Soft Shock (11 page)

“Did you tie
him up and pour alcohol down his throat? Did you in any way encourage him to be
an irresponsible ass?”

“Well, no.”

His tired smile
transformed into a completely disarming one. His eyes were as tired and
sad
as his smile was engaging. “Then don’t apologize.”

“I just feel
like I should say something.”

“It seems that
way, huh?” Owen leaned forward and dug his elbows into his thighs. Looking over
his shoulder at her, he said, “I’m used to this. It’s okay.”

Just because you’re used to it doesn’t make
it okay
, Marci said to herself, thinking of Glenda King. Sensing he didn’t
want to talk about it anymore and wanting to say something that might get his
mind off it, Marci pointed to Owen’s sandaled and bandaged foot. “What happened
there?”

Owen laughed,
and the clear, unburdened sound of it made her feel as if she’d done something
good. And she was glad that she’d done it. “The result of a very poor choice on
my part. And the reason I haven’t been in lately to the writing center.”

“Aha,” Marci
said, sweeping her hair away from her face and adjusting her nurse’s cap.

Owen sat back
in his chair and looked over at her. “This is a good look for you.” He reached
up and briefly touched her cap.

She laughed. “I
don’t know if it’s ironic or just plain scandalous that I ended up in a
hospital dressed like this tonight.”

He grinned. “I
miss you.” He cleared his throat and looked away. “Your help, I mean. I miss
your help with my writing.”

“When are you
coming back?” Marci asked.

He turned his
gaze back to her, clearly startled. As if her question hadn’t been nearly as
innocuous as it had been—as she’d thought it was anyway. “Why? Do you
miss me?” he asked.

“I’m just saying.
You seem to be getting around pretty well to me. Maybe you’re just putting off
writing that paper for your philosophy class.”

“And maybe,
just maybe, Marci King, you miss me.” Owen reached over and put his hand under
her chin. Moving his face close to hers, he said in a low voice. “Now, the
question is, what is it that you miss about me?”

“I miss
correcting your really bad grammar. It’s always fun getting out that red pen.”
She had to keep this light. She couldn’t let him know how much his touch affected
her.
Because it didn’t really.
If she felt anything,
it was the thrill of the challenge—of getting that one thing he’d denied
her. Maybe she’d give him a second chance at that one night just to prove to
him that no one could resist her for long.

Not the other
way around. She could easily resist him. No guy was ever allowed to be
irresistible. His touch wasn’t electric. She didn’t want or need that kind of
trouble.

“Is that so?”
When he mumbled the words, his lips brushed against the delicate skin just
under her ear.

“Yeah.
That’s—that’s it.” Marci tried to force the quaver out of her voice, but
she could tell from the self-assured way he brushed her hair away from her face
that she’d failed. Damn. Why did he have to be so good at touching her? He’d applied
just the right amount of pressure to just the right spot behind her ear. Let
his lips linger just long enough to make her want more.

When his lips
closed over hers, she couldn’t hold back. He could probably feel how much she’d
wanted this since the last time they’d kissed, but she couldn’t help herself. The
short skirt of her dress rode even farther up her thighs as she threw a leg
across his lap, but she barely noticed. She put her arms around his neck,
pressed in close, and indulged in the feel of his lips against hers, the taste
of his mouth. It tasted faintly of licorice and strong beer—maybe an
I.P.A.
 
She’d never taken such
pleasure in a kiss before. His kisses were not too firm, not too sloppy. Not
too much tongue and not too little. Just right. Just perfect. As if his lips
had been made to fit with hers and only hers.

When he pulled
back just as abruptly as he’d started the kiss, she found herself leaning
toward him. Realizing what she was doing, she pulled back and sat up straight
in her chair.

“Monday,” Owen
said.

“Huh?” She sat
up in her chair as she tried to collect her thoughts and make sense of the
words coming out of his perfect mouth.

