SIX (20 page)

My eyes are glued to Misty lying on the deck in a two-piece, the sun turning her skin a golden brown.

Her tits tease the two triangle strips covering them and saliva coats my mouth knowing the treats beneath.

She ate a full steak and is napping it off.

Parker lays next to her in a two-piece, but hers is fuller.

It goes down her legs into shorts and the top comes to her midriff, showing off her trim stomach that holds reminders of her motherhood.

Haley is sitting in the shade talking to Max in hushed tones.

I focus on them, still trying to figure out why they are here after all this time. Haley leans forward, her hand scratching and rubbing at one arm while she speaks. Max moves his head from side to side in a slow motion, gets up, and snaps something before going inside.
Prick.

My protective instincts raise the hairs all over my skin and my blood picks up speed, pumping adrenaline through my body.

Seeing someone who isn’t me have some form of close relationship with Haley doesn’t feel right.

I hate being a selfish bastard and wish for nothing more than her to be a normal woman, in a normal relationship, but no matter how much I want it, she just isn’t ever going to be like a normal woman, and I have this need, deep within my soul, to protect her from predators preying on her vulnerability.

Max hadn’t given me reason to be wary of him other than the fact that she met him in an institution and he came here with her like they’re a duo or some shit.

Moving with purpose, I follow him in side, my strides eating up the stairs as I mount them.

He can give me an explanation as to why she got so agitated when they were talking.

I find him upstairs pacing the spare room.

“What are you doing?” I demand.

It’s a loaded question and I’m not sure what answer I want first.

“Haley’s not doing well,” he states, placing his hands on his hips.

What would he know about her wellbeing?

Was he a sponsor of some sort—is that what this is?

I step farther into the room, making it appear smaller and boxing him in.

“Why? What’s wrong with her? She looks fine.”

“She’s not fine. She’s been itching at her skin, her jaw is working overtime, her eyes are glassed over.

She’s trying to find a place where she’s not haunted by her memories, but she’s hanging on by a very thin thread and she will never get high enough.”

Images of her hacking at her skin with her nails plagues me, and she does look pale and malnourished.

“She’s using again?”

Shaking his head, he throws his hands up and they collapse at his sides.

“Just what the doc gave her, but that won’t last and she’ll seek out other outlets. I’m worried about her.”

“Are you her sponsor, how do you know this about her?”

He shakes his head again, rolling his eyes in frustration.

“Stop being so suspicious of me, I’m just her friend, why is that so hard for you to accept, are you jealous?”

Am I jealous?
Of her having someone to confide in and someone who wants to save her? In a way, I suppose I am.

I should be the one to save her.

If saving her were even possible.

It’s not and you know it
, the monster inside me taunts.

I ask the question that’s been burning a hole in my chest for weeks.

“Why are you here?”

He sighs, raising a hand toward me.

“I thought her seeing you might help.”

So, it wasn’t her who wanted to see me.

“You made her come here? Because she hasn’t wanted to see me in sixteen years and then, all of a sudden, she just shows up.”

Crossing his arms in a defensive stance, he shakes his head.

“Why are you so paranoid? It’s good for her recovery to face her past. You’re the reason she became a victim.”

Shards of ice slice into my skin and burrow, uncovering old wounds that can’t seal shut.

“Don’t you think I know it’s my fault? Did you think I’d forget that?”

My stomach tightens as sorrow and anger battle for space in my heart.

“This isn’t about you.”

Fuck him. He doesn’t know what we’ve been through, he wasn’t there.

This isn’t his life, his past,
his Haley
.

“What is the deal with you? Why do you care so much?”

I have to know.

“You have serious issues with trusting people. Have you never just been in the same place mentally as someone and connected on a level unlike any other?”

Pacing toward him, I push him against the wall and bring my face to his, nearly nose to nose.

“When you have a cock and she has a pussy, there is always more to it.”

Our eyes burrow into each other’s, searching for answers.

“You really don’t see it, do you?” He laughs, but there’s no joy behind it.

“I see you,” I tell him, so he knows I’m watching, and before I know what’s happening, he moves forward, closing the space between us, his lips on mine.

His light stubble brushes my skin as his heavy, full lips add pressure.

How did I not see this in him? I was looking so closely, I ignored the blatant flirty smirks and winks, the defiance and need to push my buttons.

Shoving him off me, I wipe my arm across my lips.

“Really?” I growl.

I had no fucking idea he’s gay, or bi, or into me.

We bicker like school kids and I’m horrible to him—maybe he’s a sadist.

“Six?” I turn to find Misty standing in the doorframe, her eyes wild, snapping from me to Max.

Great.

I hope she saw it was him kissing me and not the other way around.

I want to reach out to her and dig inside her mind to see her thoughts.

“I think you need to come downstairs. It’s Haley.”

Haley.

Darting out of the room, I take the stairs three at a time before barging through the door to the deck.

Haley stands there, holding up her shirt and pointing to scars marring the skin on her stomach.

“That’s why,” she snaps to the woman Jude brought with him, who is standing in front of Haley, Jude at her back.

“What happened?” I demand.

“I only asked why she’s dressed like a nun,” the bitch huffs, folding her arms and shrugging a shoulder.

“Get out,” I bark to this intruder thinking she can be an asshole.

Jude mouths his sorry and nods to the woman looking up at him open-mouthed. “Are you going to let him talk to me like that? I was only asking a question.

I didn’t know she was going to have those ugly scars everywhere,” she snorts.

