothing to do with me and
everything to do with him. He caught both my hands with one of his
and held them to keep me still. When I turned my head, he yanked me
frontwards again and I cried out.

“It’s not that bad. Shut up for a second and
stay still.”

Maybe it would be better if I just let him
check it out. “Then you’ll leave?”

“No, we need to talk.”

How did he not understand that I didn’t want
to talk to him or see him or let him touch me? Did it matter? I
relaxed and nodded slightly.

As soon as he released my hands, I ran. If I
kept some furniture between us, he wouldn’t be able to reach
me.

I wasn’t even fast enough to get over the
first coffee table. He caught me by the back of my shirt and hauled
me backwards. As I fell off the table, I heard the rip of fabric
and felt it give as it tore off my body.

“Let’s start over.” He righted me and spun me
towards him, his hands now locked onto my biceps. “Okay? We’ll get
you all cleaned up and then sit down to clear things up.”

“No!”

“Jesus, Laney! Calm down! I can’t talk to you
when you’re like this.” I was a distraction or an outlet to him,
not a person, not a person he claimed he could love. I was a person
he could use and hurt and then walk away from…again. All things
he’d accomplished in the last three minutes, except the walking
away part. The one part I
really
wanted him to do.

“Leave me alone!” I pushed him away from me
the best I could, ignoring the tearing sounds, the fact that my
shirt was almost completely shredded now. He adjusted his grip,
hanging onto the waistband of my pants. “Stop! Please, stop!”

When I turned the corner, I saw the door to
Lane’s shop open. She was way too smart to leave that door open. My
heart did that half-jump thing it does when it knows something your
brain hasn’t figured out yet. I broke into a jog, pretty sure I was
completely overreacting.

Then I heard her yell, “Stop!”

Adrenaline lengthened my strides, preparing
me to fight.

Whatever made her scream like that was going
to die.

I only saw the guy’s back at first, but I
heard her crying. I pulled the bastard off her and flung him onto
the floor, spending half a second, tops, looking at the asshole
before I turned to make sure Lane was alright. Her fucking shirt
was hanging off her, only attached by a strip of fabric going
around her waist.

The fucker was going to wish his balls had
never dropped.

But as soon as I saw Lane’s face—blood
covering her nose, running onto her lips, drips of it on her chest,
I—

“He fucking hit you?”

Her expression changed, grew even more
shocked. She shook her head and reached out for me. She knew before
I did.

I’d just lost every bit of control I’d ever
had. As if a switch had turned on, the dial had been cranked all
the way up, and there was no coming down. I spun towards the
motherfucker who’d done it—made her hurt and cry and scream.

His turn now.

“Wait, Carson!”

Her ex, the fucking toad, was slowly climbing
to his feet, until his face was just high enough for me to put my
knee into. Then the asshole wasn’t standing anymore. He was
bleeding, holding his nose, cursing. But I couldn’t stop there. The
fucker had hurt her and that was bad enough. But that he’d come
back and hurt her again,
this
way, was something I couldn’t
let slide. Even if I
could have
stopped myself.