His eyes danced
with amusement. “I’ll see you Monday at the writing center.”

#

Owen blinked
against harsh bright lights as he tried to orient himself. He didn’t even
remember falling asleep. There was a sharp pain in his neck, and he realized
it’d been bent at a strange angle. Fully opening his eyes, he realized he’d
fallen asleep with his head on someone’s shoulder. Sitting up in his chair, he
looked over to see Marci sleeping in the chair next to his.

The events of
last night slowly filtered into his consciousness. He was in the E.R., where
he’d run into Marci and her friends, and his brother was recovering somewhere
in the hospital after having his stomach pumped. It’d been a rough night, sure,
but he couldn’t help but smile at the fact that he’d fallen asleep with Marci.

Marci stirred
not too long after he moved his head from her shoulder. Squinting up at him,
she seemed to be going through a mental retracing process similar to the one
he’d just completed.

“What time is
it?” she murmured.

He looked down
at his watch. “Five-thirty A.M.” He pulled himself to his feet and slowly stretched
out a very sore body. His ankle particularly screamed in protest.

“Oh. Guess I
fell asleep,” Marci said.

Owen felt
someone staring at him. He glanced over to where Marci’s friends were sitting and
realized there were two someones staring. Both the guy dressed in drag as Gaga
and Ronnie/Snooki’s mouths were wide open and their eyes were wide as well.

Marci followed
his gaze and tensed when Gaga started elbowing Ronnie hard in the ribs. “We
should go out and get some fresh air, Ronnie,” Gaga insisted. “Now.”

“I’ll go with
you,” Marci said in a tight, brusque way. It sounded like she had her teeth
clenched. She turned back to Owen with an apologetic smile. “We should get
going.”

“No, wait,
we’ll go get the car! You wait here!” Gaga’s rushed words tumbled over each
other.

Sensing Marci
wanted out and considering it’d been a long night and the ordeal wasn’t over
yet for him, Owen said, “I should go collect Jeremy.”

Marci turned to
him and did something very unlike the Marci he’d known so far. She grabbed his arm
in a comforting gesture. “We can give Dante a ride home if it’s easier for you.”

Owen turned to
Dante whose eyebrows couldn’t possibly get any higher. “That okay with you?”

“Sure, man. Let
me know if you need anything,” Dante said.

“I will.
Thanks, man.”

Dante stood and
walked from Owen’s far side to stand near Gaga and Ronnie.

“I really am
sorry about what happened to Jeremy,” Marci said. “Let me know, too, if there’s
anything I can do to help.” She wouldn’t meet his eyes and almost seemed
nervous or embarrassed. This, too, was very unlike the Marci he
knew—albeit he didn’t know much about her. She hadn’t allowed him to.

Too shocked,
sleep-deprived, and preoccupied with thoughts of Jeremy to do anything else,
Owen nodded. “Thanks.”

“See you
around, Owen,” Marci said.

“I hope so,
Marci.”

Marci walked
toward the E.R. exit, flanked by friends who were leaning in close and fiercely
whispering to her. Dante trailed them. He looked back once and sent Owen a
what-the-hell
?
look
. Owen didn’t so
much as shrug, and Dante turned around and followed the others out of the E.R.

Dragging a hand
over his face and heaving a heavy sigh, Owen limped toward the nurse’s station.
It was time to deal with Jeremy.
 

Chapter Fifteen

After Jeremy
was discharged from the E.R., Owen took him back to their mom’s house. Jeremy
refused to get out of the car.

“She’s gonna be
so pissed. Can’t I just stay at your place for a few days?” Jeremy winced. “I’m
so wrecked. I really can’t deal with her right now.”

“You do things
like this? You gotta start facing the consequences.” Owen unbuckled his
seatbelt and got out of the jeep. Then he limped over to Jeremy’s side, his one
crutch tucked firmly under his arm. He opened the passenger side door, but Jeremy
remained in the jeep just staring up at him.

