Page 20 of The Harder You Fall (Rixon Raiders 3)

“So stop,” I cried. “Walk away before it’s too late. Keelan said he’d give you a job.”

“Glass collecting at the bar?” He scoffed. “I can’t be collecting no glasses, Mya. I got a rep to protect.”

“Do it for me, J; for us. I can’t stand by and watch you do this to yourself no more. Look at yourself. Look at me. What happens next time it goes wrong? What happens when it’s not someone’s fist but a bat or… gun.”

“Nah, baby. This isn’t shit, just a little warning.”

“A little warning?” I gasped, the air leaving my lungs on a painful breath. “They held me down while they beat you. And then they…”

* * *

“Mya, mi pequeña?” Mom’s voice pulled me from my thoughts, and I swiped at my eyes, trying to compose myself.

“I’m still here.” I forced the memories back into their box, locking it tightly. “Think about the holidays, okay, Mama? I could just come for a couple of days and stay at the house. Shona could visit. Or maybe you could come here?”

“You know I can’t, baby.” Sadnes

s lingered in her voice.

“Aunt Ciara wouldn’t mind. In fact, I’m sure she’d love to see—”

“Mya, enough. Keelan’s calling me on the other line, I gotta go, baby. But be safe, okay? And we’ll talk soon. I love you, Mya.”

“Love you too, Mama.” Swallowing down the dejection, I ended the call and clutched my cell phone to my chest.

Everything was a mess. All because I fell in love with the wrong boy. People said all you needed was love. But they were wrong.

So wrong.

Love wasn’t always enough to save somebody. Two people could love one another with everything that they were and it might still not be enough to make their relationship work.

Jermaine Kingston had taken my heart and promised to keep it safe. But he’d failed me. And something told me if I gave Asher a chance, he’d also hurt me. Even if he didn’t mean to.

My heart had been shattered once.

I wasn’t sure it would survive another heartbreak.

“There you are,” Felicity said on Friday morning as I headed into the building. “I was beginning to think you were avoiding me.”

“I just needed some space.”

“Anything I can help with because if Asher is—”

“It’s not Asher,” I said a little too quickly. “I guess I’m just missing home, what with it almost being the holidays.”

“Are you going to see your mom?”

“I want to, but she doesn’t want me to go back.”

“Because of Jermaine?”

Nodding, I pulled off my hat and stuffed it in my backpack. “She’s worried I’ll fall back into old habits.”

“But you wouldn’t, right?”

“Me and Jermaine are over, but feelings don’t just switch off, Flick. I can’t say for sure how I’d act again if I saw him. I found out he dropped out of school.”

“I’m sorry.”