Jacked (Trent Brothers #1)(73)

I WAS IN the throes of a familiar reoccurring dream—the one where I’m back in high school of all places, and I’ve obviously forgotten to wear shoes again. My feet are bare and the industrial flooring is cold, and I am becoming more and more frantic because I can’t remember my locker combination. Random numbers barrage my brain as I spin the dial on the lock, but none of them seems to be correct, and for the life of me I can no longer even remember the PIN for my ATM card. An older woman with shellacked blonde hair clears her throat and informs me that I’ve missed a few important tests and therefore I’ll have to repeat my last year of high school because I haven’t technically graduated.

Somehow I know this is all so preposterous and untrue but I can neither stop the dream from unfurling or from letting it upset me. I knew I shouldn’t have argued with the strange woman because now the police have come to remove me from class. People are staring, some in shock, others with glee.

The cold steel they place around my wrists echo their frigidness down into my fingertips, making them as numb as the rest of me. A chill blasts down my spine. I wish I had shoes on; the floor is so cold. They don’t care that I didn’t do it. My words fall on deaf ears. Mrs. Morton is crying, pointing a finger at me, screaming accusations of murder that are untrue! Blue vomit dripped from the lifeless body clutched in my arms. Someone make her put down the chainsaw! Please!

I woke on a gasp, pulled right out of the fog of sleep. Despite the black-out curtains covering the solitary window, bright sunlight was still beaming down from the edges, casting a warm, ethereal hue over everything.

It took me a few moments to realize that I wasn’t in my own bed. My bedroom walls were still painted their original sterile white, not soothing sandstone. After three years, I still hadn’t gotten around to changing the color or making my mark on the place. The harsh reality was that my place wasn’t really mine. It didn’t belong to me.

I blinked a few times and rubbed the sleep from my eyes, rationalizing that the loud machine noises were coming from outside and not from the inside of my inebriated skull. My chest muscles felt strained from having expelled the contents of my stomach, but the pounding headache seemed to have mostly subsided. I didn’t even want to think about the complexity of toxins poisoning my system.

Shit, Erin. Let’s not do that ever again.

My head felt like it weighed a lot less resting on the mound of soft pillows. I was warm, cozy. Adam’s bed was super comfortable, cradling my body in some invisible layer of cushioned protectiveness. The soft blankets covering me held enough weight to keep me snuggled in though they did nothing to prevent the onslaught of reality from slamming into my thoughts.

Visions of my mother crying, utterly devastated, melded with the sounds of the rest of my family member’s painful reactions from yesterday. I’d been preparing for this outcome since the moment the extent of his injuries were assessed, and from a medical standpoint, was surprised my uncle had lasted as long as he did. Uncle Cal’s passing was probably for the best. A vegetative state was no way to live.

My own body felt in a vegetative state, lethargic and weak. I rubbed my face, trying to make the barrage of unwanted thoughts go away, and rolled over slowly, only to find Adam’s side of the bed rumpled but empty. I closed my eyes, imagining what it might be like to wake with him beside me on a regular basis.

Outside, faint voices were drowned out by the whirl of snow blowers and the scraping sounds of shovels. Apparently last night’s storm was over and Adam’s neighborhood was digging out. My eyes were still heavy, though the clock on his nightstand indicated it was after ten.

My car. That thought had me tossing the covers off.

I found the light switch on the wall in the bathroom and winced at my haggard reflection in the mirror. The purple and yellow crescent-shaped bruise under my eye didn’t help. I needed a hot shower and clean clothes and most definitely a toothbrush. Adam’s baggy florescent green T-shirt was okay but not…

Wait…

What?

I held the shirt out, seeing the image of what appeared to be a martini glass and a car key in the center of a circle with a slash across everything.

I felt my eyes go wide with astonishment.

And here I thought Adam was just the strong, silent type. Apparently he had a wicked sense of humor. I found my jeans and pulled them on but my black, long-sleeved shirt was missing. I searched everywhere, even under the bed. Next to his bedroom was a hallway closet and two smaller bedrooms; one containing a desk and makeshift office and the other barren except for some tools, some cans of paint, a canvas tarp covering the floor, and strips of white molding. Would he hide the rest of my clothes on purpose? It made no sense.

I had just found my hat and scarf on the floor in his living room downstairs when I heard Adam come into his kitchen, his alarm system announcing his arrival. The mechanical grind of a closing garage door reverberated behind him. That moment of awkward silence hit me—the one where you’re not sure if the guy really wants to see you hanging around in his house the next day or if I should ask where he put my coat so I could scatter quickly.

He eyed me warily, which did nothing for me to be able to read his mood.

“Hey. Didn’t think you’d be up yet.”

I ran a hand through my hair, hoping he wouldn’t be appalled my haggard appearance. “I heard the snow blowers.” I pointed toward the windows. “I was going to come help you but I can’t seem to find my coat or my other sock.”