“I wasn’t sure when you’d get here,” I replied as he walked to the couch and sat down. “I figured you’d be at your parents’ house for a while.”

  “Thankfully, not long,” he said shortly.

  “You want to talk about it?” I asked, running my fingers through his hair. He kept it cut short on the sides, but the top was getting pretty long. When he’d first gotten home, his hair had been shaved. I was glad he was letting it grow—he looked more like himself now.

  “Not really,” he said with a sigh. “They’re pissed that Curt and I got into it, and pissed at the timing, and pissed that I wouldn’t explain myself, and pissed that I wasn’t gonna let it go. You get the idea.”

  “You shouldn’t fight with him anymore,” I said, leaning back to sit on his knees.

  Draco huffed. “You’re seriously sayin’ that shit to me?”

  “He’s your brother,” I replied, running my fingers softly across the scratch on his jaw. “You’re a matching set.”

  “He’s a fuckin’ cunt and he’s lucky I didn’t beat him worse than I did.”

  “Draco,” I scolded.

  “Kara,” he replied in the same tone. “He had one fuckin’ job while I was inside, and he fuckin’ lied and said he was doin’ it, that he was lookin’ out for you—and we both know he wasn’t.”

  “It wasn’t his responsibility.”

  “The hell it wasn’t,” Draco snapped. His hands tightened on my thighs. “I asked one thing from that motherfucker. One thing.”

  “Well, you can’t blame him,” I said in exasperation. “He didn’t want anything to do with me, how the hell was he supposed to look after me? If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t have gotten into trouble in the first place. He and your mom knew that, and they made it clear.” I scoffed. “It’s not like I was going to let him look after anything.”

  “What?” Draco asked, his voice low. “What did you just say?”

  I froze.

  “What?” I asked, confused about his reaction.

  “How exactly did he and my mom make that clear to you?” he asked, watching me closely.

  I didn’t reply. When he said he’d gotten into a fight with Curtis, I’d assumed that he knew everything that had happened, at least with his family. If Curtis hadn’t told him, then why had they fought?

  “Why did you and Curtis fight?” I asked slowly.

  “Answer me.”

  “You first,” I said, dropping my hands to my lap.

  “We fought because the piece of shit didn’t look after you while I was away,” he replied. “Now answer the question.”

  “It was no big deal,” I said, gesturing lamely. “I just knew after you went in that they didn’t want me hanging around. It was okay. I understood.”

  “It wasn’t fuckin’ okay,” Draco replied, “or you wouldn’t have tore him a new one yesterday. What the fuck did they say to you?”

  “It was years ago,” I sidestepped. “I don’t even remember.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “Can you just drop it?” I asked, getting angry. “Why are we even talking about this? It’s over. You’re home. I’m sitting on your fucking lap, for God’s sake.”

  “Tell me,” he ordered. When I moved to climb off his lap, he stopped me.

  “It wasn’t some big thing,” I said defensively, through my teeth.

  “Tell me.”

  “Curtis said that it didn’t matter how much I wanted to suck his dick, he wasn’t going to fuckin’ prison for me,” I ground out between my teeth.

  Draco moved so fast, standing from the couch and setting me on my feet, that I almost didn’t catch him before he was out the front door.

  “He was drunk,” I said desperately, locking my arms around Draco’s waist, my body between him and the door. “It was right after you left and he was a mess.”

  “There’s no excuse for that shit,” he replied in disbelief.

  He was practically vibrating with rage, but his hands were still gentle as they pulled at my arms. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t succeeding because I wasn’t being gentle, and I wasn’t going to let him leave my house.

  “Charlie hear him say that?” Draco asked.

  “Of course not,” I replied automatically. Charlie would’ve ripped him apart.

  Draco let out a long breath. “What about my mom?” he asked.

  I tilted my head like I wasn’t sure what he was talking about.

  “What did she say to you?”

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked. “Just leave it.”

