The Love I Need

Chapter 5

I unbuckle my seatbelt and lean close to Cal. "There you are. I missed you," I tell him, while I reach up to run my fingers into his hair.

He frowns at me. "I missed you too, Emy, but..." He drifts off when I yank on his hair to pull his face closer to mine.

I noticed he keeps his hair shorter again. I wonder if he's gotten any more tattoos. I can't see any of them now, because of what he's wearing.

"What's with the suit?" I ask in a whisper. I scratch my fingers against the back of his head, then pull him closer still. I lean toward him to press my lips to his.

Cal throws his head back before our lips make contact. "The blow, Emy," he says, sounding irritated.

I smirk at him. "Okay, okay. I know you like getting high before you fuck, but I thought maybe, since it'd been so long since we've—"

"Wh-what?" he stutters out as he shakes his head. Looking distraught, he explains, "I'm not going to have sex with you, and I don't want to get high."

I frown at him and settle back against my seat again. "Well what the fuck was I supposed to think, Cal? You parked in a hidden place and asked me for blow!"

Cal points to the dumpster outside. "Yah, to make you throw that shit out!"

I stare at him, and then a laugh bubbles out of me. "What? Cal Jones wants me to throw out perfectly good drugs? What kind of alternate universe have I ended up in?"

Cal scowls and runs a hand through his hair. "It's not a joke, Emy. I can't have you coming to my house—my kid's house—with coke on you. You need to get rid of it."

"You're being fucking serious?"

"Is that not what I just said?!" he snaps the words angrily, then runs his hand through his hair and rubs the back of his neck. He takes a few deep breaths, exhaling each one slowly, with his eyes squeezed shut.

"Just put whatever drugs you have in the dumpster, and then we can go eat pancakes," he says in a much calmer voice, "Come on, Emy, let's go. Please. I can't have drugs around my kid."

This is fucking weird. He's married, he has a kid—step-kid—and he's the one asking me to get rid of drugs. How life has taken a turn.

I watch him for a moment, then reach into my backpack which is sitting on the truck floor by my feet. I pull out a small bag and toss it toward Cal. "Fine, we'll just use it up before we go back to your place then."

The speed in which he throws it back to me is lightning quick. "No! Fuck, Emy, I'm not touching that shit. Fuck off. Throw it out. Now!"

His angry voice is back, but what the fuck does he have to be angry about?

He's the one who left me behind—under false pretenses, but still! He's the one who was snorting cocaine around me for years, before I decided to join him. And now he's acting like he's too above me to join me in a little pick me up? The fucking nerve.

"Fine! I'll do it myself!" I lean forward to pour a small amount of the powdered substance on the dash, and Cal whips his seatbelt off and jumps out of the truck like I've just pulled the pin of a grenade.

He keeps the door open and glares at me, even as he backs away a couple of feet. "In Theo's truck?" he groans, then drags a hand down his face. "He's going to kill me. You're really fucking me over here, Emy. Theo does not—"

He stops talking when his phone starts ringing.

"Fuck," he mutters while pulling it out of his pocket.