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“No, I just like monogamy.” He holds his hand out, and I slip mine into it, the inked canvas of his skin a massive contrast against me. Yanking me up, he wraps his arms around me and pulls my hips into his, pinching my chin. “Which reminds me. If we’re doing this, I’m all in. I expect the same courtesy back.”
“But what exactly is it that we’re doing?”
“Whatever we damn well please,” he rasps, bending to fuse our mouths together, an explosion of heat and passion as our tongues tangle, warring for dominance. His flicks against mine, the taste of expensive weed, mint, and me creating a potent combination.
Growling into him, I grab the back of his head and pull him in deeper, twisting my head for better access. His hands slip down my back and cup my ass, hooking beneath in an effort to get me to wrap my legs around him.
Pulling back, I hold his gaze, wiping some of his saliva from the corner of my lips.
He groans, squeezing my ass in his large palms. “Come home with me. I don’t care what we do, as long as you’re naked in my bed in an hour.”
My stomach flips, the thought of spending the night away from my mother when I know what’s going on with my father making me hesitate. She was slightly more cognizant earlier today, but still not totally with it, and I can’t help the guilt that presses down on my chest like an avalanche, setting my nerve endings on high alert.
“What happened? What did I say?”
I sigh, pressing my forehead into the base of his throat, knowing that if I ditch him to stay home, I’m abandoning my mission to figure out what his deal is.
Instead of wondering about all the ways I might fix him, I’ll be up rearranging my bedroom or reorganizing the books in our home library, trying to distract myself from the world around me as it crumbles.
Plus, there’s no telling what I’ll do to my father when he comes home.
So instead, I relent, following him out of the office building and down to his bike in the parking lot, thanking the gods that I wore jeans today and not a skirt. And when I climb on and let him take me home, I try my best not to think that the roles have already reversed.
That I’ve failed in my initial mission to be the thing that heals Boyd Kelly.
Because I think he’s trying to fix me, instead.
And I’m afraid that will only make things worse.
* * *
Boyd’s soft snores pull me from my slumber; I turn in his arms, running my fingers along his pecs in the dark, amazed by the sheer fact that he’s here at all right now.
That he wants me.
This is the fourth night in a row he’s come by and fallen asleep after faking to Kieran like he’s heading home and slipping up the back staircase instead.
I’m starting to think my brother is suspicious, especially given his recent habit of strolling into my room unannounced, but I can’t find it in me to care when Boyd’s mouth is between my legs, showing me what spirituality feels like.
My stomach is in a constant state of unrest, unsure of what will happen if Kieran does find out—will he even care? Will his relationship with Boyd crumble, or will mine break before it’s really even begun?
Rolling out of bed, I reach down and grope around for my pajama shorts, pulling them up over my legs and yanking Boyd’s white T-shirt over my head. I grab the empty rotisserie chicken container from my dresser where we left it, having eaten with our fingers once I’d gotten my mother settled for the night, and tiptoe from the room.
Padding down the hall, I peek inside the master bedroom first, ensuring I can still hear my mother’s breathing, then double back around and head for the stairs, flipping on dimming lights as I pass through.
Tossing the chicken container into the kitchen trash, I’m rinsing my hands in the sink when the light above the island counter flickers on, illuminating the space.
“Fiona. Nice to see you come out of your room.”
I jump at the sound of my father’s voice, so used to the silence that lives in the walls here. Whirling around, I see him seated at the island, watching me with an unreadable expression, his phone and a bowl of cereal in front of him.
“Are you eating in the dark?”
He smiles, the gesture pulling at one corner of his mouth, making him look significantly younger. The hairline fractures crisscrossing his skin and the hollow circles beneath his eyes somehow age him at the same time, creating this frozen effect that almost makes him hard to look at.
It’s like having one foot in the past and one in the future, and not being able to see either well enough to matter.
The sound of his moans the other night filter through my perusal, the look on Chelsea’s smug little face when she said he was out of town becoming the only thing I can focus on as they flash across my vision.
