Dismantled (Girls on Top #2) (2 page)

The very first time I saw him, I knew deep in my heart he was pure, undiluted trouble. Did it matter? No. There was nothing I could do. The word attraction is defined as “the electric or magnetic force that acts between opposite charged bodies, tending to draw them together.” That’s exactly how I feel about Traxx Maxwell, and I’m almost certain that he feels the same way about me. When we are together we levitate towards each other, and from the moment my blue eyes met his gorgeous brown ones, I have not been able to stop thinking about him.

For over two years I’ve tried not to let him get to me. It’s impossible. Every time I close my eyes, it’s his intense gaze that I see looking back at me. His deep voice caresses me in my dreams. If I’m being kissed, it’s his lips I picture lightly grazing mine. I have been warned by my best friend Brianna and her boyfriend Colton, more times than I care to think about, to be careful. Traxx is in the business of breaking hearts. Not on purpose, mind you, but he has never been in a relationship. He believes he is a manwhore or love ‘em and leave ‘em kind of guy. When I see him putting the moves on some girl who catches his eye, it hurts, because I want it to be me he’s giving his attention to, but I have to hide those feelings. I’m just patiently waiting for him to be ready to find something other than a quick fuck. I’m in no rush. I know the real Traxx. The one he only lets me see when no one else is around. The one he tries so hard to hide. I like that version of Traxx.
My Traxx
is genuine, caring, smart and funny.

You can say we are good friends. We laugh. We talk. We joke and hang out in the same circle of friends. Does he like me on another level? I think so. I just don’t know how much. I’ve noticed that when I go from one room to another, his dark eyes follow my every movement and appreciate everything they see. Other times, when I catch him looking at me, his lips curve into a half smile and he quickly looks away. Also, when I bring a date to meet everyone, Traxx’s body tenses, his happy smile goes away and a forced one takes over. The look he gives him… it’s like he’s sizing him from top to bottom, as if trying to decide if the guy’s good enough for me. And as soon as he gets a chance, Traxx comes over and starts asking me questions to figure out how I really feel about my date. Can we say
Alpha much
?

Then, one unexpected day, hell broke loose; which we now refer to as “the incident.” After that, things as they used to be were no more. Actually, they got worse. Traxx is starting to fall into a person that we no longer recognize. There is a darkness moving within him. I know that he needs us more than ever. He’s pushing everyone away. I need to prove to him that it’s okay to let others into his heart. I have fought for many important things in my life: my country, my family and my friends… but I believe saving Traxx will prove to be the battle of my lifetime.

It’s a nice fall evening today - cooler than usual, but warm enough that I can drive my truck with the windows down. At the red light, I smile at the pretty girl driving a sporty car next to me since she’s trying hard to get my attention. If she only knew… I have girls throwing themselves at me at every place I go. Even on social media, girls I don’t even know are constantly trying to get inside my pants – and I love it. I never have to worry when I need to hook up. Somebody’s always a phone call away. “One Night Traxx,” that’s what they call me and what I’m famous for. I’m not proud of that, but the idea of giving my heart away scares the crap out of me. 

As I pull up to my driveway, I press the garage door opener that’s clipped to my visor and notice that my best friend and roommate, Notso, isn’t home yet. Given that we have plans tonight, I have to get in touch with him to make sure everything’s still in place. I also need to call my other best friend, Colton, to make sure he and his girlfriend Brianna are also coming with us. I need Brianna to come along because her BFFs Ciara and my cousin Keagan tend to go wherever she goes. Those girls always do everything together and they’re more like one of the guys… They fish, hunt, shoot targets, anything we want to do they are always game to do with us, and I hate to admit it, but sometimes they are better than us boys. I’ve known Brianna and Ciara going on three years from our college days. They used to be roommates in the Army and got along so well, they decided to continue to be roomies after they got out.

Ciara
… She’s the smartest, most beautiful, sexiest girl I’ve ever met. I think there’s this mutual attraction. When I see her and get to spend time with her, I’m happy. That is until some random guy comes by and talks her into dancing or even worse, hangs around and won’t leave her alone. It puts me in a fucking bad mood. The worst thing is that I can’t do anything about it – she isn’t mine. I can’t claim her. I’ve never been anybody’s boyfriend and I wouldn’t know where to start with that. Ciara’s one of the good ones. If there’s one thing I’m certain of it’s that I don’t deserve her, and she probably won’t want anything to do with me after watching me interact with girls the past few years. Besides, I’m not sure that I can trust her or any girl for that matter. The moment they know they have you, they will stomp on your heart and take it, leaving you heartless, which is something I already know too well.

I start to pull out my tie and unbutton my shirt with one hand, and with the other I’m calling Notso.