Before I can move to strangle the woman, Misty jumps in front of me, blocking my path.

“Jude, get that loud mouthed cow out of here before she becomes accident prone and a statistic.”

Jude is already carrying the woman out before Misty finishes her sentence.

“She’s a cunt, don’t listen to her. I, for one, dig your scars,” Lucky beams over at us from his perch, leaning against the deck rail separating us from the lawn.

“They document your life and what you’ve overcome. Fuck her.”

Haley’s face turns to Lucky, her head tilting to the side, taking in his opinion. Letting out a long sigh, her chest lifts and falls, her body drowning in her clothing as she drops the hem covering her scars.

“People always want to know why, where, how,” Haley mumbles, turning her face to look out over the lawn.

“But when I actually tell them, they wish they hadn’t asked.”

“Haley,” I say on a broken breath.

“Have you told all these people how I became this monster, Taylor?”

She drags her eyes to me without moving her head and sickness burns the back of my throat.

“You’re not a monster.”

An abrupt laugh sounds from her.

“No,” she smiles, but there’s nothing remotely sincere about it,

“I was just raped and tortured by them.” Her eyes close and she inhales heavily.

Misty’s hand slips into mine as she comes to stand beside me.

She squeezes, letting me know she’s there.

“Don’t,” I tell Haley, terrified she’s going to disintegrate in front of my eyes and be carried away on the breeze that’s tousling her wisps of hair as she stands there, defeat overwhelming her
—us.

“Let her!” Max shouts, stepping from inside the house to join us on.

He comes to a stop behind Misty.

“She needs to get this out.”

What will reliving that shit do for her?

“I haven’t told them anything,” I assure her.

And I haven’t because I’m ashamed I allowed it to happen and because it’s fucking personal.

She doesn’t deserve people talking about what she’s been through.

“Then let me,” she tells me, unmoving, her face stoic.

Parker moves from lying out on a lounger. She slips a cover-up over her bikini and brushes her body next to Lucky, her hand wrapping around his arm.

He’s watching Haley with sorrow and anger in his eyes.

They’ll blame me and treat me differently.

Misty will never look at me the same.

“Taylor and me…that’s his name, by the way. This Six is a character, a façade he created to cope with the remorse.” She looks to me.

Standing two feet from her, I release Misty’s hand so I’m ready to catch Haley if she finally breaks.

“Please don’t, they don’t need to know,” I beg her.

My heart is going to bleed out at her feet.

“I’m so sorry,” I tell her, my shame saturating my entire being.

I hold my arms out to her, desperate to drag her into them and hold her until the pain leaves her, but we don’t have forever and that’s what it will take.

“You don’t need to do this,” I reaffirm.

Baring her soul to practical strangers isn’t going to be good for her.

Max doesn’t have a fucking clue what she needs.

She holds her hands up to stop me from approaching her space.

“Let me say this.” She nods her head.

“Taylor found me when I was fifteen living on the streets. I ran away from my foster home when I was thirteen.”

We’re all circling her, standing there, watching, and listening to her come apart, telling her life story they have no right to know.

“I never knew who my real parents were and it’s like my memories only start from a certain point and I can’t go back further,” she says, gesturing to her head.

I hold my breath, fighting myself not to scream at everyone to stop staring at her, stop probing into her soul with their curious minds.

“Anyway, he was a fighter, tough and older than me by a little.” She smiles, as if remembering the people we were, and takes me back to that time with her.

“He took care of me.”

“We took care of each other,” I correct her.

“Yeah, he says that, but I didn’t do much for him apart from the obvious. And we had a great thing going.”

She bites her lip and smiles a genuine smile.

It’s beautiful.

I want to freeze the moment and keep her trapped in that emotion instead of the darkness that instantly washes it out of her.

“We never agreed to be faithful when it came to sexual needs, but our loyalty, trust, and love—we would always be faithful with that.” She swipes a tear and Misty shifts on her feet next to me, but I can’t worry about her feelings right now.

Haley will always be my past and nothing, not even how I feel about Misty, will ever change what I have
—had
with Haley.

“Tay had fallen for someone. I could feel it in his voice, his touch, everything.

I knew him better than he knew himself at times and there was something different about him—something off.”

Cradling her waist with her arms, Haley sniffles and laughs at the same time.

“I had my eye on a guy who worked at the local record store, but it still ate me up that Taylor felt more than lust for someone. I think I was just scared of things changing between us. So, I asked him to make sure he came home that night.”

Her eyes lift to mine.

“That’s why I opened the door,” she chokes out, and my eyes fill with hot lava.
Don’t
, I mentally scream at her,

stop…please
.

“
I won’t be afraid, I won’t be afraid
, I chanted in my head when the door gave way under the weight of those animals pushing to get in, to stop me closing the door on them.”

Her tiny frame trembles. She’ll break at any minute like glass and cut me with the pieces.

“These guys, they didn’t have any qualms about hitting a girl. The first punch nearly knocked me unconscious. If it had…that would have been a mercy.”

Nails dig into my palm from Misty’s hold as she reattaches her grip to mine and I use the pain to stop me from spiralling into the abyss.

“They kicked and punched me until I was too hurt to fight back, then they cut away my clothes, not taking care to unmark my flesh.

They laughed when the knives broke the skin.”

Sniffles come from Parker, but Haley presses on, seeming to stare at nothing while she speaks.

“Taking turns to violate me, flipping me over to rape me at both openings…being held down and laughed at while animals take away your human rights, your dignity, your self-worth,
your fucking soul
isn’t something you get over.