Worse for Hope- Book #2 in the WF Series

Chapter 31: Full Name

✮Rider's POV:✮

I see her. Near Bethane! Way too fucking close, and I can already tell what she's planning on doing.

I got out of that hell hole for a reason and I'm not letting her bring me back into it all over again. Especially now that Bethane is starting to trust me again.

"Axel," she purposely calls me by my first name because she knows how much I hate it.

I walk over there uncontrollably quick to stand beside Beth so I can be sure she's okay. Her features seem very confused, but the thing that worries me most is the tiny bit of fear I see because of how badly I want to fucking yell at this woman which Beth can obviously tell. My excitement has been deflated and has been replaced with pure anger because they won't leave me alone.

No matter how far I go, they somehow always find me.

If Beth wasn't here, I don't know how much self-control I would have had. I know I would've already been yelling at Mary to leave me alone. But I care more about Bethane than I do about anybody else.

"We should go," I decide not to feed into her bullshit because I know how screwed in the head Mary is. I have bruises and scratches to prove it.

My arm pulls Beth softly and she obliges immediately as she walks beside me with her arm locked in with mine.

Fuck!
Not the time.

"Oh, come on Axel, your girlfriend and I were just planning on having lunch sometime," Mary calls for me, bringing more and more rage to build by the second.

It takes every bit of me to not look back at her or Beth for that matter and silently pay for our stuff.

Once we're done, we walk outside and quietly get into the car. I can feel Beth's eyes on me and I know what she's thinking, but I'm not saying anything. If I do...I wouldn't. I've never done it. I wouldn't know where to begin.

"Rider," she says with her amazingly gentle voice that I could probably only hear if we were as close as we are right now.

"What movie do you want to watch?" I change the subject because there's tension and it's sad which I don't like.

"Rider-."

"We could watch Disney, Pixar, whatever the fuck Ivy watches where there are contracts," I list all the things I can think of off the top of my head.

"You mean fifty shades of grey?"

"Depends, do they start as friends with benefits?" I question.

She raises an eyebrow. "I think that's friends with benefits."

"There's a movie called that!?"

She nods with a small laugh.

God, I love her laugh.

Thankfully, the conversation has not been drawn away from the previous events. Usually, I would forget what it was about, but this time, it's fairly intact in my brain.

"I know that you're trying to divert the conversation," she sees right through me which I honestly should've expected.

"You know how someone would know that?" I ask her back with a smirk and she hums questioningly. "Someone who cares," I answer, trapping her.

She rolls her eyes at my truth.

"Keep telling yourself that," she sings, mocking me. I laugh because I know it's the truth, she's just too stubborn to admit it.