Ridge Read online

  Just not my girl.

  Her bottom lip puffed out and I knew I wasn’t doing my job well enough.

  I’d need an acting class at this rate.

  “Smells great in here.” I pecked her on the lips and turned her toward the stove. Her eyes lowered in disappointment before I swatted her on the ass full force. She giggled and rubbed where my palm had connected, and just like that, she was okay again.

  I ran a hand through my hair, turned, and rested my hands on the counter, feet planted hip distance apart, and sucked in a sharp breath.

  I was fucking losing it.

  Amy babbled on about her day. Asked about my day. I gave one-word answers because my mind was somewhere else entirely.

  My mind was with Mia.

  Just like it had been every night for the last few weeks.

  You’d think the longer we were apart, the longer I didn’t hear from her, the memory of us would be lost, but that wasn’t the case. Not at all.

  The ache grew. The memories haunted me.

  “Need any help?” I ran a hand through my hair and turned back to Amy watching me with downcast eyes.

  “Where were you just now?”

  “Mmm . . . lots going on at work. Sorry.”

  “Sit down. I’ll serve.” She rubbed her hand down my back. I pecked her on the lips to try to reassure her, before turning to the table and dropping into a chair.

  I wanted a drink so fucking bad. I clenched and unclenched my fists, tapped my fingers on the table, fidgeted like a fucking addict as I thought about the slow burn of the bourbon as it traveled down my throat. The buzz that lit up my system and filled my head with nothingness. The nothingness I craved.

  “Looks great.” I smiled and placed a hand on her bare thigh. Amy leaned over, revealing a hint of cleavage. I trailed my hand up her torso, flicked my thumb under the curve of her breast before pulling away. Her breath hitched and disappointment crawled across her face again.

  “You look beautiful,” I murmured before digging into the pasta Bolognese on my plate. Amy’s signature dish, the one I usually loved, but could hardly stomach tonight.

  Tonight felt like a culmination.

  I think I’d secretly hoped that she’d have left me by now. That I wouldn’t have to face the sixth week post miscarriage. The night she was cleared to be with me.

  Tonight felt like it meant something. I’d stuck my dick in countless women for years and never cared, so why did it matter so much now?

  What a fucking fool to think I’d developed morals all of a sudden at the age of twenty-nine.

  I picked at dinner before helping Amy clean up, and headed to the balcony for a smoke.

  I pulled out a Dunhill, lit it, and took my first long puff when Amy traipsed out, still in the little boy shorts and apron get up. She pulled my cigarette out of my mouth and stubbed it out in the ashtray before straddling my lap.

  She placed both hands around my neck, dusting her thumbs along my jawline. My eyes fluttered closed as I imagined someone else's hands there. Olive-skinned hands, perfect pink lips, dark-rimmed green eyes. I swallowed the pain that was lodged in my throat and brought my palms up Amy’s thighs to land at her ass. I palmed roughly, giving her what she wanted, what she thought I wanted.

  I slipped my fingertips under her panties and kneaded.

  I pulled and pushed as she rocked against me and moaned.

  I ran a hand up her ribcage and slipped it under the fabric of the apron to palm her breast. I tweaked the nipple and pulled. Twisted and flicked and then kneaded the round flesh again. She groaned and landed her lips on mine, pressing and thrusting her tongue as she worked back and forth on me.

  “Not here,” I growled when she leaned back to unhook her apron.

  “Here.” Her eyes flicked with dangerous lust.

  I licked my lips as the strings fell to the side and the fabric pooled around her waist, revealing the soft globes of her tits. I grabbed them both and pressed them together, then ducked my head to flick at a nipple with my tongue.

  Her hand traveled down my stomach to reach for my zipper.

  “Seriously?” she murmured when she rubbed against my crotch to find no sign of life. No raging erection. No hard-on ready to burst the zipper.

  I ignored her and kept licking at her nipple, pinching before slipping a hand into her panties and stroking her wet flesh.

  “Ridge?” She pulled away from my hands, her eyes flicking down to my flaccid cock.

