“You have. You’ve used me as your pawn for the perfect life that never really existed, and I’m done with all of it. I will tattoo rainbows on my forehead and my ass before I let you hurt me
or
Alex with your narrow-minded, hateful bullshit. I win this time. Sorry.”
Tears streaming down her face, she tilted her head back and narrowed her eyes at him. “That’s what you think.”
Matt gave her an unimpressed look and folded his arms over his chest, just waiting for her to make the decision to leave. After staring him down for a long moment, she turned away with another sob and stormed down the driveway as Matt stood there in his underwear watching until she opened the back door to the Rolls. She slammed it with more force than necessary and must have said something harsh to Charlie, because he peeled off down the street.
Even after the large white car was out of sight, Matt just stayed there staring at the empty driveway as his body vibrated with anger. Finally he turned around, seeing Alex leaning against the door. Neither of them cared about their state of undress after that disaster.
“So, um,” Alex started, his voice shaking. “I guess you forgot about tea at the club.”
Matt nodded, giving Alex a dazed look. “Yeah, I guess I did. It’s Monday, isn’t it?”
“All day,” Alex agreed.
Matt snorted and looked down the street. “Well, that blows.”
Chapter Thirteen
Alex had been waiting for it all week.
Even if Matt assured him it wasn’t an issue, Alex knew better. Cecilia Tarrington had teeth sharper than a pit bull’s, and Alex had been looking behind him for six full days, waiting for those pristine veneers to sink into his ass.
The time delay, added to the fact that Matt’s cell phone finally stopped vibrating nonstop with calls from his mama, had actually caused Alex to let his guard down, which was never a good thing.
A part of him wanted to crawl under the covers with Matt and never show his face again, but they both agreed it was better if Alex slept at home until the storm blew over. More than anything, Alex had been working up the nerve to break it to Will that the reason he didn’t need to worry about Holly sleeping with Alex was because pussy was
never
going to be on Alex’s menu. Matt was giving him the space to do it because they both knew it was going to come out one way or the other.
Matt told Alex it was better to do it on his terms.
Alex knew he was right, but after seeing the coming-out cataclysm with Matt and his mama, he wasn’t exactly fired up to break the news to Will. It was a given his brother would take it better than Cecilia Tarrington, but that wasn’t saying much. A snake-handling, southern Baptist minister would’ve taken it better than her.
To add insult to injury, Holly and Will were fighting about New York. So Alex’s home life wasn’t exactly calming. After six days of eating antacids like candy, Alex was so fried he didn’t notice the Rolls Royce until he was already on his bike.
Staring at the impressive car with dread, he leaned sideways on his bike to rest his foot against the ground. His stomach jolted painfully as the back door of the Rolls opened and expensive-looking shoes hit the pavement.
The car blocked the full length of the driveway so there was nowhere to go. Alex was trapped.
Cecilia Tarrington brushed at her skirt as she stood and leveled her gaze at him, which was bizarre for Alex because so much of Matt’s good looks came from her. Matt’s black hair, his light eyes, his full lips, and the way he quirked one superior eyebrow while he waited for an answer to his questions; it was all from his mama.
“Do you have a moment?” she asked in false sweetness.
Alex looked down at his bike pointedly. “I was sorta going somewhere.”
“Oh, well, it can wait,” she said dismissively as if Alex’s responsibilities paled in comparison to her demands. “How about a walk on the beach?”
Pass!
There was no way Alex was going to let this woman ruin the beach for him.
“You can come in.” He tilted his head to gesture back to his house, figuring he might as well get the inevitable over with. “No one’s home. They’re working the late shift at Frank’s.”
She grimaced at the mention of Frank’s, but turned to wave to her driver. “That’ll do.”
Knowing with every fiber of his being that talking with Matt’s mama was a mistake, Alex got off his motorcycle. He put the kickstand down before he turned to the house without looking at her. He felt her at his back as he put the key in and opened the door, then ushered her in. “Make yourself at home.”
She stopped past the entryway, holding her purse to her chest as if terrified walking into Alex’s home would somehow put her at danger of being robbed.
