June has only one more summer before she marries her high school sweetheart. She intends to make the most of it, but she has no idea what is waiting for her in Dolphin Coast. Socks on the Beach is a tale of steamy love, jaw-dropping heartbreak, and...
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Gasping for breath and looking back and forth between the two men, Moose just out of earshot, I stepped back nervously, stumbling my trembling legs up onto the curb. Grass tickled my ankles. I wiped my leaking eyes with a shaky breath as Nate roughly shut his car door and approached, dark sweatpants hanging from his hips.
His brow was furrowed and a vein pulsed on his neck, ticking.
"What's going on?" He asked with crossed arms and a turned face and if I didn't know any better I'd think that he was actually concerned, that the periodic squint of his eyes was an attempt to see, to understand.
Doubt it.
"I... I-" The words were escaping me and I realized that I didn't know what to say. Accepting it as rape or assault was so final and so serious, and I doubted that I'd had it as bad as other victims.
I don't want to be a victim.
"Just um, need to get away from him," I sniffled shortly, looking down at my shoes and resisting the urge to itch where the grass rubbed against skin. It was humiliating to be that upset in his presence and making eye contact was too much. Too intimate.
I don't want to be seen.
"What's up, Nate?" Moose's voice hollered as he closed in. I didn't look up.
I don't want to see.
"Curtis," Nate responded.
Moose laughed and my blood was ice. "Sorry about June - my bad, really! Accidentally gave her too strong of a dose; it happens! Didn't realize that she had such a low tolerance to shrooms."
What?
Looking up with a flinch, I was horrified to find two sets of dark eyes on me from the evil twins, both wide and unblinking as they searched my face from where they stood a few yards away. A dog barked in a nearby townhouse.
"Hm." Nate grunted.
"I'm not on mushrooms and you know that." As the words left my lips I wished that they sounded stronger and I loathed the dry, cracking quality of my tone.
I want to be heard.
Moose laughed, draping his great big arm over Nate's slightly shorter shoulders.
Why me?
"Don't listen to her! She doesn't know what she's talking about. June, why don't you come with me and we can go talk in private? You're not in your right mind." With Nate's head next to his, Moose could make whatever facial expression he wanted to, and he did. Rage. Deep and dark and barely contained. A warning through the flare of nostrils and the subtle shake of his head.
"I'm not on mushrooms." My voice was more confident this time and despite the tightening in my chest, I held his gaze. His lips twitched.
Nate roughly stepped to the side, releasing himself from Moose's grip and throwing him off balance. Breath caught in my chest like a hiccup, sudden and reflexive.
