A sly smirk rises on his lips. “I’ve never had complaints before for how I use my teeth.”
And I throw the cap at his face. “You’re disgusting.” I lean over and grab a piece of Halloween candy from Tina's pumpkin bowl on the counter.
“So, why didn’t you tell Tina he was coming?” I repeat. “She loves him more than she does the rest of you.”
Reed scoffs. “True.” He swishes his hair sideways out of his eyes. “Ah. I don’t know why I didn’t tell her. I guess I wasn’t sure how she would feel about him coming this time,” he replies. “Last Christmas, they got into it about his dad. She wanted him to go see him in the hospital. Mads basically told her to mind her own business and fuck off.”
I would have done the same.
“Why would she think that was a good idea?” I ask.
Reed presses the bottle to his lips and takes a bubbling swig. “You’d think she learned enough from everything with Alice, right?” he says, referring to my mother. “Nah. She kept saying something about facing his demons.”
“Some demons are better left under the bed,” I mutter.
“In the back of the closet,” Reed adds.
“In the cushions of that moth-eaten orange couch in the old garage,” I go on.
A soft laugh escapes him. “That couch was disgusting.”
“Yeah? It never stopped you. How many virginities did you take on that thing?”
Reed takes another swig of his drink, a thoughtful expression in his eyes. “Four,” he answers, though there’s questioning in his tone. “No, wait—Five.”
“Five?”
“Forgot about Diana Markus,” he replies.
“How do you forget about fucking Diana Markus?” I ask, remembering the pretty girl from the high school across town. “More importantly, why was she fucking you?”
Reed holds up two fingers to his mouth, showing off the tattoo on the inside of his forearm of guitar strings under his skin, piano keys tattooed on his fingers, and the chipped nail polish. He sticks his tongue through the two fingers, and I hate myself for laughing.
“You child,” I laugh.
Reed grabs a mini Twix and unwraps it. “Mom had this idea in her head that Mads would feel better if he told his dad how he’d made him feel over the years. How his decisions had affected his life with the fights and everything,” Reed went on. “Even mentioned forgiving him, but—”
“Why the hell would he ever forgive that bastard?” I ask, feeling my own defensiveness rise. “Why would he give him that peace?”
Reed smirks at me. “I believe that’s your own trauma speaking.”
I know he’s right, and I glare at him for it as I grab another piece of candy. “Suck my dick, Reed,” I say with a mouthful of chocolate. “He didn’t come back for the funeral, did he?”
“Fuck, no,” he replies. “We were onstage in Chicago. I asked him a few times if he wanted to come back, but he didn’t want to talk about it. I don’t think he spoke for at least a week. Maybe more.”
I glance up toward the pool house, glimpsing Maddox as he pulls a shirt over his head, and my heart pains for him.
His father deserved every ounce of agony that cancer had put him through.
The door to the pool house opens as I’m staring, and Maddox stretches across the deck. He’s pulled his dark brown hair into a top knot, the sides and back of his hair faded with bold lines shaved at the defining hairline on either side.
I can fully see his eyes now, and I know this look is not going to be good for the newfound, unadulterated lust I’m feeling for him.
Reed glances over his shoulder to see him.
“He still gets kind of weird about it if you bring it up,” he says. “Try to avoid if you can.”
“Yeah, I already made that mistake once,” I mumble against the rim of my drink.
