Addicted After All (22 page)

“Should we…?” Daisy hesitates to run to Ryke, but I hold her jelly arm in a firm grip.

“No, let’s stay out of it.” Though I want to be closer. So we keep our pace.

Ryke yells in Spanish so loud that my ears blister. There is pain in his voice, beneath the anger, and Lo struggles to detain him as he thrashes. “Connor,” Lo says, looking for help. Connor is listening intently to these three guys, not intervening.

We’re only five feet away. Surfer Tee yells at Ryke and Lo with just as much venom, and then laughs mockingly like he’s won a battle. Our lives are open to the public, like we live in a glass house, and people enjoy tapping on the walls, waiting and waiting for a reaction, for that little bit of entertainment. Forgetting that we aren’t performers or mannequins put on display.

Forgetting that we can feel all the same.

“CONNOR!” Lo screams for help again, Ryke tearing through his arms. He’s stronger than Lo. This has always been fact.

“Let him go,” Connor says in a stoic voice.

“What?” Lo breathes out the word. It pains me. I’m so close to him now. I reach out like I can touch him, but I feel a large hand on my shoulder. Garth.

He draws me to the side by a foot or two so I’m not smacked by flailing limbs. Daisy slips out of my grip, and Rose leaves her to strut further ahead towards the fight. Daisy stays upright on her own, swaying only a little.

“Connor,
help me
,” Lo pleads.

“I won’t,” Connor says like he wants Ryke to fight these people. “Just let him go, Lo.”

Then Surfer Tee creates a V-shape with his fingers and obscenely sticks his tongue through it. His eyes have shifted. And they land right on me. Chills race down my spine.

Lo glances over his shoulder, finding the source of the ridicule.

It was me.

All of it, I realize.

Maybe they’re saying my vagina is too big. I’m gross. I’ve slept with hundreds of faceless men. I’m diseased and disgusting. I am not fit to be a mom. I am and will always be a sex addict. Nothing more than that. I have heard it all and read it on social media. Though never have I witnessed it in Spanish.

I take another step forward, and Lo screams at me, “LILY, STAY BACK!”

My heart stops. The wrathful, pained look on his face plants me here as much as his voice. And his eyes flicker to my belly. I didn’t mean—I
wouldn’t
put my baby in harm’s way. I wasn’t going to. It’s just…Lo.

He breathes raggedly and nods to me like,
please, Lily.

I nod back.

When he ensures that I won’t risk my safety, he spins back to his brother. In a single instant, Lo removes his hands off Ryke, and this is when I think Ryke will lose all self-control and throw a fist first, tapping into his aggressive side. He’s snapped. Long before now. But he doesn’t even have his fists barred yet, not even raised for a right hook or a sucker punch. He steps forward, then stops.

It’s so quick. The tallest of the hecklers charges him, his eyes set on Ryke. In three lengthy strides, he nails his knuckles into Ryke’s jaw. I can feel my heart beating out of my chest.

That
is a sucker punch, one that lands Ryke on the cement pathway.

The other two hecklers jump on Ryke, which causes Lo to snatch their arms and land a punch or two. 

I flinch as a pair of knuckles connects with Lo’s face. “Stop!” I shout at the hecklers, finding my voice with Lo’s pain. The dark ocean water is on our right, shops on our left, the moon overhead, the dock in view. We’re not
that
far away from the tugboat which’ll bring us to the anchored yacht.

“This is not happening,” Rose says, heading even
further
forward with her pepper spray in hand. The moment she passes Connor, he seizes her wrist.

“What do you think you’re doing, darling?”

“I’m fighting for my sister,” she says seriously. She’s pregnant too. And while I love having a sister that’d be willing to insert herself into a fist-fight on my behalf, now’s not a good time.

Even Daisy has enough sense to stay put—

Just as I think it, she sprints forward. And Mikey catches her around the waist. She kicks out. “Let me help him.”

“No, Daisy,” Mikey tells her.

“This is…sexist,” she says, her arms flopping around with her legs.

“Agreed,” Rose says to Connor.

“Hun,” Connor tells her, “do I need to remind you that you’re a vessel for our unborn child?”

“Are you trying to infuriate me more?” she retorts. “Now I just want to punch you.”