“Hey man. I wasn’t able to get away from work early enough, I’m just now leaving the office.” I hear him say as I place my tie on the back of one of the kitchen’s chairs and grab a cold beer from the fridge.

I hold the phone between my shoulder and my ear. “Have you heard from Colton yet?” I ask, using my most inconspicuous voice.

“Not yet, but I spoke to Keagan earlier and she said the girls were also coming with us.”

After twisting the top, I take a long swig and do a quick fist pump in the air. Playing it cool, I respond casually. “Okay, that’s fine.”

“When are you going to stop being such an ass? You need to ask her out already!” Notso says loudly into the phone.

Not surprised that he can read my mind and knows the real reason behind my question, I answer him. “You know why.”

“Then stop being such a man whore. That shit’s gonna flip on you someday.”

“Yeah, right.” I laugh to myself because I really wish I could just turn it off. “Look, I gotta make some calls to lineup a girl for tonight. I’ll…”

Beep.

I hear the sound of call waiting. “Hey, Notso, hold a sec while I see who’s calling. It appears that pussy is coming to me instead of me having to fetch it.” I laugh loudly and click to the other line. “Hello?”

“Who’s this?” A girl asks.

“Hold on, you have it backwards. You called me. How about you tell me who you want to talk to and perhaps we can go from there.” This shit annoys me to no end.

“Is this Traxx Maxwell?” Must be a damn telemarketer.

“Yes, but I don’t need…”

She cuts me off immediately, “I’m not selling anything. You need to come open your front door. I’m outside, waiting.”

What the hell…? I click off that phone call and click again so that I have Notso on the phone. “Man, some girl is saying she’s outside waiting for me to open the fucking door.”

“Who’s this chick? Did you bring some tramp to the house and forgot to tell me? I thought you never let anyone know where we live.”

“Hell, no! You know better than that. Stay on the line a minute, let me get rid of her.”

I move quickly to the front door. As I’m looking at the door, all I can think about is that this better be a joke. I open the door in a rush. A brown hair girl is looking at me. Her hair is a mess. She has dark shadows under her eyes. She looks rough. Disheveled. I don’t recognize her. “May I help you?”

She stares at me like she’s willing me to say the right thing. I stare back with a hard look. She has some guts to show up at my place. And how did she get my address?

“Hi Traxx… by the way you are looking at me makes me think you don’t recognize me.”

“You are right, I don’t. What do you need?” I don’t mean to be rude but damn, I don’t have time for this shit.

She looks away and starts laughing hard. When she looks back at me, she is once again serious. Her expression goes from happy to neutral, to… pissed. What the fuck? “Well?”

“Of course you don’t remember. You are ‘One Night Traxx.’ Isn’t that right?”

I smile uncomfortably at her. Where is she going with all this? She can’t be pregnant. I always use protection and check carefully when I remove the condoms to make sure no accident has happened.

“You think you are some kind of god who gets to use girls left and right without repercussions, don’t you?”

Shit.

I give her my best smile. “Look, if I was with you, I’m sure we had a great time. But I don’t bring girls to my place and as you already know, I don’t do repeats. It’s always a one-time thing. I’m sure that I told you that before we hooked up. So, if you’ll excuse me, I have things to do…” I start to close the door on her face when I notice some resistance, at which point I look down and see a dingy pair of black Chuck Taylor’s on her foot blocking my door. Still frowning, I hear a loud click. My eyes slowly move up away from the shoes so I can tell her to fuck off right to her face, only to realize she has a cocked revolver pointed at
my
face.

“How about you let me into your house? Right. Now.”

Fuck
!

“Okay, no need to be harsh. Take it easy.” I can hear Notso on the phone asking me what the hell was going on. I don’t want her to take my phone away. Without putting it to my ear, I raise my hands on a pose of surrender and speak a little louder than usual. “Whoa! Is the gun really necessary? My roommate will be home soon and you may scare him with that thing. Let’s go ahead and keep it relaxed. We can talk without you pointing the gun at my face.”

“Is that what you think? That I’ve come here to ‘talk’? You’re fucking dreaming!” She takes one of her hands from the gun to her head and grabs a fistful of hair. She’s pulling so hard, a bunch comes out and she doesn’t even acknowledge it. While the girl is mumbling to herself, I hear Notso on the phone, saying something about not spooking her, because he is calling the cops right now. I wish I knew what the average response time for the local police is nowadays. Fuck me! The room is suddenly so terribly hot and I feel heavy sweat beads forming on my forehead.

