“I just…I don’t like people.”

Raine stared at me for a moment.

“Why?” she asked.

My mind began to race. I wasn’t really sure how to answer the question. I never considered myself a people person, but I never really thought about the reason for that. It was just the way it was.

“I just…don’t.”

Apparently, Raine wasn’t going to let me off the hook and prodded me to give her a better answer.

Tensing, I tried to come up with a decent answer that didn’t make me sound like an ass, but I couldn’t think of anything. As I struggled inside to come up with the perfect words, the turmoil inside of me increased and eventually overflowed. Closing my eyes tightly, I opened my mouth and let shit run out of it.

“Because I don’t have anything to say to them!” I blurted. I covered my face with one hand and slammed the back of my head ineffectually into the pillow. It didn’t help.

“What does that mean?” Raine’s voice was soft as she propped herself on one elbow to look down at me. A small amount of my tension ebbed.

“When people are around, they end up asking me questions,” I said as I shoved myself off the pillow and sat up. I wrapped my arms around my legs and put my chin on my knees. “I don’t have any answers for them. I don’t have anything to say.”

“Will you give me an example?” Raine asked, her tone going soft.

“What the fuck am I supposed to say?” My voice rose in pitch as my throat constricted. My gut churned as if a little tornado were forming inside of it. “What am I supposed to talk about? About how I was such a fucked up kid that my own parents dumped me? Should I tell them about how every foster home I was ever in kicked me out? How about my time in juvie? There’s a fun topic. Or the best question of all—‘what do you do for a living?’ How am I supposed to answer that? Oh, you know, I made a shit-ton of money killing people, but I’m retired now.”

Raine’s face scrunched up, and she squished her lips together. She let out a long sigh through her nose before opening her arms and pulling me back down to the pillows.

“I never thought about it that way,” she admitted. “I can see where that would be difficult. You are right—the kinds of things people usually ask would be difficult for you to answer.”

With a shudder, my body relaxed, and the whirlwind inside dissipated. I wrapped my arms around her and held her against my chest in silent appreciation of her understanding.

“But, Bastian,” Raine continued, “even though you might not be able to answer the questions people ask, that doesn’t mean you get to blow up at them and storm out, leaving me to try to explain and defend you. You can’t do that.”

Well, yeah, obviously I could. I had in the past, and I’d probably do it again in the future.

“You think I should just stick around and tell them to fuck off instead?”

“No,” Rain said with a loud sigh. “There are other options, you know.”

I took a deep breath as the anger inside me began to bubble again at the thought. There was one option I had considered but didn’t take.

“I didn’t think you’d appreciate me hitting him,” I said.

“You’re right,” Raine replied. I could hear the tension rising in her voice again.

“It’s better if I just leave,” I rationalized.

“Maybe for you,” Raine agreed, “but what kind of questions and comments do you think I get when you do something like that?”

I hadn’t thought about it. Once I left, everything that happened afterward had never really concerned me before. I wondered what Lindsay and Nick had to say after I took off and how Raine responded.

“I spend enough time trying to get them to understand you,” she said. “When you do something like that, I can’t defend your actions. It just gives them more justification when they start telling me I ought to get rid of you.”

I secured my grip on her clothing as a wave of panic crashed over me. It was just one more thing my selfish ass hadn’t considered. Of course Lindsay would be telling her to dump me, and Nick would be right behind her. They probably had another guy already picked out as a better suitor for Raine, and he probably hadn’t killed anyone lately.

“What did they say?” I growled. She had known Lindsay since they were kids. Raine was bound to listen to whatever advice Lindsay had to offer. The thought kick-started my paranoia.

“It doesn’t matter,” Raine said. “I’m not going anywhere, Bastian.”

I relaxed slightly, but the idea of Raine with someone else continued to terrify me.

“That doesn’t stop them from saying I should, though. When you behave like that, it makes it a lot harder to explain to them why I love you.”

The tension inside me began to build again, and I fought against the desire to tell her all the reasons she shouldn’t have anything to do with me. Her friends were probably right, but I felt like I was looking out over the proverbial cliff, and if I opened my mouth to say what I was thinking, I was going to fall.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered instead.

Raine moved her hand up into my hair and held my head against her shoulder. Closing my eyes, I tried to understand the shit that was going through my head, but as usual, I couldn’t make anything of it. My brain just didn’t work right, which I realized was the problem.

“I know there’s something seriously wrong with me inside,” I said quietly. “I can’t deny it.”

“Bastian-”

“Let me finish,” I said quickly. If I didn’t get it out now, I never would. “This isn’t about not being worthy of you or whatever—there’s more to it than that. There is something wrong with me, and don’t tell me you don’t know that.”

I paused, but she didn’t interject.

“I don’t know that I can control those…those urges. There’s a need inside of me to lash out. It’s so fucking deep, and I can’t explain it; I just know it’s there. As far back as I can remember, it’s always been there.”

“Sometimes you do okay,” Raine said. “You do all right when John Paul is around.”

“That’s different. He doesn’t ask those kinds of questions.”

“So you feel comfortable around him.”

“Yeah, I guess so. Most of the time.”

“Why is that?” she asked.

Well, fuck if I knew. It just was.

“He’s…he’s always been there for me.”

