Devil Inside (4 page)

“What?”

“Nothing.  I think my eyes were being funny.”

“Hmm.  Weird,” he responded mildly.   “Do you need any water?”

“Water would be great.”  She rolled off him so that he could get out of bed.  Taking stock of her position she was amused to realize her head was at the foot of the bed.  She righted herself and pulled a sheet back onto the bed and covered up partially.  She didn’t cover herself completely—instead she ignored the insecurities that were trying to creep in with sobriety. She looked around the room for the first time.  It was as sparsely furnished as the rest of the house.  Just a mattress on the floor and a couple of odds and ends next to it—a phone charger and a book the title of which Harley wasn’t able to make out.  Despite the lack of furnishings or personal possessions, Harley was comfortable in Levi’s rented house.  She didn’t feel as if she was intruding into his world since there was so little of him in the house.

A short time later Levi came back into the room carrying a bottle of water.  It looked as if he had already drunk half of it.  He was still naked.  She smiled at his lack of modesty—not that he needed to be.  He was as sexy without his clothes as he was in them.  The tattoo Harley noticed earlier disappeared over his shoulder and crept down his side and added to his rough, mystery.  His hair was more tousled than before in a great “I just had sex” kind of way and Harley wanted to run her fingers through it.  She ran her fingers through her own hair and hoped that she was pulling the sex-hair look off as well as he was.  She accepted the bottle from him and chugged most of what was remaining. 

“Hope you didn’t want any more of that,” she laughed.

“No.  I’m fine,” he smiled, sliding back into the bed and getting comfortable.  Up close she could tell that he looked drastically more tired than she had first thought.  She could make out the beginnings of dark circles under his eyes.  “Feel free to stay here as long as you would like,” he told her and looked as if he was already falling asleep.

Harley sighed and snuggled into the bed as she tried not to laugh.  It was amazing how quickly guys fell asleep after sex.  She did want to rest for a while before she left decided, settling down on her side of the bed.  Levi threw an arm around her waist and buried his face in her hair.  Reflexively, she stiffened a bit; she hadn’t expected Levi to be the cuddling type.  She was comfortable and cozy now but she knew that when she woke up she would leave.  In fact, she should leave now.  But it would be weird if she did because then it would become an obvious recognition of the fact that this was a one night stand.  Instead, she forced herself to relax and eventually allowed herself to drift off to sleep with Levi curled behind her.

She didn’t know how long she slept—but it was a dream about fire that woke her up.  An intense burning surrounded her.  She could smell the acrid smoke and it filled her lungs painfully.  It was a brief, yet intense dream.   She woke up on the verge of a cough, gasping for air.  She immediately remembered where she was—there wasn’t any lingering confusion.  Rather, she came wide awake immediately due to the surge of adrenaline her dream caused.  She hadn’t had this dream in a long time and was dismayed to have had it again.  She really hoped she wasn’t going to start having the reoccurring nightmares of fire again.  She had lost countless hours of sleep during the last episode and it had taken therapy to finally rid her of them.

She blinked, rubbed her face and rolled onto her back.  She could see Levi asleep with his back to her and she was glad that she hadn’t woken him up.  The tattoo that she had seen last night was etched from his elbow, up to his shoulder and down most of his back and side.  There were many intricate lines and details.  Flames, devilish creatures, swords, eyes and all sorts of weird symbols were drawn among the tribal lines.  It was beautiful and must have taken many, many sessions.  She wanted to run her hands over the ink and study it in detail.  But she also wanted to leave before he woke up.  She hoped to avoid the awkward “Hey, we had sex last night.  But now we need to say goodbye,” moment.

She slowly, quietly slid out of bed.  Thick curtains blocked most of the light so she had to feel around the floor to find her clothes.  She followed the trail of clothing out the bedroom door and into the hall.  Smiling and shaking her head, she struggled to disentangle their shirts.  She retrieved her cell from her purse that was still lying in the foyer and used
Google Maps
to figure out which street she was on.  Luckily, she was just down the road from a major intersection and shopping center so she shouldn’t have any problems getting a cab to find her. 
A thanks to the gods of technology
, she thought, relieved that she wouldn’t have to wake Levi for his address.

