"Sorrow in my soul 'cause it seems that wrong, really loves my company..."
♫ Unfaithful by Rihanna.
✰ ✰ ✰
"Hey Zayn, it's me, Cherry. I know it's late in New York, but I was just calling to invite you and Harlow to my mom's funeral on Friday, the 13th of February. It's the day you guys get back, or the day Harlow said you'd be back by? I tried to schedule it for a later date but the florist, the church, and the funeral parlor are giving me scheduling issues so I had to settle for soon, or else it wouldn't be until next Christmas. I know it's the lamest invite ever and it'll be pretty boring, but I'd appreciate it if you both could come. I texted you the formal invite with what to wear and the time and whatnot, but don't worry about rsvp-ing. Just come if you can... I um, I miss you both a lot and I hope everything's going great where you are. Tell Harlow I said what's up, and I'll talk to you later. Bye."
The second the voicemail was finished, Zayn slammed his phone on the counter and snatched my spoon out of my hand mid-bite, flinging some cereal and milk all over Cosette's shiny kitchen counters, "What the fuck did you do?"
I blinked, disregarding his comment, "Did she fuckin' say, 'Tell Harlow I said 'what's up?' She's never uttered the words 'what's up' in her life, replay it. That is just atrocious!--"
Zayn slapped my hand when I reached for his phone, "Did you tell Cherry we'd be back to Chicago in a week?"
"No."
Zayn clenched his jaw in a warning.
I reached and snatched the spoon, "I didn't tell her. I..." I sighed, "I promised her."
"You what?" He raised his voice.
"Hey! Shut up. It's too goddamn early to be yelling. Inside fucking voices in my house." Cosette came out from her room in a shower robe, scowling at Zayn with annoyance, "What the hell is going on?"
"None of your business that's for damn sure," I murmured, taking a bite of my cereal.
Cosette paused in front of her fridge to put her hand on her hip and sass me, "Those are my Frosted Flakes you're eating, you do realize that, right? I could physically throw you out and leave you starving if I wanted to. Let me know, and I'll say the word, Harlow."
"I wish you would, they're kinda stale. I could find better breakfast in a dumpster behind a Burger King." I spat out the bite of cereal and pushed the bowl forward, "Don't act like you're doing me any favors by offering me the food you let rot in your pantry because it's 'so unhealthy and full of carbs'." I mocked her voice in a shrill tone.
She rolled her eyes but continued to get her fresh fruits from her fancy fridge and use her fancy blender to make a smoothie. She did it every morning I'd been there. She woke up, showered, made a smoothie obnoxiously loud, got dressed, and went to work. It was like watching a damn robot trying to simulate human existence. Depressing as fuck.
"Harlow, why would you promise her that?" Zayn pressed on, "We're probably gonna need a little bit more than a week to find Cole. And by a little bit, I mean, I actually don't know how long we're gonna be here."
"I don't know, okay? It just came out. I figured a week would be plenty. I figured we'd fucking cram and work all night long and I thought we'd have more by now." I frustratedly explained, "Plus, I kinda promised her we'd hook up on Valentine's Day so... a week was the most time I could be gone."
"Wait--you asked her out for Valentine's Day?" Zayn put an entire freeze on our conversation with blink at me, "You made plans... like a date."
I cringed, "Don't be fuckin' nasty about it-"
"You like her. I fucking knew it."
"For the trillionth time, I don't like her." I walked around the counter and settled for a chilled root beer in Cosette's fridge. I would've gone for a whiskey or even a real beer, but that was the kicker about staying at Cosette's house. No fucking alcohol. I couldn't even drink it in her face.
The first night, after a long, long day of work--me and Zayn went out to get food and we came back with beers, and she practically had an aneurysm. She yelled at us like her teenage sons who she caught smoking weed and poured it all down the drain while we watched. It was too much for her to even see it in her current state.
Lame if you asked me.
"He loves her." Zayn ignored me and whispered to Cosette.
"Don't care." Cosette said to him with a disgusted face before snatching my drink before I could take so much as a sip, "My house, my soda. Get your own, dipshit."
