Fighting Ever After (Ever After #3) (33 page)

12:25 I
don’t know.

12:25
You
better figure it out.

Three days.
That was how long it took for me to clear my head enough that I thought I could
talk to her. Three long days of hiding out at
Micks’s
and ignoring her calls and texts, even when she said that her brother finally
woke up on Tuesday and was expected to make a full recovery. Ace was the only
one I checked in with to make sure that she was okay. He assured me that she
wasn’t, but I guess I deserved that.

Three days
of pissed of texts from Bas and
Vi
.  Three days
of regretting walking out without talking to her. Three days of replaying that
night over and over and all the ways it could have, and should have, gone
differently. Three days of watching the dates on the calendar disappear and
knowing I was running out of time to make anything right.  It wasn’t until
Thursday morning when I woke up and went in search of where I’d left my phone,
that I got the text Ace had send the night before.

You might
as well come home. She’s gone.

Those two
words – she’s gone – were all my eyes could focus on. When they finally sunk
in, I couldn’t hit call fast enough.

“What?” Ace
answered.

“What do you
means she’s gone?” There was no hiding the panic lacing my words just like
there was no shoving back the dread in my stomach.

“She’s not
staying here anymore. She went home with Bas last night. She’s staying with
him. Guess she got tired of waiting on your stupid ass.”

Of course
she’d gone to Bas’.  I should have expected as much, but the first place
my mind had gone when I read that message was that she had taken off again. I
hung up on Ace with the sinking realization that somehow since that night I
first laid eyes on Jaxyn over a month ago, she had slipped past every barrier I
had. I was pretty sure that I was in love with her. There was no way I could
let it end like this.

I slid my
thumb over her name. I let out a bitter laugh when she sent me straight to
voicemail. I had that coming, but I wasn’t giving up. I kept trying all day,
and each time she ignored me. It frustrated the hell out of me, but I couldn’t
blame her when I had done exactly the same thing to her. I would give her
through the next day, but if she didn’t answer by then, I wasn’t going to wait
anymore.

She didn’t
answer the next day either. I tried getting through to Bas, but he was less
than pleasant with me, telling me to fix this shit on my own. That is what I
was trying to do. His text fifteen minutes later calling me a bastard wasn’t
really helping. I made up my mind just to go over there. On the way out the
door, I gave her one more chance to answer, and surprisingly she did. Only it
wasn’t her. 

“Go back to
your whore and leave Jax alone asshole.” I recognized
Vi’s
voice before she ended the call. This was going to be fun. No doubt she wanted
to hit me just as much, if not more than Bas did. His car was missing from its
usual spot when I pulled up outside their apartment building. I didn’t bother
knocking on the door, since I doubted they would let me in. I jiggled the
handle and found it unlocked so I let myself in. It wasn’t a huge apartment and
I could hear the girls’ voices in one of the two bedrooms. I shoved open the
door and looked right at Jax.

“We need to
talk.”

 “Oh
hell no,”
Vi
planted herself between me and Jax.
“You’ve done enough. You had your chance to talk before you went back to your
skank.”

Why the hell
did she keep bringing up my whore and my skank? I could only assume she meant
Kaylie, but I sure as hell hadn’t gone back to her.

“It’s fine
Vi.” Jax put her hand on her friend’s shoulder. “I’ll talk to him.”

“Are you
sure?”
Vi
was still trying to dagger me with her eyes,
but Jax nodded and Lissa grabbed Vi’s arm to lead her out of the room, but not
before turning back toward Jax. “We’ll be in the living room if you need
anything.” She shut the door behind them.

Now that we
were alone, I took a moment to really look at Jax, and what I saw gnawed at my
gut. Her red rimmed eyes were puffy. It looked like small critters had made a
nest in her hair and even though it was well after
noon,
she was still in her pajamas. She looked as bad as I felt, and yet she was
still the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. She was fidgeting where she
stood, but I also caught her taking in my appearance as well. I wondered what
she saw, if she could see the sleepless nights I’d had or the meals I’d skipped
because every time I thought of her, which was all the time, I felt sick to my
stomach. I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d shaved. Actually I could.
Monday morning before the meeting that was the precursor to this whole damn
disaster. I’m not sure how long I’d been standing there, staring at her, but I
realized that one of us needed to speak for any talking to actually happen, and
I probably needed to be who started it.

 “I
know I screwed up taking off like that, but I’m ready
explain
.”

“I don’t
need you to explain. I got the message loud and clear.” She folded her arms
across her chest defensively and her expression, which had been so open a
minute ago, hardened, effectively closing herself off to me.

“I’m sorry
that I shut you out. I just panicked and needed time to sort shit in my head.”
I took a step toward her, but she retreated away from me.

“With
Kaylie, yeah I got it. She was kind enough to let me know when she answered your
phone,” she snapped at me and it was my turn to take a step back.

“What are
you talking about? When did she answer my phone?”

The look she
gave me said she thought I was trying to cover my tracks, but I was honestly
confused, up until she explained it to me. “Wednesday night. I called you, but
she answered your phone and told me you were back with her.”

“Fuck,” I
cursed. That bitch.

I ran a hand
through my hair, sucking in a deep breath to calm myself before I spoke again,
or before I found and strangled Kaylie. I took a seat on the edge of the bed,
and looked intently at Jax, willing her to believe what I said next, because it
was the truth. “I saw her, but I swear I didn’t go to her. I was crashing on a
buddy’s couch. He had people over and she showed up, but I promise nothing
happened. I must have left my phone sitting where she could get it, but I
didn’t even speak to her. You can ask Mick or anyone else who was there. I
promise you Princess. You have every right to be pissed at me, but not for
that. I didn’t touch her.”

