AllFreeNovel
Share Us
ng a new trailer to get more tenants into. It was all about how much money he could make, and I didn’t blame him, not when at least half of the people who lived here missed rent on the regular.
“What do you mean ‘again’?”
He raised a brow. “She didn’t pay last month.”
I huffed out a breath at his words and flicked my gaze over to Knox. His window was down, his narrowed eyes focused on me. I didn’t have a choice in what I had to do. It was either pay or be homeless, and right then, I needed somewhere to go back to each night. “I’ll come pay you when I get back.” I mentally counted the amount of money I had saved, and knew the rent for last month would eat at least half of that money up. Dammit.
“Make sure you do,” Tony grunted, his tone brooking no room for argument. He had a strict policy on how many missed payments you could have—three—and if you didn’t pay up, you were out and never allowed back in. “She’s on her last warning. I already told her this.”
“I didn’t know,” I said because I truly didn’t. At this stage, Tony should have known to come to me and not my mom. She wouldn’t tell me shit, and plenty of times I’d come home from school to find our stuff in trash bags because we’d been kicked out of a trailer park again. This was our last chance. If we got kicked out of here, there was nowhere else we could go, not unless we moved out of the area completely, which would mean I wouldn’t be able to graduate high school. Being able to stay here wasn’t a want, it was a need—a necessity.
A horn honking had me jumping, and both Tony and I turned to stare at Knox’s car. His arm hung out of the window, and he lifted his hand in impatience. “El! You coming or what?”
His attitude had me on alert, and although the last thing I wanted right then was to hang out with Knox, I needed out of the trailer, if only for a little while. “I’ll get that money to you today,” I told Tony and stepped away from him. “Promise.” He nodded in response, so I spun around and ran to Knox’s car.
The tiredness which had been raining down on me disappeared at the thought of having to pay two months’ rent. I’d saved that money for a reason, and I’d worked my ass off for it. But now it felt like it was for nothing. I’d lost count of the number of times I’d had to dip into my savings, and ten times out of ten, it was because my mom was too high to even remember to pay the rent.
“Hey,” I greeted Knox as I opened the door and slid into the passenger seat.
“What took you so long?” His voice was deeper and more annoyed than usual.
“Tony wanted to see how school was going.” The lie slipped so easily from my lips, but it was a lie I hadn’t even thought about not telling. There was no way I’d tell him what Tony really said to me. Knox thought he knew me inside out, but the reality was I only ever let him see the surface because anything more than that was too much to handle.
“He’s a nosy fuck,” Knox gritted out before he wheel-spun away from the trailer park, leaving a cloud of dust in his wake. I clipped my belt in as he sped down the road and away from the rough side of town. He hated being here, and although I wanted to get out as soon as I could, I’d lived in this part of town all of my life. I had friends here, people who looked out for me, but Knox didn’t know that. I wasn’t sure he knew much about me when I really thought about it. Either that or he chose to ignore all the obvious signs.
I stared out of the window as we made it into his side of town, the side which housed our school, but also the neighborhood he grew up in. I’d been to his house more times than I could count, and I thought that was where we were going until my next shift started, but when he turned away from his house and toward the hills, which landscaped the good part of town, I knew what he wanted. He didn’t have to say any words for me to understand today wasn’t about us spending time together, but for him to get what he needed, then drop me home.
My shift started in three hours, but I had to be home in two, and that was just enough time for Knox—at least I hoped it was. We’d been to the lookout point a handful of times in junior year, and once during the summer. Everyone knew you only went here when you wanted to make out, although nine times out of ten it was taken further, something I’d only done once and didn’t intend on doing again anytime soon. I hadn’t told Knox that, but I’d shown him with the way I acted—I hoped.
Knox’s hand moved to my jean-covered thigh, and I tried my hardest not to tense up. He was still driving, but that didn’t stop him from moving his hand farther up. We went higher into the hills, and as soon as I saw the sign for the lookout, I gritted my teeth. If I’d have known this was where he was going to bring me, I would have said I was busy and gone into work earlier.
With only four hours of sleep after working late last night, and a dance practice at the studio this morning, my body was begging for rest. Rest I could have been having before I did another six-hour shift later, but instead, I was here, staring straight ahead as Knox parked the car and turned the engine off.
The silence surrounded us, but Knox’s hand moved higher until he was clasping the waistband of my jeans. His thumb flicked my button open with ease and he murmured, “I missed you, babe.” I didn’t know how to answer him as he unclipped his belt and leaned over the center console. His breath fanned over my neck and was closely followed by wet kisses trailing to my mouth. I didn’t want to turn and face him. I didn’t want to press my lips to his. But I knew I had too. I had no choice—
His hand came up to my throat, his fingers biting into the soft flesh as his other hand pushed its way into my jeans. “Don’t fuckin’ ignore me,” he warned, and the dangerous tone he’d started using more and more came out. He tensed his fingers on my neck and gave it a warning squeeze. Not enough to stop my breath, but enough to have my eyes widening and my head turning to face him. This wasn’t the first time he’d put his hand around my throat, but it was the first time he did it at the same time as shoving his hand into my underwear.
“Knox…” His name was a whisper floating on the air, and I wasn’t sure what I was trying to say with the two syllables, but it didn’t matter, because he wasn’t listening to me. He wanted what he wanted, and I could either put up a fight or go along with it.
“What?” he asked, but he wasn’t really asking. He was only appeasing me as his fingers thrust inside. I wasn’t ready for him, I never was, but that didn’t matter, not to him anyway. I winced and pushed my back farther into my seat. My body was trying to get away from him, but my brain was trying to get away from me.
I should have fought.
I should have told him no.
I should have done a lot of things, but instead, I did nothing. I let him take what he wanted because it was easier.
His hand stayed around my neck and guided my face to his. I squeezed my eyes closed as his lips met mine and his fingers thrust in and out of me at lightning speed. He had no idea how to be gentle and make me wet and ready. Or maybe he did but didn’t want it to be comfortable for me. His fingernails scraped against my inside walls, and a choked sob worked its way from my chest to my throat, but it was halted by his hand applying more pressure.
“Get my dick out,” he demanded, and the second I started to move my head in the negative, he clamped his hand down on my neck, effectively cutting off my air supply. “Now.”
My shaking hand reached for his jeans, and I mentally admonished myself. I just had to go along with it. It would be over before I knew it, and then hopefully, the Knox I remembered would come back, and everything would be okay. In the grand scheme of things, it was such a tiny proportion of my day, and once I was away from him, I could push it to the back of my mind, lock it away, and pretend it never happened. I was getting better and better at being able to do that.
If I really thought about it, it should have scared me, but that was another thing I didn’t do: think. Because if I thought too much, I was frightened of what I would remember. So, this way was better. Push through and forget. Forget the way his hand down my jeans felt. Forget about the threat of his hand around my throat. Forget about the past and concentrate on what would happen in the future—if I ever made it there.
I gripped his zipper, and I pulled on it, the sound like a bomb exploding in an open field. And the second my hand touched his hard cock, I felt tears spring to my eyes. This wasn’t the first time I’d touched him, and I knew it wouldn’t be the last. I just had to keep telling myself that it was temporary.
“That’s it, babe, faster.”
