Part One
I’ve always had a thing for bad boys.
But the problem with falling for bad boys? They’re bad. Sometimes they’re really bad. Like my boyfriend, Carlos, who drove that lesson home to me by smashing me into a wall and punching me in the mouth because he didn’t like the way I was dancing at his club.
It wasn’t the first time he hit me. The first time was just a little slap for being too flirtatious with one of the customers at his club.
But, look. I’m just going to confess this, and it’s going to sound really awful. Pretty sick. But if I’m being honest, the first time my boyfriend slapped me was kind of hot. I was the tough girl in high school—I never fit in. And I was definitely not the kind of girl anybody would get jealous or possessive over. I guess I always wanted to be that kind of girl.
Otherwise, I’ve got no other explanation for how turned on I got at how pissed off Carlos was at the mere idea of some other guy’s hands on me.
And the sex we had the night he slapped me?
Incredible.
It’s fucked up. I know. But I guess I never thought it would get so out of hand. I never thought I’d find myself battered and bruised, crawling on the floor of my boyfriend’s apartment because I was too dizzy to get up and run.
My head throbbing in pain, I waited until Carlos fell asleep into a drunk stupor, then snuck out of the apartment with just my wallet and the clothes on my back. I wasn’t sure exactly where I was going—or how to get there without a car—I just knew that I was going. And that’s how I ended up on my stepbrother’s doorstep at three o’clock in the morning, bleeding, barefoot and shivering…
~~~
So. About my stepbrother.
Jake and I weren’t close. In fact, we were barely on speaking terms. Oh, there’d been that first summer in high school when our parents got married and we tried really hard to get along and be one big happy family.
I’d been a sophomore, a loner with only a few friends while Jake was a popular senior who everyone invited to their parties. All the girls would sigh and swoon over his thick dark hair, earthy brown eyes, square jawline, and athletic bod. And since Jake was pretty much the hottest guy I’d ever met, I felt lucky to be in his mere presence, much less living in the same house with him.
I crushed on him hard that summer; I’m not gonna lie. It might’ve been because he was a star running back, or because he got good grades, but I doubt it. Even as a teenager, I wasn’t drawn to jocks or pretty much any guy with an actual future in front of him.
No, I think I had the hots for Jake because he was my stepbrother, which made it totally weird and wrong. And I think we’ve already established that when it comes to sexual attraction, I’m a little fucked up.
Anyway, that summer, flirting led to a kiss—one amazing kiss—and boom. By the next morning, I was a persona non-grata. Jake was an uptight jerk from that day forward, never speaking a word to me unless it was to yell at me for skipping class. He also ratted me out to my mom when he found out I was smoking and using a fake ID to buy liquor. Jake wasn’t big on breaking rules. And I admit to being relieved when Mr. Law-and-Order joined the army and left home.
In our town, that’s what guys did after graduation.
They either joined the army or went to work at the plant.
There weren’t a lot of opportunities in our town.
It’d been a smart move for him to get out.
I just couldn’t figure out why he’d been dumb enough to come back. But after four years of active duty, he’d rented a little house near the gym where he boxed. A little house which was also, fortuitously, close enough to the local strip club that I was able to walk there, barefoot, shivering against the cool autumn wind, my mouth swelling up where my crazy boyfriend hit me.
Jake answered the door in nothing but his dog tags and a pair of jeans that he must have hastily thrown on, having been awakened by my frantic knocking. For a minute, I was scared he might have a girl over. Because Jake pretty much always had a girl over. But still wiping sleep from his eyes, my stepbrother didn’t look like he’d been entertaining women in his bed.
What he looked like was both surprised and annoyed to see me. “Goddamn it, Nicole. It’s three in the morn—” He cut himself off when I stepped closer under the porch light, and he saw my face. Then something darkened in his already dark eyes. “Jesus Christ. What the fuck happened to you?”
“C—can I c-come in?” I asked, my teeth chattering.
Jake hesitated a minute, then backed up and opened the door wider to let me in. “Sure.”
That he’d actually hesitated made me feel even worse than I already did. But I wasn’t too proud to get in out of the cold, even if he wasn’t going to roll out the welcome mat.
“Sit,” my stepbrother snapped, so I dropped down onto the beat up sofa that used to be in my mom’s basement. He was still bossing me around like a kid sister and I was still obeying like a faithful hound, which brought me even closer to tears when he stooped down in front of me to get a better look at my face.
Jake’s warm thumb traced my busted lip, and I grimaced in pain. “Jesus Christ,” my stepbrother said, again. “You’re bleeding. Are you going to tell me what the hell happened? And you’d better say you fell or that it was a car accident, because if you let some loser do this to you…”
“Sure. I fell. We’ll go with that,” I said, bitterly, because I didn’t let Carlos do this to me, did I? Maybe I did, because I didn’t leave him the first time. And I suddenly felt more embarrassed than hurt or afraid, and wondered if it’d been stupid of me to come here.
Jake narrowed his eyes. “Let’s get you to the hospital.”
I shook my head.“No, I mean, nothing’s broken. I just…” I trail
ed off, shaken to the core, not knowing what to say. And I hated the way every word I did say sounded like I was going to start crying. I didn’t like to cry in front of people, and I especially didn’t want to cry in front of my judgmental stepbrother.
“Who did this to you?” Jake asked, his hand clenching a bit into a fist. “I want a name.”
“Why?” I asked, feeling my eyes widen a bit. What was he going to do? Go hunt Carlos down and give him a beat down? My stepbrother wasn’t just a boxer, but a soldier. And while it was true that my boyfriend had a wicked left-hook—I should know—I was pretty sure Jake could break his nose with one blow if he wanted to.
I have to admit, the idea had a strange appeal. And not just because I was mad at my boyfriend and wanted him to pay. I guess I also wanted to feel protected—like someone had my back. Even if it was just my stepbrother. But I didn’t think he had it in him.
And in any case, Jake crushed that fantasy by saying, “Because we’re going to call the police, that’s why. And they’re going to go arrest this guy. Which means I need a name.”
“Wow,” I said, in slight disbelief that he thought I wanted Carlos in jail. A broken nose was one thing. But an arrest record?
“Wow, what?”
“Wow, you haven’t changed, Mr. Law-and-Order.”
“Neither have you, Miss I-Can’t-Get-My-Shit-Together.”
Those words slammed into me and I was in too much pain to think up a snappy comeback. Especially since they were true. My life was one big fucked up mess. And maybe I had nobody to blame for it but myself. So—to my horror—I lost my battle with stoicism and burst into tears.