Tied (All Torn Up #2)

by Carian Cole

I am daybreak and dusk. I’m no longer light or dark, but some vague, messed-up place in the middle.

I just like the thrill of chasing and catching things. It satisfies my inner stalker.

The secret to fairy tales is believing in them. That’s what makes them come true.

We’re kindred spirits, me and him. Both debarked. Both scarred. Both lost. Both worried about her. Both still thinking about her.

I wanted to be responsible for igniting a feeling in a soul just as lonely and broken as my own.

Instead, a smile crosses her lips, and now my ability to speak has been whisked away by how incredibly beautiful she is when her demons loosen their grip on her.

Fuck. The allure of tainted beauty is not a delicacy I can indulge in. No matter how tempting it is.

I’m slightly saddened by the fact that it took a chain of phone calls to get to someone who could come see if my brain was leaking out of my head.

I’ve never been a man afraid to cry, but right now I’m afraid I’m never going to stop.

This lost girl with the stormy eyes has become my caffeine, my morphine, my new drug of choice.

I end the call with a grin on my face that comes partly from being proud of her, and partly from finally having her in my house and being able to smell her perfume in my personal space.

Without knowing it, she twists me all up, oblivious to the way her fear knocks on the door of my hidden desires, and her sweetness melts the ice around my heart and lulls the voices in my head.

I want her to be part of my groove.

John might be nice, but his eyes are hazel, not blue. He doesn’t wear soft faded jeans with holes at the knees with torn edges. Or leather jackets that smell like smoke and woods. He doesn’t have pictures in his skin, a storybook for me to someday read. And he doesn’t make my heart flutter. He probably doesn’t even own a soft blanket.

He’s not prince material, and he never will be. Everyone knows there can only be one prince, and I’ve already found mine.

I can almost believe this girl could love me, scars, damage, ugliness and all. And oh, how ferociously I would love her back if given the chance.

She’s like the star on top of the Christmas tree—that final glittering touch that brings it all together.