THE POWER TO BREAK
The Unbreakable Thread Book One
©2018 LISA SUZANNE
CHAPTER ONE
DANI
December 17, 1999
CHAPTER ONE
DANI
December 17, 1999
I
stood outside the door and listened, waiting to overhear the inevitable
comments of praise they’d make.
Jocelyn,
my best friend, had tried to convince me to have a beer earlier. She’d said it
would calm my nerves, but since I didn’t drink and hated the taste of beer, I
refused. Besides, I’d been about to sing a song in front of two boys I
basically idolized. I needed a clear head for a strong voice. I thought maybe
I’d get a drink afterward, and now that it was afterward, I was really wishing
I knew how to drink.
Ethan
and Mark had talent—real talent—and their opinions meant the world to me.
Especially Ethan’s, especially after that little kiss we shared that no one—not
even Joss—knew about.
I
knew those two boys would find success in the music industry someday even
though they mostly just jammed in Mark’s garage and occasionally played local
bars. I was two years younger than them and only a sophomore. I was lucky
enough to be at their party tonight because Ethan’s younger sister, Zoey, was
in my class. We didn’t socialize in the same circles, but Zoey had invited
practically the entire school.
Since
I knew Ethan would be there, I couldn’t miss it. He wasn’t just the senior I
had a crush on. He was a boy full of mischief who made me feel tingles when he
looked in my direction.
We’d
spoken a few times, and that kiss...it just happened a couple weeks ago. I was
walking through the hallway on my way back to class. He’d been hanging outside
a classroom, one knee bent with his foot propped flat against the wall, every
inch the bad boy.
“Sweet
little Dani Mayne,” he’d said to me. I glanced around me stupidly. Who the heck
else would he be talking to? I was the only Dani Mayne in the school. But why
was this senior boy I had a massive crush on talking to me? How’d he even know
who I was? It’s not like his sister and I were close.
“Y...yes,”
I’d stuttered.
He
chuckled, maybe at my innocence or maybe at the way my face heated as my name
passed his lips. He stepped closer to me. “Shouldn’t you be in class?”
I
nodded, my juvenile ponytail swinging behind me as I clutched a laminated paper
hall pass. I flashed it at him to prove I was allowed to be in the hallway.
“I’m on my way back. Shouldn’t you be?”
He
rolled his eyes and jerked his head toward the classroom door. “That bitch in
there kicked me out and I’m supposed to be waiting out here to get yelled at.”
He lifted a shoulder. “It is what it is.”
“And
it isn’t what it isn’t.”
He
chuckled at my retort to that stupid saying. “I wasn’t even doing anything
wrong.” He took another step closer to me, close enough for me to smell some
mixture of lemons and sin and the stale cigarette smoke that clung to his
shirt. I wanted to know why he smelled like lemons, but I was too scared to
ask. “But when I look at you, I want to do all sorts of wrong things.”
He
must’ve been seventeen, so it wasn’t that
wrong. It might be once he turned eighteen, but he was only two years older
than me. My body shuddered violently. I’d never even kissed a boy, unless you
count the closed mouth nothing of a kiss my Homecoming date tried to lay on me
before I pulled away.
He
reached out and rolled a strand of my hair between his thumb and finger before
he tucked it behind my ear and my heart hammered. Up close, he seemed so much
older than seventeen, like he’d lived a lifetime already. He was mature—and he
was nothing like the boys in my class. His rough fingertips grazed the curve of
my neck, and my eyes closed. He leaned forward and his lips brushed mine while
my body lit with nervous energy. My knees became so shaky I was sure they were
knocking together loudly enough for him to hear.
His
massive body blocked me from being able to see around him, but I heard his
classroom door open and then the angry voice of his teacher. “Ethan Fuller, get
back here right now.”
His
eyes opened and he pulled back. He gave me one long, hot look, and then he
rolled his eyes and moved back toward his teacher, leaving me a mess in the
middle of the hallway as I forced one leg to move in front of the other to hurry
back to my classroom.
I
thought about that kiss every second of every day. I dreamed about his lips on
mine. I thought about singing a song while he played the drums, about holding
his hand, about life after we both graduated high school and what our future
could hold.
We
hadn’t had another encounter since that one. In fact, I hadn’t even seen him
since that day—and not because I wasn’t constantly searching down every crowded
hallway and peeking into classrooms I knew he was supposed to be in.
That
was why I had to go to the party.
