TROUBLE, A New Adult Romance Novel (The Rebel Series) (38 page)

“What?
 
You’re going to try and deny it?
 
Typical.
 
Fucking chicks, man.
 
Always playing games.”

I abandon the phone on the table so I can make it to the sink on time.
 
I vomit the entire contents of my stomach in a series of what feels like never-ending retches.
 
I’m still clinging to the edge of the counter when Quin walks in.

“Hey, are you okay?” she asks.

I’m sliding to the floor when she appears behind me.
 
She grabs me under the armpits and eases me down, making sure I’m leaning against the cabinets before letting me go.

“Holy shit on a stick, what is
wrong
with you? You look like a ghost.”
 
She puts her hand on my forehead and then pushes my sweaty bangs to the side.

I’m trembling all over, so much so that it almost feels like I’m having a seizure.

She turns around and runs over to the phone, grabbing it.
 
She’s about to press the buttons but then stops and stares at the screen quizzically.

I reach my hand out to stop her, but she’s too fast.

She presses the phone to her ear.
 
“Is someone there?”

“No!” I yell.

She’s listening for a few seconds as I try to organize my limbs for action.
 
Problem is, they won’t cooperate.
 
They’re made of gelatin right now, apparently.
 
My legs keep folding back under me and my arms aren’t strong enough to life me.

“Who is this?
 
Is this Charlie?”

Her expression turns mean. “Ah-haaa, so you just tried to have a little intimidation conversation with my friend Alissa, is that right?”

She pauses.

“Okay, okay, Charlie, just shut your pie hole for a second so I can clear the air, okay?
 
Here’s what’s happening.
 
You … are a penis.
 
You are a sick, diseased, full of rotten pus penis that needs to get chopped off.
 
And guess what?
 
We’re going to do it, dude.
 
We are going to come over there, to your house, and chop your shit off.
 
And guess what else?
 
If you ever, and I mean
ever
, call Alissa again … or try to make contact with her under any circumstances?
 
We will hunt you down and take you out completely.
 
Not just the penis, but the whoooole shebang.
 
We have friends in dark places, and all of us put together have maybe one or two morals max.
 
You are vermin.
 
We are exterminators.
 
Do not fuck with us.”

She pauses and then laughs.

“Bring it, dude.
 
Bring. It.
 
Your shit does not scare her or us.
 
We talked to a lawyer today.
 
She is going to eat you and your family alive.
 
Your shit is going down, like
all the way
down.
 
No chick will touch your shit for the rest of your life, which is probably no big deal since you’re going to be in jail anyway getting it up the ass on a daily basis from some dude named Bluto.
 
But don’t worry.
 
Teagan will bake you some cookies.”

She smirks as she hangs up the phone.
 
Then she walks over to me, grinning.
 
“He thinks that cookie thing was like an apology, but that’s because he’s never ever eaten one of those mofos.”

She hooks her arms under my armpits and heaves me to my feet, grunting the whole time.
 
“Holy … shit … woman … how much … do
 
you … weigh?”

I start laughing and crying at the same time.
 
This is madness. My life is a complete and utter mess.
 
Whatever ideas I might have had about this whole thing fading into the past or blowing over are now blasted to pieces.
 
I have a major fight on my hands, and there’s no hiding from the fact that I’m going to have to face up to it and deal with it starting right now.
 
Charlie is not just going to disappear and sign off on a paper giving me my life back.
 
He’s dangerous and he’s mad, and that’s a terrible combination.

Part of me wants to be angry at Quin for getting involved, but the bigger part of me wants to hug her and thank her from the bottom of my heart. So that’s what I do. She was my guts when I didn’t have any to use of my own.
 
I squeeze her with everything I have.

“He says he has a video,” I say, bawling into her neck.
 
“He raped me on video.”

“Shhhhh … shhhhh … don’t worry about that right now.
 
We’re going to get that video.
 
We’re going to get him, I promise.”

She’s still patting me on the back and talking nonsense to get me to stop crying when Teagan, Mick, Rebel, and Colin all walk in the door together.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

I’M IN BED WITH COLIN next to me.
 
The entire family wanted to come sit on the bed too, but he kicked them out.
 
It’s amazing how well he already knows me.
 
I’m proud to be a part of this group, but sometimes they’re just too overwhelming for me.

“He took a video,” I whisper.
 
My face is pressed into Colin’s chest.
 
We’re cuddling at an angle, our legs nowhere near each other to make room for my giant belly.

“Shhhh … I know it’s awful, but it’s really a good thing.”

“How can you say that?” I cry, looking up at his chin.

“It’s evidence, babe.
 
He can’t deny what he did.”

Fear slithers through me.
 
“He says I liked it.
 
That I
 
… that I … moaned.”
 
Just the idea of that makes me want to vomit again.
 
Problem is, I have nothing left in my stomach but acid.
 
It burns the back of my throat.

“I know it’s pretty much impossible, but you have to forget what he said, okay?
 
Just stop torturing yourself by thinking about it.”

“I can’t!
 
I can’t!
 
It’s all that I can think about.”

“Come on, you can focus your mind on other things.” He kisses my head.
 
“Remember our picnic today?”

An image of him kneeling in the grass flashes across my mind.

“Yes.”

“Remember talking to me in the attic? Our first real talk?”

“Yes.”

“What do you see?”

“You.
 
Sitting on that stool. Wearing those jeans.”

“Those jeans?
 
What’s wrong with those jeans?”

I wiggle a little. “Nothing.
 
I like those jeans.”

He looks down at me.
 
“I look much better with them off.
 
Want to see?”

I can’t help but giggle.
 
“Stop. I’m traumatized right now.”