“I’m a truthteller. If you don’t like what I have to say, take it up with the liars of the world.” And then we’re all distracted when Surfer Tee kicks Lo
hard
below his chest.

“Lo!” I scream, especially as Lo crumples to the ground. My stomach caves, remembering his preexisting injury: broken ribs from the Paris riot. Hot tears squeeze through the corners of my eyes.

“
Please
don’t do anything rash,” Connor forces to Rose
.
And then he inserts himself in this fight, to defend Lo and pull him out of it. Connor ducks an incoming right hook and then protectively stands above Lo so no one can touch him. I watch Lo cough hoarsely on the cement.

He was laughing only minutes ago.

This is wrong.

I jerk forward on instinct, to hold Lo, to hug him. To wrap my arms around him. But Garth keeps me put.

A fist pounds into Connor’s cheekbone as it becomes two on one, as Ryke turns his attention to Surfer Tee and lands a solid blow in his stomach. It’s reciprocated with knuckles to Ryke’s lip. They’re all beating the shit out of each other. I hate this. I glance back at our bodyguards, trying to express every sentiment and plea in my eyes.

Please, help them.

Garth and Mikey exchange a look between each other, and that’s all it takes. They release their holds on Daisy and me. Not so we can join the fight, but so they can.

It’s like adding a couple of trump cards. The minute they step in, Garth pries Ryke off Surfer Tee, and Mikey assists Connor, keeping the other two at bay. The intensity drops by a million degrees.

Ryke spits blood on the cement and says something volatile at the hecklers in Spanish. It’s such a scary fight that I didn’t realize I was shaking until Rose reaches out and clutches my jittery hand.

“They’re okay,” Rose says softly.

“I can’t believe that just happened,” I murmur. I watch Ryke throw his palms in the air like
I’m done, I’m done.
He wipes his bloody mouth with the back of his hand.

I’ve conquered my fear of facing daylight, of standing among fans, now excited when they approach for selfies. I’m no longer crippled by the constant attention. No longer a scared little hermit who hides in her house. But I don’t want to come out to find Lo beaten on the ground, accompanied by more people that I love.

“What if they had a knife?” I realize this could’ve been worse, easily. “What if they had a gun?” I freeze.

Rose says, “We can only tolerate so much until we snap. Ryke’s easier to enrage, but Connor’s not and he was upset. So you have to know that whatever they were saying must’ve been verging on a threat.” She raises her chin. “If I wasn’t pregnant—”

“You would punch back?” I presume.

“I would impale their gross, little black hearts with my heels.”

Thank God she’s on my side and not against me.

The hecklers have separated from our men, and they weakly stagger back, blood staining their shirts and a few shiners swelling their eyes.

Lo, Ryke, and Connor only appear minutely better, blood still splattering their clothes. All of them have taken hits. Connor is crouched over Lo, talking to him quietly while he nods like
I’m okay.

I try to exhale a tight breath in my chest.

Ryke finally turns towards us, and he locks eyes with Daisy, who is all alone, a few feet ahead of me and Rose. Her chest rises and falls in a heavy, uneven rhythm, like she’s suffocating beneath a brutal wave.

Ryke assesses her as much as she assesses him.

She tugs at her tight shirt, and I remember her earlier thought about stripping and racing ahead and being held down by nothing at all.

Go
, I want to tell her. She can sprint to the dock. The hecklers have disappeared down a side-street, out of sight. She’s safe.

But her feet stay on the ground, in place. “The full moon makes you crazy, you know,” she tells him softly.

“No more fucking crazy than you.” He steps nearer to Daisy and then draws her to his chest. His hand disappears beneath her shirt, as though stretching it so she’s not as claustrophobic. The gesture is sweet. “And it’s not the full moon, Dais. It’s just people who want to shit on the ones I love. I can’t fucking take it.”

My shoulders lift with that proclamation. Lo is still hurt and my stomach won’t untie until he’s in my arms and I’m in his.

So I head over to him as soon as he stands, wincing and favoring his ribs. I almost start shaking again at the flash of agony in his features. “Lo?” I whisper.

He stares down at me, his lip busted. Connor’s cheekbone is red and will probably bruise. But just by sight, Ryke has the worst of it: both cheeks and his lip beat up and bloodied.

“I’m fine,” Lo says.

