Take (Need #2) (2 page)

“I want him here instead of you,” she whispers out of nowhere, so low I almost lie to myself and tell myself I didn’t hear her. Her eyes won’t meet mine.

“W-what?”

Kira swallows, and I think I see tears swimming in her eyes, but then she blinks and they’re gone. “You heard me. He stays. I want you to go.”

I can’t remember anyone ever fucking up my head as much as my parents’ fighting had, but this moment right here, if I can’t fix it, if there’s no bouncing back for us, will be one that I never forget.

The girl I love just chose another man over me.

She wants him here on her eighteenth birthday instead of me.

She gave him her virginity instead of me.

I deserved all of that; it won’t matter in the long run. If I can’t win her back, this night will fuck with my head for the rest of my life, ruining any chance of me loving any other girl ever again.

She’s destroying me.

The fucked-up part? She has every right to do so.

And I love her, so I’ll give her that.

I jerk away from her, and her hands drop to her sides. I don’t miss seeing her clench them.

I wish that were enough to ease the howling inside me. I really do. It might be hard for her to let me go, but she’s still choosing to do so, and she’s choosing to do it over him.

Will she let him touch her tonight once I’m gone? Make love to her?

I stop that train of thought before I lose it all and say fuck it as I storm around her and head back to destroy Austin.

“Enjoy the rest of your birthday,” I tell her. The sad thing is, I really do mean it, and I know she can hear that.

Her mouth falls open and a stricken look crosses her face for a moment.

Then, just like that last beautiful softening of her guard, it’s gone with a blink.

Christ. I’ve done a million hard things when it comes to this girl, but this one takes the cake.

I’m tempted to jog down the driveway because it’ll get me out of there faster, but I refuse to look like I’m running away in front of Austin. Stepping up to Kira, I pause long enough to lean down and place a quick kiss on her forehead.

It isn’t quick, though. My lips refuse to leave her skin, and my eyes slide closed as I take in the scent of her, like a man starved. She doesn’t acknowledge my kiss, nor does she move away. Eventually, common sense returns, and when I open my eyes and move away from her, that bastard Austin is there, staring at us.

His eyes are calculating. Full of conclusions.

I should try to do something to dispel them, shouldn’t I?

But I don’t. I’m already giving him and Kira more than I can bear tonight. I won’t give that up also. It’s the only claim I’ve been able to lay on her, no matter how small or disastrous, and I’m not taking it back.

Quick steps take me down the driveway to where my car’s parked. Once in the driver’s seat, I catch sight of Kira and Austin standing in the driveway. He’s moving closer to her.

Her eyes are still on me.

But she asked me to go, so I’ll go.

Turning the ignition, I peel out of the driveway and down the block in less than five seconds, gunning it with all the speed the car has.

Still not enough. I still feel her.

It’s always been like that, hasn’t it? No matter how far I fucking go, I always feel her.

And now she’s with him. Will be with him for the rest of the night.

Goddamn it, what the hell am I going to do? How the hell am I supposed to get through tonight?

On the way back to the hotel, I veer off the road and into the parking lot of a liquor store with the intention of buying every damn bottle they have in stock.

I watch him leave, and it’s the very last thing I expected him to do. I asked him to. He told me he would if I asked, but . . .

“Kira, are you okay?” Austin asks me, coming closer.

I can’t take my eyes off Brayden, even as he starts the car and speeds off . . .

“Kira?”

“Huh?” I shake my head, trying to focus on Austin.

My eyes are still locked on the road, even though Brayden turned the corner and is long gone.

“Kira, babe, you wanna go inside and relax for a bit?” Austin’s hand lands on my arm.

I can’t stop thinking about the look on Brayden’s face.

Can’t stop thinking about him, period.

He left. He actually left because I asked him to.

So why do I feel so wrong about it?

“What the fuck do you mean you left her with Austin?”

I don’t pull the phone away from my ear, even though Ryan’s yell is loud enough to pierce my eardrum. Sitting on the loveseat in the hotel room, I stare blankly at the wall, holding my phone with one hand, a bottle of Lagavulin in the other.

There’s another two bottles waiting at my feet. Just in case. I threw down more than three hundred dollars on all three bottles, but considering how this specific type of scotch always lays me out on my ass, I consider it money well spent.

Tipping the bottle, I take another swig. “I had no choice, Ryan.” Shit. I sound as defeated as I feel.

As drunk as I’m starting to get, too.

“What the hell do you mean you had no choice?” Ryan yells. There’s a soft feminine voice in the background, soothing him, telling him to relax.

He’s with Dana. Sure, I dropped him off at her place, but it’s still a new concept
—
Ryan with a girlfriend.