“Seeing my naked body is anti-trauma medication. You should take some.”

Maybe I should be worse-off picturing Colin naked, but it’s having the opposite effect.
 
“Stop.
 
I’m pregnant.”

He kisses my forehead.
 
“So?
 
That’s not going to stop me. The only thing that stops me is the word
no
.”

“Okay then …”
 
I should say no now, but I don’t.
 
I’m suddenly on fire and desperate to exorcise the ghost of Charlie out of my brain.
 
I keep conjuring images of me on a video that I’ve never seen.
 
It’s ugly and awful and terrifying all at once.

“You’re not saying no,” Colin says.
 
“Say no.”

“Why?
 
You want me to?”

“Hell no, I don’t want you to.
 
I just don’t need you encouraging me by accident.”

I wait three breaths before answering.
 
“I’m not.”

He backs away a little and stares into my eyes.
 
“Babe, I don’t want you to do anything you aren’t ready for.”

I hold onto his upper arms with surprising strength.
 
Staring right back into his eyes I answer.
 
“I’m afraid I’ll never get that image that Charlie created out of my head.
 
I have no real memory of anything pleasant, and he’s turned my one experience into my worst nightmare.”

“So you want to…?”

“Make a new memory.
 
A good one.”

He frowns, almost with an expression of pain.
 
“I’m not sure about the psychology behind that.”

“Me neither.
 
But it feels right.”

“I’ll tell you what …” He pauses to kiss me on the forehead and then the cheek.
 
“How about we take it real slow, and you just say stop whenever it gets to be too much?”

“But … that’s not really fair to you,” I say, suddenly very shy.

“Screw that.
 
It’s perfectly fair.
 
Every second I get to touch you is a gift.
 
Don’t worry about me.”

I put my hand on his cheek.
 
“Are you for real?”

He shrugs.
 
“I feel real when I’m with you.
 
Only when I’m with you.”

Then he leans down and kisses me and I’m lost in the warmth that begins to build.

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

COLIN TAKES HIS SHIRT OFF and then immediately starts at my neck.
 
I’m lying half on my side and half on my back. Shivers run all through my body as he places the gentlest of kisses at my throat.
 
In the hollow of my neck, his breath tickles the sensitive skin, but then his scratchy shadow of a beard grinds into me as he sucks it, reminding me that this man is a dangerous man.

“Stop,” I say, a little breathless.

He looks up.
 
“Okay.
 
I’m stopped.”

I stare at his gorgeous face.
 
He’s not mad.
 
He’s not frustrated.
 
He’s just … Colin.

I let out the breath I was holding. “Okay.
 
You can go again.”

“You sure?”

I nod. “Yes.”

He smiles and moves down to my breast, lifting the edge of my shirt and bra so he can lick my nipple, flicking it with his tongue.

I gasp.
 
How is it that such a small thing can bring so much feeling to a person’s entire body?
 
Thank goodness the baby is sleeping and not moving.
 
I don’t think I could handle both sensations at the same time.

I moan when he takes my breast in his hand and sucks it while squeezing. As soon as I hear the sound come out of my throat, I freeze up.
 
This is what Charlie said I did…

“Babe.”

The darkness that was descending disappears at the sound of his voice.
 
His expression is pure sadness.

“What?” I ask.

“You have to let go of that.
 
Let go and relax.”

“I was just thinking…”

“I know what you were thinking.” He taps the side of my chin gently with his finger. “Listen … if you’ll let me, I’ll spend the next hour or so helping you forget the past and making you feel like a million bucks.
 
I hope like hell that when I do that, you’ll moan and shout and growl and scream and anything else that feels right.
 
That’s what happens when people make love, okay?
 
They make noise.
 
And it’s not the same as what happened to you before.
 
It’s pleasure, not pain.”

“Growl?” I giggle, too overwhelmed by his kindness to focus on what was freaking me out before.
 
“I’m not sure I’m going to do that.”

He cocks up an eyebrow.
 
“We’ll see.”

We’re both lying there, smiling at each other.
 
Slowly but surely, the fear disappears and the idea of moaning and growling for an hour sounds like a really interesting plan.

“What are you going to do to me?” I whisper.

“Do you want a play-by-play? Because I don’t usually plan it out. I’m more a go with the flow kind of guy.”

I bite my lip as I imagine that for a moment.
 
“Okay.
 
Just go with the flow.
 
That would probably be better.”

He pushes himself up to kiss me on the mouth.
 
“You’re too cute.”
 
Then he slides back down to where he was.
 
“Now can I get back to my business here?”

I nod.
 
“Yes.
 
Get back to whatever it was you were doing.”

“You like it?” he asks, leaning down, his tongue coming out.

I have to look away.
 
He’s too sexy to watch.
 
“Yes, I do.”

Maybe I should be embarrassed talking to him like this, but I’m not.
 
It’s just the two of us.
 
There are no cameras, no terrible people outside the door laughing behind my back.
 
It’s Colin and me and the great big unknown.
 
I’m not a virgin, yet I have no idea what this is all about.
 
But with him next to me, his leg draped over mine, I want to know.
 
I want to learn.
 
I want to replace the terrible nightmares with beautiful dreams.

Pretty soon, my lack of experience ceases to matter.
 
As he kisses me and runs his hands all over me, squeezing, stroking, tickling … I become warmer and less inhibited.
 
I reach out to touch him, amazed to find out how large he’s become and how hard.
 
He must really want me.
 
His muscles are bulging and straining in his arms and back with the effort of being gentle.
 
This knowledge makes me bolder and more excited.
 
There’s fear there too, but I won’t let it take over because I know I can say
no
and Colin will listen.