Demons on Her Shoulder by K T Bowes

Author:K T Bowes [Bowes, K T]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hakarimata Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

Jayden started the kiss but Ed ended it. Reluctance accompanied the sigh he gave as he pulled away and dropped his arms. Jayden faltered, vulnerability flooding back as she stood in her bra and skirt by the dining table. Ed’s jacket had slipped free and covered her blouse on the floor. The ugly spectre of Abandonment laughed at her from the corner of the room, opening its filthy maw and compounding her embarrassment.

“I’m sorry.” Ed struggled to meet her sparkling eyes. “That was my fault. Please forgive me.” He licked his lips and ran a shaking hand through his hair. Turning away from her, he blew out a ragged breath laden with need.

For a moment, Jayden’s face held yearning. Vulnerable and responsive, the expression disappeared as she wiped all emotion from her face with a practiced ease. She said nothing, but saw the effect in Ed’s eyes as he turned back to her, his desire seared with a jagged defender’s blade as she locked him out of her heart and sealed the door.

He retrieved his jacket from the floor and gnawed on his lower lip all the way to the stairs. When he turned back, he paused on the top step. “I will explain,” he promised. “Not now, but I will.”

Jayden listened to the sound of his footsteps on the stairs. A moment passed as he reclaimed his shoes and then the front door clicked shut. She forced herself to retrace his steps, activating the deadbolt and chain while balancing her elbow against her side.

A heady sickness stayed with her through the night, forcing her to claim broken moments of sleep on the bathroom floor. She alternated between retching up nothing and laying in a painful ball on the tiled floor. Rita’s face swam in her inner vision and Jayden almost called her. The physical pain seemed minor in the face of the gnawing hole in her heart. An awakened seventeen-year-old Lily rebelled against the severe, guarded woman she had become. Jayden battled to suppress the memories she unleashed with her escape.

With Lily came the memory of Wes. Her muffled screams returned to her, ignored as they bounced off his sweaty collar bone. She saw her father’s face, his mask of horror burned into her mind. And then the rage he’d unleashed. Wes dared to plead self-defence in court, a motive ridiculed by the prosecution. Jayden had sighed with relief as the jury batted it aside but Lily knew. She’d seen the fury of a father. She knew.

Nick was already baked on cocaine by the time his father burst into the filthy room. Dan McGowan’s last moment of life included a front-row seat to his son’s addiction. The memories tortured Jayden as she writhed in discomfort on the bathroom floor. The demons forced her head down the toilet, though she expelled nothing.

At five in the morning, the retching stopped. Her arm felt numb from wrist to shoulder, bringing relief as she moved from the bathroom to huddle on her sofa in the darkness.

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