She got dressed in the living room and crept silently from the house locking the doorknob behind her.  She got the house number from the mailbox and called a cab company.  One was promised to arrive in about 15 minutes.  At least she should have some time to compose herself a little.  She hoped to avoid the obvious walk of shame as much as she could.  She pulled her shoulder length red hair into a short pony tail and used a tissue to blot her face and make up.  Luckily she had gum in her purse as well.   As she sat at the curb waiting for the cab she smiled up at the early morning sun. 
Memorable night indeed
, she chuckled to herself.

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The cab let Harley out in front of the apartment that she shared with Jamie.  The sun had just reached full glory as she climbed wearily out of the cab.  She really hoped that she would be able to sneak in and crawl into bed without waking Jamie.  She opened the door as quietly as possible and slipped inside.  She took her shoes off and locked the door behind her.    She made her way quietly to the stairs but with her foot on the first she was stopped by Jamie’s voice coming from the couch.

“Good morning,” her roommate said with a snicker.

Harley gave her a sheepish smile.  “Morning!” she said with an overly bright tone.  “What are you doing on the couch?”

“After you left we had a drinking contest.  By the time I got home I was too drunk to bother with the stairs,” she chuckled, stifling a yawn.

“You’ll have to tell me about it later.  I’m exhausted.  I didn’t go to bed until almost dawn.  I’m gonna go back to bed for a while,” Harley said.

“Don’t even try it.  Don’t try to avoid it.  We’re both awake now.  Get your ass over here and tell me what happened.”

Harley laughed, realizing that she wouldn’t be able to get out of this one she made her way to the loveseat and plopped down.  “Did you ever talk to the little, shifty guy?”

“By the time he got up the nerve we were getting ready to leave.  He got my number though.”

“Awesome!”  Silence fell over the pair.  Jamie was waiting for Harley to dish the goods, and Harley was imagining what happened after she left.  If Jamie had gotten that drunk and did end up talking to Shifty, things probably happened that Harley would have preferred to not happen.  Jamie didn’t handle herself around guys very well.  She didn’t figure anything too bad had happened since Jamie was home, and alone.  But still, she would have to call Jason later to find out exactly what happened.  The only thing that she regretted about last night was leaving her friend, drunk, at the bar alone.  She liked to watch over her as much as she could.

Harley and Jamie had been friends since high school.  Their bond was one that was based on opposites.  As crappy as Harley’s parents had been, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews had been ideal.  After she met Jamie she had spent more time in their house than in her own foster parent’s house.   Mr. and Mrs. Andrews had been hesitant to let Jamie go to college an hour away, but they had felt better knowing that Jamie and Harley were going to get an apartment together.  They respected that Harley was more “world wise” than Jamie, and they knew that Jamie was more cautious than Harley.  They knew that where one girl lacked, the other excelled and that they would be able to look out for each other. 

“Stop stalling!  That guy was majorly hot.  I wanna hear details!”

Harley laughed and dodged the pillow that Jamie slung at her, “Ok, ok!  We went back to his place.  He rides a motorcycle—you know that was the first time I’ve ever been on a bike.  It was scary as hell.  Fun though.  Anyway, we went to his place.  We had sex.  And holy damn it was good.”

“Ooo,” Jamie squealed.  The squeal was cut off abruptly when she flinched and grabbed her head.

“Ha!  Hung over much?”

“Maybe a little,” Jamie groaned.  “Are you going to see him again?”

“Not that I plan on.  I didn’t get his number or anything.”

“Pfff!  What did he say when you left?”

“Well…nothing.  I left before he woke up.”

“Harley!”

“What?!”

“Why do you do that?” Jamie asked, staring at her over the arm of the couch.  The look on Jamie’s face was a little sad and a little disappointed and maybe a little annoyed.