"Okay--what will it take for you to ease the fuck up?" I snapped at her as she began to walk away toward her open-concept living space. She stopped halfway to her sectional, "We're here as a favor for you, remember? We can pack up our shit and be on our merry way whenever we please."
While Zayn and I actually couldn't go to a hotel because there was too much lurking on their WiFi servers, I still had a point. I felt like scraping the skin off of my face with a knife when Zayn told me we needed to stay at her place. It was physically painful the first morning to wake up to her face. But, I'd stayed out of her way and been almost pleasant because it was her house and we made an agreement to make nice to find Bella. But, she couldn't be normal. She was grumpy as fuck. Rude as fuck, to both of us. And entitled as shit when we'd ask her any questions about--anything.
It was hell.
Cosette's shoulders dropped and then raised as she took a deep breath, "Okay, fine, I'll admit, I've been a little rude." She turned back around, "But--I'm just stressed and I thought we'd have answers by now."
"You were rude from day one and it's been three days."
"Yeah, but look how much progress we made in one day with Jimmi!" She gestured with her hand toward the table full of papers and other crap we'd accumulated to help us figure out Cole's whereabouts, "For the first time in four years, I have hope! And having that just makes me realize how close we are to figuring it all out. So, whatever, my bad. I'm sorry I'm not skipping about, happy that you've found no new ways to get my fucking daughter back." She exhaled harshly and dropped the soda on the counter before leaving to go to her room.
Zayn felt bad I could tell.
I just casually reached for the soda and took a nice, long sip, "Ah. Ooo, a hint of ginger-"
Zayn smacked my arm, "Go talk to her."
"I think I'd rather jump out of the window."
"Oh, grow up, Harlow, seriously." Zayn scolded, "The first day we came here we made an agreement to be civil. You two said, reluctantly, that you'd both work on your relationship so that when Bella gets back, she'll have a stable, happy family. If you break that promise to her, you ruin that future for your baby, so yes, sometime today, please." He snatched the soda from my hand and walked across the room to sit on the couch.
I tilted my head back and gripped the roots of my hair, fighting back a guttural scream.
Speaking to Cosette for as long as I already had was making me go grey.
But--Zayn was right.
We made a stupid deal.
Even if I was a liar and maybe planning to snatch custody of Bella the second Cosette got back--right now? I needed to make nice like we were in school and let her use my crayons even though she fucking smelled and picked her nose or something.
I grabbed another soda from the fridge and headed down the narrow hallway to Cosette's bedroom which was filled with family photos of her mom, dad, and grandparents. I found that to be quite shocking to find when I first got there. Considering when Cosette got pregnant at merely fifteen, her parents kicked her out and her grandparents wouldn't give her anything except a free ride to church.
They were the reason that I had to work two--sometimes three jobs to keep our teeny two-bedroom apartment with rooms the size of closets. They refused to be her family and help out.
She always talked about how much she hated them for it and how much she wished they weren't so selfish. It was hilarious that she had Christmas cards hung up like they cared about her.
They didn't give a flying fuck about anyone but themselves.
"Let me in." I knocked on Cosette's door.
I heard her grunt before she walked to the door and opened it up, "What?"
"Are you done?"
"I'm gonna be late for work." She huffed, closing the door in my face.
"Look, if you're..." I rolled my eyes and practically threw a mini tantrum in the hallway. I hated having to speak to her. I ran a hand down my face, "If you're having trouble with your patience and you need to be a bitch to me then fine. I'm gonna be a bitch to you either way. But, if it'd help to... help us, maybe you should take a few days off of work and join the search. It'd be better than sitting at work all day, stressing yourself out about whether or not we found something. The waiting is the hardest part about this shit, believe me, I know."
That was about as nice as I could stomach.
Her footsteps came back to the door and she opened it again slowly, the most dead look on her face, "I just--it feels like before." She expressed, "Having you here makes me wanna drink. Like really, really drown myself in tequila and I can't even do that. When we were first looking for Bella, I'd get so drunk that I wouldn't feel like this. I wouldn't care if we didn't find something in one day. It didn't phase me that things took time. But, now that I'm sober..."
"You feel everything." I guessed, "Yeah, I know. You're not the only one with drinking problems."