  “Amy . . . fuck, I . . .” I swallowed and tried to form words.

  “Are you not ready? The doctor said it was fine if we—”

  “No, I know, I know, it’s . . . I’m fucked up . . .” I trailed off, letting her assume what she wanted.

  “Baby.” She pulled me into her arms and stroked my hair. I sucked in deep breaths at the curve of her neck.

  “I wanted the baby too. I’m so sorry I lost it.” Tears trickled down her cheeks and dampened my neck. She thought I was fucked up over losing the baby. This was good. This was what I wanted. Because she couldn’t hear the truth, or know it. It would be the final nail, would destroy her, possibly have her homicidal and out for blood. And I would deserve it. Oh, the irony.

  “Sorry,” I murmured as she sucked on the flesh at my neck. “Can we just go to bed?”

  “Yeah,” she whispered as I picked her up, strode into the bedroom, and tucked us both under the blankets.

  She curled into me after I stripped off my shirt and lay next to her.

  “Will you tell me about this one?” She traced a finger along the ink on my forearm. It was the tattoo she always asked about. The one I hadn't had the courage to tell her about before.

  Maybe if I told her now, that would be it. It would finally open her eyes to how bad I was for her.

  “Remember when I told you the story about juvie? How bad it was, the guards?”

  “Yeah,” she murmured into my chest.

  “There's more to that story. There was one guard . . . he was brutal. Really tough on everyone. He worked the night shift, when it was quiet. So silent that sometimes you could hear a pin drop, which made it excruciating when you heard the creak of the heavy metal door. That noise still haunts me. I flinch whenever I hear it . . .”

  I paused as I stared at the ceiling and she continued to trace circles on my stomach. “He raped them. He raped so many boys. You could hear grunts, crying, soft pleas, but they never screamed, they never reported him. He threatened them, and where else did they have to go? We were already at the end of the road. Hell on Earth.”

  “Oh my God.” Tears burned in her eyes before trickling down her cheeks.

  “One night, I heard the creak. I waited for the footsteps. He’d never touched me. I don’t know why, but that night, he finally came. The door opened to my room and I held my breath. I knew this was it. I knew it was my time, and I knew I’d rather die than have his fat fingers on me. I lay rigid in that bed, waiting for the right moment. I let him think I was asleep. As if any of us ever slept at night. We didn’t close our eyes until the grunting was over and we knew he would be gone for the night.”

  Her hand stilled on my chest and her other hand fisted at my side. “It’s okay, Ridge. Whatever happened it, it's okay.”

  “The story isn’t over yet,” I said, my voice so dead and calm that it was eerie. “He stepped closer, bent over me, his rancid breath in my face. I was waiting for that night. I knew right in that moment that I would kill him if I had to. I wouldn’t let him hurt me, or anyone else. He knelt on the bed, touched my thigh. I cringed, but he couldn’t see in the dark. His hand went to my waistband and I knew, I knew that was it.” Rage boiled in my gut at the memory. I was reliving it, right here for her. Just like I relived it in the darkness of my nightmares. The nightmares that had been chasing me every night since then.

  “I slipped my fingertips under the mattress and pulled out a weapon I'd had stashed there. I'd bound wire from the bedsprings together and sharpened it. It was a
dagger, a deadly weapon that I'd made, waiting for this night. Waiting for him to come. It sat there, tucked in the same place for months, waiting for that exact moment.

  “I stabbed him in the neck. Blood squirted everywhere and he howled. I pushed him off me, he landed on the floor, a soft thunk when his head hit the concrete. I jumped on him and kept stabbing. And then dropped the weapon and continued with my fists. I lost it. I was out to take his life, because while those other boys may have walked away, he’d taken their lives just as if he’d killed them dead.

  “So I started swinging, landing jabs at his face, pounding his head, blood splattering as I heaved on top of him, throwing punch after punch. Finally, I collapsed on the bed, covered in blood, panting and unseeing. Unaware of anything around me. I don’t know how long I went at him, but another guard came to check on him a while later, and then everything exploded. Lights went on; police were called. I was locked in the hole for days. They refused me water and food until I agreed to tell them what happened. I told them nothing. Luckily, the other kids stood up for me. They finally felt safe because I’d killed him. I killed him, Amy. I fucking killed him.” My hands shook as anxiety swallowed me whole. My eyes were unseeing as the ceiling of my bedroom morphed into the one at juvie.

