Brazen Mistakes (Brazen Boys #3)

49. Clara

Chapter 49

Clara

I let RJ drag me to the kitchen eventually, our silence overcome by the grumble of my always empty stomach.

There, a literal smorgasbord waits for us.

Walker’s reheated waffles, roast chicken, bowls of veggies, fruits, rice, bacon, cookies, everything he’s been making over the last week while trying to tempt me to eat more than a few bites, it’s all out in our collection of mismatched bowls and plates. The coffee pot sputters out a sigh, and Walker pours me a cup. “What flavor syrup, princess?”

“Rose,” I say, without really thinking. But when I take a sip, mixed with some milk, a few more of the broken pieces inside of me clatter to a halt, no longer caught in the tornado of painful avoidance and self-recriminations.

Small steps. Baby steps. Necessary steps.

Eating is another one of those steps .

Taking a plate, I add slivers of almost everything, carrying my plate and mug out to the living room. The green haze is still weird, but I appreciate Jansen covering all the windows. At least we have a safe haven again. Mostly.

Although, that means that Bryce has shifted from hovering in the bushes to actively working to hurt us. To hurt me by hurting the guys.

RJ sits on one side of the couch beside me, Walker the other, both subtly touching me with a thigh or a knee. Grounding me.

I need the reminder that I’m a person, on a couch, between two men who care about me. And for all that other people might see me as either a broken girl or a badass bitch, I’m not. Not either, not entirely. The only way to find myself is to be myself. And these four men create space for me to figure out exactly who that is.

Forcing myself to try a bite of everything on the plate, I make it through the slivers, the spicy vegetable relish winning an extra nibble as it actually tastes like something. My plate half-empty, I set it down, stupidly proud of the amount I ate.

Was it enough? No.

Was it more than I have been eating? Yes.

Did anyone have to nag me to do it? No.

A baby step.

My mug warm in my palms, I take a few more sips, the quiet somehow both comforting and slightly edged with anxiety. None of us can pretend my breakdown didn’t happen. We shouldn’t .

Walker breaks the silence. “When I was sixteen, I won a local art competition. It wasn’t through school or anything—my parents wouldn’t let me take art as an elective when my school had such a great coding program.”

RJ huffs out a chuckle. “Fat lot of good it did you.”

Walker’s wry twist of lips tells me coding was not his favorite subject. “I know, right? Anyway, the competition was a county-wide thing, and I was competing against adults, not just kids. And I won. When I got the email, I brought it to my parents, knowing this was my chance. For once, I was going to be the son they bragged about.”

He stabs a bit of waffle with his fork. “They tried to be excited for me. But they weren’t impressed. Mostly because my brother Franklin got his acceptance to his first-choice med school that same day. An MD/PhD program that funneled him right into his job now, literally working to cure cancer. That was obviously more impressive. It still is, so I got it. I really did. But I thought that when they saw me at the awards ceremony, saw my drawing in person, then they’d be proud.”

Shoving the waffle into his mouth, RJ and I wait to hear whatever he’s willing to share. Once he’s had a sip of coffee, he sets his plate on the table. “It turned out the awards ceremony was the same day as Marshall’s med school graduation. My parents weren’t even in the state when I got my prize—a hundred-dollar gift card to an art supply store and a blue ribbon.”

Taking another sip, he glances at RJ and me. “I used that money to buy the things I needed for my first genuine attempt at forgery. Monet, like a chump. I sold it online for five hundred bucks. I don’t know who was more of an idiot, me or the buyer. But that painting freed me. Why bother doing things the right way? If even my best wasn’t worth their attention, why follow their rules? I was invisible no matter what I did. Still am. Even with my family. No one seeks me out on holidays, so I just sit by my deaf grandpa who doesn’t speak English and let the conversation flow around me.”

My heart clenches. Reaching out a hand, I lock our palms together, my coffee set on the table.

The room grows quiet again until RJ clears his throat. “I’d just turned fifteen the first time I saw my mom crying over bills at the kitchen table. I’d stayed up way too late playing games, and she’d assumed I was asleep. My dad was gone. Mama’d told us that Pops was working late on a big project, and until that night, I had no reason to doubt her.”

