Crave Me (The Good Ol' Boys #4)(16)

“No! Don’t do that. Answer me. Are they doing those things or not, Austin?”

“Ask him. Ask your Bo,” I mocked.

Her eyes filled up with tears. I wish I could tell you that I felt bad, that I regretted telling her the truth she was so blind to see.

I didn’t.

At least not that time.

“She’s just a girl, Half-Pint. She’s just a f*cking girl.”

She jerked back like I had slapped her across the face, and then she took a step toward me. Invading my personal space, the same one I wanted that day. She gazed deep into my eyes for what felt like a lifetime.

My truths that I hid…

From her.

From the boys.

From the world.

Especially…

From. Me.

Stared her blatantly in the face for the first time in our short complicated lives.

“Would you hurt me like that, Austin? Would you hurt me like Bo hurts me, just for a girl?”

I watched how her hair blew in the wind. How new freckles had formed on the bridge of her nose from the sun. How her lips were parted and her body slightly trembled, waiting on pins and needles for my response. The smell of her sunscreen and cherry lip-gloss assaulted my senses, leaving a sense of longing for the little girl in pigtails. The same little girl that would follow her good ol’ boys around everywhere we went.

I took in every last detail we loved about her.

“Yes,” I lied.

That was my first and biggest mistake.





<>Briggs<>


I was almost twelve years old and settling into my new life. Another three years had flown by. The life and memories I once knew went right along with it. Everyday I remembered my parents less and less. Everyday another piece of my heart went missing, disappearing and leaving me with nothing but the hollow, empty space that formed in its place.

I read and I wrote a lot.

I had a huge collection of books. My otherwise neat room was filled with stacks of novels. Stories that were poured out of someone’s heart and soul onto a piece of paper for another person’s enjoyment. These books were my freedom.

Sometimes the books were about epic love and other times they were deeper than that, life lessons on yellowed paper. My collection was quite impressive thanks to my uncle who spared no expense to indulge me. I loved getting lost in the fictional worlds of the author’s creations. It took away the pain from my own.

My way of escaping.

My book friends.

Where I was loved, cared for, and cherished. Where there’s always a happily ever after and the hero always ends up with the heroine. Those were my favorite kinds of stories.

Except, my story wouldn’t be one of those, and I knew that even then.

I’d been writing in a journal for the last few years. At first it was memories of my parents so I wouldn’t forget them, but then somewhere along the way I began writing about my feelings and emotions.

My journal became more therapeutic than a remembrance of the people I tried to keep so deeply in my heart.

Esteban caught me writing a few times, and to my surprise, he never asked to read what I wrote. He never even asked what I was writing.

He just called it, “The window to your soul.” Which was all he ever said about it.

Esteban was a man of very few words, but when he did talk, it meant something. I really liked that about him. He never felt the need to fill the silence with meaningless banter. So when he said something I really listened, appreciating the wisdom he may have to offer.

I’d changed schools four more times in the last three years and at the rate I was going, there wouldn’t be any more schools to transfer to. A few things changed with my uncle for the better I guess. He was around a lot more, and we ate dinner together a few nights a week. He asked me how my day was and if there was anything I needed or wanted. That was pretty much the extent of our conversations, but at least he tried.

“How was class?” Esteban asked, pulling me away from my thoughts.

I started taking a creative writing course outside of school. The instructor was nice and most of the students kept to themselves, lost in their own thoughts about what they would be writing on the blank pages of the notebooks placed in front of them.

“It was good,” I answered, looking at his face in the rearview mirror as he drove.

“I bet you write better than all your friends.”

I scoffed. “You’re my only friend, Esteban.”

Our eyes locked through the rearview mirror.

“You listen to me, and you’re there when I need you. I guess you’re my chosen person,” I shyly smiled.

He didn’t falter. “I’m not your friend, Daisy,” he informed, catching me off guard.

My happy moment was quickly replaced with disappointment.

“I’m your bodyguard and driver. I work for your uncle. Don’t ever forget that,” he rudely added, focusing back on the road in front of him as if I didn’t exist.

He’d never treated me like that before, and I tried to hide my tears because in my mind I thought he was my friend.

The only one I had.





Chapter 5





<>Austin<>



“That feel good, baby?” I groaned into her ear, rubbing her clit in slow progressive circles.