Wanting by Lynn Burke

Addilyn

“Guilty,” Lloyd told me while pulling me into his arms.

I sobbed, knowing doing what he and Mother had ordered sent Gideon where he didn’t belong. I should’ve lied. Should’ve stood up for him. That desire to sink into the floor flooded through me again, and I truly hated myself in that moment. Hated that my father had wanted a child. Hated that my mother had gone through the bother of carrying me inside her body for almost ten months.

Hollowness took over my chest where my heart shouldn’t beat. I resented my body’s disregarded of my emotions and the way it continued to fill my lungs with life-giving oxygen.

“How long?” I asked, my hands clinging to Lloyd’s suit coat, even as Mother hissed at him to let ‘the whore’ go.

“Ten years.”

Another sob ripped from me, and Mother grabbed hold of my arm, yanking me away from the man she’d tried to replace my father with, a man she obviously didn’t want her impure daughter touching.

“You can’t put your hands on her like that in public.” Her low tone wouldn’t reach those in the courthouse’s foyer around us, but her actions had earned us some questioning glances.

I swiped my tears from my cheeks, fighting for calm. Bad enough everyone around us knew what I’d done, what Gideon had done to me…and now they got to see Mother’s unfounded jealousy.

“Come along, darling.” Lloyd hooked his arm through hers, patting her hand. “Let’s go home. We can process later.”

Mother whispered harshly in his ear, but he continued to murmur, coddling like always. She eventually quieted, and I followed on their heels, knowing I would get an earful for my whorish ways, how I’d soiled myself for my future husband.

“Addilyn,” Jenny called from behind us, but I didn’t acknowledge her.

We stepped outside into the spring air, and I wrapped my sweater tighter around me.

“Addilyn!” Jenny hollered again.

My best friend. The one I’d thought I could trust. I found someone to lay the blame of Gideon’s sentence on since I couldn’t bear shouldering it on my own. Ignoring her came easily, and I climbed into the car and slammed the door as she hurried forward in my periphery.

“Addilyn?” Lloyd questioned, eyeing me in the rear view.

“Just go.”

He started the car and left Jenny behind—and Mother didn’t breathe a word, simply sat seething, her entire body tight and perfectly poised in the passenger seat.

Jenny tried calling a dozen times over the next few days while I wallowed in clashing emotions. She texted twice as much, and I ignored those attempts to reach out to apologize too.

Everything but guilt with its sharp claws turned into a muted gray color in my mind. Numbness replaced my disappointment and anger toward Jenny, but my shame lingered.

Mother drank which meant she passed out more often than not, ignoring the fact I breathed which was fine by me.

I couldn’t drag myself out of bed, refused to go to school, and gagged while trying to eat.

A quiet knock on my door on day three? four? let me know it was Lloyd.

“Yes?” I called from where I lay curled on my bed, reliving the courtroom scene and hating myself for doing as I’d been told.

He stuck his head in, catching my gaze. “Jenny is here.”

The numbness inside me dissipated like smoke with a strong breeze. I exhaled a heavy sigh and clung to the rekindling anger.

I wasn’t surprised she’d shown up. Jenny was like a bulldog and wouldn’t let my silence go.

“Is Mother in the parlor?” I asked.

“No. She’s resting in our room.”

I pushed up to sit, not giving two shits I still had on sleep shorts and a camisole without a bra. Lloyd glanced down over my body, but I couldn’t rouse the energy to cover my chest—or even care he probably saw my nipples.

“Want me to have her wait in the parlor?”

“Would you please? I’ll be down in a minute.”

I pulled on a blue T-shirt of Gideon’s I’d stolen from his hamper weeks earlier. It no longer smelled like his soap, but I still searched for it with my nose anytime I pulled it on, hoping to get a whiff of him.

No such luck.

Throat tight, I shuffled down the stairs on bare feet, my legs weak.

I tried to mentally prepare myself for a showdown with Jenny but couldn’t figure out what to say. Heat rose inside me, the kind that wanted to destroy like a flamethrower to dry twigs.

