Only for Her by Cristin Harber Page A

Bring it to me.
    I’m going to be sick. War is better than the living room of my childhood. Desperate fear chokes me. I’m torn. Confused. I want her to stop, to go away, to get help. To stop guilting me. I want to help Mom as much as I wanted to save my unit.
    I blink in the dark, fight to get away. Her sweet voice calls me, and I can’t say no.
    Bring me one more, Gray-baby.
    Stupid, stupid, stupid. Tears clog my throat. I always did what she said, and I killed her. Dead. Eyes wide open. Lipsticked mouth hung slack. Dead.
    “Mom!” I scream but know my mouth isn’t moving. I’m trapped in the dark, fighting a body that won’t wake up. “Mom!”
    Then, with sudden clarity, I see her face. “Gray-baby.”
    “No!” A cold shudder runs through me, and I can’t break free.
    Extraction team voices mix with my Pops’s. Their words are a blur, indistinguishable, but I know their meaning. Everything is my fault.
    My head hurts. Pain radiates. If I can’t wake up, I want to die.
    Pops’s voice spins in my head, his words a tumble of nonsense mixed with his drunk cackle.
    “Help her!” Her lifeless face stares at me. It morphs to the desert night where I was the last man standing. “Help them…”
    Nothing changes. I fall away from the edge of waking into the hell that I deserve. The only thing that could ever save me was Emma’s voice, and I’ve lost that forever.

CHAPTER TWO

    Emma

    Business Statistics is going to kill me. The formulas in my textbook make even less sense now that they’re scrawled across a whiteboard at the front of the classroom. The professor hasn’t bothered to show up to class all semester, and I’m ninety-nine percent sure that his assistant is as well versed in this crap as me. My brain will explode soon if I can’t figure this out.
    “If you have questions, follow up with Professor Baker during office hours. Thanks.” The assistant tosses down the dry erase marker and heads out the door before a single question can be answered.
    Ugh. I’m going to fail this class, which means I’ll lose my internship. I might only do assistant shit, but pouring coffee and taking notes will pay off one day, semesters from now, with a creative job at the only decent marketing firm within a twenty-five mile radius. I need this internship because I need that job. One day.
    And I’m never going to make it to office hours. Ever.
    Shit, shoot, shit. I bite my lip and slam my book shut.
    “Makes as much sense to you as me.”
    I look over my shoulder. Two guys. One’s cute, my age. Seems popular enough. He always sits near me and more than occasionally catches my eye and smiles. The other is super-hot and an asshole. I don’t have time to chat with either of them, but unlucky for me, the guy trying for conversation is the hot asshole.
    “Something like that,” I say. No need to be rude, but I’ve seen him in action in the halls. I shove my stuff in my bag and check my phone. I have seventeen minutes to make it across campus, get Cally, and load us into the car. Then, if there’s no traffic, we can do a quick dinner and bath before she goes to bed and my mom comes over so I can go to work.
    When I walk out the classroom door, the hottie’s feet follow.
    “Hey, wait up.”
    I don’t. Can’t. I’m on a schedule.
    He’s by my side, his arm wrapping around my back. “Gorgeous, wait—”
    “Hands off.” If there’s one thing that stripping at Emerald’s has taught me, it’s not to take shit from hot guys who put their hands on me. I might look and act like a wallflower at school, but that’s a façade.
    “Sorry.” He easily keeps pace with my power walk.
    I glance at him and his confident smile. “You normally get away with pet names and touching people you don’t know?”
    His smile broadens. “Usually.”
    My eyes roll. “Right. I’m late. So… I can’t help with stats.”
    “Actually, this class is a piece of cake for me. I was just trying to get your attention.”
    Ha. “I