Ryke stands up from the couch. “I’m going to the gym. Anyone want to come?”
Daisy gasps. “You masturbate at the gym?”
He chucks a pillow at her face, and she catches it with a playful smile.
Loren turns to Lily. “You’re really going to take a shower?” His voice is full of disbelief. I’ve heard them arguing about the bathroom situation since we moved in. Lily has yet to bathe, mostly out of fear of Scott walking in. I would coax those fears if I didn’t have the same ones, hence why I shower at five in the morning.
She goes quiet, and Loren drops his voice. “You smell like sex,” he whispers, but I’m still close enough to hear. “You’ve got to take one soon.”
She stares at her hands. “Can we take them together? I won’t do anything, I promise. I’ll feel…safer.”
There’s a long pause before he says, “Only if we wear bathing suits. I just don’t want to tempt you for six months, Lil.”
Her face brightens and she throws her arms around his neck.
I rub my sore wrists, unsure of everything for a moment. Connor suddenly grabs my hand and effortlessly lifts me to my feet.
He stares down at me, and I realize what could have happened today. I could have awkwardly fumbled around him. I could have embarrassed myself on national television.Instead, he made me feel desired and hot instead of mortified and cold.
My eyes blanket in gratitude, thethank youon the tip of my tongue.
But his thumb brushes against my cheek and he says, very softly, “You’re welcome, darling.”
I exhale, glad that I don’t have to struggle to produce the words anymore. The kitchen cupboards clatter loudly as Scott lumbers around.
“You fucked with his plans,” I whisper.
“He’ll wipe his tears and get over it later.”
I’m not as optimistic. “Or he’s going to find something that you can’t screw up.”
CHAPTER 11
ROSE CALLOWAY
It’s stilldark outside when my phone buzzes on the nightstand. I rub my drowsy eyes and check the clock.4:30 a.m. I reach perilously for my phone in the dark and knock off a bottle of aspirin. It clatters to the floor, and I look over my shoulder to make sure Connor hasn’t woken up.
He remains unmoving on his side of the bed.
We didn’t have sex. We’ve been amicably sleeping together without doing more than I want—which isn’t quite right. I’m not exactly sure what I want when it comes to sex anymore. But I hesitate to give him that part of me—the part that he may take in triumph and then disappear with.
Carefully, I turn on the phone and cup my hand around the screen, blocking the glow.
5 months and 12 days until the wedding– Mom
Thanks, Mom.I text back, knowing she won’t catch the thick sarcasm.
Yesterday, when she sent me the5 months and 13 daysupdate, Lily opened the text on my phone. She almost needed a paper bag to hyperventilate into. She wants to be married about as much as a dog wants to be hit by a car. Planning the wedding is like shoving her into traffic, which is why I offered my services.
Planning. Organizing. Preparing. These are things I excel in. I even mediate between my mother’s requests and Lily’s wishes. As far as our parents go, Lily has tried to have little contact with them. The guilt of hurting Fizzle is a wound she doesn’t like to reopen often. So I have become LilyCalloway’s middleman—always reassuring our parents that she’s not bingeing on cock.
Although if I said such a thing to my mother, she’d have a coronary.
But every time I ask my sister about invitations or music, she turns pale and mumbles something likeyou choose. So I’m no closer to planning the wedding than Lily is to wanting to get married. Which infuriates our mother. I’m sure I’ll receive a phone call and lecture about time management later this afternoon.
“Everything okay, hun?”
My heart jumps at Connor’s voice. I roll over to see him wide awake, head propped up by his hand.
