Addicted for Now (Addicted #2)(73)

I push harder, the humid air squeezing my lungs. Sweat beads my skin, and the pain that ripples through my muscles feels better than my nagging thoughts. So I keep driving farther. I keep bending my knees and pumping forward. And Ryke never breaks from my side.

I know that if I didn’t care so much about Lily—or have Ryke here to glare at me—I would have already broken my sobriety. And then Connor makes me want to be a better person—however lame that sounds.

But today we all split up.

Lily is shopping with Rose and Connor, which gives her a break from obsessing over having sex. Surrounding ourselves with other people is still new for us, and kind of exhausting, but we’re making it work.

I glance over my shoulder, and we slow down to a jog almost immediately. Melissa and Daisy are barely a speck in the distance. They were the only two that wanted to join us on a run. Unsurprising, since Lily looks like the Big Bad Wolf huffing and puffing after a minute sprint, and I’ve never seen Rose wear sneakers in her life. Connor would have come along, but he didn’t want to leave Rose and Lily shopping alone in Mexico.

Our feet slow to a complete stop. “Connor’s investigator still hasn’t come up with anything new?” Ryke asks, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, shirtless like me.

“Connor says he’s looking into it as quickly as he can.” And if his contacts don’t pan out, hopefully my father has better luck. But I wouldn’t tell Ryke that I’m talking to Jonathan Hale. Nothing good can come from that.

“Let’s say, worst case scenario, it gets leaked that Lily is a sex addict,” Ryke says, uncapping his water bottle as we wait for the girls to catch up to us. “What happens then?”

My stomach churns at the thought. “I don’t even want to entertain the idea.” All I picture is Lily sobbing and unable to be consoled. Watching her in that kind of gutted agony would kill me, but if we do go down that road, I can’t resort to booze. For once, I have to be there for her. She’s my best f*cking friend. And she deserves the type of guy who can make her feel better, not worse.

If I can’t do that, then we really shouldn’t be together.

Ryke studies me. “You still taking Antabuse?”

I give him a bitter smile. “One pill a day keeps the demons at bay.”

“You didn’t answer me.”

“Yes, Dad.” I stretch my muscles, pulling my arm over my chest, trying to relieve this built-up pressure. If the pill bottle wasn’t in my pocket—if I had left it in my suitcase with the other stolen luggage—I would have more temptations to drink. I was lucky for once.

I also hate talking about that medication. Talking makes me think and thinking makes me want to f*cking drink.

“I wish you would have told me about Mason Nix sooner,” Ryke admits, changing the subject once again, this time to one of our top suspects. Ryke is good at that—talking and revolving around different topics. I find myself zoning into something, being immersed by his roundabout discussions like a whirlpool.

“Why is that?”

“We share the f*cking gym at Penn. I see him almost every day. If I knew what he did, I wouldn’t have…tolerated him.”

“So what does you not tolerating him look like?” I ask with furrowed brows. I picture him ramming his fist into Mason Nix’s conceited face. Granted, I already did that.

“We may have had words,” Ryke says.

I still imagine a fist fight.

“You know,” I mutter, staring at my water bottle, “for the longest time after our freshman year, I kept thinking that I was in the wrong. I can’t even tell you how many tires I slit. And Lily told me that she didn’t expect what happened that night, but she didn’t mind it either.” I shake my head, thinking back to our first year at Penn. We both went to a frat party, the entire soccer team in attendance. Most of it is still a giant blur. But I do remember hearing guys near the kitchen discussing some girl on the second floor. Someone named Mason convinced a freshman to screw each guy on the soccer team.

One after the other.

I didn’t have to be told it was her. I just knew.

I grabbed a bottle of Jim Beam, pulled out my serrated hunting knife, and paced manically in the parking lot. I lost it on any car with a f*cking soccer sticker, badge, identification, whatever. They would have to find another ride home.

That morning, she was dazed and hung over, but somehow I pulled the truth from her. Mason Nix asked if she wanted to have the night of her life, and she agreed as long as no one watched. As long as each guy came in and went out like a factory line.

It was one of her fantasies, she told me. And it came true, but I saw how much shame gnawed on her after that. She shrunk into herself and waited for me to stare at her like she was gross and dirty. But I just wanted to hold her and tell her that she was worth so much more than whatever she was searching for.

But I was a selfish prick back then. I wasn’t willing to change our dynamic just yet. I thought if she overcame her addiction, then she’d make me overcome mine.

And now that’s all I want for us.

“I remember how you explained it,” Ryke says. “But f*ck that, Lo. I didn’t know Lily before you two became a couple, but it doesn’t matter if she wanted it or not. No self-respecting man would offer something like that to a girl, especially one that’s drunk. You had every right to be upset and go after the *.”