So Toxic(Bad Boy Next Door Book 4)(306)

I hiked Lou to my chest, blanket and all, and dodged Candace’s grasping hand as I darted out the door.

A touch at my lower back pulls me from my nightmare of a memory, one that still occasionally haunts me when I sleep. I usually break out of it, sitting bolt upright in bed, covered in cold sweat, so thankful I got to her in time.

The girl I carried out of this shit-ass excuse for a house stands before me, smiling and beautiful. I swallow the panic still lingering from the memory too real to completely ignore.

Lou’s hair is mussed and tangled from a night of making love. “Hey, I brought you some coffee. You okay? You look like you’ve got a bad case of indigestion.”

I take the cup and pull her to my chest, resting my chin on the top of her head. “I’ll never regret getting you out of that house. I’m sorry things didn’t go the way you wanted, and that you’re still angry. But I can’t wish it was different.”

She stiffens and pulls away. Wiping the dew from a clump of grass with bare toes tipped in purple, she expels a heavy breath and shrugs.

I push the hair from her eyes, sliding my hand to the back of her neck. “I missed you, Lou.”

She backs up, not even raising her eyes to look at me before she turns and walks away.





EIGHTEEN





My hands cradle my head as I sit on the side of the bed Buck and I just climbed out of not even an hour ago.

How is it possible to wake up feeling the world might just be smiling on me, only to have old memories explode like a roadside IED, ruining the day, maybe even the week.

Mom had threatened to do it; a hundred times she’d said it.

“Someday you’re gonna pay me back for all I do for you. That little twat you’ve got. It’s worth some money. We’ll sell it to the highest bidder and make a mint. I sure as hell wish we’d had the internet when I was your age. I’d have had a nice little nest egg.”

It wasn’t like she hadn’t warned me. Maybe that’s why she started hating my friendship with Buck around the time I began to develop.

She’d say, “Don’t go giving that boy anything. It’s not his to have, and he ain’t got no money to pay for it.”

Aunt Delores had tried a few times to get Momma to let me come live with her and Uncle Manny. But Momma wasn’t having it.

“The state will cut me off if she lives somewhere else. I have to have my check. It’s bad enough Loula’s going to turn eighteen someday. I’m not going back to turning tricks.”

Somehow, even though I’d heard it often enough, it always seemed like something that would happen far into the future. Not something that she’d do when I hadn’t even turned seventeen.

A month or so before my birthday, I’d been over at Aunt Delores’s, helping her in her flowerbeds. Momma wasn’t home yet—no telling where she’d spent the night.

When I got out of the shower, voices from the living room bled through the walls. Momma’s company was never a good thing. The smell turned my sinking stomach sour. It was a sure sign she and her guest had been smoking crack, its odor rank enough to induce nausea.

Crap. I left my clothes in my room. I wrapped tight in a towel and held my breath as I opened the door, peeking out before I took the first step into the hall.

Before I made it to my room, Mom called after me. “Loula Mae, c’mon in here. I have someone who wants to meet you.”

I took another silent step toward my door, hoping she’d think I hadn’t heard.

But she stepped to the end of the hall. “Now, you wait just one second, Girl. You mind your momma. Come in here.”

I turned, my grip tight on the towel. “I will. Just let me get some clothes on.”

She laughed. “Oh, hell. Don’t worry with that. D’Jon’s gonna want to see you naked.”

My leg muscles tightened, ready to run. But running from Momma always resulted in a beating that left me bruised for days. Maybe she was kidding. Surely she couldn’t be serious.

A tall, dark figure joined Mom at the end of the hall, his face shadowed, like a nightmare waiting to happen.

And he was.

If it hadn’t been for Buck, my life would have looked so different. There’s no doubt in my mind; that wouldn’t have been the only time Momma sold me to some guy.

Without Buck, I’d probably never have gotten out.

I let go of a shaky breath. Did I ever even thank him?

He didn’t kill D’Jon, even though that’s what Mom screamed as Buck carried me out. But he put a hurtin’ on him. And then he put a whole different kind of hurtin’ on Momma. He forced her hand in letting me get out from under her thumb.

I push to my feet. Enough of this.