Brutally Beautiful(100)

“I automatically hate. That’s all I know…” I mumbled.

She leaned closer to me, smooth skin against my neck, “Last night, you told me you were falling in love with me…love doesn’t grow well when it’s surrounded by such hate. Stop hating everyone because of the f*cked up choices Thomas made. Thomas was Thomas, nobody else is Thomas.”

“But they could be. They could turn into a Thomas!” I barked.

She spun me around, tore the sleeve of my coat down, and lifted my shirt harshly up my back. “No, Kade! No! They could be a Leslie, a Gemma, a Henry, a Cory…” she listed the names of my friends who were killed, while gently touching their names with cool fingertips. “You’re forgetting the innocent people and always remembering the wicked one.”

I yanked my arm away from her, and shrugged my coat back on my shoulder. By now, the whole of the store was watching our fight. “My freedom was taken from me that day!”

“No, Kade, it wasn’t. Your security was taken from you that day. Your freedom is the choice to let it happen every day since then. This is your life. You don’t even watch it fly by. You closed your f*cking eyes to it, until you saw some waitress with a nice rack. You want to love, Kade, so give up the shit that weighs you down and makes you hate. Let it go. I will f*cking meet you half way. I let go of my baggage, if you let go of yours or we’re going to hit each other with the heavy packages for the rest of our lives.”

My f*cking head started buzzing like a cloud of killer bees was circling me. The voices of the people around me sounded too loud, they moved around too strangely, and they watched me too cautiously. “That’s a bloody joke, right? For the rest of our lives? You’re leaving here; you’re leaving me. So there’s no meeting anyone half way, is there?” I shifted angrily away from her as the line moved and I started slamming down the items on the conveyer belt at the register.

She scrunched her eyebrows together and lay her hand on my chest, “You’re angry because I’m leaving?” The question was asked with pure innocent astonishment. Fuck, she really didn’t get it, did she?

“I told you. You’re going to destroy me,” I hissed behind clenched teeth, as the items beeped past the electronic register in the hands of the cashier.

Instantly, she closed the distance between our angry, coiled bodies, curled her hands tightly around the back of my neck and pulled me down to her lips. Like a lamb to its slaughter, I went.

“Kade…” she whispered against my lips.

“I know I’m being so f*cking selfish right now, but Sam, I f*cking need you in my life. Stay here with me. I swear I will never let him hurt you again. I’ll help you get a job at the hospital here, we’ll…”

“I‘m not a surgeon anymore, I can’t be; he made sure to take that away from me. You don’t know.” Her eyes filled will tears, but they didn’t spill. She held them in, I knew not to waste any more on him.

“That will be $286.31,” the cashier yelled between us.





Chapter 15





I never thought about staying. My only clear realistic thoughts were getting away from where David knew I was; the very place where he sent someone to kill me. Sloppily, I might add. David usually did things methodically and cleverly, planned everything out perfectly. He must be getting desperate.

Kade wanted to know all about David. Nothing could beat the insane, head bashing, crapslapping experience that was David. He had left enough marks on my flesh, but what he did to my insides was damage that was beyond repairable, and telling Kade wouldn’t change anything. If anything, it would get him angrier than he already was, and the man was a ticking time bomb. Detonating him would only get him hurt, really hurt. Me staying in this town would get him killed, because if David knew I had feelings for someone, it would be an invitation to annihilate him.