Whatever love I’d had for her before had been burned to ash by her actions. It was time for me to hurt her heart like she’d done to mine.

Unleash, I told myself. Unload on her like you did to Mother all those months ago. Let her have it, and don’t hold back. She doesn’t deserve any less.

“How could you?” I asked through my teeth rather than break down in tears as I walked in to find Jenny hugging herself by the window.

She spun to face me, her face pale, eyes red. “The sheriff himself questioned me, Addilyn. He’s the law in this town! What was I supposed to do?”

“Keep your damn mouth shut to protect me! To protect Gideon!” I threw my arms up in the air and stood just inside the door. There was no way I could get any closer and not want to rip her eyes out. “You betrayed my trust, Jenny. I told you what happened in the strictest of confidence—and then I had to sit through the most horrifically embarrassing moment of my life in a courtroom full of people! Everyone knows Gideon all but forced me to give him a blow job—”

“You didn’t have to.”

Ignoring the unclean feeling crawling over my skin for giving into him, I clamped my lips shut and glared at her snippy tone. She was going to get pissy with me?

“You could have said no and walked away—but you didn’t.” Jenny’s chin lifted, and the heat in her eyes clued me in to where her anger stemmed from—same as I’d suspected the night I’d buried beneath my blankets and told her what had happened.

“You’re jealous.”

She glanced away, and I choked on a laugh.

“You’re jealous that he never gave you a second look except for when he was trying to get under my skin. You’re jealous that he’s always wanted me. Could you be any more petty, more ridiculous, Jenny?”

“You’re his stepsister,” she whispered harshly, hands landing on her hips as she found the guts to face me. “That makes him sick.”

“Two months ago you didn’t think so. You encouraged me to climb his body like a tree.”

“You could have lost your V-card twice over. Devon and Gideon. And me?” She snorted her disgust. “I can’t even get a guy to ask me out!”

Ugly, green jealousy. Gut-wrenching in its effects…

“You want Devon too?” I asked, my voice finding quiet as even more disappointment and hurt shredded my insides.

“Ever since second grade when he told you he liked you.”

I stared at my ex-best friend, the one person I’d believed would stick through me thick or thin. Our children were supposed to grow up together. Maybe even marry.

But Jenny crossed a line I never would’ve had I been in her shoes. Shameful secrets like I’d shared with her should never be uncovered by a friend, no matter the consequences of lying.

Pain jabbed at the back of my throat, and I wrapped my arms around myself as time seemed to slow down. Cold settled into my core.

“I want you to leave,” I told her, my voice raspy and sounding dead to my own ears. “And lose my cell number.” Trusting karma to deal with her, I turned and walked away with my trembling chin held high.

Horribly, devastatingly alone.

I asked Lloyd to have my cell number changed. Asked the housekeeper to lie about my availability if anyone called the landline.

I stayed home from school, unable to stomach being in hallways filled with people who knew what had happened after Gideon had dragged me away from Devon’s house. Darkness hung like a thick, swirling cloud over my head, and every other minute of the day, I wondered what my stepbrother was doing. How he was doing.

Did he understand my need to be honest?

Did he hate me for it?

On the tenth day after his sentencing while running through the words I’d spoken while on the witness stand for at least the hundredth time, I realized with vivid clarity that I had done the same thing to him that Jenny had done to me. I’d betrayed him, his trust.

He must hate me.

Not knowing his emotions ate at my stomach like acid, burning a hole in my gut, but I deserved the pain. I couldn’t keep food down, couldn’t sleep. My sulking made home life ten times worse, sending Mother into fits of shrieking because she couldn’t ‘handle me and my whorish bitchiness.’

She obviously didn’t consider the fact I was like her in every way—looks, temperament, and emotional reactions.

I hated myself. Hated her even more with every passing day and twice as much after she refused to let me visit Gideon in jail so like Jenny, I could beg forgiveness I didn’t deserve—and didn’t expect to receive.

