I Need You (4 page)

I was so messed-up and selfish.

Billy didn’t need the burden of a broken girl, I shouldn’t have said yes. He’d been ready to move on.

The forest fire of guilt flared and consumed everything else.

Billy

I slipped the SUV into drive and pulled away, my heart a boulder in my chest.

What that girl did to me! If Jason knew half the things I’d imagined over the last five years he wouldn’t have called me to meet up and wet his kid’s head.

Fuck.

Jason and I had messed her up.

This was a pile of shit.

When I walked in the door back home a lot later than I’d usually come in, my kid sister, Eva, called, “Hey, Billy!”

“Hey, Eva.” I lifted a hand.

“Where have you been?” Mom asked as I walked through the living room.

“At the gym.”

“You work out all day. You can’t have spent that long at the gym. You’re hiding something! I bet you’ve got a girl!” Eva’s passion in life was teasing me. But underneath it she loved having a much older brother to flaunt before her friends, and catch rides off of. She always gloated when I drove her to her friends’ parties. But she wasn’t a kid anymore, she was fifteen. “Don’t tell me you’ve finally given up on winning Lindy?”

I made a face at her. My family knew my trouble. In a bad moment I’d said something to Dad a couple of years ago and from then on my whole family had been a part of my secret Lindy addiction. “Nope, I saw her today.”

“Billy! I thought you’d stopped that.”

“I’m taking her away for a couple of weeks.”

“OMG!” Eva screamed.

“Is that a good thing?” Mom stood up.

“When you and that girl get together, it always ends badly, Billy.” Dad threw in his cent without moving from his armchair.

“Thanks for the enthusiasm.” I shrugged and turned away, but Eva grabbed my arm and then hugged me.

“I hope things work out. I’ll be glad for you if they do.” I gave her a squeeze then let her slip away.

“As will I,” Mom said, smiling at me.

My gaze shifted around them all. “Except this isn’t like that. It’s just as friends…”

Eva rolled her eyes. “Lindy is so blind.”

Mom kept smiling.

I turned away and headed for my room.

I scanned through my calendar and called clients to tell them something personal had come up; the stretched and worn leather band on my wrist sliding up and down.

I always wondered what the hell I’d do if it broke. It was my talisman.

The fingers of my other hand span it around my wrist a couple of times as I waited while a call rang.

I knew where I was gonna take her. To the place I’d run to every summer for years. It had started the summer we’d left high school.

There was no answer. I ended the call, but then my cell vibrated.

”Lindy’s back home.“ The message was from Jason.

”I know, I went ‘round to see her.”

”She okay?”

”Nope, quiet and crying.“

”Tell her sorry. And tell her Rach and me are thinking of her. We didn’t want her to get hurt.”

”She said to tell you sorry too. She’s sorry we saw her like that. She said she felt guilty about getting us caught up in it.”

He didn’t answer for a minute, but then came back and said. ”Tell her it’s okay. I get it. I know I messed her around. But tell her I hope she can be happy.”

I sighed. So did I. ”I’ll tell her. Do you still want to go out for a drink again next week?”

”Shit, yeah, I need another night out to get over that one. When?”

”Thursday?”

”Okay.”

The place I was gonna take Lindy to was beautiful. You could stay right on the beach in an apartment, listen the ocean and watch the waves roll up on the sand. It was the sort of escapism Lindy needed to put her vibes right.

I looked at my cell, and my thumb instinctively slid up Lindy’s image. ”Hey. I’m gonna take you to a place I know on the coast. It’s perfect for chilling out. You’ll get caught up in the awesomeness of the universe and forget about yourself.”

While I waited for a reply I booked the accommodation. I’d cancel the rest of my appointments later. I booked adjacent apartments.

”That sounds amazing.”

”Cool.”

“:-) Shall I transfer my share of the money to you?’

”Lind you’re not paying. I asked you. I owe you.”

”You don’t owe me anything. But thanks if you’ll pay. I’m not earning.”

‘I know. Maybe when we’re out there we can start working on what new job you feel like doing.”

“:/ When I feel better, Billy.”

“Yeah. Sorry I’m pushing. Too much. Too soon. One step, Lind. By the way, Jason said he’s sorry too, and that he and Rachel wish you well. He wants you to be happy. That’s what we all want.”