She sighed and leaned her head against the door, "I know I seem like a weird robot and my routine is strict, but it keeps me sane. It keeps me from drinking. You guys fucked up that routine when you decided to stay here and its' no one's problem but my own, I know that. But, it takes some getting used to."
"You could've just told me that," I said annoyedly.
"Yeah, well..." She trailed off and snatched the soda from my hand, taking a long swig. Her throat bobbed as she swallowed and she handed it back to me, but I declined.
"Look, just try. We could use you, you're a fast typer."
Her eyelashes fluttered as she looked down in contemplation.
"I don't have all day-"
"Okay, fine! I will call in sick to work, now get away from me." She shooed me away.
"Gladly." I turned around and headed into the living room.
That was... easier than I thought but it still made me wanna bathe in bleach. It wouldn't get any easier either.
"Did you fix it?" Zayn asked, then at the dining room table at his computer.
"Yes, dad," I said sarcastically.
"Good. Cause we've got a fuck ton of work to do if you're gonna make it to Carol's funeral on Friday. We have three more days to figure out where Cole is." He replied, smacking his hand on the stack of papers I left off on the previous night.
"Then, I guess we better get to it."
✧ The Next Day... ✧
"Harlow! H-Harlow!"
Someone's hands on my shoulders shaking me woke me up from my tranquil dream of hot male & female strippers feeding me chocolate cake and honey-glazed donuts. A rude awakening, indeed. Even more so when I realized the hands on me were Cosette's.
"Augh, god, that's one way to kill a boner," I whispered as I shoved her hands off of me and shot up from my laid-out spot on the couch. A couple of papers fell off then since the couch was covered in them.
Most of them were New York auction receipts we got from Jimmi. We were hoping to find an alias name Cole used to purchase items or maybe track down someone linked to him. But, it seemed every person who went to these 'private auctions' doubled, hell tripled down on their security and couldn't be found anywhere online whatsoever.
The other half of the papers were traffic cam photos of him walking out of a multitude of shops, his arrest records, and his past employment records or other bits of personal information we could find on the name Cole Pierre.
We'd spent the whole night cramming. But the most we found was a new shot of him walking from a bakery in Manhattan four days ago. He was damn near impossible to track. He wore different clothes, shoes, and hair colors almost every time he went out. And he drove a different car. The only reason we knew it was him was because he didn't care much about covering the birthmark he had on his left hand.
Dumbass.
"What, Cosette, what?" I rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands as the couch dipped.
"I found something, look, look, look." She shoved the laptop onto my thighs and scooted closer to me, her hair frazzled and her nails chipped.
"God, did you even sleep?" I eyed her messy state. I had never seen her in such a way.
"Look at the screen!"
I shook my head and blinked hard once to clear my fuzzy vision. She had the page opened to some sort of a chat room, and the top message read, "User GutHerGilmore invites you to a private auction at the warehouse sector near 80 Halleck St, Brooklyn. Friday the 13th. 1 AM. Cash only. Arms allowed. Exclusive clientele only--Cosette... I'm not following."
"Okay, so the user GutHerGilmore has posted on this forum Zayn found on the web thing--"
"The dark web, yes." I corrected.
"Whatever. Anyway, he has posted on this forum for creepy rich guys who show off their shit--twelve times and hosted twelve different auctions, each one entailing some sort of 'special item' at a private viewing that you had to have an invitation to. Shady stuff, right?"
"Right..."
"So, I began to think maybe this would be the type of place Cole would lurk. I went through the old chat logs and it took forever because there were so many messages, but I lost my place when the chat started moving again and GutHerGilmore posted that new auction. I panicked because I thought maybe they'd find out we somehow hacked into their invite-only server and were watching the convo, but they had no idea I was there and kept chatting."
"Uh-huh..."
"They go on and on about being in on it, and how they hope he brings some Peruvian diamond or something--when this user pops into the chat. ELOC66. It's just Cole backward so it wasn't like I had to decrypt anything to figure it out," She rolled her eyes, "The guy seems like a dud, and no one in the chatroom likes him. But that would make sense! He steals other people's stuff, he's an ass--"
I gestured with my finger for her to wrap it up.