  “Jesus. You didn’t mean to. It’s still not your fault—”

  “I meant to. I didn’t know if I had the strength to do it, but if ever given the chance, I wanted to. I knew I would at least try. I meant to kill him, Amy. And I did. I took his life. He was someone’s son, someone’s brother, neighbor, maybe husband, I don’t know, and I took his life with a few short blows. I murdered him.”

  “He deserved it, Ridge.”

  “Really? I don’t think anyone deserves that.”

  “What he did—”

  “He should have stood trial for. Been proven guilty, shamed, and mortified all over the newspaper. But as it was, he died and nothing ever happened. It was covered up. And I have his blood on my hands.

  “The director deemed it self defense and they swept it under the rug. I had to serve out the rest of my time in the hole, but it was okay. The guards treated me well after they found out what was going on. And I didn’t want to be around anyone anyway. I couldn’t even look at myself; how could I look at anyone else?”

  “Ridge.” She crawled on top of me, plastered her body against mine, and wrapped her arms around my torso, hugging me fiercely, as if she could protect me. That was Amy. So much good in her. So much forgiveness.

  “The tattoo is the date I killed him.” My voice had gone blank again. She lifted her head from my shoulder. Her eyes held mine before flicking down to my forearm.

  “Why would you put that on your body?” She looked appalled.

  “To remember. I never want to forget what I did, what I’m capable of.”

  “Baby, it isn't a reminder, you're hanging onto the guilt. That’s poisoning you.” She traced the Roman numbers with her fingertips.

  XI.X.MMII

  “I deserve it. I had no right to steal someone's life, no matter what they did. That’s why we have a legal system.”

  “A legal system that doesn’t always work.” She shot straight up, her knees on either side of my hips.

  “It’s okay, Amy.” I trailed a hand down her neck, down the center of her naked body before landing at the waistband of her lacy underwear. I pulled the elastic and snapped it against her skin.

  “Stop. We need to—”

  “We don’t need to do anything. You asked. I told you that you didn’t want to know, and now I’ve told you. Let's go to bed.”

  “Ridge—”

  “Bed,” I growled as I yanked her down into my side, turned her away from me, and curled my body around hers. I heard her breaths coming in deep pants, felt her heart hammering in her chest beneath my arm. She wiggled and shifted, unable to get comfortable. I closed my eyes, trailed circles on the silky skin at her wrist, and willed myself to sleep.

  Was this it? Would Amy wake up in the morning and realize she's been sharing a bed with a murderer and hit the road, never to look back?

  She thought I was justified in taking his life because of the horror he'd inflicted.

  Everyone thinks they’d kill someone that could touch a child the way that evil man had, but until you have blood on your hands, until you've snuffed out a life just like that, you can’t fathom the emptiness that fills you. Eats at you. Spreads through your body until the only thing left is pain and despair. You’ve suddenly become no better than the evil you so easily snuffed out.

  Another month went by and Amy and I were different. An entire month, and because Amy thought I was still fucked up over the miscarriage, she hadn’t approached me for sex. Which was a good thing because I still couldn’t get it up.

  My fucking dick didn’t get hard for anything and I fucking tried. I tried to please Amy. I knew she wanted the connection between us, but I was sinking.

  I was sinking so far, falling into the darkness, that I’d started drinking again. I’d gotten sloppy.

  I took some days off work, or worked from home in my boxers and nothing else. I trailed around the house with my laptop and a bottle. I smoked like a fucking chimney as I ran over the night with Amy when I’d told her everything in my head.

  And still she remained. Anger began to flare after the first week.

  How could she stay? Why would she want to?

  We were now officially two months after the miscarriage and she was still with me, still living in my house, coming home every night with that fake fucking smile on her face that drove me insane.