”Thanks.“

The thanks seemed final and I didn’t know what to say next.

My fingers tapped the desk, beating out a rhythm.

I wanted to call. I had a feeling she was crying. I shouldn’t have mentioned Jason. I didn’t call though ‘cause I’d grown a coward’s streak since the fall. I didn’t want to hear her tell me how she missed him and how much she still loved him.

Guilt curled up in a hard ball in my belly.

Why the fuck was she speaking to me? She shouldn’t be.

Why the frick was she going away with me?

The girl was crazy.

This could be the stupidest idea, I’d ever had.

Chapter Two

Billy

“You’re sure everything is squared off with the hospital, Lind. You’ve got your meds…”

She nodded, but she was scaring me, her hands trembled as I took her case and put it in the back of the SUV, next to my surfboard.

Her dad stood on their porch, in his uniform; it meant he’d ducked off work to come back and say goodbye to her. He watched us, like he didn’t want her to go.

He certainly wouldn’t want her to go if he knew the truth. But he didn’t. No one did except me and Lindy.

I hadn’t seen her Mom. That was weird because she didn’t work. I’d have thought she’d have come outside to say a final goodbye to Lindy.

“Is that everything?” I asked. Lindy nodded, her blue eyes glittering with tears.

“No, I forgot my purse.” She turned away and ran back up the path into the house.

This was weird.

I slipped my hands into my pants pockets as Mr. Martin came down.

“If she wants to come home, you’ll bring her back right away?”

“Yeah.” Of course I would.

“Well, you look out for her. She’s my girl, and she’s all I’ve got.”

“Yeah, Mr. Martin.” He knew I’d been hanging around her a lot last fall; he knew we’d been friends for years. I bet he wondered why I’d stopped hanging around and why we hadn’t spoken for months. I was glad he didn’t know.

Lindy came hurrying back out of the house, her purse swinging in her hand.

“Did you say good-bye to Mom?” Her dad asked.

“Yeah.” She hugged him, firmly. He kissed her hair.

The guy had scared the hell out of me when I was kid, but now all his scariness looked hollow. Lindy had hurt him when she’d chosen to press the eject button. He looked in pain. That was a new look for Mr. Martin.

“You’ll call me if anything happens, Dad, won’t you? Don’t wait. I’d hate not to get back…”

What was it with getting back? We hadn’t even gone yet. I suppose her family must be cautious now, though. Maybe they didn’t trust her not to try it again. I’d have to watch her when we were away.

Her dad nodded. Tears shining in his eyes. Hell, I’d never thought I’d see that.

I turned away and got in the SUV. I didn’t think he’d welcome me watching him, but in the side mirror, I saw him give her a kiss on the cheek. Then he walked her to the passenger door, opened it and held it while she climbed in.

He shut it only after she’d settled and pulled her seatbelt over.

I pushed the button so the window went down and they could talk.

My abs gripped tight with nerves and my belly rumbled. I hadn’t eaten this morning. I was too nervous about how this was gonna go down. My forearm rested on the wheel, the leather braid hanging loose on my wrist. That thing was so much a part of who I was.

My fingers started tapping on the dashboard.

“Ready?” she asked.

I looked over at her. Her dad stepped back from the window as she looked at me.

Shit, she probably thought me tapping the dashboard had been telling her dad to hurry up. It wasn’t. It was just a habit.

My other hand gripped the gear shift.

I was ready, though. I wanted to get away from her house. There was a ton of bad energy coming from it. I could feel it everywhere in the air around her.

I smiled and slipped my arm off the wheel. “Yeah. Mr. Martin.”

She looked at him. “I’ll call you when we get there and I’ll call you every night. I promise. Don’t worry about me. You’ll make me feel guilty if you do. And tell Mom I love her… I’m really sorry.”

“Honey…” He came forward again and leaned in through the window to grip her hand. “Your mother understands. She’s not angry, or hurt, or anything. She just wants you to be okay.”

Lindy nodded, tears rolling down her cheeks.

No matter how nervous I was. Or how awkward it felt. This was right. She needed to get out of here for a while.

