Travis (Pelion Lake)(4)
Author: Mia Sheridan
The bedroom door was slightly ajar too and I stood next to it, attempting to peer in, my chest rising and falling. A lamp was lit and in the shadows on the wall, I could see what looked like a man holding Phoebe down. Molesting her as she struggled. Adrenaline pumped through my veins and in one swift movement, I opened the door, raised my weapon, and headed straight for the attacker.
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! I’m coming, Phoebe!” A male voice. Not my own, although the words were somehow familiar.
“Oh God! You’re the best! The best!” Phoebe screamed back.
In that split second, my fear and reality collided, a harsh internal smack. I drew back just in time to avoid putting a bullet in the back of the head of the guy—I blinked, swallowed—fucking my girlfriend in her bed. The room wobbled. The gun did not.
Phoebe’s eyes flew open and my gaze locked with hers. Her expression morphed from bliss to horror and she screamed, the guy on top of her jolting and scrabbling off, getting tangled in the sheets so that he flipped out of the bed, dangling over the side naked. As he tried desperately to extricate himself from the tangled bedding, his expression filled with shocked terror, his now flaccid penis flopped limply from one thigh to the other. To his credit, he’d worn a condom.
It would have been hilarious if I were someone different, watching the whole scene unfold on a movie screen.
I lowered my gun slowly as he managed to unbind himself, jumping to his feet, tripping over the contents of the bedside table that must have been knocked over during their evidently frenzied fucking but catching himself before he pitched over again.
Ice water was slowly filling my veins, dulling any emotion. The guy, who looked to be barely legal, froze, clapping his hands over his groin.
“Why bother?” I asked. We’d both already gotten an eyeful.
The guy’s gaze darted to Phoebe who was now sitting up in bed, the sheet pulled up to her neck demurely, eyes wide, mouth slack, then to the other bedside table where countless pictures of me and Phoebe rested, back to my face, and finally landing on the gun. “Uhhh…” he gurgled.
“I think you better go, Easton,” Phoebe said softly, her lashes lowering, her skin smooth and tan against the pale pink sheets.
Easton. My humiliation had a name.
Easton didn’t hesitate. He dove for his clothing, pulling on his pants, stepping into one shoe, before he again glanced at me, the gun, and then did a half-limping-half-running gait toward the door, dropping his shirt, scooping it up, and then practically throwing himself out of the room as if he expected a bullet to slam into the back of his skull at any moment.
He thudded down the stairs and seconds later the front door slammed.
I’d been in quiet situations before. Hell, I’d spent several hours in my brother’s company, helping with some project or another, the brother who couldn’t speak a word. But I’d never, in all my days, experienced a quiet quite like that one.
“Say something,” she finally squeaked.
“I don’t think I’m the one who should be expected to speak right now.”
Her shoulders dropped. “I’m so sorry, Trav.”
“Why?” I asked dully, the gun that I’d almost used to kill my girlfriend’s lover now held slack at my side.
Phoebe came to her knees, the sheet dropping away as she moved toward me. “Please forgive me,” she pleaded.
I looked away. I didn’t want to see her nudity. It felt obscene after what I’d just witnessed.
She sank down, pulling the sheet over her breasts again as though she’d read my mind. “It’s just…I love you. I really do.” Her shoulders lowered. “I just…we went to the bar to get a few drinks after the tournament, and I met him there and he was so into me. The way he stared…it made me wonder if you really love me at all.” She looked miserable, and despite myself, a twinge of sympathy twisted my stomach. I pushed it down violently.
My gaze caught on a flyer on the floor from the bar they must have been at. It was an ad for dollar drinks.
“You met him at a bar a few hours ago?” Somehow that made it worse. Why did it make it worse? Could it get worse? My girlfriend had gone home with a stranger after a few hours of discounted day drinking.
I thought back to what I’d heard her screaming as the guy pounded into her—the woman I’d considered having children with less than thirty minutes before for Christ’s sake: You’re the best! The best! And damn if I’d willingly be second best to anyone again, especially some young Romeo likely just passing through town, spending a few bucks—literally—and spewing a couple sweet, drunken words to a girl he’d met in a bar.
“I didn’t realize you were that cheap,” I said.
Her expression crumbled and she put her hands over her face.
I turned, leaving her sex-scented room, walking numbly down the stairs and out the front door. The bouquet of flowers was still on the ground, and I raised my foot and stamped on them hard, grinding the blossoms into the dirt.
It appeared Bree wouldn’t need to rename her dog after all.
Chapter Three
Travis
My jaw felt sore from keeping it permanently clenched for the past three days. Every time I relaxed it, the vision of the young, naked dude pounding into my girlfriend filled my mind and I practically bit my own tongue.
A car drove by in the opposite direction, nearly sideswiping me when it veered into my lane. “Holy shit!” I yelled, barely avoiding it, my tires skidding in the roadside gravel. I pulled a quick U-turn, flicking on my lights and siren, and sped to catch up to the drunk tourist driving the battered-looking Honda Accord with an out-of-state license plate.
The tan car came to a slow, idling stop on the shoulder of the road that led from downtown Pelion to the turnoff for Calliope. The heat of the day had mostly burned off, and as I approached the vehicle, a soft breeze lifted my hair and set it down gently. It was a strange feeling…almost…comforting. I relaxed my jaw, a glare off the vehicle casting my gaze downward, over the bumper stickers. One featured a group of cartoon farm animals and ridiculously stated Friends Not Food, and the other proclaimed You’re Never Too Old to Play in the Dirt, whatever that meant. The back windows were completely steamed up and the driver’s window was already down. Either the occupant didn’t have AC or was hoping the breeze in his or her face would help sober them up. It was one of those inebriation tells I’d witnessed too many times to count, but I always kept an open mind.