Lead Me Not (41 page)

Maxx shrugged her off, and she stumbled a bit before looking at me. She grimaced and had the decency to look embarrassed by her behavior.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were here with someone. I just thought . . . ,” she began, and Maxx glared at her, shutting her up.

“You thought wrong. Now get out of here!” he told her firmly. The girl suddenly looked meek, and I sort of felt sorry for her. She was pretty, wearing clothes that weren’t cheap, and I found myself wondering what brought her here, and why she wanted what she thought only Maxx could give her. All of these people were the
same. They were running from something. Including Maxx.

Including me.

The girl scampered off, and I looked up at Maxx, whose eyes were now trained on the people around him. Had my boyfriend traded drugs for sexual favors? I thought I was going to be sick. What would have happened if I hadn’t been there? Would he have gone off with her? Would he have given her drugs if she spread her legs for him?

I tried to pull away from Maxx, revolted by the thought. How quickly my feelings had changed. Only moments before I had been full of an all-consuming love for this man. Now I wanted to get away from him as fast as I could.

He squeezed me tightly against him, not letting me move. “It’s not what it looked like, Aubrey,” he said, tucking his head down into the crook of my neck.

I struggled against him, knowing he’d use his hands to subdue me, to make me compliant. Damn him, not this time!

Maxx took my shoulders in his hands and pulled me to face him again.

“I don’t do that shit. Not anymore. And definitely not since you,” he swore, his eyes pleading.

“But you used to. You gave girls drugs if they what? Sucked you off? Had sex with you?” I accused, curling my lip up in disgust.

Maxx shook his head. “Don’t judge me for the person I was before you came into my life! I did ugly things that I hate myself for! I would never do that again. I would never do that to
you
.” His thumbs brushed the length of my jaw, his fingers curling into my hair as he held me firm.

“I love you, Aubrey! I will
never
touch another woman. I will never
look
at another woman. There will never be anyone in my life but
you.
I won’t cheat. I won’t play you false. You are it for me. Forever,” he swore, looking down into my face.

I gulped, my mouth dry.

“But you’re still selling and doing drugs, Maxx. How can you say you love me when you try to hide it from me? I’m not stupid. I know how often you take those pills. I know why you disappear and won’t answer your phone. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen what you do. How can you say you love me when you won’t give that up? You won’t give
this
up?” I demanded, trying not to wince as Maxx’s fingers dug into my skin.

His eyes flashed at my accusations. He didn’t deny anything. He stood there, the press of bodies all around us, not moving as he stared into my eyes. I saw a conflict on his face. I saw the two sides of him fighting for dominance. And I knew without a doubt that this lost and deeply troubled man loved me. But did he love me
enough
?

He dropped his hands and looked away from me. My heart broke. It shattered. It fell into a million tiny pieces at my feet. I had my answer.

“I’m not doing this here, Aubrey!” he hissed.

“Well, it’s not like we’ll do it any other time,” I bit back.

“You wonder why I don’t talk to you about everything going on in my life? You ask me why I keep things from you?” He whirled around to face me again, and I saw that he was angry. This was a man so deep in his denial that he couldn’t see the destruction all around him. He couldn’t see that this world was stealing his soul.

“Because you stand there on your fucking soapbox without a goddamned clue as to what it’s like to be me. It’s so easy to judge, isn’t it,
Aubrey
,” he spit out hatefully.

“I’m not judging you!” I argued, but he didn’t hear me.

Maxx grabbed me by the shoulders and pushed me back up against the bar. “I’ve got shit to do. You need to stay here. Don’t move!” he commanded, his eyes making it clear that he expected me to listen.

I had never seen him so angry, not toward me, anyway. I didn’t know what to do, so I didn’t do anything.

Without another look in my direction, Maxx disappeared into the crowd. Eric the bartender was at my elbow the moment I was alone.

“Can I get you another drink?” he asked me. I looked down at my empty bottle and nodded.

So I drank another beer. Then another. Then another. And then I thought, to hell with Maxx and his demands. I pushed myself off the bar and headed straight for the dance floor.

I was mildly drunk and feeling a nice numbness. The dull pain in my chest from Maxx’s earlier behavior had faded a bit, and all I wanted to do was dance and forget.

I found myself a pocket between dancers to station myself. The music was fast, and I started to bob around on my feet. I rocked my head back and forth, my short skirt riding up my thighs. I was probably in danger of showing the world my ass, but I didn’t particularly care.

My feet were starting to ache from the heels, so I kicked them off, my bare feet making contact with the filthy floor. I didn’t think about what I could be standing in. Here, I didn’t care. I felt myself let go, just like the last time I was here. And it was liberating.

The pleasurable release lasted for a few more songs. I danced with complete strangers, not pulling away when they touched me. I belonged in this amazing communal experience. Someone handed me a flickering glow stick, and I stuck it into the bodice of my dress as I continued to dance.

I was slick with sweat, my bare feet dirty and aching, my head fuzzy from the alcohol, and I was feeling pretty damned great.

Until I opened my eyes while I danced and saw Maxx, my
boyfriend
, up against the far wall, two girls standing in front of him with their boobs out on full display.

