Because of Ellison (17 page)

Fuck, she was stupid. I’d tried everything I could besides
throwing her out on her ass to convince her that things were over. She wouldn’t
believe me. She kept arguing that it was because we weren’t around each other
and that a night out would show me how much I’d missed her. Three hours in her
presence and I knew for a fact that I hadn’t missed her at all.

“Ready to go? Let’s get our party on!”

“Yeah, let me finish up what I’ve got laid out.” I quickly
snorted five lines.

“Jesus, Hunter. You’re acting like a junkie who hasn’t had
his fix.” She knelt down between my knees where my legs hung over the bed.
Spreading them apart with her hands she smiled before licking her lips and
smacking them together. “I bet I know something you’ve missed.” She reached up
to unbuckle my belt and open my pants. Her hands immediately were on my cock
and it hardened at her touch.

That’s the thing about coke. It might numb the soul, but it made
the nerve endings hypersensitive. Sex was amazing on it. I hadn’t forgotten
that and neither had Hunter Junior.

She freed me from my underwear and immediately wrapped her
mouth around me. The wet heat felt so fucking good that I moaned and allowed my
head to fall back. I didn’t want to see the girl that was sucking me off. I
wanted it be Ellison — and despite how good it felt
,
I had to stop it.

“Tiff stop.”

She reached up and worked her hand and mouth on me at the
same time. Holy fuck, it felt good.

“Tiff. Fucking stop.”

She didn’t listen.

I grabbed her hair and tugged her off of me. “Tiff! I said
to fucking stop.”

“Ow! What the fuck, Hunter
?!
”
Standing up, she reached back to smooth down her hair. “What the fuck is your
problem?”

My hands worked quickly to shove everything back into my
pants. “I don’t want a fucking blow job, okay? Let’s just get going so we can
get through this fucking night.”

. .
.

The drive to the bonfire was an exercise in self-control. I
can’t tell you how many times I had the overwhelming urge to pull the car over
and dump Tiffany on the side. But, it was her car and luckily, that left me
with no choice but to refrain from ditching her.

“I don’t see why you didn’t just run their fury little asses
over. It’s our road. They deserve to get hit if they are stupid enough to sit
around on it.”

I hated her.

She bitched the entire drive over. I’d demanded to drive
just because of the type of rental she had, and I’d played the usual game of
Frogger on the way out. Tiffany was annoyed that the car kept coming to sudden
stops. She yelled at me each time I did it and she about lost it when I stopped
the car for something as small as a lizard at one point. It didn’t matter if it
was a raccoon, an opossum, a squirrel or a duck … if it was on the road Tiffany
believed it deserved death for being stupid.

“Just drop it, Tiffany. We’re here now and there’s no point
in hashing it out. Try to have some fun or just shut up or something.”

“Whatever; where’s the beer? If I have to party with
hillbillies, I may as well see what it’s all about.” She started to walk in the
direction of the kegs but the heels of her shoes kept sinking into the dirt.
“Fuck! Haven’t these people ever fucking heard of cement or pavers
?!
Seriously, they are living like fucking homeless people
or … well … hillbillies.”

She took off her shoes and bare-hoofed it to the kegs. I
raised a brow at that maneuver and gave the girl some credit for not be afraid
to get her feet dirty.

But I still hated her.

My body rotated around while I searched out El. I didn’t see
her in the same area she’d been at the last bonfire and I wondered if her and
Lil were running late. Or maybe Lil had told her that I was bringing Tiffany,
and Ellison decided to skip it all together. I was giving up hope when, in the
distance, I saw Ellison walk by carrying her guitar with Finn following closely
behind with a blanket in his hands. So much for avoiding him like she’d said,
but I guess circumstances had changed since the afternoon.

She looked beautiful. She had on a short dress, her cowboy
boots and her straw hat and it felt like someone had shot me in the chest to
see it. Her blond hair blew out behind her in soft waves and she had a smile on
her face that burned brighter than the large bonfire ever would when it was
finally lit. It was still light outside and the brilliant sunlight shone off
her skin as she laughed and talked to Finn who’d caught up to walk beside her.
The dogs followed at their heels. They looked one big happy family. And I hated
it.

