He grunts in frustration. “I’m growing impatient. Please hurry.”
“I know.” Ivy’s voice cracks through her words, her blue eyes welling with emotion. “I’ll do what I can.”
“Great,” Ryker says before ending the call.
Ivy bites her lip, but she ambles toward me with a gentleness. “You’re doing everything you can. Do not let this be one more thing that—”
I cut off her warning with a kiss to the temple. “I’m okay today, Freckles. Thanks for handling that.”
She reaches for the baby, her gaze connecting with mine. “Eat. We made a feast.”
Petting Felicity’s head one more time, I smile as I walk to the island and grab a plate. “I can see that.”
“We’ve got the good stuff over here,” Celeste teases, lifting apiece of bacon for Liam to sample lewdly, to which Wells playfully sighs.
“I see that too, Lettie.” An authentic chuckle leaks out of me—there’s definitely something to the utter-exhaustion method of mind control. “But maybe less PDA while we’re eating.”
“Amen to that. Every damn corner of this fucking house,” Gage growls from the table, his plate already piled high. He builds himself an egg, cheese, and sausage biscuit. “At least Wells gives us some sort of heads-up. You two with your freaky exhibitionism.”
Liam busts up laughing. “We have never been anywhere you could actually see us, unless you’re a Peeping Tom, Big Guy.” He raises his hands in the air. “That’s not on me.”
“I’m not a fucking Peeping Tom,” Gage snarls. “But I’ve got ears, for Christ’s sake.”
“Soundproofing more rooms is on my agenda,” Wells adds, passing Ivy a plate, filled with protein pancakes, fruit, yogurt, and eggs.
Gage lifts his biscuit sandwich. “Thank fuck.”
I’m not sure what that’s about, but I can imagine. Celeste and Liam are still very much in the honeymoon stage. Not that Ivy and Wells have slowed down—even with Felicity.
Seeing them happy is … everything. The guys and I had been through unimaginable torment separately and together by the time we welcomed Ivy into our little circle. I don’t think any of us could have fathomed mornings like this. Ivy softened the jagged edges that had been spearing us. We’d been close before her, but she melded us into a true family. And when Lettie and Felicity came, that rocky past dulled even more.
I wish I could soak it all in. Bathe in it the way I had been. But even as their banter ensues around me, the morning light trickling into our vast kitchen, ricocheting off the stainless appliances with a glint of cheer and brightening the matte blacks and cherry wood, it’s like I’m on the ceiling, watching. Unable to reach them.
Maybe it’s the fear that they’ll be ripped from me, too, that hasme paralyzed. Or the remembrance of how undeserving I am of this family when I failed the first one. Or the demons I can’t seem to fight anymore—how enraged I feel every time I think of all the motherfuckers in this world I’d like to kill, which makes me no less of a monster. And how good it feels when I surrender to the beast inside me.
Or maybe it all boils down to the girl I can’t stop seeing, whether my eyes are open or closed. In yet one more ironic twist of my fucked-up life, the one I’m not supposed to want is the only one plastered to this godforsaken lonely ceiling with me.
I attempted to lie low after breakfast, do some work, sulk in peace, and indulge in a few extra Kraken and Cokes. Unfortunately, Liam and Wells were up my ass all damn day, as they had been since my unraveling a few mornings ago.
They mean well. But sometimes, shattering is the only way to piece yourself back together.
Whenever the flashbacks return, I crave the breaking. The crumbling. The flogging.
It’s what I loved about the Navy. They tear you down so they can build you up. Every facet of who you once were is dismantled so they can reassemble you into the warrior they need.
I’m not sure how that applies now. Maybe it doesn’t. Either way, I want to heed the pain of every last fucking scar I own.
And the campfire kumbaya retreat I’m currently enduring is not the setting for it. No ceiling to hide on. I’m floating into the inky night while the pool fountains gurgle a background beat to the laughter and teasing and crackling logs.
Wells is beside me, sucking on those goddamn butterscotch candies, so the smoky air is washed away by the scent of the Little Moon. How do I tell him his sugar addiction is going to send me to the grave?
I’ve managed to feign attentiveness all evening, murmuringresponses in all the right places, which is good. With any luck, they’ll be onto some other crusade soon.
Ivy’s phone trills, the conversation dying while she digs into her hoodie pocket to retrieve it and glances at the screen. “It’s Ryker.”
That does garner my attention. I assume it’s further pressing about Mercy. “Tell him I reached out, but it’s going to take some time.”
She nods and answers. “Hey.”Pause.“No, I haven’t. Not since this morning …” Her posture jerks ramrod straight. “Hold on. I’ll put you on speaker.”