“You’re always
saying how you don’t want to upset her by telling her every little thing I do,”
Jeremy said before rubbing his bloodshot eyes.

“This isn’t a
little thing,” Owen said. “Besides, she already knows, and she’s worried sick.
You had her listed in your phone as an emergency contact. She’s the one who
called me and told me where you were. I promised her I would bring you home as
soon as you were out of the hospital. It’s the only way I could get her to calm
down.”

“She’s gonna
kill me.”

“And you don’t
deserve it?” Owen shook his head. “Do you even realize what you’re doing to
her? You’re tearing her down piece by piece.”

Jeremy recoiled
as if Owen had bitten him. “Where’s all this coming from?”

“I’ve tried to
be understanding, Jeremy. I know you’ve been through a lot. All three of us
have. But at some point…at some point, it gets old. And I don’t think me
enabling you is helpful. Not even to you. You can’t just coast through life
thinking I’m always going to be there to bail you out.”

Jeremy nodded
and looked around the jeep for a minute. Then he got out. “Didn’t know I was
such a burden to you.”

“Jeremy. I
didn’t mean it that way.”

Jeremy pushed
past him and made his way up the sidewalk without another word. Owen followed.
They found their mom on the living room couch clutching a cup of tea as if she
could hold herself together by clenching it tightly enough.

“Hey, Mom,” Jeremy
said.

“Don’t you
‘hey, Mom’ me,” she said in a low, shaky tone. “You could have died. Doesn’t
that mean anything to you? Haven’t we lost enough members of this family?”

“I’m sorry.
Things got a little out of hand—”

“A
little
out of
hand
? There is no ‘out of hand,’ Jeremy. I told you that you had
one more time.”

“Mom—”

“No, Jeremy. I
can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep living this way, not knowing if you’re
alive or dead. Having the cops bring you home half the time. You haven’t even
tried to fool me into thinking you’re looking for work for months. This goes
beyond irresponsible. This goes beyond what I can bear,” Mom said.

“So
you kicking
me out?” Jeremy asked
,
wearing the same stone face he’d worn just before getting out of the jeep
earlier.

“I wish I
didn’t have to,” Mom said.

“I’m tired of
you two acting like you care about me.”

“I didn’t want
it to be this way, Jeremy. I didn’t want it to come to this,” Mom said. Setting
down her teacup, she added, “You can come back as soon as you’re ready to take
responsibility for your actions.”

“Whatever. I
gotta pack.”

“You can stay
the night.”

“No thanks,” Jeremy
said with a sneer.

“Jeremy, watch
your tone,” Owen said.

“Okay, Dad. You
really think you’re him, don’t you? Everything except the screwing Mom part.” Jeremy
snickered. “At least I hope everything except that.”

“Jeremy!” Mom
gasped.

“Don’t worry,
Mom. I’m going.”

“Where you
going, Jeremy?” Owen asked.

“Don’t worry
about it.”

“I guess you
think you’re staying with me,” Owen said.

“No thanks.” Jeremy
glowered at him. “I don’t need so much as a ride from you. I’ll call someone
who actually cares about me to come get me. Yeah, I’ll get one of my real
friends to help me out.” Jeremy stormed from the room.

Owen sighed and
scratched the back of his neck. “Did you even sleep last night?”

Mom shrugged. “I
don’t sleep well this time of year anyway.” October was the month his dad and
sister had passed away.

Owen walked
over to Mom and squeezed her in a hug. “You did the right thing.”

Mom wiped tears
from the corners of her eyes. “That doesn’t make it hurt any less.”

“I can’t
imagine it would,” Owen said. This could either be the push Jeremy needed to
get his life together or the push that sent him spiraling in the wrong
direction. Owen hoped for the best, but he didn’t have a good track record of
hoping for the best panning out. Good thing he knew this and always prepared
for the worst.

