“Early?” She giggles and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “It’s ten in the morning.” Her big green eyes travel from my face to my neck and down. “Um . . . thanks, ah, again for helping me out.”
She stares at the ink on my chest and tilts her head to read the writing tattooed on my ribcage. I fight the urge to shift uncomfortably at her blatant ogling.
“Em . . .”
Her eyes move up toward my face but snag on one silver barbell through my right nipple then glide across to the one in my left.
“Emma.”
Her eyes are wide and dart to mine. “Oh, yeah, yes. I’m leaving now.” Pink colors her cheeks.
“Let me grab a shirt and I’ll walk you down.”
“No need. I got it.” She reaches in her pocket and pulls out her keys. “Here ya go. Twice a day would be great, but if you can only get over there once, that should be okay too.”
I tuck the keys into the pocket of my track pants. “Shitty’s food in the same place?”
Her jaw drops open with a big smile. “Oh my gosh, don’t call her that. And yeah, Miss Kitty’s food is under the sink.” Reaching down, she hefts the duffle onto her shoulder. She pulls long strands of her chestnut hair out from under the strap with a wince.
“Let me get that.” I don’t give her a chance to argue and take the bag, cringing slightly as pain twists behind my collarbone. I set the bag down. “Give me a sec.”
I leave the door open, knowing that Emma won’t come in. She knows how things work with me and respects my boundaries.
The first day she moved in she came by to introduce herself. I knew by her jeans, flannel shirt, and hiking boots that she wasn’t from around here. That and transplants are always friendlier than natives.
And that’s Emma. Friendly, beautiful, and naïve to a fault. Small town girl in the City of Sin. When she goes home to visit her family, I take care of her cat, Miss Kitty.
Leaving her at the door, I go to my closet to grab a T-shirt and a pair of shoes. I pull the shirt over my head, but carry the shoes to the door, popping them on while standing on the doormat, then grab her duffel with my uninjured arm.
“Thanks again, Rex. I owe you.”
“Yeah?” I close the door behind me. “Bring back some of those cookies your mom makes.”
She giggles and the sound of it makes me smile. I’ve never met a more open, bubbly, and all around happy person in all my life. She’s light, comfortable to hang out with, a good girl.
She puts on her sunglasses as we make our way through the courtyard and into the bright late morning sun. “You playing a show tonight?”
“Yep. Usual Sunday night gig.”
Emma has never been to one of my shows. She asks about them and I’ve invited her, but she stays separate from that part of my life, the band and the fighting. I like that. With her, I get to just be me, not T-Rex or the lead singer of Ataxia. Just Rex. Simple.
Once at her Jeep Cherokee, she opens the back and I put in the bag, stepping aside for her to drop the hatch. “Drive safely. I’ll take good care of Miss Shitty.”
“Stop calling her that.” She smacks my chest.
I laugh and feign injury. “What? That’s her name.”
“Miss Kitty. Not Shitty.”
“That’s what I said.” I chuckle.
She shakes her head then looks up at me and uses her hand to shield her face from the overhead sun. “I should be back Tuesday, but if not, I’ll give you a call.”
I hook her around the back of her neck and pull her in for a hug. Her arms go around my waist in a quick, chaste embrace.
“Break a leg tonight.” She hoists her tiny frame into the driver’s seat and fires up the engine.
I nod and stand back as she pulls out of her parking spot and leaves the lot. Yeah, she’s a good girl. She doesn’t belong here in Vegas. I thought for sure that the city would corrupt her, but after two years she’s still the same. She goes to school, studies hard, works harder, and always keeps that smile on her face.
There’s a voice deep down that whispers I should date her, ask her out and see where things go. She’s pretty in a way that screams purity. White. Clean. Something that needs to be protected, not dirtied.
And I’m nothing if not dirty.
After her car is long gone, I turn to head back when I get the feeling someone’s watching me. It’s been happening a lot these last few months. One minute nothing, and then it’s as if the air pressure changes. A weight, thick and dense settles in around me.
I crank my neck to the left and right, but keep walking, knowing that eventually the feeling goes away. It seems stupid to care about being looked at. I’ve been in the public eye for years, but this is different somehow.
“Fuck, I’m losing my damn mind.” I’d tell my shrink at our next meeting, but the last thing I want added to my list of syndromes and afflictions is motherfucking paranoia. “At this rate they’ll throw my ass in a straightjacket.”
Since I started seeing my therapist at seventeen, he’s been trying to figure out where my compulsions stem from. I’ve heard phrases like repressed memories, abandonment issues, and post-traumatic stress disorder ever since I was hospitalized as a kid.
That’s my earliest vivid memory: waking up in a hospital bed. It’s funny. I don’t remember wanting to die. I don’t even remember why I did it other than the satisfaction of marking my skin and watching my blood pool. The visions I have of that day only come in flashes and specific colors: bright red blood against my pale skin. Surprisingly, the thoughts don’t evoke much feeling.
But then there are the others, two very specific flashes: fire-orange hair and light gray eyes. And with those visions comes the warmth, the peace.
There are sounds that accompany the soft orange waves and the misty gray eyes—humming—soothing, rhythmic melodies that calm my inner turmoil.
Those two things are the memories I hold on to. They’re the ones that keep me sane at night when the insomnia won’t let up.
That sounds so fucking insane. The best explanation my therapist can come up with is some shit about coping mechanisms and self-soothing. But what is there to cope with, to soothe, if I don’t remember?
Not at all in the mood to take this ride down no-memory lane, I grab my cell from my pocket just as I hit my front door. Scrolling through my contacts, I find the one I’m looking for and hit send. I kick off my shoes and carry them to my closet.
“Rex,” Blake answers the phone sounding as if he just rolled out of bed. “What’s up?”
“You training today?” I know he is. The guy is a fucking machine when it comes to his fights, and this one coming up is a career changer for him. It’s also instrumental in earning back what reputation he lost a few months ago.
“Does a monkey shit in the woods?”
“You mean bear.”
“Bear who?”
“It’s ‘Does a bear shit in the woods?’”
“You seriously fucking calling me on a Sunday to talk about this shit?”
“No, dick, I’m calling to find out what time I should be at the training center so I can show you what a pussy you are.”
“I’m leaving in thirty.”
“See you there.”
I hang up, smiling and suddenly excited to get in a good sparring session before my show tonight. What I started with that guy at the bonfire, I can finish with Blake.
~*~
I pull into the parking lot and see that Jonah, Caleb, and Blake’s trucks are the only ones there. Using a passcode and key card to get inside, I move through the darkened lobby and into the main training center. It’s empty, but I can hear music coming from behind the door of the weight room.
Caleb spots me as I head toward the locker room. “What are you doing here? Thought you weren’t training today.”