Chapter One
“Homecoming.”
CADEN
By the time I opened the front door to our house the party was already in full swing. Half naked girls and drunken people slathered from one side of our massive family room to the other. A few pairs of eyes fell on me before a low murmur started that erupted into a whole room full of cheering and clapping.
I slammed the door shut behind me. What the fuck was this?
“There he is! Finally!” Luke pushed his way through the throng of people; a shit-eating grin plastered on his face as he threw his arm around my shoulder and thrust a beer into my hands.
Of course, my little brother would be behind this huge fucking mess.
I raised my eyebrows. “Luke, what’s this?”
“It’s your homecoming,” he slushed into my ear.
I snorted at that. I had already had my homecoming; my own private homecoming with the little cunt that was responsible for me leaving in the first place. And, fuck me, if she didn’t have a nice set of lips and a deep throat that knew just what to do with my nine inches.
Ugh, just the thought made my cock throb all over again.
This whole revenge thing might be even better than I thought.
My little brother’s grasp tightened on my shoulders as a girl with a tray of shots made her way toward us. “Can I have everyone’s attention?” he called out loudly, swaying from one foot to the other.
The room fell silent around us and I sighed, hanging on to some of his weight so he wouldn’t fall over. I loved my little brother. Well, I loved him as much as I could love anyone, anyway, and I knew he meant well. But the truth was that if he knew me at all, he would have known how much I hated shit like this. Everyone clapping me on the back and cheering for me because I got out of jail early after I beat a guy half to death with my fist and a golf club, it wasn’t like I was winning an award for character of the year anytime soon.
Not that I gave a fuck what these people or anyone else in this God damn town thought of me but they might look at it differently if they knew the truth about that night; if they knew the whole story.
It was all so phony and uncalled for, a bunch of people I could care less about crowding around me and praising me like I was some kind of celebrity just because my dad had more money than he knew what to do with and because I made them fall into place with my fist. It was all so superficial and fake. If there was one thing I had learned by now it was that outside appearances were always fucking deceiving. The more it seemed like someone had it all, the greater the chance that they were completely and totally falling apart on the inside.
Or, like in my case, completely dead.
There was barely anything-alive swimming inside of my soul anymore.
And the tiny, fractured, chipped, pieces that were still there, holding on for dear life while black consumed all the blood and bone around them, had been taken over by the devil long ago.
And that was just the way I liked it.
Everything had been so much easier since the day I stopped feeling.
It was who I was.
It would never change.
No matter who or what tried to break me.
You can’t break something that doesn’t even exist.
Luke grabbed a shot from the tray in front of him now, tossing another to me sloppily. “LADIES AND GENTLEMAN,” Luke held his shot up into the air and looked over at me. “OUR KING HAS RETURNED.”
The crowd went wild.
I couldn’t help the grin that came across my face as I downed the drink and threw my hands across my brother’s back. He may have been completely misguided and a complete pain in the ass but he was still my little brother. His intentions were good, even if they did end up missing the mark most of the time.
We made our way through the pool of people to the other side of the house. High fiving and clapping hands as I went, taking in as many hugs and drinks I could in the process. If the whole damn town wanted to kiss my ass, just like always, I wasn’t going to tell them to stop.
I may have been dead but I wasn’t an idiot.
“We were expecting you earlier,” Luke said once we reached the kitchen, leaning his body against the back of the counter. “Like six hours earlier.” His thick eyebrows knitted together in suspicion as he searched my face for a sign of where I had been.
I shrugged and grabbed a beer, studying him back just as intently. “I had some things to do.” It really was canning how similar the two of us looked. People had always assumed we were twins, barely noticing the two and a half year age gap that existed between us.
“Yeah, I bet.” He held my gaze, taking a step closer to me. “I bet I know exactly what you had to take care of.” He sighed and removed the beer out of my hand, moving close enough so that no one else would be able to hear him. “Is this thing going to become a problem, Caden?”
“What thing?” I played dumb.
He shot me a knowing look but humored me anyway. “This thing with her.”
“Her?” I kept the stupid act going.
He chuckled and his eyes grew dark. “You just got out.”
“And?”
“And it would be great if you could stay out for a while,” he snapped.
“She’s not a problem,” I told him firmly. “She’s nothing.”
“I hope you’re right, for all of our sakes.” He held my gaze for a few more seconds before shaking his head and brushing it off. “Anyway, I got you a little welcome home present.” He grinned wickedly at me and turned around, pulling a girl with blonde hair a huge rack out of nowhere and pushing her in front of my face. “Caden, this is Dolly.”
Dolly? He had to be kidding me.
“Of course, it is.” I traced my eyes up and down her body, already bored. Don’t get me wrong; she was the whole package with her blonde hair and huge tits. A heart-shaped face and decent ass to match but I had already gotten what I wanted for the night, I had already had the mouth of the little bitch I had been thinking about for the last six month wrapped around my hard cock while she kneeled in front of me like the good little angel she loved being.
I wasn’t naïve enough to think anything else would compare to that.
Dolly slid up next to me, draping her arm around my shoulder and eye fucking me slowly. “Caden, baby, we’ve missed you so much.” One of her long red fingernails started at the top of my chest and trailed down to the buckle of my jeans. “I’ve been waiting all night to satisfy you, to remind you what a real woman feels like.”