I didn’t know what they were saying. I could tell by Maxx’s body language that he wasn’t looking in the direction they hoped he would. Their blatant efforts at trashy seduction would have been bad enough. But it was the sight of the money leaving their hands and tucking into Maxx’s outstretched palm that gave me pause.

He pulled a baggie out of his pocket and tossed it toward one of the girls. She opened it up and poked her finger inside, pulling out what I only imagined was a pill of some sort. She handed one to her friend before slipping another under her tongue. Then she gave one to Maxx. He held it in his palm, not moving. Slowly, his head came up, and I saw him scouring the crowd. He was searching. Looking.

For me.

I ducked behind the people dancing closest to me, not wanting to be spotted.

After a heartbeat, Maxx lifted his hand and dropped the drug into his mouth.

I couldn’t help but stare as he pulled out another baggie and shook several more pills into his waiting hand. They followed the first onto his tongue. Without another look at the boob twins, he turned away and walked back through the club.

X was in his domain.

This wasn’t the first time I had seen him do this. So why was it hitting me like a ton of bricks this time?

It was because now I loved him. And that made the reality of what he was doing even harder to swallow.

But wasn’t it being the worst kind of hypocrite to get into a relationship with him, knowing exactly who and what he was, and now to be disgusted by it? How could I expect him to change in such a short period of time? It wasn’t fair to him. It wasn’t fair to me. It wasn’t fair to the relationship that we had only just started to build.

Yet as I stared after him, the sight of him selling pills to those girls who grabbed at them greedily, willing to do just about anything for them, I couldn’t see anything but the memory I had never wanted to think about again.

I had exactly thirty minutes to get home and changed before meeting a few friends at the diner downtown. I had a paper to write that night and was already outlining it in my head.

I had stopped to talk to a few people in my English class, waiting for the mad rush out of the parking lot to die down before I headed to my car.

Finally it was clear, and I walked out of the school by way of the side entrance that led past the football field. It was a bright, sunny day, so I slid my sunglasses down over my eyes.

I hurried underneath the bleachers, which served as a shortcut to the parking lot.

I heard a coughing, then a laugh I recognized all too well.

I veered back the way I came, curving around until I was approaching a
pocket of bleachers tucked into the side of the building. It was dark back there, and it was a place the stoner kids liked to congregate between classes. You could smoke a joint or snort a line without getting busted. You would think the teachers would have gotten wind of the druggie hidey-hole by now, but it remained a safe place to engage in all kinds of nefarious behavior.

“I want another,” I heard my baby sister demand, followed by the throaty chuckle of a guy who was clearly very pleased with himself.

“You know what I want first, Jay.”

I peeked my head around a steel beam to see a small group of kids seated on the ground beneath the bleachers. A few were smoking cigarettes.
One guy had a pipe and a lighter. A girl looked
passed-out beside him, her head in his lap.

But that’s not what caught my attention. Blake, my sister’s loser boyfriend, dangled a baggie in front of Jayme. She laughed and tried to grab it from him. He pulled it just out
of reach, making it a game.

For a second they looked like any other couple goofing around. How I wished that was all they were. But watching them, I knew a lot more was going on.

“I’m not doing that here. In front of everybody,” Jayme said, casting a nervous look at her friends.

She was such a pretty girl, finally growing into her body. Her acne had begun to clear up, and she had lost a lot of the baby fat that had clung to her frame until recently, much to the detriment of her self-esteem.

“I don’t care, Jay-Jay. You know what you have to do if you want any more. You’
re a greedy girl,” Blake taunted, and there was something in his tone that made my skin crawl. I hated that guy. I hated how he treated Jayme. I hated how she defended him even when it was obvious what a jerk he was. Most of all
, I hated that he was introducing my naïve sister to a world she should never have to know, one that I didn’t know at the time would ultimately kill her.

Blake unbuckled his belt and pointed at his crotch. “No one sucks my dick like you do, baby,” he crooned, as if that should be a compliment. No way would Jayme fall for that sleazy line of bullshit.
I could tell she was uncomfortable.

So it was with complete and total shock that I saw her drop to her knees in front of him, her dress filthy from the dirt she took no notice of. She tilted her head up and opened her mouth. Blake laughed, knowing he was getting his way. He opened the bag and dropped two pills onto Jayme’s tongue.

Then her hands were on his zipper, pulling it down, and
Blake’s hand went around to the back of her head, pushing her forward.

I looked away then, feeling sick. I stumbled away from the scene without intervening. I hadn’t done a thing to stop my sister’s degradation. I had walked away, wanting to forget I had seen anything at all.

And I never spoke to Jayme about it.
I never offered any sisterly advice, explaining that no guy would ever respect her if she didn’t have any respect for herself. I should have said those things to her.

But I never thought to until it was too late to say anything at all.

I left the disturbing scene behind me and hurried home, taking a shower and going out with my friends, trying to pretend I hadn’t seen my sister barter a blow job for drugs from her shithead boyfriend.

And I spent years trying to forget that I had done nothing when it had mattered most.