13. Theo Glass

Chapter 13

Theo Glass

I slammed my head against the wall.

“Fuck!”

My bathroom wall was solid concrete. I hit my head again. The cracking sound made an echo in the room. The stinging pain was sharp. My brain felt like it’d been tossed into a blender. Stars burst across my vision.

I did it again.

“ Fuck ! ”

I stumbled backward, leaned on the bathroom countertop. The room spun, representing the exact way I felt inside.

I’d made a grave mistake. Messed up in a way that would end me. I had no doubt about it.

The anxiety was severe. The panic was a brutal claw that sunk into my lungs and threatened to rip them right out of my chest. I had already downed a Xanax chased by tequila, and that still wasn’t working to numb me. It was as if I were caught out in a raging storm. I didn’t know what was the ground and what was the ceiling. I had no sense of what was right, only what was wrong.

I turned to look at myself in the mirror. Blood dripped down my forehead, over my nose. It reached my lips. I could taste it. Copper. Iron. Regret.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I had spent too long with Jace. Told him too much. I told him about Marielle.

How the fuck had she slipped across my tongue like that? I had vowed to never bring her up, to never tell anyone about her. Why? So they could pity a ghost? Only I could cherish her memory. My little sister, taking from me because of the twisted fucking monsters that all needed to pay.

And yet, there I was, lying naked with this man who was becoming something like a tumor. He was growing inside of me. Making me sick. Making me make bad judgment calls.

On the other hand, he was also the man who could calm these emotions. Somehow, someway, he was able to quiet the panic and dread that coiled inside me like a cobra waiting to strike. I had no idea how he did it, but he worked faster than the pills I took and the liquor I drank.

Why? Why did it have to be the one man who could end me?

Why had I made these choices?

Why couldn’t I turn back time?

I pushed off the countertop. I reared back, ready to crack my skull against the wall. Be done with it .

A meow from my feet stopped me. Luke. He was the only other soul in this world who had the same powers as Jace. He twined between my legs. His tail wrapped around my calf. He started to purr. I crouched down and gave him the chin scratches he asked for.

Oh, Luke. What a simple, beautiful life he lived. I found him roaming the streets, clearly having been in a fight, blood still dripping from the chunk torn off his ear. He allowed me to pick him up without any struggle. I took him to the vet, got him cleaned up, brought him home the next day. This was three years ago, around the same time I lost Marielle. She’d been my only best friend. The person who understood the trauma that scarred my soul since she had lived through it with me.

I always imagined that she had sent Luke my way. It was why I called him Luke in the first place, after Luke Skywalker, Marielle’s favorite fictional character. Someone who had a bright soul but still went to the dark side eventually.

You can’t escape the darkness, not when it’s already inside you.

But you could harness it. You could muzzle it temporarily. Try and contain it.

I stood back up. Instead of banging my head against the wall again, I went to the sink, let the water run warm before I splashed it across my face. The cut on my forehead wasn’t too bad, but head wounds always bled more than they seemingly should. All those veins and vessels carrying blood to the most important organ of the body. The one responsible for the rushing torrent of anxiety that currently gripped me.

Luke followed me back into my living room. The medication was beginning to work. A delicious kind of numbness began to set in, making my limbs a little heavier and my thoughts less dangerous. Instead of sharp daggers, they turned to dull butter knives. I moved to the couch and looked out the window at the park underneath. Luke jumped onto my lap and continued to purr.

I lifted him up and kissed his head. He wasn’t always this big of a cuddle-bug. I held him tight.

The night with Jace at the bathhouse had been two days ago, and I still couldn’t stop thinking about it. The start of this obsession was a raw, undeniable force. And it wasn’t just physical—though that had a lot to do with it. There was more. It was in the quiet moments we lay there, his arms wrapped around me, cock still inside me. As though we were lovers on a honeymoon in Paris and not two horny men locked in a dark room of a sex house. And the conversations we had. Simple, yet still informative.

He knew I had a sister now. Knew I loved Hawaii. I told him my family was from the military.

Of course, I didn’t tell him about how my father abused us. How he drove my mother to suicide. How he pushed my sister into the darkest, seediest, deadliest corners of the world. If there were truly someone on this Earth that deserved death, it was him. I hoped he had found it. I had no idea where he was, what he was doing, who he was hurting. Maybe I’d find him one day. Maybe I’d hurt him back.

Maybe that was my true goal.

I gently moved Luke onto a soft yellow pillow and went to the kitchen. Poured myself another drink. Whiskey this time. I wanted to sip it.

My phone dinged. It was my actual phone, not the burner. I was expecting to connect with another one from Pressure Point, but they were being cagey.

I walked back into the living room and unlocked the phone. It was a message from Jace.

JACE: Hey. Checking in. How are you?

I laughed, imagining how he’d respond if I were honest with him.

THEO: I’m currently still bleeding from a panic attack that almost had me cracking my skull open because I feel like I’m falling for you, which is the biggest mistake I can ever possibly make, but I can’t pull myself out of whatever spiral you’re drawing me into.

I deleted that message.

THEO: I’m good. Just having a drink at home. You?

JACE: Same. Long day at work.

I’m sure it was. I hadn’t been making his job easy. What would he do if he knew he was texting Nevermore? I’d imagine it wouldn’t be long before police were knocking down my door. Maybe that’s what I needed to stop the torment in my head. A confession. A way to just clean my hands of the choices I made and the lives I took.

JACE: Wouldn’t mind some company to help get my mind off things…

Shit. My heart started to race. I couldn’t meet him now. Not even if I wanted to. How could I explain the cut on my forehead? I could say I fell, have him nurse me back to health. But then that would be putting myself back in the line of fire.

But, fuck, I wanted to. Wanted to see him. I started getting hard thinking about it. Like Pavlov’s dog salivating at the sound of a bell, except it was my cock leaking at the idea of Jace. He’d be the perfect antidote. He’d work better than the concoction of Xanax and alcohol coursing through my system right now.

My brain was fuzzy, but the decision began to solidify. I could say yes. Meet him somewhere for drinks. Or maybe go over to his apartment. I could be inside his space. I could smell his scents, feel his carpet under my toes, feel his bedsheets under my bare ass. It would be one of the riskiest things I’d ever done, and that thought thrilled me.

THEO: Sure, I think?—

Before I could type out my message, the other phone vibrated against the glass coffee table. Luke startled at the sound. He jumped off the couch and went to the kitchen, where I heard him begin to stress eat.

Same, buddy. Same.

I grabbed the burner phone. It was a message from my contact in Pressure Point.

G: Rachel is down to meet tonight. You free?

Well, there was my answer. I couldn’t see Jace tonight.

It appeared that I had other plans.