I’m here, in this hotel room, with nothing but this rage and agony pulsing through me.

I’m happy for him—he finally got his girl. I really am. Still hurts, though.

He didn’t hurt her as much as I’ve hurt Kira.

Is she busy trying to forget me? Trying to hurt me some more? Is she allowing Austin to do every single goddamned thing I’d kill to do to her?

Another swig.

“Answer me, Brayden.”

“She asked me to,” I whisper, and another gulp burns its way down my throat. My stomach turns, almost rejecting it. I’m drinking too much, too fast.

Let me get sick. Don’t care. It sure as shit can’t feel worse than I feel right now.

“And that’s enough of a reason for you to just leave him there?”

“She has so many reasons to hate me already . . . she looked so sad. There were tears in her eyes. She asked me not to ruin her birthday any more.” I hear myself uttering the words as if from afar, lost in the twisting labyrinth of misery in my head.

I’m so fucked up over this girl. I shouldn’t be. I should have never allowed any woman to have this much power over me.

Hah!
Allow
. As if I ever truly had a choice.

Ryan is silent and I hear Dana speaking to him in the background. From the little bits I manage to pick up, I can tell she’s now fully in on what’s going on. That she’s giving him advice.

Sounds like she’s telling him to side with me, to understand. That I have a point.

If I wasn’t so utterly morbid right now, I might be able to smile at that.

Ryan sighs. “I don’t like him near her.”

I throw my head back and laugh bitterly at that statement. There’s no need for me to even tell him what that laugh means; he knows.

“Shit. My bad, bro. I keep forgetting this is probably harder for you than me.”

The bottle is raised to my lips again. I’m halfway through it by now, can feel the alcohol starting to hit. The numbing buzz taking over.

It’s not anesthesia. Nowhere near close. Nothing short of that will dull the pain I’m starting to realize.

“Maybe I should just head over to the party,” he says.

“She’ll end up hating you, too.” It’s true. We’ve both gone about this the wrong way, no matter how entitled we are. Kira is a woman, with her own free will. With her own right to decide what’s best for her—what’s going to help her forget the pain I caused her. Help her be happy again.

Us getting in the way of that only hurts her more.

But,
fuck
, I just wish to high hell it wouldn’t have been Austin.

“So what the hell are you going to do?”

“I have no fucking clue,” I grit out.

“Are you giving up?”

I stare down at the hazel eyes of the kitty tattoo on my wrist. “I think she wants me to.”

“Can you?”

The answer to that is easy. “I don’t think so.” But that’s not where it ends. Suddenly, it’s all bursting out of me, like a flood, unstoppable. Destructive. “What does it matter, though? I gave her every reason to hate me—”

“She doesn’t hate you, Brayden.”

I laugh again at his statement. “You didn’t see her eyes tonight. She does. And I don’t blame her. I never will. I can’t force her to believe that I love her. Won’t matter if she does if she can never forget everything I did to her. I’d hate me, too, if I were her.”

His frustrated exhale comes over the phone. “Even if she does hate you, you do know what that means, right?”

I fall silent at his question, confused.

“It means she still loves you. You can’t hate something you don’t care about. Think of your dad.”

That is the very
last
person I want to think about right now. That wound needs to remain tightly sealed, thank you very much. I’m already bleeding internally over Kira. I don’t need to add whatever sick emotions my father has caused into the mix.

“I know it’s hard to think about it right now—”

“Stop psychoanalyzing me.”

“
Somebody
has to, because it sounds to me like you’re letting yourself get caught up in the pain and you’re not thinking clearly.”

“What the hell do you want me to say?” I shift in the seat, too worked up, too raw to take this. He’s adding to my frustration, poking at an already irritated weakness, and I don’t know how long I can hold out without snapping at him. “Your sister told me it’s over. Done. She told me there’s no hope, pretty much let me know that no matter what I do, I’ll never be able to fix it.
Then
she told me to leave and that she wanted Austin there instead of me!” The last part leaves me on a roar, and the still half-full bottle goes flying out of my hand, shattering against the wall.

Immediately, I’m reaching for one of the others at my feet, ready to open it—

“Brayden, are you drinking?”

Sighing, I leave the bottle on the ground.

“Stop for a second and hear me out.”

“Your girl’s not with another man, doing God knows what with him,” I murmur angrily, my fingers twitching listlessly. I need something in them—a bottle back in my hand.

No, what I actually need is Kira, her soft skin beneath my fingertips, her pretty eyes staring up at me like they once used to. Like she adored and admired me.

Like she couldn’t imagine a life without me.

“Not right now, no, but it did happen.”

