Eddy basically hip checked her brother to get past him, hurrying straight over to me. She climbed across Dylan, uncaring about stomping on him, and snuggled down on the side that Beck wasn’t dominating. I winced as she wrapped her arms around me, but when she gasped and tried to pull away, I shook my head and held her close.
“I’m fine,” I said against her protests. “Don’t worry about it at all.”
We remained like that for ten or more minutes while Dylan fussed, Beck stroked my hair, and Eddy held me like I might float away if she didn’t keep hold of me.
“Dante is out,” she whispered out of nowhere.
I jerked my head up on the pillow. “He’s out?”
She nodded. “Yep. All charges were dropped before a judge this morning, and he sent me a text straight away asking if I knew where you were.”
My throat suddenly felt thick and scratchy. I couldn’t swallow and breathe properly.
“What did you tell him?” Beck asked, hiding his emotions fairly well, even though I could hear the pissed off in his tone.
Eddy lifted her eyebrows. “What do you think I told him? I said that I’d check with you all and let him know if he had any Riley privileges left.”
I waited for Beck to go caveman and start cursing Dante out and telling me I could never see him again. Then I’d have to bitch back and tell him he didn’t own me and I would be friends with whoever the fuck I wanted.
It was kind of our thing. Even though I felt a little too tired and fragile right now to really give it my all. Turning to Beck, I waited … and waited some more.
But all he did was smile. “Choice is yours, baby,” he said, and I was pretty sure my mouth dropped open.
“Wh—What?”
Beck’s grin grew, those perfect white teeth stealing my attention for a second before I remembered that we were having an actual conversation. “You’re not going to carry on about Dante?” I asked, not sure I believed a fucking word coming out of his gorgeous mouth.
Dylan snorted, but didn’t comment. I paid attention to him again for a moment, realizing that he was spending an awfully long amount of time fixing my leg up, his huge hands wrapped around my thigh. In fact, if he moved his hands just an inch higher…
“Dylan,” I said in warning. He just lifted his head, winking, and if I didn’t have Beck to compare him to, his breathtakingly handsome face would have knocked me over. But I did have Beck, and Dylan was going to have to take a small step back.
Just for now. Until we worked this dynamic out.
Because Dylan had been almost possessive since they got me back from Johnson, the fucking psycho. And I got it, but the lines were blurring. Not in my heart, but … maybe in the physical world.
“Move that hand any higher, Dyl, and you’re going to lose it,” Beck said. He never missed a thing.
Dylan lifted both hands in the air in surrender. “All fixed up. You can go back to discussing Dante.”
Yeah, anything to take the heat off him.
He wasn’t wrong, though, and I turned back to Beck. “You’re not going to fight me on Dante?” I asked again.
Beck shook his head. “No, Butterfly. I can’t fucking deny you anything. If you want Dante in your life, then I won’t stand in your way. But I will stand at your back and make sure that fucker doesn’t put a knife in it again.”
A smile burst across my face. “You’re so sweet,” I said, leaning over to kiss him, forcing myself to ignore the pain.
Eddy cracked up then. “Only Riley would think that was sweet. You’re both as fucked as each other.”
She wasn’t wrong.
25
It took Dante three days to find me. Three days where I did not make it easy for him. Eddy wasn’t allowed to message him. No one was allowed to talk to him at all … he needed to fucking prove himself to me. Now that no one was paying—or blackmailing—him to be in my life, did he really want to be in there? I needed to know.
Bang.
The door practically rattled on the third day, and I exchanged a glance with Beck and Dylan, both of them on their feet before me, stalking toward the door. We knew Jasper and Evan were at Delta meetings with their parents and shouldn’t be back for at least three hours. Eddy was with her mom shopping or some shit. Apparently when she moved out, Mrs. Langham decided she missed having a daughter.
