Damaged Love (Bay Falls High NEXT Book 2) Read online

  Damaged Love

  bay falls high NEXT

  Jaxson Kidman

  Contents

  Welcome to

  Damaged Love

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Want more #bfhnext?

  What is #bfh vs #hch?

  More from Jaxson

  Welcome to

  “Face it, Winter, you’re ours now.”

  Written by Jaxson Kidman

  Damaged Love

  They think I can’t remember…

  What they don’t know WILL hurt them.

  My plan has hit a few speed bumps.

  An unexpected secret falls into my lap, but I can live with it.

  In fact, I can use that secret to my benefit.

  I’m still bouncing between the Bumps and the Trocs.

  That’s okay. It’ll all pay off in the end.

  I just have to keep going. I have to keep getting closer to the three guys who tried to kill me.

  I have to know their stories… and their secrets.

  I’m going to expose them in a way they never think can possibly happen.

  There’s one small problem.

  Someone is now following me.

  And I’m pretty sure they’re following Noah, Easton, and Xavier too.

  The guys are getting spooked. I’m getting closer.

  Next thing I know, they demand I come away with them to a fancy ‘look how rich I am’ party…

  This is probably a big mistake, but in my life, it’s clear: My revenge knows no limits.

  Prologue

  at least i’m dressed

  The way everyone is staring at me, I casually look down to make sure I remembered to put clothes on. Everyone stands perfectly against their lockers. Their eyes moving with each step I take down the hallway. At the end of the hallway there’s a large set of doors. It’s not the same doors I’m used to seeing, but at this point, it’s a set of doors.

  It’s an escape.

  I get to leave.

  I’m able to get into Tank Two and drive away.

  Drive home.

  Well, not home. I don’t exactly really have much of a home.

  It’s more like a place of comfort.

  I tell myself that’s exactly what a home is, but I fear if I admit that it’s actually home, then I’m admitting that my relationship with my mother might actually work out.

  My feet shuffle down the hallway.

  Not a person speaks.

  They just keep staring.

  I see Gia between two girls.

  She stares like the others do.

  “Gia,” I whisper. “Come with me. Right now. Please. Come with me.”

  Gia doesn’t move.

  She doesn’t respond.

  I guess she and I are in some kind of fight now.

  Great.

  Just what I need on top of everything else that’s going on.

  I want to stop and talk to Gia but my feet keep moving.

  I have no idea what’s happening.

  But why not, right?

  I’ve only been almost killed in an accident. I lost my memory. Got it back. Now I’m pretending I still don’t have my memory so I can get some revenge on the guys who did it.

  This is perfect.

  Just freaking per…

  I’m not sure how it happens, but a figure appears at the end of the hallway.

  It’s Easton.

  Smoking a cigarette.

  Staring right at me.

  I quickly turn my head, my mind already wanting to go back.

  But I can’t.

  That’s where Noah is standing.

  In his nice clothes, but there’s nothing nice about him.

  I take a deep breath.

  I slowly look to my right.

  Yup.

  There’s Xavier.

  He’s the closest of the three.

  I suddenly realize I’m wearing his hoodie.

  The one he let me borrow the night he showed up at my mother’s beach house.

  “I want my hoodie back,” he says. “And more.”

  Xavier takes one step and I start to run to my left.

  I find another hallway to run down.

  I keep going.

  There’s no stopping me.

  I hear the sound of their footsteps behind me.

  They aren’t running but they’re able to stay with me.

  When I finally push open a door and feel the sunlight hit me, it’s freedom.

  I run toward the parking lot, plotting my escape from it all for good.

  My feet move faster.

  Faster and faster…

  I see Tank Two.

  And I see Noah.

  I have no idea how he got there so fast…

  I plant my feet and stop running.

  “Where are you running to?” Xavier asks from behind me.

  Xavier touches my right arm.

  Easton touches my left arm.

  Noah walks toward me.

  “I just want to leave,” I say. “I want to go home. I want to forget everything.”

  Noah points at me. “That’s the problem, isn’t it?”

  “What?” I ask.

  “You remember everything, Winter,” Noah says.

  “Nice try,” Easton says.

  “Now it’s time to face the truth,” Xavier says.

  They all start to laugh.

  Tears fill my eyes.

  Chapter 1

  time of the month

  I sat up in my bed and didn’t need to look around or take a deep breath. I wasn’t broken out in sweat or clutching the sheets either.

  Sadly, that dream was now just part of my normal nightly routine.