I snap to attention at Ryan’s comment. “What?”

“What do you think got my ass in gear? She got sick of waiting for me, started moving on with her life.”

Man, I realize, there’s really so much about what went down between him and Dana that I’ve been clueless about. That he hasn’t told me. In the back of my head, I wonder why he never did, but I also can’t fault him for it. It’s not like I’d given him a front-row seat to what happened between me and his sister.

Yeah, partially because she is his sister, but it was also too weird to give him the 4-1-1 on how messed up a girl had me.

“How did you deal with it?” It’s not like I’d seen him stumbling all over the place, drunk off his ass like I’m getting now.

Wait. I had seen him like that. But we’d been partying together.

“Exactly as you’re dealing with it now,” he tells me, confirming my suspicions.

Suddenly, I feel like an even bigger piece of shit as I realize what a “great” friend I’ve been.

I wasn’t there for him. Okay, I didn’t know, but I could have paid more attention, maybe seen some signs that would have helped me know he wasn’t doing so well.

“But Dana forgave you.”

“Eventually.”

“Didn’t take too long from my point of view.”

“I also didn’t fuck up nearly half as long or half as bad as you have, you stubborn fuck.”

I sink lower on the loveseat. The self-hate is a hurricane rolling in my chest. Deadly. Growing deadlier by the second.

In desperate need of an outlet.

Trapped.

“Like I told you. It’s hopeless—”

“You’re really starting to convince me that you’re ready to give up on her.”

I do the smart thing and shut the fuck up.

“Hear me out before I also decide that it’s time for you to give up.”

Lips pressed together, I remain quiet, my hand itching to reach for one of the bottles.

“How far are you willing to go to get her back?”

“It’s not a question of how far. It’s a question of
if
she’ll ever—”

He interrupts me again. “How. Far?”

“Anything.” The word leaves me as a whisper, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

“So stop being a bitch about it and deal.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. You don’t need to be getting drunk right now. You need to fucking sleep, formulate a plan. Convince yourself that it’s gonna keep hurting and keep freaking going.”

This wise motherfucker, I swear to God. The stubborn side of me wants to contradict him, argue some more, but what’s the point? He’s right.

Sighing, I get off the loveseat.

“Did you hear me?”

“I’m on my way to get some water.”

He’s silent for a few seconds. Then, “Good boy.”

“Fuck you, dude.”

Ryan laughs, and my lips twitch despite themselves.

“I know you love her, bro. This right here is convincing me, although it was pretty obvious. Unfortunately, I’m not the one you hurt, and Kira is still more stubborn than I am no matter what she says. She may even be more stubborn than you.”

“Hah. If only she heard you.”

“It’s true.”

I pour myself a glass and throw it back, refilling another right away.  It’s going to take a shitload of water to start negating any possibility of a hangover tomorrow. I don’t feel that drunk, but I also know that there’s still more alcohol being processed in my system. Not all of it has hit me yet.

On that note, I need to order some room service. Get some food in me.

“What do you suggest I do?” I ask Ryan, because aside from being ready to go for tomorrow, I have no real plan.

He pulls the phone away from his ear, and I hear him talking to Dana again. “Dana says she knows the sister of one of Kira’s friends.”

I perk up like a goddamn dog at the sound of that, ears twitching and everything. An in? An honest, serious in? “Which one?”

“Jenna. Dana is going to try to figure out their plans from now on, and I’ll be able to let you know.”

Swear to God, I feel like fist-pumping the air.

“Just keep taking those hits, Brayden. You’re not going to convince my sister any other way. And if she truly is with Austin—”

“I’m fucking taking her from him,” I say, my resolve returning on a rush. Hell, yeah, I am. Ryan’s right. I let myself sink into the pain of it. Didn’t pay attention to the other signs.

There really were tears in her eyes.

She could barely bring herself to say she wanted him instead of me.

She watched me the entire time as I pulled away from the house, even as he walked closer to her.

There’s still something there, and I’ll be damned if I don’t keep pushing. Take advantage.

“Can Dana try to find out what their plans are for tomorrow?”

“She’s texting Jenna’s sister now.”

It’s wrong on so many levels. Devious as fuck, too.

Kira’s going to kill every single one of us if she ever finds out.

“Tell your girl I said thanks, man. Seriously.”

“She says you’re welcome but she’s really doing this so I don’t have to deal with your moody ass all the time.”

I laugh at that. I haven’t had much time to get to know Dana, but she’s starting to seem real fucking cool. “You too. Thank you.”

Ryan sighs. “I’m doing it for her as much as I’m doing it for you. And because if Austin somehow ends up as my brother-in-law in the future, I think I’m going to kill someone.”