“So fine that I can hug you?” I ask skeptically. He’s putting on a good front.

“Go ahead, Lil,” he nods.

I gently wrap my arms around him, keeping distance between our bodies.

His warm breath touches my temple as he whispers, “That’s not how we hug.”

“I’m not hurting you,” I tell him adamantly. “I know you’re in pai—”

And then he squeezes me to his chest, in a common embrace for us, one where our bodies meld together with no seeming beginning and end. It’s like we’re one. I feel his heart
thud, thud, thud
against my skin.

I’m not sure how long we stay like this, frozen in time, shielding the world from us. It’s a moment that eclipses the rest of the day and shortens my lifespan to a single solitary snapshot. My belly flutters, a literal movement that causes me to straighten like a board.

“Lo…” I whisper.

“Lil?” He scrutinizes my expression.

It happens again, only this time, stronger, like a foot… I touch my abdomen, my heart quickening.

“Is he…” Lo trails off.

I nod. “I think so.”

Lo places his hand on my belly, and after a few quiet seconds, the faint movement happens again. Lo’s eyes smile so much that I laugh into one.

And then he kisses me, so suddenly. His lips right on mine. My arms right around him. His around me. Where they’re meant to be.

{ 20 }

LOREN HALE

“Shut the door,” Ryke orders, flipping on the faucet. I close the yacht’s bathroom door behind me and sink on the tiled floor against the porcelain tub.

I wrap an arm around my ribs that shriek in pain, maybe fractured again. I try to ignore it. I’ve had this injury before, and all I can do is wait for it to heal. Since I’m an addict, they always advise to forgo medication. I won’t take anything to numb this.

“Fuck.” Ryke winces as he rinses his bloodied knuckles beneath the water.

Connor inspects his own bruised cheekbone in the mirror and says something to Ryke in French, who replies back.

“Stop,” I tell them, each large breath stabbing my lungs. “I have to know.” The girls are trying to calm down their parents, woken up after a text from an overly concerned Poppy. All I want to know is why the hell these guys have been following us and what they were saying about Lily.

Ryke and Connor share hesitance, and it’s like someone kicks me again in the ribs.

“I can take it,” I say with everything I have.

I can take it
.

No one is going to bury me. I have to trust myself, more than ever. Because I picture a life where I
never
stand up on my own, where I’m stuck leaning on Ryke and Connor, and it
hurts.
I want to take those first steps by myself again. For one turn of fate, I’d like to be the kind of guy that braces them from falling.

It’s always felt impossible.

But it’s a goal that’s been keeping me moving.

“This won’t push me over,” I continue. “I won’t drink. I just need to know.”

Ryke turns back to the sink and washes his face.

Connor sits on the toilet lid and stares at the ground, haunted almost.

“Goddammit,” I sneer with burning eyes. “Someone say something.” It’s killing me.

“I’m trying…” Ryke presses a towel to his lip and then leans against the wall. His eyes are also on the ground.

I sit higher up, but the pain shoots through my body and I stay slightly slouched. “I know it’s about Lily.” My tendons sear.

“It’s not just because I don’t think you can handle it,” Ryke suddenly tells me. He pulls the towel away from his lip, focusing on the damp cloth. “It’s that…” His face twists. “…I don’t know if I can translate it without screaming.”

“Just give me something,” I choke out the words.

Connor is quiet, looking concerned for me.

“I can handle it,” I remind him.

“I know you can,” Connor says. I can tell that he’s placating me, saying what I want to hear.

Ryke balls the towel in his hand. “I’m just going to let some of it out as fast as I can.”

I nod.

“
How many guys have pounded into that slut?
” he says at first. It’s another swift kick.

I squeeze my eyes shut.
Don’t think about it.

“
Is she still full of their cum?
”

I shift, pain intensifying in my gut, but it’s not from my ribs anymore. I can feel the type of torment Lily would experience if she heard these exact words. And the part that belongs to her is sunken with agony. The part that belongs to me is rattling with rage.

“
Bring her here…
” Ryke’s voice breaks.

I open my eyes, and my brother is covering his mouth like he wants to scream and punch someone again.

My eyes are on fire, holding back.
Why are you fucking crying? Stop crying.
I’m not crying. “Keep going,” I prod.