"She's a bunny, Fawn. That's all she is." He snaps a thorny stem with a deliberate crack.
"And I'm a little deer," I say, flat-toned.
Hands still full of flowers, his green-blue eyes hit me hard. "And sometimes, no matter the sweet nature of the little deer, it tramples the silly bunny that gets in its way."
Fuck.
He's nuts.
Also, I like it.
I stare at the Juliet Roses, their petals unfurling in layers of peach and cream, delicate as tissue paper. At the edges light seems to pass right through them. Then I gaze at the thorns, the ones Bronson is picking off with his bare fingers.
I’m reminded of a conversation from over a year ago, when I had an existential crisis, considering thorns and roses, and how the roses might be pretty but without the thorns theywouldn’t survive. Clay said he would be my thorns.Yes, we definitely need roses for our wedding.
CHAPTER SEVEN
clay
I tearthe phone from my desk the moment Bronson’s name blazes across the screen. “Where are you? Why the hell are you calling?”
The line crackles with wind, a car door slams, and Bronson’s voice rolls through the speaker. “We ran into the foster mother.”
I sit up, jaw locking. The foster mother—Fawn’s?“Where’s Fawn now?”
“On her way home with big boy Bolton.”
“And you?”
A slow, wild drawl, “Guess.”
“Don’t play games with me.”
“I trailed a little bunny back to its warren,” he sings. “She spotted Fawn at the market. I didn’t like her one bit— imagined shoving a rose through her eye.”
Why was she there?
Stalking my sweet girl, or pure chance?
I exhale through locked teeth. “Is Fawn okay? Did she seem uncomfortable?”
“Uncomfortable? Yeah. But she handled it like a queen. A sweet, young queen, but still a fucking queen. She is on her way home with a bunch of roses. She had a ball with her big brother Bronson. I promise. If she dreams about me tonight, don’t be mad?—
“And the mother?” I rise and walk to the window.
He laughs low. “Hopped into an old Civic, headed east through the underpass, straight back to her house.”
“Take me through what happened.”
“Fawn asked the soldiers to let her pass. I didn’t stop it—I was at her shoulder, beautiful brother, don’t worry. They talked for six, maybe seven minutes. The foster mother stared at Fawn like she was a ghost, but there was something else going on. Not sure what. Her eyes, they held some serious resentment. Reminded me of the way my Outlaw looks at store-bought tomato sauce; she-a true Sicilian, that one.”
I picture Fawn with her chin high, defiance burning in her pretty eyes. My chest tightens. “And Fawn?”
“Fawn stood her ground,” Bronson says. “But that woman is gnarly manipulative, needs either a good fuck or a hammer to the skull. I’d like to help with the latter.”
I nod. One hand cracks my knuckles, stiff from years of boxing and tension, the other crushes the phone until the plastic creaks. Did she follow them?Impossible.Not with my soldiers, our surveillance, decoy cars, mixing lanes masterfully confusing onlookers. “Where are you now? Bronson?”
A grunt, then the hollow thud of wood. “Jumping her fence.” He curses in Sicilian as he lands. “So,” he pants, “she drove straight home, brother. Didn’t glance back. Parked, walked up to the house like a corpse. Ordered Chinese—the delivery guy just left. Smelled good. Now I’m hungry. She shut the curtains. Of course, I’m going around the back. Can I killher? I’ll make ittoxicas fuck,” he says ‘toxic,’ as if it’s code or laced with meaning. “I’ll bring her Chinese home.”