Her hands
dropped to her side and she sighed, “I believe you, but it doesn’t change
anything. I still don’t want you here.” Fuck, hearing that hurt so much, but
I’d expected it.

“I
understand. I just need to tell you something, so you’ll understand that none
of this was ever your fault. I need to explain everything. I owe you that much.
Then I’ll go.”

I was
offering the one thing she’d been begging me for – the truth, and I knew she
wouldn’t be able to resist it. A part of me also hoped that she hadn’t
completely given up on me.

 “Okay,
I’m listening.” She dropped down on the edge of the bed beside me, her head
angled toward me.

There were a
few minutes where we both just sat there quietly while I tried to figure out
how and where to start. Somehow, even through her silence she was able to
reassure me as she waited patiently.

“I hated
playing the violin,” I began. “The first time my mother put one in my hands, I
wanted to smash it against the wall.” Back then I’d begged her to let me take
karate or play baseball instead, but it had never been about what I wanted. I’d
never had any say, and maybe that’s why I fought so hard to stay in control of
my life now. Around Jax I felt all that control slowly slipping away.

“The violin
instructor my parents hired was a dreadful bitch. I had to deal with her three
times a week until I was thirteen. The day she retired and moved, I wanted to
throw a party. Two weeks later my mother found someone to replace her, and I
stopped hating the violin so much.” I was staring straight ahead instead of
looking at Jax, but I could feel her eyes on me, seeing every little nervous
gesture. I took a deep breath before continuing. I knew it wouldn’t take her
long to catch onto the direction of this story.

“Elaina was
nineteen and music lessons were how she paid her way through school. I was just
hitting puberty and she was every horny, little boy’s fantasy. I hung on her
every word and would practice for hours after she left, just so I could impress
her. My parents were never around. Our sessions were always in private.” I
paused, finally looking over to meet her eyes. I wanted to see her reaction
when it started sinking in.

“Things
didn’t get weird until a few months after Elaina started coming to the house.
She would start rewarding me when I perfected a new piece or concept. At first
it was just innocent little things, or at least I thought they were. A hug, a
kiss on the cheek, or she would end the lesson for the rest of the day and we
would play video games or go for a swim in the pool if we could get away with
it. Pretty soon she started bringing me gifts, like a
cd
she knew I wanted but my parents didn’t approve of, and then one day she
brought me a dirty mag.”

Her eyebrows
shot up.

“Like I
said, I was a horny little bastard so it wasn’t the first time I had seen porn,
but having my hot, older violin teacher bring it to me was mind blowing. That
night when she was gone, I pulled it out and realized that the girls in the
magazine looked a lot like her.
Curvy blondes.”

There it
was. That disgusted look on her face. She was trying hard to keep her face
neutral, but it was all in those eyes. Even though she had no doubt figured out
the plot of this tale, I had to keep going, because it was the ending that
mattered.

“It wasn’t
long before the touches and kisses on the cheek started lingering a little
longer and happening more frequently. My parents loved her because I wasn’t
complaining about having to play anymore, and she quickly became my obsession.
It wasn’t too much later that she gave me my first real kiss. A month after
that, we took another swim, only this time she went topless. Then the next time
she took her shirt off, she asked if I wanted to touch her.”

Jax started
shaking her head and her eyes were swimming with the tears that she was
fighting so hard to hold back.

“Please,
just let me finish. You need to hear it all,” I told her.

 “Okay.
Keep going,” she whispered.

“After that, she made it a game. She would
try to distract me while I played by stripping, and if could make it through
the piece without messing up, she would let me touch her. When I got better at
that, she came up with new tactics and started touching me. I was still
thirteen when I lost my virginity. Then most of our lessons were spent in my
bed. I was so in love with her, and I thought she loved me back. She said we
just had to keep our relationship a secret until I was eighteen, then we could
be together
.”
She’d turned twenty-one by that time. In hindsight, it was so obvious that she
was just playing with me, but I was too young and starved for affection. I just
wanted someone to be able to love and have that validated, to have it returned.

“We
continued sneaking around until I was seventeen. She became my entire fucking
world. No one had ever paid attention to me like that, listened to me, cared
about what I thought. I felt like she was the only person in the world who
truly got me.” I’d considered her not only the girl I loved, but also my best
friend, the one person I could count on, but it had all been a lie – one I’d so
naively believed. The other six days a week that I didn’t see her, she was off
living her real life, with someone else.

“Then one
day my Mom informed me that she quit because she was getting
married
.
I went up to my room and did what I had wanted to do when I was a kid.
I smashed my violin to pieces. I haven’t picked one up since that day. It was
all a joke. It was all pretend to her. She was just another heartless bitch, no
different than my affectionless mother who used people and discarded them when
she was done. I swore to myself back then that it would never happen again.”
 I played their game by my own rules. I took what I wanted, giving nothing
of myself, never letting another girl mean so much, never giving her the
ability to crush me like that.

Crushed was
a good word though, for how I felt seeing the anger and disgust on
Jax’s
face. She couldn’t even look at me and she was barely
holding it together. I could only imagine what she must be thinking, all the
ways she was trying to analyze me and chalk up all my behavior and actions to
some childhood trauma. Whether it was true or not, I hated that. I hated that
she was trying to label me or fit me under some definition. I hated that if she
was right, it meant I really didn’t have any control over my
life,
that
everything I did was still because of my mother, or father or
Elaina. It gave them too much power.