The
only thing we had in common besides that kiss was music. We’d never had a real
conversation, but he somehow stripped a piece of my innocence that day. And I
needed more. I needed to find a way to get him to notice me. I wanted to hand
over the rest of my innocence to him so he could do whatever he wanted with it.
While
I loved singing, was a proud member of the school chorus, and pulled the lead
in every school musical despite my age, he was the opposite. He didn’t get
involved in anything music-related at school. Instead, he and Mark played bars
where they couldn’t even stay afterward to drink because they were underage, though
I’m sure he found a way to sneak a beer anyway. He had less than six months
until he was done with North Chicago High School. He was going to leave this
place and do great things with his life—anyone could see that from just looking
at him.
I
knew about Ethan’s rough upbringing, his imprisoned father, the revolving door
of men his mother introduced to her kids. I’d seen him getting talked to by
teachers after class, serving time in detention, and making out with girls
under the bleachers. My naive mind never imagined he took it further than that,
but maybe he did. What did I know? I was just a little girl who loved singing
and had all the school spirit in the world...and had a massive crush on a
senior boy.
It
was the last day of final exams, and we had two weeks off ahead of us—two weeks
of sleeping in and lying in our pajamas without homework, practice, or any
other responsibilities weighing us down. Two weeks to daydream about a stolen
kiss in the hallway and wonder with nervous anticipation whether there’d be
more.
And
now, I’d have two weeks with Ethan’s words rolling over in my mind.
It
had been my idea to do a little Christmas caroling. A few of my chorus friends
were at the party, too, and they’d been drinking. I nudged Monica and told her
we should sing the finale of our Christmas concert, and she was on board. She
got Lizzie, Mark’s sister, on board, too. I had a long solo during the finale,
and I was set to impress the boy of my literal dreams.
We
sang our song, and I crushed my solo with my eyes on Ethan the entire time. I
swore he was looking back at me with something akin to admiration. It couldn’t
have just been my imagination.
I
was sure this was going to happen for us. I felt it, and the way he looked at
me...I was never more certain that he felt it, too.
I
was going to make my move. I wasn’t sure how, but I was going to listen to him
talk to his best friend about how amazing I was, and then I was going to work
up the nerve to tell him I liked him.
It
sounded so juvenile, and it was more than just like...but I had to start somewhere.
I
excused myself after we finished singing and I exited the doors next to where
Mark and Ethan stood. I was just on the other side from them, able to overhear
their conversation since I left the door cracked open. My ears perked up when I
heard my name leave Mark’s mouth.
“Dani
has quite the voice,” Mark said. He was cute, but he didn’t make my heart race
the same way Ethan did.
We
all have moments that define us, and Ethan’s reply to Mark was one of mine. It
was harsh and grating and memorable, and it set a completely new course for the
rest of my life. His words came with a resolution to be better and a lifelong
quest for revenge.
“If
Y2K doesn’t kill us,” he said, “listening to that talentless pig sing another
solo might.”
CHAPTER TWO
ETHAN
“Dani has quite the voice,” Mark said.
I couldn’t admit the truth about my feelings for a sophomore.
I couldn’t admit that she made my heart beat faster, that I took
the long route around the building just so I could walk past her locker, that I
hid in the back row of the school plays and swore up and down I was only there
for extra credit.
I didn’t know why I had these unfamiliar feelings for her, but I
did know one thing. If I said them out loud, they’d be real instead of just
this idea in my head I could easily fight. Acting on them would be disastrous.
She had the kind of beautiful soul that deserved better than anything
I could possibly offer her. I barely knew her, but I knew enough to comprehend
that truth. Not only that, but I might as well resign myself to the fact that
I’d be stuck here forever if I admitted my real feelings.
Thoughts of our kiss in the hallway a few weeks ago snuck into my
mind constantly.
I hadn’t been able to help myself. I watched her brown ponytail
swing naively behind her with each step she took down the hall, and I knew it
was my moment. I’d dreamed up all the ways I could get her alone, but I never
acted on it. She was the one girl I wanted more than any of the others, but she
was like a forbidden fruit.
If I had more than a single taste, I’d never be able to let her
go.
And I didn’t want that.
I didn’t want that for her.
She deserved better than what I’d ever be able to give her.
Besides, I wanted to move on with my life, move out of Chicago,
start fresh. So instead of admitting the truth to my best friend, I said, “If
Y2K doesn’t kill us, listening to that talentless pig sing another solo might.”
That girl threatened my resolve to get the hell away from my
mother and father, to make something of my life. I deserved more than being a
son to two people who never wanted me, and I deserved more than ending up like
them—with a kid and wife I never wanted.