I started to move in her direction. I had to talk to her.
She didn’t seem upset, but I knew she was good at hiding her emotions when she
didn’t want a person to know what she was thinking. The blow I’d done before
coming here wasn’t helping my thought process either. It would have been best
for me to leave her alone, but I couldn’t. I just fucking couldn’t. I had to
explain.

I started to run, but my arm was suddenly grabbed and I was
jerked back. “Where are you going? You’re not bringing me out here just to
ditch me with a bunch of redneck idiots.” She took a swig out of the solo cup
and made a disgusted face. “Least they could do is have imported beer.”

I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t want to bring you out here in
the first place. I have someone I need to talk to. Just stand around and look
pretty until I get back.”

If there was ever a time where I felt like I’d been cut a
break, it was at that moment. Lily and Ryan walked past us on their way to the
kegs and I grabbed Lily around the arm. Pulling her to me so I could whisper, I
begged, “Please, please, please, fucking,
puh
-lease,
will you distract Tiffany for a second? I need to
to
talk to Ellison.”

Lily looked up at me with an angry expression. “Hell no you
don’t. I think you’ve done enough to that girl, Hunter. I haven’t had a chance
yet to get you alone and away from your raging bitch of a girlfriend, but you
can bet that when I do, I’m ripping you a new one for what you’ve done!”

“Fine … rip me a new one, rip me a few new ones, but only
after I’ve had a chance to talk to Ellison. Lily, this isn’t what it looks
like. I broke up with Tiffany when I came down. I didn’t think she’d show up. I
need to explain it to El.”

Lily eyed me suspiciously. “You broke up with her before you
left New York?”

“No. I broke up with her three days after coming down. The
night of the last bonfire. I left her a voicemail.”

“Are you fucking kidding me Hunter? You broke up with the
girl over voicemail and you expected her to be okay with that? I know you’re
smart and all, but you sure as hell don’t act like it.”

“Whatever, Lil! That’s not the point at the moment. Please
distract her so I can find El.”

“You want a bump, baby?” My eyes met the cocaine tipped key
Tiffany was holding at the exact same time Lily saw it.

“What’s wrong with you
?!
” Lily
turned so that she was nose to nose with Tiffany. “Don’t bring drugs and shit
around here, Hunter’s trying to quit. That’s the whole point of him coming
down.”

Tiffany laughed. “Quit? Why? Everyone’s doing it. Plus, he’s
already finished off about ten lines since I’ve been here, so I highly doubt
another bump is going to hurt him.”

Fuuuuuuuuuuck ….

Lily turned her blue eyes back to me. Her face was red with
anger and I flinched knowing that I was about to hear it.

But then she surprised me.

Plastering a sweet smile on her face, she angled her head
toward her shoulder when she said, “Hunter, why don’t you go deal with what you
need to deal with for a moment, okay? I’d like to have a little girl talk with
Tiffany.”

Tiffany rolled her eyes.

 
I didn’t wait
around long enough to let Tiffany object. I looked around the clearing and
eventually found Ellison sitting with Finn on a blanket out near the tree line.
I had no idea why they were sitting so far away, but I didn’t have time to
concern myself with the details. I just ran in their direction. By the time I
reached her, she was bent over her guitar strumming out a slow song.

“Hey, Hunter! Is your girlfriend having a good time at the
bonfire?” Finn smiled up at me.

This guy was really
starting to piss me off with the friendly act …

“Uh, she’s not my girlfriend … ”

Ellison snorted.

“Hey, Ellie. Can I talk to you? Privately, please?”

She looked up at me and the smile I’d seen earlier was
completely gone. “What do we have to talk about, Hunter? I think you’ve had
plenty of time to talk to me over the past weeks and you had nothing to say
then. Why now?”

Finn looked between us with a suspicious look on his face.
“Look, Hunter, maybe you should just take your girl- … ”

“She’s not my fucking girlfriend! Say it again and I’ll beat
your fucking face in, asshole!”

Okay — so, the blow was definitely not doing good
things for my thought process.

