The Only Song (Only You)

17. Sadie

Chapter 17

Sadie

H iding in the bathroom seemed like the best thing to do. My thoughts are still swimming from all the furtive glances in Jaxon’s direction, wondering if I’m as big a distraction to him as he is to me. Based on his stoic expression, I’d say not. He’s barely spared me a glance. He also played his solos effortlessly, like it was an afterthought. Somehow my brain connects it to feel like I’m an afterthought and I don’t know why that bothers me so much. Why all of a sudden I so badly want him to look at me. To be distracted by me. For his body to heat like mine does around him. I don’t know. What I do know is I envy how easily he can slip into cold concentration, whereas I’m left to ignore the burning between my thighs.

“Get it together, Sadie. You. Can. Do this,” I chant to my reflection while gripping the edges of the porcelain bathroom sink .

I shake my hands as if it’ll ease my nerves before meeting Jaxon for our private rehearsal. After sharing the bed, the idea of another intimate setting has my heart hammering. But we had just finished our first full run-through of the concert program and it makes the performances feel so much more real. It makes me think I’ve bitten off more than I can chew by asking for a solo after six years of not performing. It’s no wonder he agreed to help me.

“One more hour. Then this dress can come off,” I promise to myself reassuringly. My hands run down my stomach and over the curve of my hips. I wonder what it’d be like if it were Jaxon’s hands.

I shake the thought. Even if it is a stunning dress, it’s impractical, like wearing tall rubber rain boots on a sunny day. Wearable, but questionable. And wearing this dress in front of him just makes me self-conscious.

“Fuck it.” I plaster on a smile and sweep out the bathroom, only to smack right into something. It knocks me so hard I rebound back, my phone flying out of my hand to clatter onto the floor.

“Shit!” I grab my phone, momentarily forgetting the length of my skirt when I bend over. I straighten up quickly, one hand covering my ass, the other hand holding my hopefully not shattered phone, but I falter when I feel the weight of someone’s gaze behind me. “Oh, sorry! I didn’t see you.”

I pivot my back to the wall as I inspect my phone for damages immediately. No signs of a cracked screen, Face ID works, and it doesn’t randomly flicker or shut down without notice. Phew . Got lucky there.

There’s no response to my apology, so I don’t realize who I’d slammed into has advanced forward until I look up. My stomach sinks when I realize it’s not someone I’m comfortable with. It’s someone I want to be far, far away from. The violinist, Smith, who was eyeing me like candy when I first walked into rehearsal, a dangerous look in his eye.

My limbs stiffen as an icy realization sinks into my veins. The way he looks at me isn’t normal. It’s dirty , and not in a hot way. My fingers turn buttery and I almost drop my phone again. I should call someone, but I can’t move my hands, or my mouth, for that matter, to yell.

He encroaches on my space with a menacing smile. It makes me backstep shakily and when my back hits the cold wall, my throat instantly turns dry, my shallow breaths all I hear.

Fuck .

Flickers of a night six years ago flash through my mind, immobilizing me in place.

Move, Sadie, my body cries.

But I can’t.

Smith doesn’t even say a single word. He’s just here, a sneer across his bearded face, his eyes shadowy, leaning in to scent me as if I’m some animal because what? I’m in a fucking dress?

More memories surface. The same type of sneer in a dark bedroom, not mine. Dusty blonde hair between my legs. My limbs frozen in shock as he pulled up my skirt. My lips wanted to call for help, call for Jaxon, but Jaxon wasn’t there anymore. He left.

Another lost help dies on my lips as Smith rasps in the silence, “Hey, pretty thing.”

I swallow a whimper. The words grate on my skin like velvet being rubbed the wrong way or the way a dog’s hackles fly up when it senses danger.

Danger. That’s what this is.

And I can’t move.

He reaches for me then, his fingers moving in the same way as The Creep six years ago, fingers trailing up my skirt, his thumb pushing in at the dip of my hip, pressing me to the wall.

My mind begins to spin into overdrive.

I need to move. I need to get away. But my limbs aren’t moving no matter how hard I try.

His other hand grazes my thigh at the edge of my skirt. I shudder in disgust, but he continues to skate over the high slit until it rests at my hip, both palms pressing me into the wall now, and I want to gag. His breath scrapes over my skin, face so close I turn my cheek to the side to keep our mouths apart. Fear roots me in place as everything in me numbs.