“You want me to leave the door open?” Alex asked as he watched her look around the inside of the house like she was afraid the poverty was going to rub off on her.
“Yes, thank you.” She nodded, completely missing Alex’s sarcasm.
She turned back to him and squared her shoulders as she lifted her chin to look Alex in the eye. “I want you to get out of my son’s life.”
“Yeah.” Alex swallowed hard and nodded. “I kinda figured that was what you wanted.”
“How much will it cost me?”
Alex tilted his head as if he hadn’t heard her. “Excuse me?”
“I’ve got ten thousand dollars cash in my purse.” She patted it to make her point. “That’s quite a bit of money for someone like you.”
Insulted, Alex pulled back. “Someone like me?”
“I’m not playing games, boy.” Her eyes narrowed. “I know you think it’s amusing to take advantage of Matthew. To seduce him with your debauched lifestyle, but the fun is over. I’ll give you this money right now. All you have to do is forget my son ever existed and move on to your next conquest. Go ruin someone else’s life.”
Alex shook his head, feeling hurt on so many different levels. “That’s not really how it happened. I’m not trying to ruin anyone’s life.”
“Once you’re gone, he’ll be normal again.” She sounded almost manic. “This is a phase!”
It didn’t help things when Alex laughed, but he just couldn’t help himself when he was so desperate for an outlet for the anxiety. “I thought that once too, but I don’t think it’s a phase, Mrs. Tarrington. We’ve been together for a while now.”
She placed a hand to her forehead and turned away, taking a shaking breath as she tried to compose herself. “I will not let you destroy everything I’ve spent my entire life working toward. Matthew will take over for his father like he’s supposed to, and you will disappear out of our lives forever.”
“You can’t just buy me off,” Alex said with another laugh of disbelief. “I know this is hard for you to grasp, but some things
aren’t for sale
.”
She huffed and looked around his house once more. “You have a price.”
“I love him,” Alex said firmly, almost feeling sorry for her. “There’s no price for that. I’m sorry.”
“He won’t be worth anything if you stay with him. I’ll cut him off.”
Alex opened his mouth, looking for a comeback for something that made his stomach feel like the bottom had just dropped out of it. “You can’t—”
“Oh, I can. And there will be no job waiting for him in Atlanta. They’ll never allow someone who lives your sort of filthy lifestyle be the face of Tarrington department stores. You think you can keep him happy working at that seaweed-covered shack on the beach? How long do you think your love will last when he’ll have to look at you every day knowing you ruined his life?”
“I’m going to ask you to leave now.” Alex fought the bile rising in the back of his throat from the fear that washed over him. “And I don’t want you to come back.”
Surprisingly, she turned to leave, and Alex found himself breathing a sigh of relief. He walked to the door to close it when she stepped outside, needing a physical barrier between them.
She turned back before he could get it shut. “If you love him, you
will not
do this to him. Without you, he’ll have anything a man could want—a wife and children and respect from everyone who comes into contact with him. With you he’ll be poor, mocked, and in danger for the rest of his life. You think about that, Mr. Hunter. You think about what you’re doing to my son by holding on to him. This was never supposed to be his life. You did this to him, and he will hate you for it when the honeymoon ends.”
“I don’t think the honeymoon will end,” Alex said, because that was the only thing he was sure off. “It doesn’t wear off for us, Mrs. Tarrington.”
“How young and stupid you are,” she spat at him furiously. “It
always
ends, and you two will have nothing but regret to stand on when it does.”
Alex swallowed hard, letting that sink in. When it did hit him that she was probably right, he shut the door in the face of the richest, most powerful woman on Mirabella Island.
* * * *
If his life were a movie, Alex would’ve ignored Matt’s mother and run off into the sunset with the man he loved.
Unfortunately his life wasn’t a movie.
Alex started having nightmares. Every night horrible scenarios unfolded in his mind that usually ended with Matt getting killed in the worst kind of hate crimes. Alex had woken up every morning for the past week covered in sweat, shaking and crying over Matt’s bloody, beaten body. It took him a long time to figure out it wasn’t real because the seeds of fear and doubt Cecilia Tarrington planted in his mind were so infectious the nightmare started to bleed into his reality.