“Do what?” Harley asked, feigning ignorance.

“Did you at least use protection?”

“Of course.”  Jamie narrowed her eyes at her.  “We did!  I promise!”

“But why do you end things before they even start?”

Harley was silent.  She could have given her a lot of answers and offered a lot of explanations.  Hell, Jamie probably knew the answers herself.  Instead of answering, Harley decided to leave Pandora’s Box closed and go with the easy, safe answer, “Because—why bother?  I don’t have time for a relationship.  He’s only here temporarily.  What’s wrong with us just having a good time?  Scratching an itch, so to speak, and moving on?”

Jamie shook her head at Harley and settled back down on the couch.  “You’ll never know what can happen if you never give it a chance.”

“Mmmph,” Harley grunted at her. 

Jamie looked at her seriously, “And you really do need to be careful.  There has been a lot of druggie stuff going on lately.”

“What does that mean?”

“I’ve just heard a lot from some of my clients at the outreach center.  And a dark mysterious guy just shows up out of the blue.  You don’t know anything about him.  He could be a dealer for all you know.”

“Oh, and the little shifty guy is just fine, right?” Harley snorted.

Jamie didn’t respond to that for a moment.  Harley knew that she was trying to think of a way of defending herself and not offending Harley at the same time.  “You’re right.  He could be a drug dealer too.  All the more reason for both of us to be more careful.”

Harley rolled her eyes at her friend but didn’t argue because she knew Jamie had a point, she just didn’t want to admit it.  Finally, Harley felt like she had let the moment be serious for long enough.  “I’m going back to bed.  I didn’t get much sleep last night,” she wickedly tossed at Jamie as she bounced up the stairs.

“You’re incorrigible,” Jamie called after her with a laugh immediately followed by a groan.

Harley stripped off her bar clothes and kicked them into the laundry basket.  As she did so she caught sight of the fading bite marks across her thighs and stomach.  She chuckled to herself as the memories of the night before washed across her.  The memory of Levi’s intense blue eyes caused a flutter in her stomach.  She pulled on a tee-shirt and climbed into bed.  She buried her head to block out the increasing sunrise and sighed.  A small nagging in the back of her head partially wished she had waited until he woke up before she left.  The troublesome voice wondered what would have happened had she stuck around.  But another voice told her to grow up and be realistic.  She had gotten exactly what she was after and things were exactly as she had intended.

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Harley didn’t sleep long.  The combination of the sun butting its way into the room and fact that she had chores to do this Sunday prodded her out of bed by noon.  After showering and then making her way downstairs she found Jamie still under blankets watching romcoms on TV.

“Ugh,” Jamie grunted in greeting.

“Agreed,” Harley answered.

They watched Kate Hudson try not to fall in love with Mathew McConaughey for a while in silence.  Finally, when a commercial came on Harley ventured into the conversation she hoped wouldn’t start a fight.  “So…what happened with Shifty after I left?”

“His name is Eric,” Jamie answered somewhat grumpily.

“Uh huh.”

“Nothing happened really.  He kissed me.  He asked me for my number.  I gave it to him.  Maybe he will call…maybe he won’t,” she answered, trying to sound more nonchalant than she actually was.

“Uh huh.”

Jamie ignored her.  Harley just hoped Jamie didn’t spend the night making out with the guy in the corner again.  If that’s what she wanted to do—fine.  But Jamie didn’t go home with guys.  And she picked guys who expected her to go home with them.  When she didn’t, they didn’t usually call.  Harley hoped she was wrong.  If not, she would be picking up the pieces soon.  While she didn’t mind being there for her, she hated seeing her friend hurt.  She didn’t press further though because she sensed that Jamie would only get hostile if she did—Jamie didn’t like feeling like people thought she was naive.  Instead, they watched the rest of the movie in silence.  Eventually, they roused themselves from the couch to take care of the chores they both had to do and ordered a pizza.  The grease from the food and the movement helped drive the remnants of their hangovers away.