“I’ll be okay,” she whispered. “But I feel selfish. Good-bye.” She leaned and kissed his cheek. Then her dad stepped back and finally we could go.

My heart started pumping on hyper-drive, as I slid the gear shift down and pulled away, super- cautious not to over rev the engine with her dad watching.

I glanced at her as I drove up the street. “Did you eat or are we stopping for breakfast?”

She looked at me, a broken heart in her eyes, tears tracking down her cheeks. She wiped them away with a sniff. “Sorry, I’m going to try and not be bad company. But I don’t want to eat. I’m not hungry. How long is it gonna take to get there?”

“A couple of hours.” I looked back at the road. “We can settle in, then get lunch.”

She laughed, a low half-choking sound that was almost a sob. “I forgot how hungry you get. You can stop for breakfast if you want…”

I threw her a smile. “Sorry, you’ll have to accommodate my appetite. I don’t eat like a bird like you do, but I can wait ‘til lunch.”

She’d fed me and Jason through most of our college years. In the shared apartment we’d had. The couple and the spare-part best friend––three had definitely been a crowd. But I’d still hung around them. I bet people had thought it weird.

I was weird.

Fucking crazy!

I’d always wondered if Jason knew. But he hadn’t said anything the other night when we’d got everything out in the open. I figured he’d have said something then if he’d known.

“I can’t believe you still wear that thing.” She leaned over and flicked the leather bracelet as my hand gripped the wheel.

How the hell did she not know?

I glanced at her, giving her a twisted, guilty smile, as something hard grabbed my heart. “Yeah.”

“I made you that years ago.”

“I’m just lazy, I can’t be bothered to cut it off.” I let a fake sound of amusement slip from my throat, acting as if it was nothing––like I had every other time she’d mentioned it.

She’d made it at high school. It had been the thing all the girls were doing at the time, braiding these silly leather bracelets and threading beads into them. It was before she’d been seeing Jason. We’d been fifteen.

Yeah, I had been wearing it that long. Pining over a girl that wasn’t mine.

But shit I can still remember the feel of her gentle fingers touching me as she’d tied it off, and it had done stuff to my cock. I’d liked her before, but that was the day she’d got me. It was like her fingers had touched my heart too. I’d had this burning need for her ever since.

I should cut the thing off.

I glanced over at her. Her hands were in her lap and she stared ahead. I didn’t know what to say to her. I was too anxious to hold a meaningless conversation and I didn’t want to quiz her, ‘cause I was taking her away to forget all the stuff that made her feel bad.

I said a few things and she answered, but then I couldn’t think of anything to add. She said some things and I nodded, not knowing what to say back.

In the end we were quiet most of the drive.

I was relieved when I finally pulled up in the apartments’ parking lot on the coast.

“Wow, this is nice.”

The ocean rolled up onto the miles of beach before the parking lot. This place just calmed me. I’d come here the summer we’d left high school and it had been the best therapy. This beach and the ocean was my psychiatrist. I’d come back every summer since.

I hoped it was gonna work for her too.

I freed the door and as it opened the sound of the ocean swept into the SUV.

I looked at Lindy.

She was wide-eyed, watching the beach.

“Let’s go get our keys. I’ll get our stuff later.”

She looked at me, uncertainty creeping into her eyes, but she nodded.

I wanted to grip her hand as we walked across the parking lot. There was a whole minefield of protective energy bubbling around inside me. But it had blown up in my face before. I was steering clear of too much touching.

The thing with Lindy was she was so tiny it made me want to just put my arms around her and wrap her up. She was like a precious, breakable doll, five-two, to my six-one.

I glanced over at her. The ocean breeze flicked her wavy blonde hair against the curve of her cheek.

Her fingers tucked her hair behind her ear.

I’d wanted to do that for her. There was a hard need to touch her in my belly. But I’d spent years ignoring that instinct. That was nothing new.

She didn’t look at me. She looked ahead at the apartment block.

She’d won beauty pageants as a kid. Her Mom had been into all that shit, driving her to loads of contests and Lindy did have the look for that sort of thing, perfect symmetry.

At high school she’d been full of confidence. At college that had died for some reason.

She glanced at me, her blue eyes seeming bluer under the clear sky.