Ellison stood up and the guitar swung on its strap to her
back. “Whoa! Hunter, calm down! If you want to talk to me so bad, then fine, we
can go for a walk. It’s obvious you’ve got more in you than anger at the moment
and walking it off might do you some good.”

She knew. I didn’t know how she could always see right
through me, but, somehow, she knew.

She walked towards the road and Bear followed behind her.
Sasha chose to stay on the blanket with Finn and I eyed the dog.
Traitor.
Ellison was moving fast and I
jogged to catch up to her.

“Ellison, listen, this is so not what it looks like. I broke
up with Tiffany. She’s my ex-girlfriend — EX. Just like you and Finn. She
hasn’t accepted the split, but that’s not my fault, El. You have to see that.”
I was babbling, but I was so freaked out, I couldn’t formulate an intelligent
statement to save my life.

She didn’t bother to turn around when she asked, “When did
you break up with her, Hunter?”

“On the night of the last bonfire. I borrowed Lily’s phone
and called Tiffany to end things.”

“Did you talk to her?”

“No … but I don’t see why that matters.”

Ellison stopped suddenly and turned around. The brim of her
hat shaded her face as the sun set beautifully in the distance behind her.

“Because it’s the respectful thing to do. When are you going
to learn that? You can’t just go around doing things that are right for you
without considering how it affects other people. I believe that you probably
broke up with the girl, but not in a way that would give her any kind of
closure. I’m not surprised she showed up. I mean
,
it’s
a little bit crazy for her to travel all that way, but still. She has a right
to know what happened. And you disrespected me by never saying anything to me
about her. You could’ve mentioned you’d just broken up with your girlfriend. I
don’t want to be the branch you use to swing away from her. Take some time to
be alone before jumping from one bed to another. But, dammit, Hunter, if you
can’t learn to respect yourself, you’ll never learn to respect other people
— which is obvious given your current state. How long did it take for you
to go back to drugs since she’s been here? Five minutes? Ten?”

I looked down at my clothes. Everything was clean and in
place. How did she know? “I’ve got to ask how you know, El. It amazes me that
you can see right through me. How the fuck do you do it?”

She sighed and crossed her arms over her chest before
uncrossing them and pointing at me. “You’re all fidgety, Hunter, and you’re
sniffling like you have a cold. Plus, your eyes are dilated and shifty. It
doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what that kind of behavior means.
Not to mention you threatened Finn when all he was doing was trying to get you
to leave me alone.”

El wasn’t psychic. She was just observant.

“I … fuck … I know I shouldn’t have done the lines and I
won’t do it again. Not while I’m around you … ”

“It shouldn’t be about whether or not you’re around me. It
should be about the fact that you want to care about yourself and you don’t
want to end up a fucking loser who is too damn stupid to do something meaningful
with his life. Especially you. You’re a special person, Hunter, and it’s a damn
shame you don’t see it! All I heard about before you came down here is how
smart you are. I was really excited to meet you because I thought you’d be a
great person to be around. But all that you’ve shown me since you’ve been here
is that the only thing you’re good at is making bad decisions. I have no
problem with alcohol, Hunter, when it’s used in moderation. Hell, I don’t even
have a problem when people smoke pot around me. But you’re an addict and you
don’t need to be around it at all. You can’t handle it.”

I held up my hands at the ‘a’ word. “I’m not an addict, El.
I was sent here to change my lifestyle, not to attend rehab!” I was yelling
again and I tried to calm myself down.

She walked up to me and craned her neck so she could look me
in the eyes. Poking her finger into my chest, she said, “When it gets to a
point where you are parking your car in a pool, Hunter, you have a problem.
There isn’t anything you can tell me that would convince me otherwise.
Withdrawal symptoms or not … you’re an addict.”

I grabbed her around the shoulders. She was so close to me
that the heat from her body rolled over and intensified my own. Her scent
permeated everything — it was the only thing I could smell. I didn’t want
her to move away, I would fucking die if she moved away. I was a stupid bastard
at that moment and I leaned down to kiss her.

“Ow! You fucking bit me!” My hands released their grip and I
pulled away from her and brought my hand to my mouth. It stung like a bitch and
when I looked at my hand, I noticed a speckle of blood.