  “What did she say to you?” he asked again, tenderly wrapping his hand around my jaw.

  “She said that I’d already gotten one son locked up, so to stay away from her other one,” I replied in defeat.

  “Jesus Christ,” he said with a huff of disbelief.

  “It’s okay,” I replied, loosening my grip on his waist. “Really. It was a long time ago.”

  “You don’t get it,” he said, dropping his head back to look at the ceiling as he shook it slowly from side to side.

  “Then explain it to me,” I replied. “Come away from the door.”

  “I spent every day inside worryin’ about you,” he said, not moving, his head still tilted back. “I knew that Curtis and Charlie were gettin’ hassled a bit at school because of all that shit, but they were takin’ care of it.” He finally looked at me. “But you stopped comin’ to see me, so I couldn’t get a read on you. So I’m askin’ ’em, right? How’s she doin’? Is anyone botherin’ her? You’ll take care of it, right? And the whole time, they’re sayin’ that they’ve got it covered. That you’re fine. That they haven’t noticed you gettin’ messed with. Seems like everyone’s leavin’ you alone.”

  I nodded. He leaned forward so our faces were inches apart.

  “But they weren’t takin’ care of it, were they?”

  “I had Charles,” I replied quietly. “She’s like a one man army.”

  “Charlie’s five feet tall and a hundred pounds soakin’ wet,” he replied just as quietly.

  “I’m okay,” I said, lifting my arms out to my sides. “You’re looking at me. I’m fine.”

  Draco stared at me.

  “Sweetheart, when did they say all that shit to you?”

  I didn’t answer, because we both knew. It was right before I’d stopped going to see him.

  “You can’t really blame them,” I said reasonably, giving him a small smile. “I was the reason you went to prison. If he hadn’t taken that video of me, you wouldn’t have beat him up.”

  “You take your top off on purpose?”

  “You know I didn’t.”

  “You take a video of it?”

  “No,” I snapped.

  “You send it to the whole school?”

  I didn’t reply.

  “You ask me to beat his ass? You force me to grab that bat?”

  “You did it for me,” I said, pushing at his chest.

  “I did it because I fuckin’ love you and that motherfucker deserved everythin’ he got,” Draco shot back.

  “Then maybe you shouldn’t have loved me,” I yelled.

  “It’s not exactly somethin’ I could fuckin’ control,” he yelled back.

  “Then you could’ve controlled yourself, at least!” I shouted, immediately slapping my hand over my mouth in horror.

  “You angry about that?” he asked, no longer yelling.

  “No.”

  “Sounds like you are,” he replied.

  I took a step backward.

  “Don’t walk away from me.”

  I paused.

  “You angry that I beat that little piece of shit?”

  “Of course not,” I replied, crossing my arms. What exactly did he expect me to say?

  I was expected to feel thankful for what he’d done. Everyone we knew felt like the fact that he’d stuck up for me and damned the consequences was some kind of declaration of love or something. So how was I supposed to explain how fucking guilty I’d felt? How was I supposed to tell him that I was angry at the decision he’d made that had changed all of our lives forever—especially when I hadn’t stopped him from beating Travis Sholes up in the first place?

  “There will never be a time when I let someone treat you like trash,” Draco said, lifting his hands, palms up. “It’s not the way I’m built, Kara.”

  That was exactly what terrified me. It was the entire reason that I’d kept my distance for as long as I had.

  “I don’t need you to fight my battles,” I replied.

  “You’re missin’ the point,” he said stubbornly.

  “I don’t think I am.”

  “If someone was goin’ after me,” he said, throwing his hands in the air with irritation, “you sayin’ you wouldn’t do anythin’ about it?”

  “That’s different,” I snapped. “I’m not six-foot-five of solid muscle.”

  “So you wouldn’t be able to physically stop someone,” he said, his lips twitching. “But there’s plenty of ways for you to use your brain. You sayin’ you wouldn’t?”

  I didn’t reply.

