“I think I should leave.” Bethany’s cadence is soft and innocent, and it doesn’t hold any of the regret I’m sure she’s feeling.

She’s been silent since I brought her into the bedroom. Limp, well fucked, and sated.

And questioning everything.

I know the war that rages inside of her. I feel the same.

It’s not just business. And there’s no justification for the two of us being together.

She knows it. I know it. It’s easy to get lost in each other’s touch, but when it’s over, what’s left?

Beth turns in my bed, careful not to disturb the sheets to face me. Her small hand rests against my chest and I lift mine up to hers, holding her hand and bringing it to my lips so I can kiss her knuckles.

I don’t know what this is. Or where it’s going. All I know is that we shouldn’t be doing it. She knows it too.

“Do you mind if I use your bathroom?” she asks, not even looking me in the eyes.

I nod, forcing her to peek up at me, and the well of emotion I’m feeling sinks deep into the soft browns and hints of green in her gaze.

I move to lie on my back as she scoots to the edge of the bed and quietly picks up her sweater from the pile of clothes we carried in from the den. I watch the dim light kiss the curves of her body until it’s covered by the soft fabric.

Listening to her bare feet pad on the floor, then the flick of the light switch and the running water, I stare at the ceiling, knowing I need to give her an answer to her unspoken question, but the moment I do, I may lose her forever.

“You take medication?” Beth’s question brings my attention to her as she stands in the threshold of the bathroom. One hand on the door, the other on a bottle of unmarked pills.

“No,” I answer her, feeling the tension thicken.

Her weight shifts from one foot to the other. “So… you just keep your product in your bathroom then?” she dares to speak.

“My product?” I’m quick to throw off the covers and stalk toward her. My shoulders feel tense, hearing the confrontation in her voice. Maybe she just wants to pick a fight. Something she knows will end whatever it is between us and she can go back to pretending, it’s just business. Bull-fucking-shit. I won’t allow it.

“For a moment, I forgot. For a moment,” she says under her breath, shutting the medicine cabinet. She turns around before I get to her and looks me in the eyes as she takes a step forward to meet me. “I was looking for Advil. And I thought…” She trails off and swallows hard, pulling her hair into a ponytail before continuing to speak. “For a moment, I forgot and I don’t know how that’s fucking possible.”

I expect anger, but all I see in her features are disappointment and sadness. “Of course you have drugs here. You’re a drug dealer.”

Even as she stares at me, her eyes gloss over. She’s so close to the edge of breaking. Looking for anything to push her over so she doesn’t have to deal with the real cause of her pain.

Reaching around her, I open the medicine cabinet door and pull out the pills. “They’re for sleeping,” I tell her, and my voice comes out hard.

She tries to maneuver around me, but with my other hand, I grip her hip and keep her right there. “That’s all they are. I don’t do drugs and I don’t like what I do, but I have to do it.”

“You don’t-”

My finger over her lips silences her. Her eyes spark and rage, but beneath the anger there’s so much more.

“You don’t have to understand.” She pulls my hand away from her mouth just then.

“Yes, I do,” she says and shakes her head. “You don’t understand. I am not okay.” Her last word cracks. “I don’t know when I became this woman, or if I was always like this and never knew it because I was too busy solving someone else’s problem. But right now, I have nothing.” She swallows thickly, holding on to her strength. “I feel like my life is on the precipice of changing forever. And I don’t want to go back to the girl I was, but I don’t like where this is headed either. I don’t have answers, and I need answers.”

Her hand is still firmly gripping my wrist, and I stare at it until she loosens her hold.

“What answers do you need?”

My patience with her is higher than it should be. I’m softer and more willing to be gentle with her.

“I don’t like what you do.”

“That’s not a question to be answered.”

“Well I don’t like it. I don’t like that I like you.”

I let her raised voice and condescension slide. For now. Only because it’s true. She’s only being honest, and I get it.

“Someone’s going to do it, Bethany. There will always be someone in my position. You can’t stop that. I can at least have control if I’m that someone.”

“You sell drugs?” she asks, staring at the door to the bathroom before looking me in the eyes.

“You know I do. That answer isn’t going to change.”

“Why?”

“It’s a long story,” I say, keeping my voice firm.

“I have time.”

“I don’t want to tell it right now.”

“Why are you making me pay Jenny’s debt?” Her wide eyes beg me to give an answer that will calm her fears. I can see it clearly. “You didn’t mention it when you came to the house. It wasn’t until after you brought me here. And you don’t need the money, that’s for damn sure.” Her gaze searches mine, looking for the only words she wants to hear.