I can feel my mental barriers stacking brick upon brick of a barricade that blocks me from all senses and feeling. It blocks this unwanted touch and the musky, sweaty scent around us. It blocks my problem-solving skills as my vision turns into a cloud of white and my heart pounds in my ears. I realize there’s no fleeing, no fighting, no fawning.

I’m freezing. Again.

“Sadie?” I hear a muffled voice in the distance. His voice. I swim through the emptiness of my mind to try and pull it together. My thoughts are empty, but my body still tries. For him , it will.

It’s easier to dissociate when you feel numb. It’s easier to black out than feel the scrape of Smith’s beard lightly grazing my skin like sandpaper. The smell of leftover cigarette from his exhale. The choked sound that comes out of me as a hand trails upward to play with the ends of my hair, his sneer widening.

Move, Sadie. You need to move.

“Sadie!” His voice pulls me above water. Smith pulls back a second to look over his shoulder at who’s calling, who’s coming toward us, and it’s enough.

Fuck this. Fuck him. He’s not touching me. No.

“Get off me!” I yell, shoving his crusty hands off me and peeling myself from the wall. He starts for me again, but I evade his grip. My vision is still blurry, but I run down the hall as fast as I can to him .

Jaxon.

My body wants to shut down, my mind wants to numb itself, but I fight the crumble and keep running. When I’m close enough, he yanks me toward him, pulling me to his chest first, the scent of cedar wood and mint flooding my nostrils as I soften instantly at his touch. A cry escapes my lips, and he squeezes my shoulders gently, before guiding me behind him, one arm winding behind to rest at my back as he faces off with Smith still standing at the other end of the hall.

“Smith. Go home,” Jaxon growls, a clear warning to my assailant. My forehead rests against Jaxon’s back, his broad shoulders shielding my view.

Smith has the audacity to laugh haughtily and ice prickles down my spine. “You’re not in charge of me. She’s game.”

Jaxon’s arm stiffens at the word game . His other hand clenching like he might punch him, but he keeps his arm around my body, tucking me behind him further. My hands fist into his jacket as I try not to crumple against him or collapse on the spot, my legs now dangerously akin to Jell-O.

“She’s not game ,” Jaxon grits through clenched teeth.

“She your girlfriend?” Smith taunts, taking a step toward us. “No? I heard that she?—”

“Shut the fuck up, Smith. You heard nothing,” Jaxon seethes. “Want a paycheck to bring home to your wife? I suggest you fuck off before I tell Bert to replace you.”

“You can’t—” Smith argues, but Jaxon cuts him off angrily.

“I can . Now, get out.”

Smith grunts at the threat, but it pauses him in his tracks .

“Don’t make me say it again,” Jaxon warns. I’ve never heard his voice this low or menacing. It’s a whole new timbre that leaves goosebumps all over my skin, stirring a heat within me at his protectiveness amidst the shock and horror of whatever Smith tried to do to me.

A short pause lapses before Smith’s hard footsteps stomp down the hall, the echo ricocheting off the linoleum. I peek from around Jaxon’s broad shoulder to see his retreating figure and breathe a sigh of relief.

When the door slams shut, Jaxon finally loosens his grip and turns towards me. But now that we’re alone, my body unshackles. He catches me by my forearms as my legs give out, pulling me back to my feet, but my body starts to shiver uncontrollably.

I’m a quivering mess. I can’t speak. And everything around me starts to dull. It’s the familiar trademark of my brain blacking out events my body will remember physically, like a painful score it keeps track of, even if I lose memory of it.

Soft fingers around my shoulders pulse in light squeezes, more muffled sounds and blurry lights. The adrenaline high is crashing down and I’m feeling more like a shell and less like a person.

When my breathing finally slows, I start to make out deep brown eyes wide with worry.

Jaxon.

He’s mouthing something I can’t hear, the worry creeping up from his eyes now etched all over his brow, and my body awakens enough to wrap my arms around his waist and bury my face in his chest.

I don’t mean to cry. I don’t mean to squeeze him as tight as I can in panic and shock and relief and anxiety. I don’t mean to drench his probably stupid expensive shirt with tears and sob so hard I snort. But he doesn’t make fun of me. He doesn’t scold me. He wraps his arms around me gently, tentatively at first, as if he doesn’t know if he should touch me like this after what happened.