Lloyd ended up caught in the middle of our daily arguments, the only time I could unleash the slew of shit inside me, and I took solace in his hugs after he coddled Mother into silence and sent her off to bed.

She headed to the spa for a much-needed afternoon of rest and relaxation on what seemed like day five-hundred and sixty-seven of my life in hell, and I breathed easier in my room, attempting to get caught up on schoolwork.

Lloyd had gone to the school board and principal, asking for help for the remainder of my sophomore year. Considering the situation, they agreed to let me learn remotely, along with weekly meetings with two tutors I’d be stuck with until the end of the school year.

At least they were substitute teachers and not other students.

A soft knock sounded on my door, one I recognized from his daily check-ins.

“You can come in,” I called to Lloyd while typing up one last answer for the social studies lesson I’d been assigned.

He moved to stand behind me, his hands on my shoulders like he’d done the day before. His light hold made me feel grounded. Steady. A touch I could trust. “How’s it going?” he asked.

“Good.” I finished the sentence and hit the submit button. “Just completed my last assignment of the day.”

He squeezed gently, kneading at muscles that always went tense after hours in front of the computer, and I melted beneath his hands. “Your mother isn’t at a spa.”

I straightened and spun my chair to face him, his hands falling away from me. “Where is she?”

“She finally agreed to see a therapist.”

Letting out a heavy exhale, I relaxed again and muttered, “Thank God.”

“But she’s going to the spa afterward. That gives us a few hours of silence.”

So, she had finally started to get on his nerves too. I huffed a snort while pulling my hair up, glad for said silence. “Hopefully the therapist can get her on some meds to help her chill.”

Lloyd reached out and grasped my wrist, stopping my attempts to tame my long locks into a messy bun. “Keep it down.”

I peered up at him, a weird twinge radiating through my belly. The kind that made a kid ask for a nightlight—the same feeling I had when I first met him all those months ago. “Huh?”

“Your hair.” He removed my hands from the twisted knot atop my head and ran his fingers through my long hair, bringing it back over my shoulders. My arms sank down, palms on my lap, limp.

“What are you doing?” Tone wary, I peered up at him, wondering at the strange way he looked at my hair…my mouth.

Grasping my chin in his palm, he tilted my head up, his thumb brushing along my lower lip.

My scalp prickled.

“Lloyd.” I tried to pull from his hold, but he tightened his fingers along my jaw, keeping me in place.

Chills raced through me, raising the hairs on the nape of my neck.

“Things couldn’t have worked out any better. All I’d hoped, all I’d planned…”

I stilled, my pulse jumping as I processed what he said, his presence hovering over me. Dominating. Intimidating.

Dark eyes peered into mine, and I shivered, instinctively shrinking against my chair as far as I could go. “What are you doing?” I whispered again, my voice ragged.

He removed his hand from my chin and stepped away.

Oxygen rushed into my lungs.

“Let’s have a little chat.” Lloyd settled onto the foot of my bed, patting the mattress beside him.

“I-I’m fine right here.”

“Come over here and sit beside me, Addilyn.” Lips in a thin line, he gave me the stern look I’d only ever seen on Gideon’s face. And his tone? It promised punishment if not obeyed.

The last thing I needed was two parents pissed off at me. Swallowing, I forced my suddenly shaky legs to hold me while shuffling to do as told.

I settled on the edge of my mattress, plenty of space between us, hands on my lap.

“I spoke with Gideon earlier today.”

Straightening, I honed in on Lloyd, desperate for information since Mother hadn’t allowed me to visit or write to Gideon and beg forgiveness. “How is he? What did he say?”

Lloyd studied my face, his brow furrowed. “He blames you for his sentencing.”

I sagged, my breath catching as my eyelids slid shut. I knew it.

“You’re dead to him, Addilyn. He never wants to hear from you. See you.”

Swallowing hard, I nodded, my chest hollowing out.

Empty.

Aching.