“I wanted to let it go,” I lie, hating myself for every word that comes out of me.

“How could she even owe so much? What did she use the money for?” she continues, not finding my answer satisfying enough.

Every question is another cut in the deepening gouge.

“You already got a question. Mine first.” It’s the only thing I can think of to hold her off for a moment. She quiets, watching me and waiting. Willing to give me whatever answer I need.

“How did you know about The Red Room? Why is that where you went to find answers?”

I already know the truth, so all while she speaks, I grasp for what answer I can give her in return.

“Jenny; she used to talk about it. The back room of The Red Room. All the time. I heard her on the phone.”

“Who was she talking with?”

“I don’t know.” She’s quick to add, “That’s another question.”

“Semantics.”

“Answer my question!” Bethany pushes her hands into my chest. Not to hit me, not to push me, but to get my attention, to demand it. My blood simmers simply from her touch. “Why did she owe you so much money?”

“She owed it to Carter,” I answer her, unable to deny her at this point. Blaming the debt on someone else like a coward. “He didn’t want to let the debt go and be made to look like a fool.”

“I don’t understand what she did with all that money,” she nearly whispers, looking past me as she searches through her memories for answers. Answers she’ll never find.

“Debt adds up fast.” I try to keep my tone gentle as I speak. “I can tell you I met her once,” I add, and my confession brings her gaze to mine. “She was looking to buy that drug you just had.”

“Sleeping pills?” She looks confused.

“Sweets is what they call it. Sweet Lullabies. We mostly use it for addicts to wean them off, put them out during their withdrawal.” Bethany stares up at me, hanging on every word as I speak. I only wish this story had a better ending for her.

“She was strung out on coke; every telltale sign was there. And she was buying too much of the sweets. It didn’t make sense. It wasn’t for her. When we questioned her, she said it was for her brother. She left and never came around again.”

“We don’t have a brother.”

“I know. We could tell she was lying to us, so we sent her away.”

“That’s what you know of my sister?” Shame and sadness lace her words.

“That’s the only time I met her,” I answer her and her gaze narrows, as if she can see through my truth to the lies I just told her moments ago. But this is the truth.

“I don’t know who she was buying it for, or if it has anything to do with why she was killed.”

I’ve lost a piece of her in this moment. I don’t know how, but I did.

“Don’t judge me, Beth. I’m the one who will pay for this.”

She stares up at me, but she doesn’t say a word. Still assessing everything I said, or maybe trying to see her sister as she was in her last days.

“You’ve got to calm down.”

“I don’t just calm down,” she says, wrapping her arms around herself and I think she’s done, but she tells me a story. “I was a preemie when I was born, and I almost died. My mother told me she thought it was God punishing her. She hadn’t wanted my sister; she almost gave her up. Not that she was a bad person,” she adds, quick to defend her mother. “She didn’t think she’d be a good mom to her, and had broken up with my father just before she found out she was pregnant. She came very close to giving her up, but my father came back around and wanted to try to make things work. And then a few years later, they wanted to have me. And she told me she’d thought God was going to take me away. My lungs didn’t work and the hospital couldn’t do anything, so they put me in a helicopter and sent me away to a hospital that could save me. My mom couldn’t come at first, because she lost a lot of blood.

“My grandfather used to say I came into this world fighting and I never stopped. He told me once, ‘You’ll leave this world fighting, Bethy. And I’ll still be so proud of you.’” Tears cloud her eyes, but she doesn’t shed them. Not my fiery girl; she holds on to every bit of her pain.

“It’s okay,” I tell her, rubbing her arm and then holding her when she falls into my chest.

“I’m sorry I’m a bitch,” she tells me, sniffing away the last evidence that she may have been on the verge of crying. “I don’t know why I’m always ready to fight. I just am.”

“It’s okay, I already told you that.”

“Why is it that when you say that, it feels like it really is?” The way she looks up at me in this moment is like I’m her hero. It’s nothing but another lie.

“Because I’ll do everything I can to make sure it is okay, maybe that’s why?”

She sniffs once more and takes a step back to the counter as she says, “I should leave.”

“I want you here. I don’t want you to leave tonight.”

“Why?” she asks. “Why do you want me to stay?”

“Do you really want to go to bed alone?”

“No,” she whispers.

A moment passes between us. The look she gave me a moment ago is coming back.

“Jase, promise me one thing.”

“What?”

“Don’t hurt me.”

I lie to her again, knowing that I hurt everyone I touch. Knowing I’ve already hurt her, although the truth of that hasn’t revealed itself yet. “I won’t hurt you,” I tell her. I would have told her anything. Just to get her to stay.