“And what? You don’t think Lindsay and Nick care?”

“They care about you, not me.”

“That’s not fair,” she said. “They’ve both tried to get along with you. You aren’t very receptive.”

“It’s fake,” I said. “They do it for you, not me. It’s kinda hard to take their shit seriously when it’s all an act.”

“How do you know that?”

“I can just tell, okay?” I snapped. “It’s like knowing when a chick is faking an orgasm; if she’s not clenching down on my cock, she’s not coming.”

And just like that, I was back to being a dick again.

“Being crude and obnoxious doesn’t help,” Raine growled. “It’s just me here now, so why don’t you stop the shit?”

Raine almost never cussed, so it usually caught my attention when she did. Recognizing it didn’t even change my behavior though. When push came to shove, it was always the same for me—get the fuck out. I shoved myself off of the bed and away from her, grabbed my smokes, and went to the balcony.

Raine followed.

“You can’t just walk away from the conversation,” she informed me.

“I dunno,” I said, still in pissy-mode, “I’ve done it before.”

I knew I was being a jerk, but I also thought if I came right out and told her that I’d love to send Nick flying off this balcony, she would like that even less. I wanted to say or do something to make it all right again, but as usual, I was clueless.

I turned toward her, and the small light near the top of the balcony door shone over my face, making me squint. Raine narrowed her eyes, and she took a step closer to me. Her fingers brushed over my cheekbone, and though I tried not to, I flinched as she touched the bruise on my face. Her eyes went wide.

“What happened to you?”

“It’s nothing,” I said.

She straightened up and leaned forward to get a better look at me. With her hand on the side of my face, she tilted my head into the light and glared a bit.

“What happened?”

“Just a little tiff,” I said with a shrug. “Seriously, it’s no big deal.”

“You got in a fight? With who?”

“Just some dude,” I shrugged again. “I went riding, stopped for a bit to walk it off, and then ran into a guy who wasn’t all that pleasant. It’s all good—he got it worse than he gave.”

“Is that really all you have to say about it?”

I took a slight step back but was stopped by the balcony door. I looked off into the distance and watched the waves slipping back and forth over the beach.

“I guess I’ll take that as a yes,” Raine mumbled.

“Pretty much,” I replied. I looked back to her. “I’m fine.”

“If you say so.”

“Don’t be pissed.”

“It’s kind of late for that,” Raine sighed. “I just don’t know what to make of you sometimes.”

“I’m a dick,” I said. “You already know this.”

“Not usually.” Raine reached up and ran her fingers through her hair. I tried not to get distracted by the way the dark strands lay against her neck and shoulder. “When you are, I usually understand why, but not with this. I don’t understand why you don’t realize Nick is trying to be your friend, and I don’t understand why you react to it by going out and beating up someone else.”

“He was asking for it,” I said quietly.

“Nick or the guy you beat up?”

I wasn’t really sure myself, so I went back to the ever-present and noncommittal shrug.

“You’re really trying my patience,” she said.

I looked back at her, realizing how angry she still was. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do or say—all this relationship shit was a mystery to me. I never said the right shit, and I certainly didn’t do the right shit. I was probably the worst match for my gentle Raine as I could possibly be, and that just made me want to cling to her, so I did.

I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around her. I pulled her close to me and kissed her gently on the forehead.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“For what?” she asked.

“Everything I do wrong,” I replied. “I’m a shitty boyfriend, you know that.”

She took a deep breath and blew the air across my shoulder as she laid her head against my chest. Her arms came up around my neck.

“You are my hero,” Raine said. “You’ve always been that to me. My savoir, and despite your flaws, I still love you. I just wish you’d tell me what was going on in your head in a way I could understand.”

“My head is fucked up,” I told her. “I don’t know how much of that is fixable, babe.”

I leaned back a little and looked down into her eyes.

“Seriously,” I said. More tension flowed through my body as I tried to choose the right words. “If…if your father was still alive, do you really think he’d approve of you being with me?”

I felt Raine tense in my arms. Bringing up her father might not have been the wisest thing to do, but it was the best way to get my point across. After all, I was right there when he was tortured and murdered, and I didn’t do a damn thing to stop it from happening.

I hadn’t known Raine then and had no idea who her father was other than being a small-town cop in the wrong part of the big city at the wrong time. Why he was there I didn’t know, only that once he was discovered, Landon’s crime boss, Joseph Franks, wasn’t about to let him live. Everyone in the area who was considered a threat to Franks and his organization was rounded up, brutally tortured, and eventually executed.

I had watched it all, unable to intervene.

I shifted my eyes back to Raine’s face and observed her far-away expression. Tightening my arms around her, I pressed my lips to her shoulder. I hadn’t meant to upset her by bringing up her deceased father, but I needed to make the point.

“He wouldn’t want you dating me,” I said.

Raine flicked the tip of her tongue over her lips.

“I don’t know,” she said softly. “He wouldn’t like what you used to do, obviously, but neither do I. I think if he got to know you—really know you—I think he might have been okay with it.”

I snorted through my nose at the ridiculousness of her statement.

“I mean it,” Raine said. “I don’t know if I can honestly say he would have liked you or wanted to hang out with you on the weekends, but I think if he saw how you are with me, I think he’d understand.”