Cosette sighed and cleared her throat, "There's an auction. That is cole, I know it is. Which means he's going and we should too. Which means we are ten steps closer to finding him and finding Bella and--"
"Zayn!" I got up from the couch and paced my way to the dining room table where he fell asleep in his chair.
"Huh?" He was startled awake, a pen stick to his cheek that left lines, "What's up? I'm not asleep, I'm totally awake-"
"Doesn't matter. Cosette told him what you just told me." I put the laptop down in front of him and Cosette started blabbing, which she did best, but by the time she was wrapping up, Zayn was perked up a ton and rapidly glazing over the chat logs and typing like a fiend hacker in some suspense movie.
"So... is this him? Can we go?" Cosette tied her hair up in a neater bun and impatiently waited for an answer.
"I can't trace it back to an address or an identity to be sure. All that's required to make an account on this forum is a username and password. Which means, we can't be 100% that it's him--" Zayn rambled.
"But?" My heart was racing as I sat down in a dining chair.
"But..." Zayn tapped his foot on the ground repeatedly and tipped his head back and forth in contemplation, "It's the best lead we've had so far. So, I guess we're going with it."
"Yes! Oh my god, I know it's him, I know it is. And when he shows up, we're gonna kick his ass," Cosette shook my shoulders, the most excited I'd seen her since--a long time, "I wanna put him in a chokehold and just watch his face turn purple-"
"You're not going." Zayn scoffed.
"Ha." A blurted laugh fell from my mouth.
Cosette froze and the semi-youthful glow she held seconds before was gone. Her diva-bitch-business woman voice was back, "Excuse me?"
"Cosette, come on, it's too much for you." I chimed in.
"You're not going either."
I raised my eyebrows slowly, "Yes I am."
"Both of you," He gestured to us, "are an emotional liability. Neither of you can be in a situation like a private auction with criminals who've done god knows what, and stay cool. I will call Jimmi, get a couple of his guys who are trained and I will go alone. You two can stay here where it's safe and stew in your anxiousness."
"Zayn-"
"Look me in the eyes and tell me you wouldn't lose your cool if Cole so much as looked in your direction. Or worse, if he made some snide comment. Or god forbid, brought Dominic or one of the others. Go ahead, tell me you wouldn't blow a fucking fuse." Zayn said in a snarky tone.
I sighed through my nose and rubbed my forehead with my nails, digging my fingers into my flesh, "Fine!"
"Good. Now, if you'd excuse me. I have work to do and calls to make and--you two both need a shower." He shooed us away and pulled out his phone, "Or at the very least, a toothbrush."
Cosette smelled her breath and then widened her eyes, pacing to her bathroom before I could get the chance to go pee, "My bathroom, my rules. Don't even think about saying a word, Harlow."
I sighed.
Only two more days of this and then I'd be free.
I just had to hold on and push through until then.
✧ Friday... ✧
When the clock struck 12:00 on the night of the auction, Jimmi's pair of men came knocking on the door. It was silent in the house, Cosette curled up on the couch with a glass of sparkling water. Me, pacing around the living room. And Zayn loading up all his guns on the kitchen island counter.
Glocks, pistols, you named a gun, he had it. It was mostly precautionary, it case things didn't go how he planned. But, even that wasn't solid--which left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
The entire day was spent with that taste. Bitter regret. Anxiety. Fear. Denial. I woke up with shaking hands and spent the whole day chainsmoking in hopes it would distract me. But, there was only one thing that could help me. Or rather, one person. And she was a thousand miles away from me.
Nothing was in my control that night and that bothered me. It terrified me.
Zayn opened the door to two men, one half his size in all meanings of the word, and one twice. They were both dressed in typical clothing. Black shirts, black pants, and jackets that couldn't conceal the loaded weapons they had stuffed in their pants. The smaller one had a thick mustache and hair so greasy it didn't fly a millimeter away. While the other was your average bouncer; tatted, strong, and mean-looking with the same pissy frown Jimmi himself carried. Not a bad group.