I squeeze my arms around him tighter and he whispers soothingly, drawing absent-minded circles in between my shoulder blades, his other hand smoothing my hair. He rests his chin atop my head and I imagine the press of his lips against my hair for only a moment. Or was that real?

My sobs die down enough for sound to slowly crescendo into my ears. If I weren’t already floored by what happened, Jaxon’s soothing notes would have done it. “It’s okay. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”

He repeats it again. This time, his touch amplifies every word.

“It’s okay.” He draws a circle between my shoulder blades. “I’ve got you.” His palm smooths my hair. “You’re safe.” His lips murmur on top of my head.

Slowly, reluctantly, I peel myself from his chest. When our eyes meet, there’s a whole new understanding between us. His dark eyes grip my hazel.

You’re safe .

Jaxon breaks the silence first. “Did he hurt you? Are you okay?” he croaks, then quickly follows it up with, “Shit. That’s a stupid question. I’m sorry.”

A snot-filled laugh bubbles out of me and I hastily wipe my face clean of it. So much for not embarrassing myself further today. When I glance back, I see the wet patch of tears I’ve left on his shirt.

“Shit, I’m sorry.” I pat at the wet material as if my hands might dry it. He shakes his head as he circles my wrist and holds them gently, looking at me with so much care it feels as if my chest might crack open.

The last few minutes painstakingly replay itself in my mind, along with the painful memory from six years ago. Not the one of me and Jaxon, the one later—after he left.

Heat flushes my cheeks as fresh tears stream down, and I remind myself that this time is different.

This time he’s here.

Jaxon lets go of my hands to cup my face and tilt it upward. His gaze pulls me in like a moth to a flame and my thoughts quieten in the well of his dark brown eyes behind his glasses. He’s so handsome it hurts and his kindness to me tonight makes me want to cry all over again. Which I am, as he wipes another loose tear down my cheek with his thumb.

“Don’t be sorry. You’re safe,” he repeats, his words nursing the open wound in my chest. “I’ll keep you safe.”

A knot forms in my throat so I lean into him in response, resting my cheek on his chest and letting my tears flow freely. We stay like this for I don’t know how long, holding each other in the hallway, a little too close, a little too intimate but neither pulling away.

Eventually, I’m able to form words, but the first thing out of my mouth is, “I should burn this dress.”

Jaxon’s mouth quirks, but he shakes his head, looking deeply into my eyes when he says, “What you wear is no invitation for anyone to do anything you don’t want.”

His words are soft but firm, confident and sure, the same way he said I’m the one person who could give him a run for his money. That I deserve the solos. And I can’t help the electricity rumbling through me as if lightning sparks flitter off his skin into mine.

A half-sob, half-laugh bursts out of me. “I spilled coffee on my clothes and put on my best friend’s dress so I wouldn’t be late to rehearsal.”

He smiles softly, dark eyes so warm it melts the stress in me, replacing it with whatever tenderness and care is in his touch at this moment.

“You shouldn’t burn it,” he murmurs.

“What?”

“The dress.” He looks down at me then, the light catching a golden flare in his chocolate brown eyes. It almost takes my legs out from me again, along with what he says next. “You look amazing in it.”

I blink at him, heart hammering in my chest, breathless once again, but for a whole different reason, as I have no idea what to say back to that .

Clearly not firing off on all cylinders, my mind blurts, “We never practiced.”

“We’re not practicing tonight.” His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows thickly. “I’m making you dinner and you’re going to bed. I’ll take the couch again.”

I don’t get a chance to retort, as I can’t seem to stop crying. Once again, his thumb catches the tear on my cheek, then brushes a strand of hair behind my ear.

Somberly, I nod, my heart fluttering from all the dips and sensations from tonight. When he releases his arms over me, I’m surprised when he catches my hand in his and holds it the whole way back to the hotel. Then, keeping to his word, he cooks for me, lays his blankets back out on the couch and lets me sleep in the bedroom alone.

But the empty space in the bed doesn’t give me comfort. Not after that night we shared. Not after he protected me from Smith. Not after how being with him makes me feel the most safe.

Now, all I can think about is how much I wish he were beside me and I didn’t have to fall asleep alone.