Page 32 of Traces of Her
Twenty
ROWENA
HIS WORDS PLAY ON REPEAT, over and over in my mind, drowning out the sound of Scarlet’s annoying voice as she leads me into the house. I don’t care or pay attention to where I’m going, for the only thing I can see is the look in his eyes when he knew that I had heard him. Griffin played me to be the fucking fool and he was caught, point blank. I knew better than to actually trust someone, to let them in, to start to fall for them. This entire time I’d thought I was feeling good, that he was influencing all of the positives in my life. But he was the positive in my life. And that feeling was me falling, free from anything holding me back.
Why wasn’t there anything to hold me back?
Where were the warning signs, red flags, something?
They were all there, but there’s this little inconvenient thing that tends to get people into trouble a lot. Love. Hell, I didn’t even know what love was, I could never explain what love is to you. But Griffin. Griffin is love, what I feel for him, to me, that is love. And he destroyed it all before we truly had a chance.
“Ro.” Scarlet snaps her fingers in my face, drawing me out of my mind. She pulls a pack of cigarettes from her bra and pulls one out with her long dirty fingernails, putting it in between her chapped, cracked lips. “Have you heard a word I even said?”
Silently, I shake my head in response.
“Girl,” she says, blowing out a cloud of smoke. “It’s been a minute since I saw you.” She pauses, looking me up and down. “Griffin must be treatin’ you well because you look fuckin’ good.” She smiles, revealing her cracked and rotting teeth or at least the ones that aren’t missing yet.
Staring at the frizzy-haired blonde in front of me, I wish I could say the same about her. All of the drugs and alcohol transformed her into the walking, talking poster child for meth, crack, dope, you name it and I’m sure she does it. She’s withered away to nothing but picked at and scabbed skin and protruding bones.
There are no compliments to give, so returning the favor isn’t in the cards. “Thanks,” I reply indifferently.
She takes my response as an invitation to talk and she’s too high to notice that I sincerely don’t care about anything she has to say. She rambles on and on, talking enough for the both of us and keeps jumping from one subject to the next, I couldn’t keep up even if I cared to. Her life is a fucking shit show and she goes on about it with so much pride and enthusiasm, it’s pathetic and borderline sad.
“So,” she says, plopping down onto one of the dirty couches. “You and Griffin, huh?” She smiles again, showing off her ragged black teeth. “How is he? I mean Jared is a fucking freak, if you know what I’m saying.” She winks. “But shit, Griffin…” She trails off, looking at me expectantly.
Standing in the center of the room awkwardly, I look around at the mess of straight garbage surrounding me. “Things aren’t like that with us,” I confess, quietly.
“Shut the fuck up!” she exclaims, half jumping out of her seat. “You mean to tell me you’re living with that fine ass motherfucker and you ain’t even had the dick?”
I simply shrug, keeping my cards close and my poker face in place.
None of this is her goddamn business and she’s slowly skating on thin ice, regardless of what I heard Griffin say outside.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” she chuckles. “And I thought me getting to ride his cock wasn’t gonna happen anymore but looks like lady luck might be on my side right now.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I can taste the vomit as the acid burns my throat as the contents in my stomach threaten to come up. Swallowing hard, I struggle to keep it inside.
“Oh shit,” she gasps lightly. “My bad, girl, I didn’t realize you wanted him like that. Is it because you don’t take it up the ass? He seems like someone who’d beat that shit up and you don’t look like someone who’d take a good ass pounding.”
“Okay, you need to stop right there,” I bark, completely on the verge of losing full composure. I take a deep breath, fighting the urge to knock the rest of her teeth from her mouth. “Scarlet,” I say in a calmer, more neutral tone. “You couldn’t be more wrong with the things you are saying, so I’d highly suggest you fucking drop it.”
Her bloodshot eyes bulge out as she widens them and raises her hands in the air. “Okay, okay,” she gives in. “My bad, girl.” She stops for a moment, absentmindedly picking at a scab on her cheek. “Are you guys here for the show then?”
Cocking my head to the side, I draw my eyebrows together mulling over what ‘show’ she could possibly be talking about.
“Ah, fuck,” she smacks her forehead. “It was probably supposed to be a surprise.”
“What’s a fucking surprise?” Jared booms as the front door slams shut behind him. Scarlet and I both jump at the sudden noise, looking over at him with Griffin walking closer to me. I watch as he crosses the room with his dark eyes on mine, heavy with regret.
Scarlet lets out an exaggerated sigh. “With Lydia and Ryder here, I thought it was supposed to be a surprise or some shit since Ro seemed clueless,” she explains with a bored tone.
Griffin’s expression grows dark and he stops mid-step, spinning on his heel to face Jared. “What the fuck is she talking about?” he demands, staring him down.
“Yeah…” Jared scratches the back of his neck with a sheepish smile on his face. “I may have left out a few minor details on the phone.”
The moment the words leave Jared’s mouth, Griffin has him pushed against the wall with his hands wrapped around his throat. He’s an inch or so shorter, but he has Jared as far as muscle is concerned. He squeezes harder as Jared’s face turns from red to purple and his grin grows wider. I’m lost in the moment, watching the muscles ripple through Griffin’s shirt as he continues to squeeze the life out of his brother. He’s intimidating and dominating and every piece of what’s unfolding in front of me has me clenching my thighs together.
And then I see the movement, the light shining off of the metal. Jared’s arms were free, and his gun was in his hand. Scarlet’s screaming becomes background noise to the sound of my blood rushing through my head as I quickly make my move toward them. Griffin sees the flash of the pistol as Jared raising it to his temple, but he doesn’t let go. I don’t stop moving until I’m behind Griffin with my hands grabbing at his arms when I feel the cool metal pressing into my forehead.
Griffin releases his grip on Jared’s throat, letting his arms fall to his side in defeat. Jared coughs and hacks loudly but remains upright with a trained steady hand holding his gun to my head.
“And here I thought you didn’t have a weakness, little brother.” He chokes out a laugh. “Boy, was I fucking wrong or what?”