Page 2 of Daddy’s Muse (Bloody Desires #12)

Colby

Present Day

I was jolted awake from the sound of my dorm room’s door slamming open and shut, followed by the too-loud whispers of my roommate. I rubbed my fist against my eyes, glancing blearily over at the alarm clock I kept on my desk.

Bryan had gone out the night before and was only now getting back.

Without even looking over at him, I already knew that he’d spent the past few hours drinking.

Honestly, it was at the point where I didn’t understand how he hadn’t been kicked out of campus housing or expelled.

I highly doubted he was passing all his classes.

And if he was, something was seriously wrong with his professors.

As I listened to him stumbling around and mumbling to himself, I wondered what it must be like to genuinely not care about anything besides getting drunk or high or laid. It seemed like a pretty chill, low-stress existence.

Bryan was a terrible roommate, but when I’d asked for a room change because of his behavior at the start of the year, I was told that there weren’t any available beds and to either “deal with it” or get an off-campus apartment.

The dorm advisor had seemed annoyed by me throughout the whole conversation, keeping his answers short and maintaining non-existent eye contact as he swiped at a dating app on his phone. So incredibly helpful…

I couldn’t afford to live off-campus. I wouldn’t have even been enrolled in the first place if I hadn’t been offered such a generous scholarship.

I was already juggling a full course load and two part-time jobs just to make ends meet, so paying for housing when my room and board stipend covered my dorm didn’t make sense.

It was late February now, so I just needed to stick it out a few more months. I told myself that every day, again and again, like a mantra.

Bryan wasn’t much different from the bullies in high school, except that back then, I’d been able to at least catch a break after school, safe at home with Grandma and Pop-Pop. It was a lot harder to deal with a bully when you lived in the same tiny room as him.

Bryan’s mattress springs groaned as he collapsed into bed, the sour-sweet reek of cheap vodka filling the room.

He fumbled with his phone, the screen casting a pulsing blue light onto the ceiling.

I held my breath, counting silently—one, two, three—hoping he’d pass out before he remembered I existed.

No such luck.

Stuck in the muck , I thought to myself, curling my lips inward to hold back a giggle at the earworm from a book I hadn’t read since childhood. I briefly considered whether our library may have Click, Clack, Moo: Cows that Type, but then again, it was a college library.

But… maybe they had a children’s section? Some students had kids. Professors, too.

“?Colb, dude. Colb , you awake?” His “whisper” was a drunken bellow. Also, Colb ? I couldn’t begin to count the number of times I’d told him not to call me that.

I stayed perfectly still, arm curled protectively around the nice coat that I held against my chest. It gave me a similar feeling of comfort that my childhood blankie had.

I hugged the coat closer, snuggling my face into it as I thought about the time Bryan had discovered my blankie and ruined it.

I wouldn’t allow him to destroy the coat, too.

Although he probably wouldn’t anyway, since it was just a coat, and he’d destroyed my blankie because he said it was too childish and that he couldn’t room with a baby.

Even so, I always kept the coat hidden underneath my covers, just in case.

It felt silly to care so much about a coat, but I couldn’t help that it was so special to me. I’d woken up with it wrapped around me after a night of sleeping outside.

It was the best gift I’d ever received.

I’d still ended up with frostbite from that night in December, but the campus doctor said it would’ve been much worse if it hadn’t been for the coat and hand warmer my kind stranger had left me.

Whenever I got really sad or scared, I liked to breathe in the faint leather scent and imagine the person who’d given it to me. Whoever it was must’ve been an angel. I just wish that they had left a note or even woken me up to say hi.

Bryan muttered again, rustling through the mini-fridge for another beer that wasn’t there. “Dude, got any drinks? C’mon, Colb. Know you’re awake.”

I forced my voice past the knot in my throat. “No, Bryan.”

“Let me borrow some cash then. I know you get tips from the diner.”

His words slurred together, but I still heard the accusation of stinginess woven through them. I gripped the coat tightly. If he saw it, he’d never believe it wasn’t stolen. He might even try to take it from me and sell it himself. It looked and felt expensive.

“I spent the last of it on textbooks,” I lied.

I needed my last twenty dollars for the week to buy snacks.