"You must be Zayn." The smaller one said, "I'm Topher, this is Pudge. At your service..." he said sarcastically, looking around the room like the luxury loft was a trash ground, "Fuck is this place, huh? A hospital? Get some damn warmth in here. Feels like my ma's basement."
If Cherry was here she'd laugh. She'd say I fit right in with my face tats and bitchy 'tude.
Zayn ignored their comments, gesturing toward the living room, "Nice to meet you. This is Harlow and Cosette. They're my friends and the parents in the case I'm working."
"Hi." I deadpanned. Cosette stayed silent.
Topher nodded slowly, sizing me up, "I see. Nice tats. Is he comin' with? We could use a cute map holder."
I wasn't sure whether to be offended or flattered by that comment. I chose the latter.
"Just me." Zayn loaded the last gun he had and shoved it into his jacket pocket before grabbing his bag and walking around the counter to face me, "Tell me your job one more time."
"Sit on the couch and wait," I grumbled.
"And if we get Cole out alone and alive?"
"You'll call and tell me," I said.
"And if we can't and I don't call by..."
"Two o'clock, then I call the FBI tipline and send them the address to air the place out," I added.
"And why is that?"
"Because the police capturing him is better than not capturing him at all--I got it, Zayn."
"I had to make sure you understood. 'Cause while it'd fucking suck if we couldn't get him ourselves, which is likely if he doesn't come alone--then we want him off the streets. We'll figure out where to go from there if that happens." He explained, reaching out to hold my shoulder, "Try not to lose your mind while I'm gone. And be nice."
"Whatever," I murmured. I didn't have the energy in me to come up with good Cosette insults anyways.
"Alright." Zayn turned around and nodded at the boys, "Let's go."
The door shutting made my heart race.
This had to go exactly according to plan.
I wanted Zayn to get Cole and bring him back here so I could interrogate him myself. Feel his bones crunch under my hands, myself. The police doing it was nearly as satisfactory. Plus, if that happened, we'd be right back to square one. He'd be locked up and we'd never have access to him for answers.
We'd made such good progress, yet so much rested on this trip.
"Stop pacing around." Cosette said after about fifteen minutes, "You're stressing me out."
"Would you rather me sit and drink sparkling water until my bladder explodes like you? Or hey, maybe we should put on a Disney movie and make some popcorn!" I sarcastically said, pulling the sleeves of my sweater over my hands.
"We could just talk..." She mumbled.
"Yeah, about what?" I scoffed.
It was quiet for another five minutes before she said, "We could talk about that girl that Zayn says you like so much--"
"No." I stopped pacing and sat down on the other end of the couch, counting the squares on the plush carpet beneath my feet.
"Are you gonna go to her funeral, wake thing-"
"No." I snapped, but then felt grossed out, "I don't know. But... no, considering it's in eight hours. I don't have the time. I'll go back on Valentine's Day instead."
"So, you're gonna skip out on her mom's funeral but show up on Valentine's Day instead to--I'm guessing fuck her--and then you're gonna leave her again right after? That's your plan? God, no wonder why you're still single, you're a douche-bag."
"Why would I leave her again?" I glanced over.
"Well... you are coming back to me, aren't you? B-Back to New York. The work we're doing won't be finished, especially if we catch Cole. We said we'd..." She trailed off and cleared her throat, "You agreed we'd try to be a family again. For Bells. That doesn't include her."
I hadn't thought about that.
"So, that's why I'm asking what you're gonna do. 'Cause, it kinda involves me, now. You made promises to me and her. It's not fair to break either of them-"
"Then, what do you suggest I do, Cosette?" I raised my voice.
"You know what? Nothing, my god." She angrily said, slamming her cup down onto the coffee table and getting up, "Fucking forget I said anything. I'm gonna go read, if Zayn calls, you know where I'll be."
"Cosette." My mouth blurted out an objection against my better judgment, and she stopped halfway to the hallway, her long knit cardigan swaying gently. I ran a hand down my face and rubbed the corners of my lips, "If I'm being honest, I haven't thought about it, okay? I don't know how I'd feel about living with you again, and I don't know how I'd feel about being so far away from all the important things that are happening here if I went back to Chicago. It's not an easy decision for me to make, especially not when you're breathing down my neck or I have voicemails from Cherry asking me to come to funerals and telling me she misses me. I just--I need a fucking minute. If you could please--"
"Okay!" She surrendered, turning around and putting her arms up, "Okay, I get it, it's not easy. You like the girl. You wanna be here too. Sorry. I... just figured it'd be an easy decision considering you said you don't have feelings for her."