The first night after the confrontation, Alex slept at Matt’s out of sheer necessity. They made love and not once did Alex mention the earlier visit. Matt’s mother had ripped open Alex’s soul and exposed all his worst fears, the ones that had been festering in the back of his mind this whole time and telling Matt about it felt like showing him a mirror.
If you love me, this is what will happen! You’ll hate me for making you poor. For all the jeers and comments. You’ll hate me every time someone says faggot in jest, and you’ll really hate me the first time someone says it to your face.
Her words were already true for Alex. They became a reality the moment she put voice to them, and he couldn’t escape the vivid illusions. All Alex could do was try to hide from them before they swallowed him whole.
He woke up screaming from the first nightmare. Actually screaming at the top of his lungs and looking at his hands wildly for Matt’s blood that had been clinging to them just moments before. Alex never thought he’d feel that type of fear again, because everything about it reminded him of the night two police cruisers and a woman in a white social services’ car pulled into the dock parking lot. Grim-faced, the trio had knocked at the door to number five and then told Will their parents had been killed on the way back from date night by a drunk tourist.
They’d tried to take Alex to his aunt’s that same night, even though he was sixteen and perfectly capable of taking care of himself. They’d thought Will was too young to provide for him, but Alex didn’t need much.
All he needed was his family and the ocean to heal him. Matt had become more than family to Alex. He was more than the beach on a spring day too. He was happiness and freedom and a dream that was dying before his eyes. Even though Matt held Alex after that first horrible dream and told him whatever he was screaming about wasn’t real, it was very real to Alex.
He stopped spending the night at Matt’s and tried to fight the demons alone, but it wasn’t working.
Alex was drowning and no one knew it.
Not Holly, who was caught up in her own nightmare as Will got ready to leave for New York with big dreams and law degree in hand.
Not Matt, who Alex had diligently kept in the dark in fear of him finding out the truth—Alex was
not
worth it.
And not Will, who was still completely unaware that Alex was gay and about to do something insanely stupid like push away the love of his life out of fear of a very uncertain future.
He would never know if it was the nightmares, or the fear of seeing the hatred on Matt’s face, or just the need to protect Matt that finally pushed him over the edge, but Alex did fall—and he took Matt down with him.
All it took was four tequila shots and the balls to break up with Matt to drain the last vestiges of love and youth out of Alex’s life. He’d brought the bottle with him and started drinking the second he got past the door of the beach house while Matt watched him with concern.
Things hadn’t exactly been perfect since the explosion with Matt’s mother, so Matt didn’t stop Alex. He just stood there and patiently waited while Alex downed one shot after another.
“Are you going to tell me what this is about?” Matt asked, belatedly holding up the saltshaker.
Alex took the salt. He was three shots of liquid courage toward a move that felt like something akin to cutting off his own arm with a rusted saw. He dumped a pile of salt onto his open palm that was noticeably shaking as he waited for the tequila to dull the pain.
Alex licked at his hand, the dry grains clinging to his tongue before he washed it away with another shot. Then he put a hand to his burning chest and closed his eyes to wait for the light-headedness. Considering he was sleep deprived and hadn’t eaten well for the past two weeks, it didn’t take long.
“Out with it, Alex,” Matt said, his voice sharp and edgy as if suspecting something. “Let’s lay it out on the table, because you have not been okay since my mother’s meltdown.”
Alex put a palm over his eyes and silently prayed for strength not to break down. It would never work if he did. Matt wouldn’t believe him.
“I just—” he started, wanting to get it out before the emotions ruined everything. “This is too fucking intense for me. I don’t want this anymore, Matty.”
“Bullshit,” Matt growled with that annoying, spoiled way of his. “You’re just freaking out, but it’ll pass. I’m sure everyone goes through this. You don’t want to tell your brother, and my mother is—”
“
I don’t want this
,” Alex said more firmly this time as he lowered his hand and leveled his gaze at Matt. “I know it’s hard for you to understand, but sometimes you don’t always get what you want.”