  “Fuck,” he said with a sigh, running his hands trough his hair. “You know you would, Kara.”

  “Did you know that he got in trouble?” I asked. “You can’t distribute naked photos of a minor, even if you are a minor.”

  “Yeah, I heard about it,” Draco replied.

  “He was arrested and everything,” I said. “You didn’t have to do anything. He got into trouble.”

  “That motherfucker got probation,” he scoffed. “And had to clean up garbage on the side of the road.”

  “Can we just please stop talking about this?” I asked in frustration. “It was years ago. Do we really have to go over it all again?”

  Draco’s shoulders dropped. “Yeah, baby,” he said, pulling me toward him. “You keep sayin’ it was years ago, but I’m just findin’ this shit out for the first time.”

  “I’m fine,” I replied, leaning against him. “It all worked out in the end, right?”

  Draco nodded, kissing the top of my head. “Thank Christ, you didn’t have any problems while I was inside. Curtis would have a real hard time ridin’ his bike with a coupla broken legs.”

  I closed my eyes and forced myself not to react to his words. If he had any idea what I’d gone through, I was afraid that his relationship with his brother would be broken forever. I wouldn’t let myself be the reason for that.

  For what had to be the millionth time, I told myself to forget it all, to push it down so deep that it never came up again. I was fine. I no longer had to see anyone I didn’t want to see. I no longer had to endure situations where I was uncomfortable. If that made me look boring, or weird, well, I was okay with that.

  Chapter 10

  Draco

  As I ran my fingers through Kara’s hair, I tried not to focus on anything but her. I was there, in her apartment, with her arms around me, finally, and I was fucking it up because I was so livid with my family.

  I wasn’t sure how Kara expected me to just ignore the fact that they’d treated her like shit while I was gone. Even if I hadn’t asked them to watch out for her, they’d still known how I felt about her and they’d cut her out. Had they thought that I wouldn’t find out? What had their long-term goal been? They’d known that eventually I’d be out, and if I was lucky, we’d start back where we left off.

  “I need a shower,” Kara grumbled. She tipped her head back to look at me. “You can watch TV or something?”

  “Sure,” I said. I wondered how pissed she’d be if I left while she was in the bathroom. I could take care of shit quickly, but there was no way I could be back before she got out of the shower.

  “You’ll wait?” she asked suspiciously. “It’ll only take me a couple minutes.”

  I sighed. She knew me too well.

  “Yeah, I’ll wait.”

  “You can take one when I’m done,” she said as she pulled away.

  “You sayin’ I stink?” I asked, smiling as she immediately started shaking her head.

  Kara rolled her eyes. “You know what?” she said, putting her hands on her hips when she realized I was teasing. “You do stink. I mean, I wasn’t going to say anything, but whew.” She fanned her hand in front of her nose. “Ripe.”

  She screeched as I lunged for her.

  “You better grab some clean clothes,” she yelled, racing for the bathroom.

  “Why don’t I just shower with you?” I asked, lifting her from the floor with one arm around her waist.

  “No,” she said, laughing as I nipped at her throat. “I’m trying to get clean, not dirty.”

  “We gonna get dirty after you get clean?” I asked, setting her back on her feet.

  “If you play your cards right,” she joked. “And, you know, get rid of that stank.”

  My mouth dropped open in surprise and she laughed as she bolted for the bathroom.

  “I thought you were joking,” I called through the door, sniffing under my arm.

  “Everyone stinks like smoke, you big baby!” she called back. “Go grab some clean clothes. I’ll even let you use my fancy shampoo.”

  I left the hallway and moved back to the living room. I had a bag of shit in the back of my truck, but I wasn’t sure if those clothes would smell any better than what I was wearing. Debating whether I should just run over to my apartment building, I looked over in surprise as Kara tiptoed out of the bathroom in nothing but a towel.

  “You change your mind on the joint shower?” I asked, reaching for the hem of my shirt.

