I Love You More Than I'm Afraid (Our Forevers #2) by Rebel Hart (the first e reader .txt) 📕

Finally making my way through the disgusting downtown traffic and to The Undersound’s parking lot, I saw that there was an orange cone already sitting in one of the spaces. It was directly next to Suli’s white Jeep, and I knew she’d saved the space for me. My car was nothing to write home about, an old beater that I saved up for myself, so it was no skin off my back to pull into the parking space, gently pushing the cone out of my way with the tip of my car in order to park. I got out and snagged the cone to bring it inside with me, then I walked up to The Undersound’s side entrance and gave the door a handful of hard raps.

A loud creak joined the fray of downtown’s noises as the door pushed open, and then Suli poked her head out, smiling when she saw me. “Hey!”

“What’s going on?” I said. “I assumed you put that cone there for me, so I hit it with my car.”

She laughed. “I kinda figured.” She yanked it from my hand and then pushed the door a little wider. “Well, get the fuck in here.”

The transition from the bright outside into the darkened interior of the bar blinded me temporarily, but my vision came back to me slowly, giving me a nice view of Suli. She was tall, standing at about an even six feet, with a gorgeous, bronze skin. She had long black hair held up directly on top of her head in a ponytail and still fell all the way down to her ass. Her brown eyes were flecked with gold, and the way she was smiling at me curved her cheeks into deep dimples. On top of that, she had goddess-like curves, with a large bust and wide hips, which she’d dressed up in a simple pair of tight jeans and a black tank-top with tons of cleavage.

She was just a distraction from Hannah, sure, but an insane one to be sure.

Sticking a hand out, she twirled some of my pink hair between her fingers. “How’s it going? I’m glad you came. I feel like you’ve been avoiding me lately.”

I forced a laugh. “Nah. Just with graduation coming up, my parents are getting particularly insufferable and school requires more focus. I hate both, if you were wondering.”

She looped an arm around my shoulders. “Nothing a drink can’t fix, come on.”

I was only half-lying to Suli. School and my parents really were taking more of my energy than they had in the past, and impending graduation was definitely the cause, but there was a new change that had kept me from The Undersound as of late.

Aria.

Ever since I met the woman, I’d found myself finding more authentic joy in our friendship. All of the days I’d have normally spent running to The Undersound and Suli in the couple of years prior, I was spending with my new bestie, her boyfriend, and her wonderful mother. Aria’s mom was an angel delivered straight from heaven. Not long after she found out how my parents treated me, she offered for me to move in with her and Aria. I very nearly took her up on it, but I didn’t want to impose. Instead, I spent many nights there, keeping Aria company when her mom worked nights, though I gave her and Tristan plenty of space to take advantage of those nights too.

Aria didn’t know anything about The Undersound or Suli. Though I’d been relatively honest with her about everything else in my life, from Hannah to my plans to flee the state the second I got the chance, this was just one aspect of my life I didn’t feel like I should share. Maybe I was embarrassed? Aria was the glowing light in my life, whereas The Undersound and Suli felt much more like the shadows. I didn’t want the two to mix.

The door that Suli let me in was connected to a long hallway that passed the bathrooms and eventually emptied out into the main room of the bar. Along the left wall was a swinging door that Suli pushed into as we passed it, but I continued forward into the bar itself. It was still empty and all the lights were on, but that didn’t stop it from having that unique, grunge bar feeling. The walls had never been painted and were their original cement color, trashed with graffiti. It lent itself to the theme, which of course was the dank underground. It reminded me of a subway station, stretched out, and none of the passengers would ever be whisked away to a better destination.

For most of us, The Undersound was the hell we chose.

Aside from the cement slab bar, there was a sizable dance floor that separated the bar and handful of tables from the aptly named ‘Shadowbox Stage.’ The way the raised stage and section of the wall directly behind it had been painted black made it look like a hanging shadow box when it had live performers.

“Are you the only one here?” I asked as Suli pushed through the door behind the bar that connected to the kitchen.

“Yeah.” She grabbed a bottle of tequila and started mixing up a tequila sour, my drink of choice. “Ant was supposed to come in today, but I don’t know. He just sent me a text like an hour ago saying he wouldn’t be in today, so I’m on my own until the kitchen staff get here at five, and then Marie and Sono will be here shortly after that, but whatever. It’s a Monday. I’m not worried.”

I gestured to the brightly lit bar. “Is that why you’ve set such a mood in here?”

She snickered, stirring up my drink and setting it down in front of me. “Thanks for the reminder. I’ll be right back.”

She walked back through the door and I heard the hallway door