AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Kinney jolts backwards like our dad electrocuted her. Her breathing heavies. “You didn’t do anything bad. You couldn’t…you wouldn’t?”
He wears a half-smile. “Me? Do something bad? I’d never.” His sarcasm and way of cheering up Kinney lands lifeless in the tense room.
“Dad,” she says, sounding scared. “What’d you do?”
He lets out a breath, glances at our mom for support, and then holds out a reassuring hand. “I meant that if you go after Paul, you’re going to have to go through me. I’m standing in front of him, and just so everyone in the room knows”—he spins around to lock eyes with each of us, staying on me for an extended beat—“I haven’t been easy on him. I might’ve even been hell for him.” He cringes into another dry smile. “So…it’s complicated.” He claps his hands together. “Class dismissed. Let’s clean this up. Help your sister—”
“Wait a minute,” Xander interjects. “That’s it? You’re leaving out like half the fucking story.”
“Yeah,” Kinney says. “This doesn’t make sense. Why are you protecting Donnelly? And from what? And what does that even have to do with Luna?”
Mom sweeps the shattered ceramic mug into a dust bin. It’s the only sound outside of our dogs whining behind the closed door.
Either my dad is struggling to unleash the full truth out of respect for me and Donnelly, or because he’s not sure how much Kinney and Xander should know.
I decide to just tell them. It’s better than lying, and they’re not accepting any vague picture anymore.
“Donnelly came here tonight to ask Dad for permission to date me,” I explain. “Of what Donnelly told me, Dad said, not yet.” I turn to him for confirmation.
He nods once, his neck taut and muscles flexed. “Yep. That happened.”
Maximoff and Farrow exchange an unreadable look.
“You like him?” Kinney asks with a deeper frown, and I wonder if she’s baffled on how she missed this rare, strange occurrence. Me falling for Xander’s bodyguard.
I just nod, words feeling too tender and fragile to share.
Xander stares at the floorboards, unblinking.
“Why not yet?” Kinney asks our dad. “If they both like each other, what’s the big deal?”
“His family,” Dad starts to say, just as Xander suddenly bolts out of the room.
“Summers!” Maximoff calls after our brother, but Xander is gone. He leaves, hopefully just for his bedroom. Our parents share a quick glance, and I think they’re deciding on who stays for me and who goes for him, but Maximoff makes things easy.
He passes Baby Ripley to Farrow and says, “I’ll go check on him.” Quickly, Moffy runs after our brother, his footsteps echoing down the hallway. “Xander!” I hear the slam of a bedroom door. The opening of it. The close of it again.
Xander’s not so great reaction to knowing I’m falling for his bodyguard—and that Donnelly has attempted to be with me—is sitting like curdled milk in my stomach.
“Why is he this upset?” my dad questions Farrow, his ass now in the hot seat.
My temples start pounding from the mental detours.
“You’re asking me?” Farrow adjusts his son on his hip.
“You do know Paul the best of everyone here.”
Ouch.
But I guess that’s probably true. Farrow knows Donnelly in ways that I might never learn or come to discover. That sucks—the idea that I can’t even voyage deeper into Donnelly’s mind, his heart. That the exploration has limitations and borders, and I’m standing at the No Entry sign.
Farrow tips his head. “That’s definitely debatable.”
“Debatable, okay.” Dad nods a lot and paces a short distance back and forth. “You know what? I have a serious problem with you right now and it’s not even funny.”
Oh no.
2
LUNA HALE
“Me?” Farrow says.
“Yeah, you,” my dad retorts. “I want to laugh. I would really goddamn love to, but this has to stop.” He raises his hands in a way like he’d love to strangle his son-in-law.
Farrow looks stumped. “I don’t follow, Lo.”
“You. Donnelly. Acting like you’re nothing more than two hallway acquaintances.” He stakes a glare on him. “Do you know how annoying that is? Do you know how different things would’ve been if you’d just been upfront with me?”
Visceral heat radiates off Farrow’s brown eyes. He could give Cyclops a good run. “I’ve been upfront with you, Lo. I told you exactly the kind of person Donnelly is, and you still chose not to listen to me.”
“You never said you met him when he was seventeen.”
Farrow’s face screws up. “What difference would that’ve made?”
“Papa?” Ripley blubbers up at Farrow.
He takes a breath. “It’s okay, little man.” He kisses his son’s cheek. “Lily, do you mind…?”
After my mom ditches the broom and fills the dustpan, she gladly lifts her grandchild in her arms. She bops his nose, and Ripley lets out the cutest giggle. I’m a little jealous of the baby cuddles. I just hug my arms around my body.