With the dark silver barrel staring at me, my mind briefly drifts to think about all the shitty things I have done in the past. I also think about my mom, how I don’t want her to see my body without a face. My dad. My brother. My friends. As the images cloud my vision, Ciara’s smiling face is a constant next to all the others. Simultaneously, I’m also trying to come up with a way out of this mess. The girl is steadily mumbling and whispering to herself, shaking the gun every which way – I wish I knew her name… Isn’t that what they say in situations like this one, to appeal to their human connection? If that fails, can I try to overtake her?

“Why don’t we sit down and just talk through this situation like adults.” I take one step towards her. She looks at me, with tears in her eyes that have started to overflow and fall delicately on her cheeks. She looks lost and so sad.

“Don’t you fucking move one more inch! Adults? What the fuck is an adult to you! You treat girls worse than trash! Use them and leave them! What kind of fucked up human being are you? Why do you do that?”

If she only knew why…

It was the beginning of 8
th
grade. I was looking forward to seeing my friends after the summer break. As I caught up with them, I noticed that I was a bit taller than most. Taller and heavier. I was happy to be that way, because it meant my chances to grab a good position for the football team were really good. The happiness didn’t last long. During lunch on that first week, a swarm of girls came to my table, where I was eating with my friends. I vaguely remembered the girl leading the group as somebody from elementary school. She wasn’t all that pretty and her family had lots of money. There was always something about her eyes that kept me away.

“Hey Traxx – How was your summer?”

My friends at the table started to giggle, which embarrassed me. I didn’t like being the center of attention.

Barely glancing at her, I answered with a muttered “Fine.”

The giggles got louder from the guys and I noticed the girl’s face turning red. She looked back at the other girls around her, took a deep breath and asked “Do you want to hang out sometime?”

Giggles were starting to turn into laughter when I looked up at my friends. I wished for a hole in the ground that I could crawl into.

“Not really.” Was all I had to say. Two small words. These simple words made my experience in middle school pure hell.

“Why not?” She asked me and sounded a little upset.

My friends were not subtle with all their giggling. I didn’t know what to say to her. I was not into hanging out with girls. Shrugging my shoulders at her was the action that lit the match of her anger towards me.

“You think you are funny, don’t you? Well, I promise you that I’ll be the one laughing from now on. Remember, you had your chance.”

Just like that, I became the target of the Queen Bee and her minions. Every day I was taunted, pushed around and made feel like a nobody. My height and size were no longer something to feel proud of as it became the point of all their cruelty. They even got some of the guys from the team to pick fights with me. I had to learn to fight the hard way – I didn’t have much of a choice on that. The mental anguish I had to endure those years because of their bullying almost broke me. If it wasn’t for Colton having my back and being my friend regardless of anything that they did, I would have lost my sanity.

I learned that I could not trust girls. They are crafty and use their powers over boys to get them to do anything they want. They pushed me to be this way. I hate the thought to let any girl near my heart.  They don’t deserve it. They don’t deserve me. Thankfully, the torture ended when I entered High School, as those girls ended up attending a different school from mine, but the damage was done. I was brainwashed and scared to get close to anyone of the opposite sex. So, I switched the tables and started to take from them. It made me feel powerful and in control.

At that moment, this girl’s voice brought me back to the here and now.

“I was supposed to be THE ONE! The one who finally gets the guy of her dreams. We were going to date for a couple of years, then one beautiful Valentine’s Day spent in the Caribbean you were going to ask me to marry you, because you had come to realize that you could not live without me. At that point, I would cry and say yes. After a one year engagement, we were to have our dream location wedding in Bali. We were going to read our very own vows professing unending love for one another, followed by the best honeymoon ever. We couldn’t wait to start our very own family:  three kids, two boys and a girl. Together we were going to buy a dog and be absolutely happy. Now, thanks to you, all of it it’s ruined. You… YOU ruined it all! They all think I’m crazy and that I was lying to them!” She raised her hands to her head and squeezed hard against her ears, as if trying to keep something or someone out. Then she slaps her flattened hands on her temples over and over again.

What.the.hell?

“You are a selfish motherfucking asshole, you know that? You only think about what you want and damn the consequences!” She is yelling and starts to pace. Nope, I’m not calming her at all. It seems I have gotten her more agitated.

“Look, I’m truly sorry for whatever I did to you. I just don’t do relationships and I prefer casual sex, that’s all.”

“I know that! I’ve seen you around, always picking up a girl and fucking her and then never have contact with them again. That’s why I’m here. I refused to be ignored by the likes of you.”

What.the.fuck?

“I’m sorry, can you please tell me your name?”

“I don’t know what for, if you don’t remember it, why do you want to know now?”

“Well, because I was obviously careless to have forgotten your name.” I really hope this works. I take a deep breath and give her my best smile. “Because you came here – to my place - to see me and whatever the reason, it’s important to you. It’s only fair that we communicate by using our names. Don’t you think?”