Chapter 9

9

Bodhi

A vise-like arm snaked around my waist and yanked me nearly off my feet. Rush grunted, hauling me out into the hallway as a loud pop silenced everything.

Ears ringing, I stumbled, and Rush shoved between my shoulder blades, making me fall onto the floor. I pushed up as he yelled and lunged for my bedroom door.

“Coach!”

Fresh hell reached up from rock bottom and pulled me into its basement. I hit with a resounding thud that left my bones vibrating. It wasn’t panic or pain that assaulted me. It was nothing at all what I thought rock bottom was like.

It was worse.

When my sister died, there was shock. So much shock. And then a hollowness as literally half of me was ripped away. I didn’t know what it felt like for other people to lose a loved one, but Brynne was my twin. I’d never known life without her. We’d literally been conceived at the same time, developed together, and took our first breaths just minutes apart. She was a literal extension of me, our DNA the same.

And then she was gone.

The pain was unbearable, her memory a form of torture.

And the guilt? It literally feasted, daily, on what was left of me.

I took all of that, trashed my life, burned my bridges, free-fell through Mexico, and nearly killed myself ten times over with drugs and alcohol. I’d slammed hard into rock bottom at Two Towers.

Or so I thought.

He told me he cared. I do.

Then he’d followed up the words with action. Kicking in my bedroom door. Using his body as a battering ram so I could breathe. The second a gun appeared, he threw me behind him, becoming a shield.

He came from a place I hated. I didn’t know him. Didn’t like him.

He took a bullet for me.

As if he thought there was something left worth protecting.

And I killed that too.

“ No, ” I wailed without much force, for I cried out in desperation, not anger. Wild-eyed and with nothing left to lose, I hurried into my room, seeing Rush standing there staring, his eyes wide.

I shoved him on my way past, seeing the bodies on the floor, a guttural groan ripping out of me as I fell onto my knees, carpet burning my skin as I crawled toward him.

“I’m sorry,” I rasped. “I’m sorry.”

My fingers grappled for his shirt, and I used the fabric to climb him. I fell, landing against his warm body, folding in.

I cried, but no tears fell. My well was dry, the ability I had for sorrow dehydrated. Yet still, my heart produced it, and it felt somehow worse being wrenched from an already wrung-out soul.

The murmur of voices came close but couldn’t make it as deep as I was buried. And then hands were in my hair, knotting in my curls and massaging my scalp.

“Bodhi,”

“ I’m sorry .”

“Bodhi, look at me.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and refused. It was enough to feel the basement of rock bottom. I didn’t want to see it too.

Probably so much blood.

“Goldilocks.”

My eyes flew open and I gasped, seeing the sunbursts in the center of his eyes, an up-close view that really glowed with a golden hue. His lashes were short and dark, sort of an aggressive frame for eyes so breathtaking.

“Goldilocks,” he said again, his voice having the same buzz effect as a belly full of whiskey. “I’m not shot.”

My heart stuttered, fingers tightening in his shirt even more. And then the words registered. I blinked. Took in his eyes again. Eyes that were free of pain.

It was too much to make sense of. The pieces of my world blown too far apart to assemble them so quickly. “What?”

“He’s a terrible shot. It went wide.” Emmett gestured with his chin, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from him to look.

“You aren’t shot?” I reiterated.

He shook his head.

I slumped against him, body going completely slack. I realized then that I was in his lap and he was holding me. The constant beat of his heart was right beneath my ear.

Safe.

“Let me up!” an angry voice yelled, and a body began thrashing around so close by it disturbed the air.

I bolted up, but Emmett palmed my hip, keeping me in his lap. “Call the cops,” he told Rush who wasn’t just standing in the middle of the room but pinning the guy who attacked me into the carpet.

“No!” he roared, struggling.

Rush dropped and jammed a knee between his shoulder blades.

“You’re giving me a headache,” he growled and reached for his phone.

“Wait,” I said, peeling myself out of Emmett’s lap and going across the room to a safe hidden in the closet. After unlocking it, I reached inside for a stack of cash. Carrying it over, I tossed it on the floor beside the asshole’s face. “Here. That’s all of it.”

“You owe him money?” Rush’s voice was strangled.

I shrugged.

Red-faced, Rush bolted up, black eyes swirling. “You almost got us killed because you owe some asshole some money!” he roared. Putting his hands on my shoulders, he shoved. “You stupid asshole!”

I stumbled back but didn’t retaliate. He was right.

The man in the leather jacket—I couldn’t remember his name or even why I owed him money—grabbed the cash and stood. “This is four grand?”