I glanced at Luke and shook my head, sending a silent message his way. Really? Don’t you think this skank is a little much? He just shrugged and tipped back his beer bottle, taking a long swig.
It was obviously a test.
Luke wanted to see if I was okay with everything as much as I was pretending to be. If I took the bait, clearly the only girl I could never really let go of my hate for wasn’t in my head as much as he thought she was. The problem was that he was right; my little brother knew my need for revenge outweighed anything else that he could throw at me. The slut standing in front of me couldn’t itch the scratch that had been bothering me for the past six months. Hell, the women who had put it there had already taken care of it.
At least for the time being, anyway.
“Thanks but no thanks,” I told her sternly, looking at my brother the whole time. “Go suck my brother’s cock.” I pushed the blonde toward my brother, returning the challenge. “I’m sure he’s thrilled at the prospect of being with a woman like you for the night.”
Dolly took my insult as a compliment and moved toward my brother, wrapping her daggers around his neck and pulling his lips into her neck. “Is that what you want, baby? I’m going to rock your world.”
Luke reeked of disapproval but I didn’t give a fuck.
“I’m back now,” I said calmly. “Let’s not forget who makes the rules here.”
I turned around before he had a chance to respond and made my way to the other side of the house. Suddenly, I wasn’t in the mood for a fucking party. The only thing I was in the mood to do was cause someone bodily harm or rock the body of the innocent little bitch who had gotten me deeper into a situation she knew absolutely nothing about.
That was the problem with naïve women who always wanted to do the ‘right’ thing. Most of the time they had their head so far up in the clouds that they had no idea they were making a fucked up situation a million times worse. I wondered if Winter even knew anything about real pain.
She always seemed so damn hopeful.
By the time I was done with her that part of her would be dead.
Just like me.
I was so busy avoiding one fucked up situation that I didn’t realize I was walking into another one until it slapped me in my face. There, standing at the bottom of the steps, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, was Josh Donavon.
Josh Donavon: my best friend and Winter’s stepbrother.
It was the first time I had seen him in person in months. I hadn’t expected him to be here, heard he had moved back in with his mother after everything had gone down that night. I took in his eager stance, clutched hands at the sides of his body, jolting limbs in each and every direction.
I smirked. He was just as jumpy as he’d always been.
I hadn’t spent much time thinking about what I would say to him once I got out and I was instantly glad. One look at him told me it was fucking un-nessacary. He was still my best friend, still my blood, and nothing was going to change that. Not after everything we had been through.
He had his arms around my neck in seconds and I returned the embrace, slapping him on the back as hard as I could. When I pulled back he kept his hand on my shoulder a second longer before looking me up and down slowly. “You look good, man, you look good.”
I waved it off, slapping him on the back of the head a few times playfully. “I didn’t expect to see you here.” I removed my hands and joined him on the side of the steps. “Figured you’d still be up at your mom's.”
“You’re back, I’m back,” he said simply.
The notion shouldn’t have reassured me but it did. Luke was my back up but Josh? Well, Josh was like a part of me. No matter what I did, no matter how deep shit got, he always had my back. And more importantly, he always kept his fucking mouth shut.
“You wouldn’t see me,” he offered up.
“Man, I didn’t want anyone to see me like that.”
Josh paused, nodding. “I just wasn’t sure if…”
I jumped in, filling the silence. “Nothing that Winter did would ever have anything to do with me and you,” I assured him. “Blood is thicker than water, right?” I nudged his shoulder firmly.
His shoulders relaxed. “Right.”
I grabbed a few beers out of a random guy’s arms as he passed. He shot around but one look at who was taking and he kept on moving. “Ah, I missed that,” I chuckled, handing one of the cold liquids over to Josh. “How are Michael and Carl doing? Still kicking your ass?”
“More like still annoying the shit out of my ass.” Josh huffed. “Truthfully, I haven’t seen much of them since I left. I tried to stay as far away from that house as possible if you know what I mean.”
I did know, Josh was loyal to a fault. He didn’t trust himself to be around Winter while I was away any more than I did. The town was under strict orders not to touch her, what happened to her once I got home was up to me and me alone. Revenge was my favorite kind of pleasure next to fear.
“I do,” I told him. My tone was laced was a deeper meaning, one I knew he would catch right away. “Speaking of dumb and dumber will they be making an appearance tonight?”
It wasn’t that I had anything against Michael and Carl, they got respect just for being Josh's blood but I had never allowed myself to get that close to them. Something about them rubbed me the wrong way; as if they were the kind to smile in your face then stab you in the back when it suited them.
“I’m sure they will be along.” He sipped his beer. “I can’t believe you’re really here.” He stared at me for a few seconds as if he was trying to figure out if he should say something or not. “You didn’t? I mean… you never saw my dad in there?”
My fists instantly clutch into my sides without my permission.
“No.”
If I did he would be dead.
Josh nodded. “Didn’t think so.”
“Hey,” I said, turning to face him. “No regrets.”
He stared at me for a few beats before relaxing again. “No regrets.”
I pushed my can against his and drank to that.
I was lying, of course.
I had one regret from that night.
If I could do it all over again, I would have worked faster.
Fuck a coma.
I would have killed that son of a bitch.
I probably still would.
Now if he would only wake the fuck up.