"It's more complicated than that. Just because I don't wanna be with her, doesn't mean I wanna leave her." I leaned back against the back of the couch.
Cosette leisurely walked back to the couch and sat on a cushion closer than before, "Okay. I can kinda get that. You're friends, I'm guessing?"
"We're... we're close, yeah." It felt wrong to talk about Cherry to someone outside of our friend group. Let alone, Cosette.
"Well, then what's so bad about staying here if it's not serious? She could come to visit, or you could go visit her? Planes, trains, and cars are there for a reason."
"Staying here has more to do with you than it does with her and you know that." My gaze fell on her, "What do you think is gonna happen if I stay? Do you think we're gonna get back together once we find Bella? Do you think we're all gonna suddenly be one big happy family? Do you think none of the past stuff matters?"
"Of course not. I'm not naive. But, don't act like deep down, we both don't still care for each other." She looked down at the sofa and ran her nails along the stitching.
I laughed. I really, really laughed.
"Oh come on, it's that funny to you?" She interrupted my laughter with one of her own, "Harlow, we made a baby. We got married. You loved me once. I loved you. I'm not saying we're gonna become the perfect poster family for peace and love once we get Bells back. But, I'd like her to have a stable home. I'd like for her to have two parents to keep her safe. I want her to have a backyard and a treehouse and all the dolls she wants. I wanna have Christmas's and Halloweens' with the three of us together."
My laughter faded out.
"I wanna take her to school and be a chaperone on her field trips to the zoo. I wanna have tea parties with her and play dress-up. I wanna get the chance to be her mom because you and I both know I never was." She laughed a little, but I could tell it stung because her eyes were glassy. She sniffled, her voice lowering to a hushed whisper, "Just think of how nice that could be. You'd be with us, terrorizing the tea parties in your Reptaur costume."
"I don't wear that anymore and I haven't since I was fifteen years old." I laughed at the memory, "It probably still fits though. It was always a little baggy. I could squeeze."
"Oh, I'm sure you'd try." She grinned.
I let my head rest on the back of the couch and then turned it to look at the ceiling as silence fell over us. Moments like those where Cosette wasn't the woman she used to be, made me feel--sick. It felt like everything she ever did to me or said to me was a figment of my imagination. There was a part of me that wished she'd never changed those parts of herself.
Because then the decision would be easy.
I hated that she was right. I hated that I wanted a proper mother and a father for Bella so badly. Badly enough to forgo our past and look toward the future for once.
My sanity wasn't something I wanted to sacrifice.
But, I'd do anything for my little girl, anything in the world.
Cosette broke the silence when the hour was through, "The auction is starting now."
I inhaled a deep breath and gripped the edges of my sweater tightly. This was gonna be the hardest part of the night. I could feel the bile collecting in my throat. This had to work, this needed to go perfectly.
"Hey." Cosette stopped my train of thought with her hand on mine, "Everything's gonna be okay. Zayn's got this. I know it."
"You don't know anything."
"Well, I've got hope enough for the both of us." She said instead, running her thumb across my knuckles, "What can I do to help distract you?"
"You, help me? Please." I tossed her hand away from me and back onto her lap, "You cause stress, you don't ease it."
"What would..." She paused, scooting a bit closer nervously, "What would Cherry do to help you?"
My face grew warm and I wearily watched her hands out of the corner of my eye. I kept my mouth shut, but my mind began to wander, imagining Cherry there with me instead, her hands in my hair and her soft stomach pressed against my cheek. Her words of encouragement and her sweet-smelling perfume.
"Would she kiss you o-or hold you or put on a movie and make you watch it?" Cosette listed off things like they were on her grocery list.