He rubs the back of his neck, staring at the black TV across from the three of us. “There were only three weeks until the house went into foreclosure. Months of missed payments, months of water bills and electrical bills partially paid at best. Mama hadn’t known—Pops had always managed the money when he was home. But he’d been out so often, he’d missed hiding that foreclosure notice. We found the rest of them behind his shoes in the closet. He’d gambled away one payment, then another, always thinking he was one hand from winning it all back and then some. Overnight, all weekend, digging himself deeper and deeper into the pit.”

Walker slips his hand from mine, shifting us both so I can lean against his shoulder while we listen to RJ.

RJ runs his fingers under the braids at the back of his head, then forces his hands to his knees. “I’d played around on the dark web. I was curious. Could you really just buy up people’s credit card numbers? What else was out there, unindexed and hidden? That meant when I sat down with Mama, when I saw how bad it was, I knew where to go. I’m not proud of what I did. It still makes me sick. But I bought up three lots of stolen numbers, then used them to buy cash cards. Thousands of cash cards.”

His eyes are dark when he looks up for a second. Loss clear, his innocence vanishing with that choice. “I mailed them to my damn Nana’s house, never told her or anything, just helped her with chores for a week, saying it was community service for school. Then I found a bunch of places that would buy the cash cards at seventy-five cents for every dollar. It took nearly the whole three weeks, but when I brought my mom two paper bags full of cash, she never asked where it came from. But she knew it wasn’t from anyplace legal. And neither Mama or Pops ever treated me the same. I was a roommate, but not their son. And I was too afraid to bring it up, to find out that they didn’t trust me, didn’t love me anymore, worried that by saving them, I lost my place in the family.”

I reach for his hand and he lets me take it, but doesn’t look up. “For what it’s worth, from what I saw, your dad loves you. He’s just not—” I stop, not sure how to say the rest.

RJ nods, not making me continue. “He’s not right. And he needs help. Real help.”

“Yeah. That.”

This time, when the silence falls, I know it’s my turn. Walker started this, and if he’s brave enough to share this truth, then I want to give him the same. Both of them .

I pick up my coffee, taking a sip for courage before I set it back down, afraid I’ll fiddle with it and spill it everywhere. “The first time I noticed that things with Bryce weren’t right, I thought it had to be a fluke, you know? He’d been so sweet for months, showering me with gifts and nice nights out. That evening, he’d brought me to meet some of his friends. The night seemed like it was going well, the conversation was fun, but I’d had a few glasses of wine, and I was still new to drinking. I stood up at one point and suddenly had to pee. I tried to hurry, but I was dizzy too, and I tripped, stumbled into the table, and spilled everyone’s drinks. Red wine ran like a waterfall over the edge and onto the pale rug under it.”

A tiny burst of anger lights in my chest, the memory overlaid by more guilt than it deserves. “Who the fuck puts a rug under the kitchen table? And a light-colored one at that? Whatever. I guess that part doesn’t matter. Anyway, I started cursing and apologizing, dropping to my knees in my short dress, trying to blot out the pending stains with napkins.”

I close my eyes, not wanting to see their faces for this next part. “It calmed down, the rest of the night went well, and Bryce took me back to his place. I thought things were okay. But when we got to Bryce’s apartment, it quickly became clear that things were not okay. Not at all.” I swallow, knowing I have to get past this point. Knowing I have to excise the wound so it can heal. Knowing it and dreading the pain in equal measure.

I’m making myself remember what I fought so hard to forget.

Because it hurt so fucking much. Not just physically. It broke a little piece of my soul off, and I don’t know if I’ll ever find it again. Or maybe it tarnished that piece of my innocence, beat it bloody and purple. The images swirl in my mind, not settling on any logical image, any metaphor that fits, the shame too big to allow them space to roost.

“He scolded me, and because it was the first time, I took it seriously. I hadn’t gotten used to it yet. When he said I’d embarrassed him, that I was horribly uncultured and unladylike, that I should never curse, and under no circumstances should I ever crawl around on my hands and knees with my pussy on display, I felt nothing but shame. Guilt.”