  There was nothing that could chase it away either.

  I had tried a drink before bed.

  I had tried not to drink before bed.

  There was some chamomile tea that I drank… that did nothing for me.

  No matter what, as soon as I caught myself in a nice, deep sleep, the dream would pop up. Tiny pieces of the dream would change here and there, but it was always the same cast of characters.

  And why not?

  I was walking a very thin edge worse than ever, thanks to Gia’s confession.

  Winter… Xavier is my brother…

  The words hit me over and over again.

  I had gotten so close to Gia. I considered her my best friend, but it was obvious I didn’t know much about her. My entire plan to get revenge on Noah, Easton, and Xavier always seemed to be ready to blow up at any minute, but this one was really tough.

  After the confession, I told Gia I had to go home.

  That feeling in my body and head started to kick up again and I took off before I could ask her any of the questions that raced through my mind.

  I should have stayed with her on the beach that night.

  I should have asked those questions.

  Instead, I ran and hid.

  I decided to hole up in my room and fake sick.

  Not that I needed to fake much of anyth
ing… everyone already thought I had no memory because of the accident Noah, Easton, and Xavier caused. The easy grab, it was my time of the month.

  So I just stayed home.

  Hid in my room.

  Slept when I could.

  Wake up from that dream and fight to fall back asleep.

  At night I would go outside and get some air and watch the waves.

  I acted as though I had been hiding for months.

  It had been all of two days.

  But it sure felt like two months.

  I needed to figure out a plan.

  I needed to talk to Talon.

  That worried me.

  If I told him about Gia, then what? Would he do something crazy? Or maybe it didn’t matter to him. Why would it? I was the one out for revenge. I was the one up against some very powerful guys and their families…

  All the while Dad was still away and my mother was going out like she was my age.

  Everything was backward.

  I groaned and fell back down to my pillow. I pulled the blankets up over my head and shut my eyes.

  I just wanted sleep.

  Good sleep.

  The kind where I would wake up and it would be, I don’t know, days later. I’d wake up, feel great, and everything that had happened was just a dream.

  Tank would be fine. I’d be back in the castle, in my gigantic room.

  But that would mean being friends with Evie and Darcy.

  And ignoring Gia.

  I had lived such a different life before the accident.

  It was like being two people at once, torn in half, and just thrown on the floor.

  Worse than that, I was dancing the line between Trocs and Bumps, which was kind of unheard of.

  I had no business being near Talon. Trocs were bad news.

  I was in too deep with Talon.

  I was in too deep with everything.

  My heart started to race.

  My toes curled and I kicked at the sheets.

  “No,” I said.

  I’m not doing this tonight…

  I threw the covers off my body and got out of bed.

  I looked around the room and saw Xavier’s hoodie balled up on my dresser.

  “No,” I said.

  There was another hoodie on the floor.

  I put that one on and felt defiant. Like I was somehow getting back at Xavier. Which was so stupid to think. The guy wanted me to die in an accident and I felt badass for not wearing his hoodie?

  I walked through the dark beach house and went outside for some fresh air.

  At the top step of the deck, I stood there and took a few deep breaths.

  My breathing relaxed.

  The ocean was peaceful.

  I looked in the direction of Gia’s beach house.

  I shook my head.

  Inside my heart I wanted to go get my phone. Send her a text. Tell her to come outside and talk to me. We owed each other all of the truth. I mean, I had given her the truth. Just way too late to not be a bitch. And she dropped her bombshell on me… which she could have done much earlier.

  Xavier is your brother? Are you kidding me? How…

  I shut my eyes and took another breath.

  A faint smell touched my nose.

  My eyes popped open and I turned my head.

  I couldn’t see Easton, but I could see the glow of his cigarette in the distance.

  I slowly sat down on the second step and pulled my hoodie over my knees.

  I had no phone.

  No escape really.

  I could have darted back inside, but that would give off the wrong image of things.

  Unless, of course, Gia told Xavier the truth…

  I looked left to right and then behind me.

  Parts of my dream teased my memory, making me think Noah and Xavier were going to show up too and box me in.

  When Easton was close enough, I waved my hand.

  “Do you mind?” I asked.

  He pointed to his cigarette. “Oh. Right. Do you want one?”

  “That’s funny,” I said. “Do you hear me laughing?”

  “Someone’s in a bad mood,” Easton said.

  “I was out here alone.”

  “In the middle of the night.”

  “What are you doing out here?” I asked.

