Page 33 of Harts & Hurts

“Exactly. What’s going on with her? You might need to get her some help. This is beyond not thinking straight, Pops. She could get Melrose taken from us.”

“Wait. Wait. Let me call her in here.” He turned away from the screen and yelled Yolanda’s name.

I couldn’t be present for that. I couldn’t listen to her make excuses or try to downplay the evil that drove her to do what she did. I stood up from the chair. “I’m going to eat breakfast. I think this is an issue you should handle with just your family.”

Griffin didn’t try to stop me, so I left the room.

15

Griffin

A Month Later – September

The aftermath of the CPS visit was brutal. It basically sent Anistyn spiraling into a really dark place. I felt like that was a combination of her grief over losing her sister and the thought of losing Melrose. I couldn’t lie and say that I didn’t feel something similar. The chain of events that my mother could’ve possibly put into play was some shit I hated to even consider. It hovered over the guesthouse like a dark cloud for three weeks until we received a very nondescript letter informing us that the case against Anistyn had been closed as unfounded.

Every night for the three weeks that we waited to hear something about our fate and future as Melrose’s guardians, Anistyn cried once we got Melrose to sleep. And each one of those nights, I lay next to her in the king-sized bed and held her.

Somewhere during the late-night routine we’d developed, Anistyn had gotten under my skin. Holding her while she was at her most fragile and vulnerable made me feel even more protective of her than I already felt. With that protection came a sense of value. You didn’t protect something that you didn’t value. And it was at the point where all I wanted to do was protect Anistyn. I wanted to protect her physically. I wanted to protect her mental health. I wanted to protect her heart. That was a problem.

I opened my eyes. Her face was planted in my chest. It was the same way I’d woken up almost every day for the last couple of weeks, and it never got old. Her body was soft as hell, and she smelled so fucking good—like toasted marshmallows or something. I let my fingers gently caress her exposed thigh. Since we’d been sharing the bed, she’d taken to sleeping in sleep shorts and an oversized T-shirt. The shorts were short as hell, and I just knew she had a fat pussy because those shorts got eaten up by it every single night. The T-shirt was oversized, but she didn’t sleep in a bra, so her juicy titties bounced all over the place while she slept.

We’d given up on pretending that we didn’t notice our bodies’ reactions to one another. Most of the time, we acknowledged it. We just didn’t act on it. I felt like that was real grown up and mature of us, but at the same time, it was frustrating as hell. I wanted to slide into Anistyn’s guts almost as much as I wanted anything on Earth. I couldn’t pinpoint when the shift happened, but I felt like it was probably when she let herself be soft with me. As soon as she showed her soft side, I wanted everything she had to offer for myself.

She rolled over and wiggled around until her ass was nestled against my dick.

“Argh.” I groaned lightly. This girl had a habit of doing that. Clearly, she didn’t realize the amount of discipline and restraint it took not to fuck her. I was about to adjust my dick because he was hard and straining against my boxer briefs. Before I could do it, she caught my hand. That wasn’t unusual because she often took my hand in her sleep and wrapped it around her middle or laced her fingers through mine. This time, though, she took my hand and rested it between her legs, right on her pussy.

I froze, not sure if she meant to do that. Not sure if she was asleep, awake, or what, I tried to pull my hand back, but she tightened her grip on me. Me being me, I cupped her fat-ass pussy, enjoying the feeling of the weight and width of it in my hand. I slowly made circles in the area of her clit.

“Ani, are you okay? Won’t you tell me that you’re okay,” I softly sang Michael Jackson in her ear. “You got me holding your pussy. It’s a fat girl. I’mma fuck you, Ani.”

“What?” she asked, her voice still coated with sleep.

“You got me holdin’ your pussy. I’m over here fighting for my life every damn day, trying to keep my dick to myself, and you got me holding your pussy. You dreaming about me?”

“What?” she repeated, like she was semi-offended by what I was saying, but she didn’t close her legs or move my hand.

“You like this shit.” I gave her vagina a squeeze.

She spread her legs wider. “It does feel good.”

I couldn’t help chuckling, because I had never seen this particular side of her. “And trust me. What I want almost more than anything is to make you feel good, sweetheart. But my dick has been getting real familiar with blue balls lately, and I can’t continue to play these games with him.”

“We can have sex, Griff. I’m saying. I’m a few days out from my period. I’m so horny,” she whined. “We already discussed . . . meeting each other’s needs.”

“Right. And I thought we decided that it wasn’t a good idea. It wouldn’t be healthy for Melrose to be raised in a situation where her co-guardians are friends with benefits. What happens if one of us meets somebody? The tension? The jealousy?”

She didn’t speak for a few minutes. “Are you suggesting that we date one another?”

“Maybe.”

“Look at you, trying to play coy like you’re not already into me.” She laughed. “I see the way you look at me, Griff. And the way you touch me . . . You care about me. The way you’re still holding my coochie while we have this conversation⁠—”

I barked out my laughter and removed my hand from her center.

“You wanna date me,” she teased in a singsong tone.

“And you feel exactly the same.”