  “Just forgot all my stuff was packed,” she replied sheepishly, awkwardly bending down to grab her bag off the floor. “Be out in a few minutes!”

  I laughed as her towel slipped and she yelped, trying to carry the bag and hold the towel up at the same time.

  God, she was sweet. She’d always been sweet.

  Making a decision, I grabbed her keys off the top of the backpack she’d left by the doorway and let myself out of her apartment, locking the door behind me. It would only take a couple of minutes to run home and get some clothes, but I wasn’t about to leave her apartment unlocked.

  Kara meant it when she’d said she could fight her own battles, and I respected her for it, but I also knew that she wasn’t hard like the rest of us—for lack of a better word. Get her with Charlie and the two of them were crazy, but Kara alone? She’d rather run than stand her ground. Confrontation had never been something she was comfortable with, and while that wasn’t a bad thing, I knew from experience that it gave others the impression that they could do whatever they wanted and get away with it.

  I glanced around the parking lot as I strode toward my building. It was still pretty empty, but it looked like people were slowly making their way back home. There wasn’t any sign of Officer Asshole, though, which was good. I didn’t have any idea why he was bothering Kara, but I was going to put a stop to it if it happened again.

  Trying to figure out where I’d seen the guy before, I let myself into my apartment. Something about the cop was familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. I had to have met him before or at least seen him around. I had a feeling once I figured that out, I’d know why he was being a dick.

  As I was grabbing what I needed in the bedroom, the front door opened and I paused. I wasn’t sure if I was relieved or not that it wasn’t someone trying to rob us—just my dickhead brother coming home. I straightened, ready to go out and confront him when I thought of Kara, sheepishly smiling at me in nothing but a towel.

  I’d deal with Curtis later—when she wasn’t waiting for me, all wet and sweet smelling from her shower.

  Thankfully, he didn’t say a word as he passed my doorway and I completely ignored him as he went into his room and shut the door. I guessed he wasn’t anxious for round two as I was.

  By the time I got back to Kara and Charlie’s apartment, Kara was out of the shower and sitting with Charlie at their kitchen table.

  Well… fuck.

  “Well, hello there,” Charlie said, grinning. “I see you have a key.”

  “Took Kara’s,” I replied, lifting the keys up to show her. “Glad you’re home.”

  “You sound very excited to see me,” Charlie replied drolly. “Sorry to rain on your sex parade.”

  “Oh, shut up,” Kara said, reaching over to flick her.

  “What?” Charlie replied. “He even brought clothes!”

  “I was gonna take a shower,” I said.

  “And you couldn’t have showered at your own apartment?” Charlie asked in amusement. “Less than a block away?”

  Huh. Now I kind of felt like an idiot.

  “I told him he could shower here,” Kara said, getting up from the table. “He wants to use my nice soaps.”

  “Is that right?” Charlie asked, trying to hold back a smile.

  “I can go back,” I said with a shrug. I’d been in such a hurry to get back to Kara, I hadn’t even stopped to think I could shower at home. It wasn’t really a big deal for me to shower at my place real quick. Of course, there was a good chance Curtis wouldn’t be able to keep his mouth shut long enough for me to get cleaned up—but I wasn’t real worried about that. It was going to happen sooner or later.

  “No,” Kara said, coming toward me. “Just take a shower here.”

  She towed me to the bathroom as Charlie snickered.

  “She gave Curtis a ride home,” Kara said as we reached the bathroom. She grimaced, looking me over. “I guess he didn’t want to take Roxanne out in this. Did you see him?”

  “Heard him come in,” I replied. “Didn’t talk to him.”

  “I thought you wouldn’t be coming back,” she said, grabbing a towel from under the sink.

  “Told you I’d be back.”

  “I know,” she replied, shrugging. “But probably better if you just avoid him for a bit.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond. I sure as hell wasn’t going to promise not to get into it with my brother.

  “So the bottles are labeled,” she said jokingly as she gestured to the shower. “I think you’ve got it from here.”