  Easton dropped his cigarette and squished it into the sand.

  “I like to walk in the middle of the night.”

  “Do you have a beach house around here?”

  Easton laughed. “It still amazes me that you don’t remember anything.”

  “Why?” I asked. “I was in an accident and should have died.”

  I watched as Easton’s jaw tightened.

  We were in a bit of a showdown. Who was lying and who wasn’t.

  Easton crouched in front of me and touched the bottom of my hoodie.

  His fingertips flirted and then he touched my knees.

  My body turned into ice.

  But a warm ice.

  How is that possible?

  It bothered me the way they all made me feel.

  Like my hoo-haw overpowered my brain for a minute or so, thinking they were so big and powerful and hot and sexy…

  They tried to kill me.

  Nothing else mattered.

  “Let’s just say there’s a house or two that are mine,” Easton said. “The old man decided for my eighteenth birthday to hand me the keys to two properties. Any value I create is my value to keep. His way of making me learn. Because, you know, I’m not allowed to have my own thoughts on life, right?”

  That I didn’t know.

  It wasn’t shocking to hear that Easton - or his family - owned property on the beach.

  Money and power knew no limits when it came to this area.

  “So I have somewhere to live,” he said. “Somewhere to enjoy myself…”

  His right hand tried to inch up my left leg.

  I swatted at his wrist. “You don’t want to do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Time of the month, Easton,” I said.

  “Doesn’t bother me,” he said.

  “It bothers me,” I said.

  He took his hands away and smiled.

  “I like this game, Winter. The back and forth with us. You still have no idea if we fucked or not.”

  Oh, believe me, Easton, we never did. Maybe in your wet dreams we did, but in real life, nope.

  “Noah thinks otherwise,” I said.

  “He’s just protective of you.”

  “Why?”

  Easton shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not going to air someone else’s dirty laundry.”

  “So there’s dirty laundry with Noah? And me?”

  “You’ll have to ask him,” Easton said. “I’m more worried about you and I, Winter.”

  I kicked my right foot out and pushed at Easton. “There is no you and I.”

  Easton stood up and stepped back. “That’s what you say now. Come here, Winter. Real quick. I want to show you something.”

  Easton put his hand out and I took it.

  When I stood up, he pulled me against him and touched my face.

  His fingers gently stroked my cheek.

  As I stared into his eyes, I could see he wasn’t trustworthy. He wasn’t a good guy. He was worse than a bad guy.

  But he wasn’t Talon. He wasn’t a Troc.

  I let myself get too close to Talon and look what happened.

  As much as I hated to admit it, Easton was…

  He put his lips to mine.

  I felt myself instantly wanting to melt into him.

  My hands started to grab for his shirt.

  His tongue ran across my lips and I pulled away.

  I stepped back and ran up the steps.

  I wiped my lips.

  Moving so fast, remembering who Easton was.

  “Wow,” Easton said. “Look at you. Wiping that kiss away.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “This can’t hap
pen. Fuck. I need to get some sleep.”

  “I just wanted to come check on you, Winter. Make sure you’re okay.”

  “I’m perfectly fine,” I said. “Just taking some time to myself.”

  “You sure you can handle another night alone?” Easton asked. “It can be our secret. We don’t have to tell anyone. How good are you at lying?”

  I swallowed hard.

  “Goodnight, Easton,” I said.

  He lit up another cigarette and continued his walk.

  I hurried back inside and up to my room.

  I dove into the bed and saw my phone on the nightstand.

  The screen was lit up.

  I looked and read the text.

  I closed my eyes and groaned.

  It was a text from Talon.

  See you soon, darling.

  The next morning I went downstairs for coffee because I felt hungover.

  I hated that feeling after a bad night of sleep.

  At least with a hangover you were able to think about the night before and smile at all the crazy stuff that had happened.

  My mother was in the kitchen, a cup of coffee in one hand, her phone in the other hand.

  “Medical school is still considered college, right?” she asked me.

  “What? Why?”

  “I met this guy…”

  She looked at me and shrugged her shoulders.

  “I need coffee,” I said. “Because I know where this is going.”

  I poured myself a cup and started to drink like it was ice cold water on a hot day.

  “It’s not the college thing as much as the age thing,” my mother said. “It’s a tough balance, Winter. There’s a certain age where you get it and it’s done. Any younger and they’re like a puppy, following you, always looking for a treat. Any older and they’re talking about interest rates for a fucking mortgage. At that point, just go down on me so you can do something productive with your mouth.”