Is that how much I owe? “It’s five. See the band around it?” I said, and he looked. “Consider the extra a bonus.”

“Whatever,” he spat and started toward the open sliders. But then he turned back, eyes falling on the gun lying near the bed. He took one step toward it.

Emmett stepped between him and the weapon. “Don’t even think about it.”

“That’s an expensive piece,” the man whined.

Emmett folded his arms over his chest. His biceps bulged, and it was distracting. “I’m sure the cops will be interested in where you got it.”

“Bro, get lost and don’t come back,” Rush spat.

“Rich dicks,” he bitched but left without another word.

Emmett muttered beneath his breath, scooped the gun off the floor, and started after him.

Alarmed, I gasped and grabbed his arm, squeezing it with both of my hands. “Wait.”

He glanced down at me, eyes indiscernible. “Let go.”

“No,” I demanded. “You can’t just go shoot him.”

His lips twitched like he wanted to laugh. My eyes narrowed.

Rush made a sound and slapped a hand on my shoulder. “Come on.”

I let loose an angry sound and smacked his arm away, then turned to swing.

Emmett caught my arm, his hand locking around my wrist. To Rush, he said, “I’ll handle this. Go back to bed.”

“You think I’ll be able to sleep?”

“Count some sheep.” Emmett snapped.

The muscle in Rush’s jaw jumped, but instead of storming out, he hesitated. “You sure you’re okay?” he asked, the words not directed at me at all.

Emmett let out a low exhale. His voice was not nearly as biting as before. “I’m fine, son. Go on.”

Rush nodded once. “I’ll check the locks,” he said, exiting the room.

The hand around my wrist yanked, pulling me around. Intense eyes bounced between mine. “You’re nothing but trouble.”

“I’m not the one trying to shoot someone,” I smarted off.

He smiled. A genuine smile that had my heart performing a cartwheel in my chest. “I’m throwing it in the ocean.”

My lips formed a small O. His smile grew.

Wiping the surprise off my face, I pulled my arm free and wrapped both around myself. “Whatever.”

He chuckled, and I thought about kicking him. But then I remembered he had a gun when he lifted it to empty the chamber.

“Wait here,” he ordered and went out onto the deck.

I rushed out after him, slamming into his broad back when he stopped midstride. The wind blew strands of my hair against my cheek. “You’re coming back, right?”

The muscles in his back tensed, but he remained facing away.

Embarrassment blurred my vision, and I thought about throwing myself into the ocean with the gun. Why did I say that out loud?

His intense silence lasted so long that I grew even more embarrassed and shifted to flee into the privacy of my room.

He caught my waist as I turned, tugging me hard enough that I tumbled into his chest. He had enough height on me that I had to drop my head back to look up. With the gun in one hand at his side, he reached up with his other, molten stare tracing every inch of my face.

No one has ever looked at me like that before. Ever.

The pads of his fingers were warm and soft when he dragged the hair off my cheek, tucking it behind my ear. He didn’t pull away, though. His fingertips stayed close, ghosting over my earlobe and creating shivers down my neck.

“You worried I won’t?” he asked, his voice once again like top-shelf whiskey and making me drunk.

I nodded without hesitation. The vulnerability I showed suddenly seemed minuscule compared to the depth of his stare.

He made a sound in his throat, a deep satisfied purr. My eyelids drooped. This man was indeed some sort of drug. God, he is beguiling . I was completely beguiled.

His face lowered, and my pulse began to hammer. Anticipation rode me hard, giving me the jitters.

When he was mere inches away, my eyes swept down, no longer able to even stare at his face.

“Nothing but trouble,” he murmured before settling against my lips.

I melted, body liquifying as though there was nothing solid left to my form. His arm wound around my waist, holding me up, and I arched over it, surrendering all my weight.

His lips were warm and forgiving, something I hadn’t felt in so very long. The scruff on his jaw and chin was a soft scrape to my smooth skin. I whimpered and tried to clutch him closer, but he was the one in control. After another lingering brush of his mouth, he lifted enough to speak.

“Yeah, Goldilocks, I’m coming back,” he said, his voice vibrating my half-dead heart.

I cracked my eyes to peer through my lashes at the specimen he made. He eased back, and my fingers bunched in the shirt at his waist.

Instead of forcing me away, he nudged me to the railing. “Stand here and watch me.”

I nodded.

He stepped away, and only then did my thoughts un-muddy.

“Oh, and, Goldilocks?” he called.

I tilted my head in his direction.

“I want you packed and by the front door at eight a.m.,” he said. “You’re going home, and that’s final.”

I nodded.

It was only after I watched him walk out into the Malibu surf that I realized what he’d said.

Home.