I had to put up a fight—it’s how I was raised and it was all I
ever knew. I didn’t deserve to feel the way I did for her, but she didn’t deserve to get twisted,
chewed up, and spit out by someone like me.
Pain and heartache is all I’d ever be able to offer her no matter
how much I wanted to be able to give her more.
No matter how much she made my heart ache with need.
“Jesus, Ethan,” Mark muttered. “She’s none of those things.”
He was right, but I wasn’t about to admit that. Instead, I
shrugged and took a sip of beer. “Whatever.” I walked away from my best friend
because I didn’t want to stand around talking about her anymore.
He’d made a comment the week before about how he thought someone
like Dani would be good for me, that we’d be good together, and I’d laughed it
off. He’d said he saw the way she looked at me with stars in her eyes and he
thought I should give her a chance.
I’d laughed in his face—until he started in on how hot she was. It
took everything inside me not to beat the shit out of him.
But seriously, who the fuck was he to talk about getting serious with one girl? It’s not like he
did it.
Besides, what the hell did good
together at seventeen and fifteen even mean? It was fucking Romeo and
Juliet bullshit, that’s all. And everyone knew what happened to them in the
end.
I wasn’t about to change the course of my life for some teenage
crush—and that was all it was. A simple crush on a girl who was on a completely
different playing field than I was. She was sweet and talented and beautiful
and I was the big bad monster who would only hurt her in the end.
Besides, a real, honest-to-God fucking talent agent showed up at
our gig two weeks earlier. We played this local hole in the wall bar called
Sevens, and he’d heard about us from a friend. He was interested in talking
about a record deal.
A fucking record deal.
We were still in high school and someone was interested in giving
us money to play music. It was just Mark and me and one other guy, Toby, who
jammed with us, but he wasn’t serious about music. We needed someone who was.
I didn’t know if anything was going to come of it, but I had to
choose my future over some stupid high school girl. Drumming was my first and
only true love. It was paradoxically the calm in the storm and the storm in the
quiet, the very essence of what gave my life meaning. Hope. If I could have a
real shot at playing professionally, I couldn’t risk fucking that up because
some chick gave me a boner. There’d be plenty of those hanging around if we
caught a real break, anyway.
It was probably more complicated than that, but it was easy
enough to simplify it down to that very equation in my mind. Life in general didn’t
look kindly upon the Fullers, and I had to grasp onto whatever lucky break I
could find.
Mark seemed to think this talent agent guy was trying to scam us
out of money, but to me, it didn’t matter. All that mattered was someone was
interested in us, and I wasn’t about to let anything—or anyone—hold me back
from the ultimate dream.
So rather than find sweet little Dani Mayne and kiss her like I
did in the hallway that day at school, kiss her good and long and hard like she
deserved to be kissed, I looked around for Isabelle Martin. She’d spread her
legs for me more than once under the bleachers at school, and I knew she’d do
it again if I shot her the smoldering look I’d practiced in the mirror at home.
She was drunk on Jello shots, which made for an easy target.
She’d help me forget about the sweet girl with the angelic voice who somehow
managed to steal my heart when I wasn’t paying attention.
I’d pay better attention now, though. She couldn’t have my heart
when it belonged to my drum kit. I’d ignore her presence, forget about her, and
dedicate my entire being to my craft.
After I blew my load, of course.
We were in the basement of my childhood home. My mother was staying
the night at some boyfriend’s house, and the only reason we even had a decent
size house with a nice basement was because of my dad’s fucking drug money.
Setting my mom and us up in this house was the one good thing he did before his
stupid ass got locked up for good.
“Come up to my bedroom with me,” I said. I figured I’d fuck someone in there tonight, so I
straightened up. I tossed a pile of dirty clothes into my closet, pulled the
old tattered blanket I used as a comforter off the bed and hid it on the top
shelf of my closet, and cleared off every item from the top of my dresser
except for a pair of drumsticks. My stash of weed was hidden right next to my
lucky sticks under my mattress, and I thought for a split second Isabelle and I
could get high.
But then I realized I didn’t really want to share anything more
than just sex with her.
She didn’t respond by nodding or speaking. Instead, her mouth
covered mine. She wasn’t who I wanted her to be. I shouldn’t be doing this with
her—I should be running after the one my brain was telling me to find. My brain
typically had decent instincts, and I wasn’t a listen to your heart kind of
guy. But instead of listening to my brain or
my heart, I allowed my dick to lead the way up the stairs, through the
house, up another set of stairs, and finally into my bedroom.
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