Page 83 of This Reckless Home

“I—” I literally don’t know what to say, shame, hot and bright, making my stomach curdle, my tongue thick.

The guys turn, all three of them with jaws clenched, tension making the air around them practically vibrate.

“You call us if you need to, okay, Flower?” Steele orders, his brown eyes that were hot moments before now colder, harder.

“No matter why, we’ll come and get you if you need us, Bloom,” Ant adds, coming up beside me, his warm hand gently grasping the top of my arm.

“O-okay.” I’m not entirely sure why I might need that, but something inside me relaxes slightly at the offer.

“Blossom!” My father’s voice yells through the open door and I flinch. Hard.

“I have to go,” I whisper, suddenly not wanting to step through that door. Safety is here, with them, no matter how complicated things might be between us right now. Out there, feels… dangerous.

“This is fucking bullshit,” Nox hisses, reminding me of what he said about Noah having to leave us.

I give him a reassuring smile. Or try to anyway, but it feels a little wobbly at the edges, a little flat. They see it, the way it wavers and doesn’t reach my eyes, because the tension turns almost violent in the air, palpable against my skin.

“I’ll be fine, Nox. Probably won’t be there long anyway.”

The slamming of a car door has me looking at each of them one last time, then stepping round them and hurrying out of the door into the early summer night. I don’t look back. I’m not sure I’d be able to leave if I did.

The driver is by the back passenger door, holding it open for me. He must be my father’s man because it’s not Henry.

“Thank you,” I murmur as I get in, the door closing with a quiet but resounding click behind me.

The engine starts. We drive off, down the gravel driveway and the further we get from home the more my heart jackhammers in my chest, each pulse shaking me.

I feel more than see my father look over.

“Your mother would be so disappointed.” I have to hold in the flinch at his barbed words. He knows exactly where to cut to give the most pain, and my mother is one of those places. “Wasting your potential on broken things, and now those two thugs…” He cuts off with a disgusted noise in the back of his throat.

Two thugs? Does he mean the guys? But then he’d surely have said three? And they’re not criminals, not that I know of anyway and I’m sure they would have told me.

“Playing house with other people’s castoffs. It’s pathetic, Blossom. Just because you’re barren, doesn’t t mean you need to lower yourself to looking after mongrel mutts.”

Each word lands like a slash, and I’m surprised I’m not bleeding all over this silk dress and the leather seats.

I look out of the window, stare at the city passing as I don’t say a word. What is there to say? He’s never hidden his disdain for my choices, but he’s also never been so scathing and barbaric in his language.

The small flutter of hope I felt at finally having some of his attention fizzles and dies as we drive into the night. That’s the tragedy of my father, of the great Wilson Devonshire. He doesn’t even need to work hard to undo me. To make me feel small. To make me feel worthless.

He just has to be himself.

The gala passes by in a sparkling blur, like I’m on a merry go round that is too loud, too bright. I feel like I’m performing, smiling, making polite conversation that fits with society’s expectations. Being the daughter my father needs for optics, to make himself shine brighter.

I’m scarily good at it. Perhaps because I’ve been doing it my whole life in the hopes that he would finally see me. He never does.

Yet I now know what it’s like to be seen. To be heard and worshipped and loved even though none of us have used those words yet.

And that leaves me feeling a little raw standing here, pretending. Still not fully healed from what happened with Steele, with Noah. And it’s like my father opened a wound that never fully heals, never closes completely. Just waits there, festering.

I take a sip from the glass of champagne they handed me when we arrived, the sweet taste barely registering as I reply to the person talking to me. I actually can’t remember their name, or really what we were even talking about. My father is across the room, working it with charming smiles and manly chuckles that have the men and women around him captivated.

He doesn’t look my way, not unless someone says something about me to him. Then he’s the doting father, showing me affection that only goes skin deep.

The people I was just chatting with excuse themselves, and I’m blissfully free for a moment. I catch my reflection in the window they were standing in front of. Perfect make-up, not a hair out of place. Elegant dress and red bottomed heels. Everything my father would want me to look like. Nothing of myself visible.

No dirt under my nails from the garden, or jam on my skirt from one of the kids. No laughter.