Hothouse Flower (Addicted #4)(135)

“Why are you holding back? No one’s f*cking here but you and me!” My hand slides to the small of her back. “Stop pretending to be fine when all you really want to do is f*cking scream?!”

Her chest collapses. I almost have her there.

“Do it!” I shout, my blood pumping. I’m in her face, not letting her dodge this, not letting her give up on herself. “Finally, for the first time in your f*cking life, let go!”

And then she grabs onto my shoulders, and I feel her body before I hear her voice. How she has to clutch onto me, how she has to brace herself to something f*cking sturdy. Her scream pierces my ears, the most powerful f*cking thing in the universe. The pain and ache rip through her yell.

She jostles me, shaking me like she’s shaking the entire f*cking world. And I support both of us on the ledge, careful and attentive so we don’t fall.

For another full minute, she releases everything she’s buried inside, and then she crumbles into my arms. I hold her upright, brushing the hair off her face. And her green eyes meet mine, drained but light. So f*cking light.

I don’t say anything.

I just kiss her, breathing more life into her body. On a ledge. A shallow lake below. She responds by clutching the back of my head, her fingers tightening in my hair. Her body curves towards mine, and I inhale, wrapped in the heat of her skin and the beat of her heart, pounding against my chest.

We’re not there for long before a car rolls to a stop in front of us. A concerned stranger opens his door, but I keep kissing her. And her lips rise into a smile, not breaking apart just yet.

“Hey,” the man yells, “the water is too shallow!” He squints and gets a good look at us. “Are you two crazy?” He shakes his head and climbs back in his car.

Daisy’s lips leave mine, and a gorgeous f*cking smile overtakes her face. Her light restored. Powered up and f*cking charged.

My hothouse flower that I will always keep alive.

“We are pretty crazy,” she whispers to me.

I mess her hair with a rough hand, the blonde strands tangled wildly, and I remember what Sully said awhile back about her being fun and me being f*cking moody. “Yeah? Maybe our kids will be crazy like us.”

She gasps playfully. “You want to make babies with me?”

I answer by kissing her with a strong force, and she runs her hands through my thick hair. I lift her in my arms and bring her off the ledge, to safety. And back home.





< 66 >

RYKE MEADOWS



Connor pours coffee into a Styrofoam cup since all the mugs are packed in boxes. I sit on a bar stool next to Lo while the girls talk alone in the living room, an archway from us. Some months ago, there was a drooping banner hanging over it, saying Bon Voyage, Daisy. Now this place is empty, bare, a house full of so many f*cking memories that we’re all going to leave behind.

I can’t see the couch from here or Daisy seated on the cushion. I’m nervous for her, but I’m also relieved that she’s finally going to get this shit off her chest. Before we left the bridge, she said, “I don’t want to drag myself down anymore.”

There is no good time to release news that hurts people.

Lily said something like that tonight, and I think Daisy has finally learned that too.

“Is she okay?” Connor asks me.

“She’s better. She just needed to scream,” I say, twirling a f*cking salt shaker on the counter.

“That’s not surprising.” Connor hands me a cup of coffee. “I have to force Rose to scream every now and then. Must be a product of being raised by Samantha.”

Lo shakes his head. “Lily doesn’t have that problem.”

We both look at him. He doodles f*cking circles and squares on a paper napkin, and his pen stops at our silence.

Connor tells him, flat out, “That would be because Samantha didn’t raise Lily.” Lo’s best friend, his girlfriend, his fiancée—she was pretty much the undesirable daughter, I’ve come to realize over the years. She was the one Samantha let run off to the Hale residence, the ugly f*cking duckling, even though she is beautiful, just too shy for Samantha to understand.

Lo doesn’t deny the claim, but he doesn’t say anything either.

“You can’t control the past, Lo,” Connor adds. “And I raised myself too. It’s not such a shameful thing.”

He resumes drawing on the napkin. I nudge Lo’s shoulder. “How you holding up?”

“Ask me again when it f*cking sinks in,” he says.

“That you’re going to have a kid?”

“Yeah,” he nods. “And I already feel f*cking awful for the thing.”

“He may not have addiction problems, Lo,” I say.

“No, it’s not that.” Lo looks up from his napkin and points the pen at Connor. “Our kid is going to have to compete with theirs. It’s already f*cked and it’s not even born yet.”

I can’t help it, I smile. Connor tries hard not to, hiding his grin into the rim of his cup. “Connor’s kid is also going to be a snot, so you can rest assured that yours won’t be totally f*cked,” I say.

Connor opens his mouth, about to retort, but sudden sobs come from the living room. I straighten up. Hell, we all do.

“Should we go in there?” Lo asks, gripping the edge of the counter, ready to jump.