Lloyd brushed my hair over my shoulder, his knuckles trailing down my arm.

“Don’t touch me,” I whispered, shying away and wrapping my arms around myself to keep from shivering. I didn’t deserve comfort—I deserved the pain Lloyd’s words had brought back with force.

“Did you know that I have access to your cell phone?” he asked, his fingers twirling through the ends of my hair. “To all your social media? Your search history?”

I frowned as his words took time to fully register in my brain—and the blood rushed from my face, jacking my heart rate from sluggish with pain into hyperdrive. I stared, my stomach threatening to heave as a slow smirk lifted his lips. My stepfather knew what I used to Google late at night while hiding beneath my covers?

“Our little sweetheart isn’t so pure,” he whispered when my eyes blinked wide.

I gagged on rising bile and swallowed it down.

His smile returned, and a tremor rippled over me. “Restraining fantasies, Addilyn? Consensual non-consent? Where have you learned of such things?”

Words escaped me as I stared at the only person I thought I had left on my side. “D-Did you tell Mother?” I choked out.

“No.” His gaze flitted over my face to my neck. To my heaving chest. “Not yet.”

“You’re g-going to.” I didn’t ask a question because why else would he bring the topic up unless to warn me of the sure outburst and screaming match in my near future?

“I was thinking—” Lloyd slid closer and wrapped his hand fully in my hair, tipping my head back “—I ought to tell her, but perhaps you might have something that’s worth my silence.”

Gulping, I held his stare, shivering over the look I recognized in his eyes.

Lust.

Want.

Sick desire he shouldn’t feel for me.

Oh God…

“You can’t do this,” I whispered, trying to back away from him even as he grasped my hair tighter in his fist. Shoving against his chest proved ineffective, and I whimpered at the rapid racing of my heart.

His hold on my hair ripped at the roots, and my eyes filled with tears at the sting.

“Ow…p-please, Lloyd.” I shoved at his chest again, the need to flee tensing every muscle in my body. “Let me go.”

“I helped save you from the attentions of a boy who would have fucked you, stole your heart, and left you for California in May,” he stated quietly, his focus on my mouth. “And while I hate he took a first from you I had every intention of claiming, the rest of your firsts will be mine, just like I’ve been fantasizing about.”

“No!” I clobbered his shoulder with a wild hook, and he grasped my wrist hard enough I gasped.

“Don’t fight me, sweetheart.” One twist of my arm sent me face first onto my mattress, and he held me down, his hold on my hair crushing my cheek against the comforter. “You’re going to take what I give you.”

“No!” I screamed, scratching at his hand as he pressed my face into the mattress. “Let me go you s-sick f-fuck!” I screamed harder, flailing—punching and kicking whatever I could reach, my chest threatening to explode with how hard my heart pulsed adrenaline through my system.

His hand disappeared from my hair.

I jerked beneath him—and a smashing blow against my temple rang my ears. Knocked me senseless. I lay like a limp rag, breathing. Blinking at the spinning, liquid-like wall of my bedroom. Pain radiated between my ears as I fought to focus.

Stay awake.

“I’m going to give you the world, sweetheart,” Lloyd whispered against my ear, his hand sliding up the inside of my limp leg. “And you’re going to let me because we both know what a whore you really are. Your mother won’t believe you—” he groped me between the thighs “—so don’t bother telling her. And if you do?”

Cool air slid over my core as he ripped my leggings clean off my body.

“I’ll make it hurt,” he promised with a tone I knew to be truth.

Nightmare, I told myself while trying and failing to make my body move, fight him off as he shoved my thighs wide. This isn’t happening.

Two months earlier, I’d thought my life sucked, that my reality couldn’t get worse.

What I wouldn’t have given in that moment to have my pre-sixteen days back when all I had to think about was hating how my body reacted to Gideon.

My protector I’d betrayed had tried to warn me while being hauled off in cuffs. He’d told me to stay away from him.

If only I’d known he’d meant his father.

THE END

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