And that made me sad with laughter. My head turned to look at her again, "That's the thing, Cosette. She wouldn't even have to ask. She'd just know. She'd just... do it. Cherry would kiss me and she'd tell me I was gonna be okay and I'd believe it. And that would be it." I zoned out on her face and got lost in my head again.
Only did my brain register her interpretation of my words, when her lips were an inch from my face.
I felt paralyzed the second they connected, like her lips were laced with venom and it was how she captured her prey. It didn't feel like anything. It didn't feel good, it didn't feel bad. It was like a kiss from a stranger--and my eyes remained squeezed shut once she climbed onto my lap.
I fisted my hands and tried to lift them myself but I couldn't. She grabbed my wrists gently and moved them where she wanted them on her waist. It felt like I was fifteen again, like I couldn't say no. Like I couldn't stop what was happening simply by getting up. I felt small and useless. Like she often made me feel when we were together.
I finally found my voice when she pulled our lips apart and trailed them slowly down my neck.
"Cosette." It felt like someone was twisting my vocal cords.
"I can help." She whispered and stopped kissing me to lock eye contact. Her fists gently gripped my sweater and pulled me in for another kiss, "Please, let me help."
I would've loved to look back on that night and admire myself for how I stood my ground. For how I didn't give in and just let her touch me because I needed to feel something other than scared. For how I was able to ignore the sliver of care my twisted heart somehow had for this manipulative woman.
But none of that was true and it turned out I was a fuck ton weaker than I thought.
I kissed her back.
I let her hands act as a temporary fix for my problems and slide up my shirt to warm my skin. I let my hands enjoy the weight of her curves on my thighs. I let her cover up the hickies' on my neck from a girl I was trying so hard to forget. I let her take my belt off. I let myself let go.
And I rationalized it all by telling myself we weren't together.
It wasn't until after it was all over that I realized just how badly I'd fucked up. Just how easily I let her use me.
"Get off. G-Get off me. Get off me, Cosette." My post-orgasm come down left me in a state of panic, sitting on the couch with both of our shirts discarded on the floor and my pants down to my thighs. My lips still stung. My hands were still covered in her arousal and my own was soaking into the fabric of my boxers.
We may not have had penetrative sex but we may as well have. It felt all the same. I felt just as dirty.
"Are you mad at me?" She whispered in confusion, grabbing her bra from off the back of the couch like I was gonna take it. She didn't put it on, but held it to her panting chest, "You seemed into it, I... you didn't tell me to stop."
I gulped down my exhaustion and didn't even bother looking at her. I pulled up my pants and kept my eyes on her ceiling while I zipped them.
"Harlow." She muttered, "Can you say something?"
"I have to go." I stood up instinctively and grabbed my shirt from the floor. I wanted to be anyway but there.
"But, it's almost two o'clock, Zayn could call--"
"Well, you know what to do if he does and if he doesn't, so there's no reason for me to stay here. You can handle it, you're a big girl." I put on my shirt and walked to the closet by her front door where my overnight bag and jacket were.
"You can't just leave, not like this-"
"Yes! Like this!" I yelled, turning around as I turned on my coat, "I let you s--we fucked around and I feel disgusting. I feel like I just..." I couldn't place the word or feeling exactly. It felt like I just took ten steps backward. Like I was sober and I just took my first drink after years of sobriety. It felt like I was lying to Cherry. To myself.
"Cheated on her? Oh please, you two aren't together!" Cosette exclaimed, "Last time I checked, the only person you ever made vows to, was me."
"Yeah, and look at how well that turned out? I'm leaving." I grabbed my duffel and stuffed my phone into my ass pocket after checking the time, "Forget this ever happened."
I grabbed the door handle when she spoke in a strangled voice, "You said you'd try! For Bells, for me! We made a deal. You belong here. You belong with us."
I shook my head slightly and forced my daughter from my thoughts, "Not right now, I don't."
"Harlow!" Cosette's voice cracked.
I opened the door and stepped right out into the dark hallway of her loft building, slamming it shut behind me.
I didn't have a plan of where to go. My only plan was to get away from her, to clear my head, and decide what to do. But my feet took me onto the streets of New York and a minute later I was hailing a cab.
The next thing I knew, I was headed to the airport.
***