My hand picks up the familiar rhythm on my leg, and I don’t bother trying to stop it. I need the distraction. “My pussy on display. His words. And I was mortified. I burst into tears, apologizing, asking what I could do to make it better, wondering if I should apologize to his friends. I didn’t know how to fix it. All I knew was that I’d done something to make the sweet, kind Bryce go away, and I wanted him back. He said that what I’d done had reflected poorly on him, so he was the person I needed to appease.”

Appease. That word alone should have been a sign to walk away. I should have listened to the voice in my head that questioned it, even then.

Walker’s hand lands on my leg, squeezing, and even with my eyes closed, I can feel RJ vibrating with anger beside me. Even without me saying it, they know it’s bad. But I need to say it. Because then maybe, just maybe, it won’t haunt my dreams. “He had me strip and said if I wanted to stick my ass in the air, it must be because I knew I needed to be taught a lesson. I…I was scared. I thought he was going to spank me, but I stuck my ass up like he’d asked, because I thought if I did this one thing, then maybe it would go back to normal. And it’s not like I haven’t been hit before. But that’s not what he did.”

The words catch in my throat, not wanting to come out. As if by not saying them, I can keep pretending that it never happened. That I can save that blank spot in my memory, the moment where things should have been clear, but instead turned everything disconnected and confusing.

The air’s heavy in fear, grief, and that special hum that takes up space when you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop. And it’s my job to chuck that shoe to the floor. “I never said no. I didn’t fight him. But what he did? It hurt to shit for a week.”

And I can’t say more. I just can’t. They’re smart. They can figure it out without me having to say he tore into my ass with enough force for me to bleed. Because I just can’t. What I’ve already said makes me want to run away, to hide, to never open my eyes again and see the results of what I’ve been hiding.

I clear my throat, wanting to get to the next part of the story, past the moment where I should have run, but stupidly stayed. “Afterwards, he held me as I cried, told me I was forgiven. He bought me flowers and teddy bears, one of each every day for a week, just like he left on the porch this fall. That next morning was the first time he said he loved me.”

The memory settles into the space I’d hidden from, and I huff out a sad little laugh. “Or more accurately, he said that he loved me despite my flaws. Asshole. Worse, after that day, he started telling me which of my friends were bad influences, which people in my life brought out my ‘vulgar’ tendencies. And I let those friends drift. I lost them all, everyone except Emma. I should have seen it. He’d shown me exactly who he was, but because I thought I deserved it, because I thought he loved me, because it was a one-time thing, and I never said no, well, if I was unhappy with the result of that, wasn’t that my fault too? If I hadn’t wanted that, wouldn’t I have fought? Wouldn’t I have said no?”

Keeping my eyes closed, I plow forward. “I know that’s a dumb thought. I know that, logically. But I don’t feel it. I don’t want to feel anything about it. I want to keep pretending it never happened. But Chicago, I guess it shook the memory loose, that and a bunch of other memories that I just, I don’t want. They can’t be mine. I can’t have been the girl in those situations. She must be someone else. Otherwise, what does that say about me?”

Yanking out my hair tie, I let my hair down, another layer between me and my words. “Before, when Bryce was in jail, it didn’t matter. That girl didn’t have to be me. Not anymore. Not ever. She was locked up with him, unable to get to me. But now Bryce is here, and that broken girl, she followed him. And I have to look at her and admit that she and I are the same person. And I just wish we weren’t. So badly. Because I’m not her. I can’t be. She and I want different things, see the world differently. She trusted much too easily, and it hurt us both.”

I want to curl up into a ball; I want to disappear. I want to suck all my words back inside where they can’t haunt me, where they’re my secret pain that no one ever has to see. My mistake that I never have to own up to.

Instead, I force myself to spin, sitting on the coffee table facing the couch before I open my eyes. Walker’s eyes are glassy, his lips spread thin like he’s locked his mouth shut for fear of saying the wrong thing. RJ’s fists clench and unclench, his breath coming faster than normal.

But it’s Jansen and Trips that startle me, not knowing they were here at all. Jansen’s perched on the back of the couch, one leg held tight to his chest, the other one resting on the arm of the couch. He swallows as I look at him, inexplicable guilt written across his face. And Trips, as always, waits half out of the room, arms crossed, his face nearly purple.