  So I drank more. She mentioned it here and there, emptied the glasses that sat around the house half-full, cleaned up the ashtrays, and wiped the counters of the bourbon rings that I left in my foggy wake.

  And still she remained.

  Amy begged me to go out one night with her friends, a couple she’d known for a while. We’d never been out with her friends before. I wasn’t much for social interaction, but I was drunk most hours of the day, so she dragged me. She pushed me into the shower, picked out my clothes, tucked in my button-down shirt, and grabbed my wallet as we headed out the door.

  We got to the restaurant and I ordered a drink.

  By the time the picture perfect couple joined us, I was on drink three. Amy was rolling her eyes and nudging me under the table to talk.

  Brian was a computer engineer and his charming wife Samantha a stay-at-home mom to two little monsters—his term, not mine.

  I was sick of Amy kicking me, sick of the bartender watering down my drink, so I shuffled out of my chair halfway through dinner and sauntered to the bar. I slammed the glass on the bar top and interrupted the bartender as he served another drink.

  “Macallan's, straight, no fucking ice, no fucking filler,” I growled and pinned him with a stare.

  “Ridge, you don’t need any more.”

  The bartender connected eyes with Amy and realization dawned.

  “You told him to water me down? What the fuck?” I shoved her away from me and tears flamed her eyes.

  “Hey, man. We don’t need this.” The bartender placed a hand on my forearm.

  “Get the fuck off.” I shrugged his hand off me.

  “Ridge, I didn’t want you to embarrass yourself.”

  “Too fucking late. Macallan's. Now.” I pinned the bartender again.

  “No can do, man. I think it’s time for you to leave.”

  “Fucking hack establishment anyway.” I turned and launched a barstool across the room. Heads shot up and a soft murmur rippled through the crowded room before a big guy took me by the bicep and dragged me to the door. “I can fucking walk, prick.” I wrenched my arm away from him and walked out the front doors and down the street. I stalked to the nearest liquor store and bought a bottle before tucking it under my arm and lighting a cigarette.

  “Ridge. Come on.” Amy pulled up beside me in her little car, the window rolled down. “Let's go home.”
<
br />   “Fuck off.”

  “Ridge. Grow up. Come on.” Amy threw the car in park and launched out the driver door.

  “Fuck off, Amy. I told you everything inside me and you’re still fucking here. Fuck off.”

  “Of course I’m here. I love you.” She was trying to talk me down. Her arms trailed around my biceps, torso, and neck. “Let me take you home.” She pulled the bottle from my hands and guided me to the car, a soft smile on her face.

  “Let me finish my smoke.”

  She passed a tight smile as she waited patiently with the door hanging open. I started at her, my eyes hard and unforgiving as I power-smoked my cigarette. I blew the last puff toward her before tossing the butt and falling into the car. She shut the door behind me and then crawled behind the wheel. We pulled away, headed toward my apartment. Our apartment. Fuck if I knew anymore.

  When we got home, I poured myself another drink.

  Amy dropped her purse and keys, slipped out of her shoes, her eyes on me the whole time. I ignored her as I hit the balcony, the setting sun casting shadows on the streets.

  “We should talk.” She padded out and plopped in the lounger next to me.

  “Yeah.” This was it; she was leaving. I’d finally pushed her over the edge.

  “You need help, maybe AA.”

  I raised my eyebrows in surprise. Not what I was expecting. I didn’t expect her still to care. I did need help, but nothing AA could provide.

  “I’m not going to AA.”

  “What do you think you need?” she asked softly. Had she been a fucking counselor in another life? Knew how to talk people off the ledge?

  “I need . . . I need . . . to fuck.” I ran a hand through my hair and yanked as hard as I could.

  “Oh . . . we can—”

  “No, baby, you don’t get me. I need to fuck. Dirty. Get it out. Pour it all into pussy. It’s the only thing.” I cocked a menacing smile at her. Her face blanched, her eyes wide as saucers.

  “I’m afraid . . .” she murmured.

  “I know.” And finally, finally my fucking dick twitched. Finally, after two months, the little bastard was stirring to life.

  For fear.