#

Monday
afternoon, after their tutoring session, Marci took her time packing up her
things while talking to Owen about how his classes were going. He didn’t seem
in any hurry to get away either. She wasn’t sure if she should bring up his
brother or not. While she was still trying to decide, Owen took her mind away
from the subject.

Shrugging on
his North Face fleece while balancing on one foot, he asked, “You have any more
appointments today?”

“Nope,” she
said. “You’re the last one.”

“Good.” He
flashed her that toothpaste-commercial-perfect grin that she found herself
thinking about more often than not recently. “Why don’t you come home with me?”
Owen stuck his crutch under his arm and leaned on it slightly.

Marci laughed.
“You get right to the point, don’t you?”

Owen’s ears
reddened, and that was the only clue that she’d gotten under his skin. Other
than the dead giveaway red ears, he had a decent poker face. “I remember you
saying you skipped lunch. Lil cooked for
me
as she
felt sorry for me in my disabled state. There’s some leftover lasagna if you
don’t mind the company.”

“I don’t know.
I have a lot of work to do,” Marci said. All the while, she was telling herself
not to be a jerk after what’d happened with Jeremy over the weekend. That was
something that didn’t come naturally to her—not being a jerk when it came
to guys. Or, it hadn’t come naturally to her in quite a few years at least.

“You don’t look
like you’re very interested in working right now,” Owen said. “And you gotta
eat, right?”

“I could work
through an early dinner.” Marci worried her dad’s class ring on its chain
around her neck. That kiss they’d shared in the E.R. had whetted her appetite
for more. It’d brought back memories of their frustrating yet hot hook-up in
his room the night of the bet. Damn, he
had
to be good in bed if the previews were any indication. Besides, even if nothing
happened, what was it really going to cost her to be nice to him?

“And you
could…not. Do that.” Owen gave her a look that was both unassuming and sexy at
the same time. He’d make a perfect con artist. No wonder his brother was so
good at fooling people. However, the ability to disarm was likely where the
similarities ended. Marci could never imagine Owen using his looks and charm for
evil the way Jeremy did.

“Okay.
Only because I’m starving.
And only if you promise to have
the revised thesis and outline of this philosophy paper complete by next
Monday,” Marci said.

“I promise,”
Owen said with mock solemnity. Marci couldn’t help but laugh at his
exaggeration of a serious expression.

“What is wrong
with you?” She was still laughing as she asked it.

“Absolutely
nothing now that you’re coming home with me.”

“You know that
charm-the-panties-off-a-nun ease with flirting you have is such a waste.” Marci
leaned in close and whispered. “Because you’re such a tease.”

“I’m not saying
you can’t have the milk,” Owen said. “I’m just saying you have to buy the cow
first.”

“Isn’t the girl
supposed to be the cow in that metaphor?”

“Isn’t this the
twenty-first century? I think we can mix these things up a little.”

Marci threw her
bag over her shoulder. “To your place. What are we waiting for?”

They went out
to the parking lot behind Drew Hall and got into Owen’s jeep. He drove them
over to his place. While they waited for the lasagna to heat up, they talked
and Marci wandered out of the kitchen with Owen in tow and took a look around
the place. She hadn’t seen much the last time she was here because they’d been
in the dark.

The first thing
she noticed was the place was surprisingly neat considering two guys lived
there. The second thing was the old movie
posters
.
They obviously had an obsession with Scarface, Star Wars, and The Godfather.
Randomly, there was also a huge The Matrix poster that didn’t quite seem to
fit. When Owen caught her staring at the Matrix poster with her head cocked to
the side, he said, “I’m pretty sure Dante is convinced The Matrix exists. He
thinks that movie is gospel. If you ever say a bad thing about it in front of
him, be prepared to defend yourself.”

“I consider
myself warned,” Marci said. She looked up at him, and they locked eyes for a
moment. Looking away, she said, “The décor in here is halfway decent.”

“Half moms,
half dudes.”