“I decided a while ago that I’m not going to apologize for shit that isn’t my fault. I thought that if I just became stronger, tougher, less of a stupid, brainwashed girl, then maybe I wouldn’t be her anymore. But I fucked it up. Which means, even though I don’t want to, I need to apologize. I’m sorry I’ve worried all of you. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you what was going on, because then I had to admit to myself that I really am broken. And I don’t want to be broken. Not anymore. But I don’t know how to fix myself. And every damn day, something happens that reminds me exactly how broken and fucked up I really am. How much pain follows me, no matter what I do. I don’t want to hurt you guys. I don’t want to worry you guys. But I don’t think I know how to, I don’t know, not be broken.”

Trips opens his mouth, but then closes it, shaking his head. “I…I think I need to go upstairs. Thanks. For sharing.” We stare after him until the door to his room clicks shut, a muffled roar drifting down the stairs.

“I think I broke him, too,” I mutter, and Jansen lets out a sad little chuckle.

“Nah, he’s been broken longer than the rest of us. Don’t take that blame, beautiful. It’s not yours. ”

RJ stands up too, but he ends up pacing on one side of the room. “Before, at the beginning, we asked you, we asked you if he’d ever—” he stammers, anger coloring every halting word.

“He hadn’t. I let him.”

“He coerced you, Clara.”

“Yeah. He did. But do the cops care? Would the med school have cared? He says I didn’t say no, I didn’t fight, he says he thought I was in on the game, and who’s going to contradict him? It’s too gray, and too hard to share with a bunch of guys I’d only just started to get to know. And honestly, too hard to admit to myself.”

Walker reaches across, needing some touch, and I let the warmth of his grip defrost some of my fear. “You said there were other memories? You don’t have to share, not at all, just—Clara, how bad?”

Staring at the ceiling is easier than eye contact right now. “That was probably the worst. Maybe. It’s not like I’ve ranked them. But it’s one that keeps showing up in my dreams. Or nightmares, I guess.”

RJ pauses his pacing. “Are they closer to the gun thing, or closer to this?” I see the other two tense, but he clarifies after a glance to me to see if it’s okay. “He chewed her out, then described how it feels to shoot a deer and watch it die.”

“Shit, Clara,” Walker says, moving to sit beside me on the coffee table. I lean into him.

I shrug. “That was probably the most physical he ever got, but after that, well, he said once he’d trained me well, and I guess he had. He didn’t have to police me when I was busy trying to be perfect for him, so he’d be sweet to me. How fucked up is that? Trained, like a fucking dog.”

Another yell comes from upstairs, followed by the barely audible smack of fists against leather. RJ’s fists clench before he forces them open, running his hand over the back of his neck. “I might have to go join him.”

A wave of exhaustion hits me, too many emotions in too quick succession, forcing my body to request a reset. “If you need to, go. I think I’m going to rest.”

He paces a few more times before squatting down in front of me. “Is there more? Bigger? I don’t need a story, I just, I’ll worry there’s more, worse, unless I know one way or the other.”

“You’ve gotten to hear the full range of purely psychological to purely physical. The rest fall in the middle, I guess. Don’t worry. Those memories, they only feel like they’re mine when I’m asleep. And even then…” I shrug again, not knowing how else to communicate that he doesn’t need to carry my mistakes when he already carries so many other people’s mistakes on his shoulders.

He presses his forehead to mine, saying nothing. Then, with a groan of frustration, he pushes to his feet and up the stairs, his knock sounding moments later.

Walker and Jansen stay, Jansen silent on the back of the couch, looking at the wall, the chairs, the black TV, anything except me. Standing makes me woozy, but I still make it to the kitchen before looking over my shoulder for Jansen, who doesn’t follow .

Walker’s brows crease, looking between the two of us. There’s a heavy sorrow as he looks at me before tilting his head toward Jansen, a question on his face. I nod.

He clears his throat. “I’ll clean up the food. Jansen, maybe you could go with Clara? I don’t think she wants to be alone right now.”

Alone, I’ll just cry more. But pressed between warm bodies that care, that’s infinitely safer than being alone with my thoughts.