But I knew if I mentioned that, he’d insist that I didn’t need any.

I got three meals a day from the dining hall, but my body required snacks and water for the hours between meal times.

If I didn’t snack, my blood pressure would drop too low, and I’d feel awful. None of that mattered to him, though.

Ten more weeks of classes, then finals. Ten weeks and I’d never have to see him again.

He groaned and got back into his bed. Within minutes, a rattling snore filled the room. I waited until his breathing settled into its deep, uneven rhythm before I eased upright.

Carefully, I slid the coat into the back corner of my bed, covering it with my pillow. Then I pulled on sweatpants, gathered my shower caddy, and slipped out of the room.

The long hallway was silent, except for the distant hum of an elevator.

Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead as I walked.

Once in the communal bathroom, I locked myself in the end shower stall and stripped, stepping forward to turn the chipped faucet.

I practically purred when the warm water sprayed onto my back.

In three hours, I had a shift at the small diner where I worked.

I would shower, study for my Latin quiz, grab a to-go breakfast from the dining hall, and still make it across campus and into the outskirts of town without being late.

I was working from 8:30 a.m. to 12 p.m., had a lecture from 1 p.m. to 2:45 p.m., a tutoring session from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m., another class from 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m., and then the closing shift at the diner from 8 p.m. to 12 a.m. Thursdays were my busiest days by far.

I leaned against the cool tile wall, letting the water soak my hair.

The warmth helped, but it wasn’t enough to chase off the bone-deep fatigue that clung to me.

I didn’t even scrub right away—I just stood there, head bowed, arms loose at my sides, letting the stream beat steadily between my shoulder blades.

I was so tired that it made my teeth ache. Not just sleepy—tired in a way that no amount of rest could touch. My eyes felt like they were full of grit, presumably from my lack of sleep.

Every time I blinked, my body begged me to just… stay still. To just let my eyes close for a second and sink down onto the floor of the shower.

I didn’t. I couldn’t. I had too much to do.

I tilted my head back, dragging my fingers through my curls. I couldn’t remember the last time I hadn’t been exhausted.

It wasn’t just from work or school or the heavy backpack I carried everywhere, but from everything .

From living this way.

From constantly monitoring how much food I had left, calculating every dollar, every second. From listening to Bryan snore or puke or stomp in at godawful hours and having to act like it didn’t bother me. From refusing to get sick, because I couldn’t afford to miss a shift.

From pretending I was okay.

Because I needed to be okay.

Most mornings, it felt like I didn’t even wake up—I just resumed, like the pause between consciousness and unconsciousness had disappeared completely.

My body hurt in quiet, persistent ways: an ache in my lower back that never went away, the ever-present tightness in my jaw from clenching it in my sleep, and the stiff, red, raised skin across my fingers where I’d burned myself on the grill the day before.

My body felt like a broken vending machine—overworked, understocked, and still expected to keep running.

There was no choice but to keep running.

No other option.

I stayed in the shower a little longer than I should’ve, but it was really the only moment of peace I’d get all day.

When I got out, the bathroom mirror was fogged over.

I wiped it with the corner of my towel and stared at my reflection: hollowed cheeks, blueish shadows under my eyes, chapped lips.

My skin looked papery pale in the fluorescent light, the way it always did when I didn’t eat enough salt.

I stuck out my tongue just to check. Slightly dry.

I needed to get something with electrolytes today, if I could swing it.

Maybe I could stop by the dollar store for a sports drink in the afternoon.

I forced myself to smile in the mirror, just to see if I could still do it.

It looked strange. Fragile. Like a mask that didn’t quite fit anymore.

I let it drop and bit the inside of my cheek to stop my bottom lip from wobbling.

Crying would only make me more dehydrated.

* * *

The bell above the diner door jingled as I stepped inside, the familiar scent of fried eggs and burnt coffee welcoming me in.

The sky outside was still streaked with early morning gray, but the inside of Mama Mae’s was already alive with the low hum of conversation, clinking dishes, and the soft buzz of the overhead lights.

The place looked exactly like an old-timey diner, complete with the squishy and cracked red booths, black and white checkered floor, and countless retro photos and memorabilia covering the walls.