“Ah. That
explains it.” The furniture was black and mahogany.
Black
couch, mahogany desk, that sort of a scheme.
There was a dark colored
vase on a table toward the back of the living room and near the door to Owen’s
room. She hadn’t even noticed that table when she’d come over before. It was a
wonder and a miracle that she hadn’t knocked it over that night.

“That gross
chair doesn’t fit, though.” Marci pointed to a dilapidated recliner that looked
as if it had time traveled from the seventies and been dropped a few times on
the way to Owen’s living room. It had to be the
ugliest
chair in America.

Owen laughed, a
joyful lighthearted sound that warmed her—no, not her heart. Her what? “That’s
Dante’s. He calls it The Throne,” Owen said.

“Hm. Don’t
know
that I’d call it that.”

Owen laughed
again, and she was once again disconcerted by how much she liked the
sound—liked being able to make him laugh. “Me, neither,” he said.

She turned to
him and opened her mouth to say something to him only to discover she had no
idea what to say. Something was happening here, she was feeling something she
didn’t want to feel. It wasn’t safe to feel this way.
Not at
all.
But she also didn’t want to push him away. Owen was the first guy
she didn’t want to push away in a very long time. That made him a threat.

Owen glanced in
the direction of the kitchen. “The lasagna’s almost finished warming.” At her
suggestion, he’d put it in the oven to heat instead of the microwave so it
wouldn’t get that microwave wilt to it. “You want garlic bread? I can whip some
up real quick.”

“I can do it.”

“It’s no
problem.”

“Let me. Please,”
she said. “I feel bad with you running all over the kitchen on your bum foot.”

“I’ll keep you
company then.”

“Good.” She
walked into the kitchen, and he followed. “I just need to know where you keep
your bread, garlic salt, and butter. And do you have any garlic?”

Owen handed her
half a loaf of French bread from the counter and followed it with the
ingredients she’d asked for. She broke off a couple cloves of the garlic and
handed the rest back to him. After putting away the garlic, he went over to the
oven to pull out the lasagna and set it on the stovetop to cool.

“How’d things
turn out with your brother?” she asked as she busied herself preparing the
bread. She hadn’t asked about his brother so far, and he hadn’t offered up any
details. She’d been going back and forth with herself over whether to ask about
it since he’d shown up at the writing center earlier. Finally, she decided to
just ask. He didn’t have to answer.

Owen grabbed a
cookie sheet from a cabinet below the counter in a maneuver he made look easy
even though he squatted down with his weight on one leg. This was a man in good
shape. She bet he had a lot of stamina to go with that strength. She’d seen a
preview the night of the bet. Now she’d like to put both stamina and strength
to the real test. He set the cookie sheet on the counter before her, and she
finally realized he hadn’t said anything yet. Her mind had been too preoccupied
with dirty thoughts to realize it until the sound of the cookie sheet hitting
the counter brought her out of her head.

“Okay, I guess,”
he said with a small frown and a little shrug of his shoulders. “He’s okay
physically. They discharged him not long after you guys left.”

Marci had the
idea that more was going on there, but she also had the feeling that Owen
wanted her to back off. She respected that. She certainly wouldn’t have wanted
to talk about G.K. and her latest marriage destined for failure. Sometimes, you
just wanted your family crazy to stay in the family.

After she
finished with the bread and stuck it in the oven, they waited around for it to
bake in mostly awkward silence until Owen’s phone vibrated against the counter.
He grabbed it, frowned down at it, hit the screen a few times, and tossed it
back on the counter.

“Who was that?”
Marci ventured, mostly out of the desire to say something to break the silence.
Only after the words were out of her mouth did she realize how nosy they
sounded.

“Someone from
my past who doesn’t realize they’re part of the past yet,” Owen said
enigmatically. Okay. Two subjects back-to-back Owen obviously didn’t want to
talk about.

Just then, the
timer went off, letting them know the garlic bread was ready.