“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back up. You met a guy?” I repeat, my words slow.
“Yeah,” she sighs.
“In the week since you’ve been back…”
“Yep.”
“… and you had sex with him?”
“Sure did,” she nods.
“… at his house. Where you stayed for multiple nights.”
“I know, right? It sounds crazy.” She laughs, throwing an arm over her face.
“You can say that again,” I mumble. “How on earth did you get your folks to okay this?”
She drops her arm by her side and gets a sheepish look on her face. “I may have told them I’ve been with you and Becca.”
I stare at her in disbelief. This is out of character for Lily, to say the least. She’s always been a fly by the seat of your pants kind of girl, but never reckless.
“Don’t be mad, Lee!” She sits up, putting her hands together like she’s praying. “I know it wasn’t right to use you and Becca that way, and I’m sorry… but they never would have been okay with me going over there.”
“Were his parents gone or somethin’?”
“No, he doesn’t live with his parents.” There’s an edge of defensiveness to her tone.
“He doesn’t live with his parents,” I repeat her words back to her again. “Who even is this guy? And how old is he if he has his own house?”
“His name is Darryl and he’s older…”
“How old, Lily?”
She cringes. “Twenty.”
My stomach bottoms out. I feel sick. I don’t know much about people in their twenties, but I do know nothing good can come from one who wants to mess around with a fourteen-year-old girl. I collapse onto the couch, too shocked to process how I’m feeling. I’m angry at her for bringing me into her lies. I’m sad because I think there’s more going on than she wants to tell. I’m worried because I don’t think she knows what she’s getting herself into. I close my eyes and lean my head against the back of the couch.
“Does your brother know?” I whisper.
She stays quiet, but it doesn’t matter. I already know the answer.
4
Chase
Sixteen Years Old
I get the feeling Anna wishes I would call her “Mom.” Lily had no problem, taking up the moniker as soon as the ink was dry on the adoption papers, but I just can’t bring myself to. Honest to God, I start every day with the intention of getting over my shit and just doing it. I can give this to her. She deserves the title after everything she’s done for Lily and me. But then I think of my real mom, and even though I try like hell to erase her, she’s still the biggest part to the ugliest sides of me.
I keep Anna firmly in her place, but Sam is another story. I connect with him on a level that has me swallowing back the word “Dad” daily, and I’ll be damned if I know why. Maybe because I don’t have a real dad to compare him to? All I know is he doesn’t push. He just takes me to Sugarlake Construction and lets me disappear into the work. I shocked the hell out of myself when I realized how much I enjoyed it. There’s something peaceful about the methodology in building something from nothing. There’s no room for error, no guesswork. Everything is exact. Precise. Controlled.
Two years ago when Sam bought the construction company, he sat me down and laid out his plans of eventually passing it down. I’ll never tell him, but that was one of the best days of my life. I’ve never had someone believe in me, and while the feeling is intoxicating, mainly I’m just terrified of disappointing him.
I’ve been dying to talk to somebody about it, but the only one who I’d want to listen is Goldi, and it’s been ten days since I’ve seen her. That hasn’t been an accident. She has this way of making everything around me disappear until all I see is her, and that’s not good for either of us.
I thought with some space I’d be able to get my shit together, maybe gain some perspective. Instead, she invades my mind to the point of insanity. My thoughts are far from platonic.
It’s not right.
Fuck, I know this.
She’s my little sister’s best friend. Hell, she’s my best friend, and even worse she’s only fourteen. A fucking freshman. She’s just learning about what it means to become a woman, and here I am jerking off to thoughts of how perfect her lips are, and imagining what it would feel like to slide my cock between her tits.
It doesn’t matter though—I’d rather torture myself into eternity before I give in. Our late-night talks mean too much for me to ruin it by losing my self-restraint. If that means I have to put some space between us and fuck all the other girls in town to get her out of my system, then that’s what I’ll do. I’d rather have her in my life from a distance than not have her at all.
I am, however, going to introduce myself to that prick who moved in behind her house. What’s that saying? Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? Yeah. Guess who’s about to be your new best friend, buddy.
The front door slams.
I look up from my breakfast as Lily walks into the kitchen, makeup smudged under her eyes from the night before, and a sour look on her face.
“What the hell happened to you?” There’s only been a handful of times where Lily hasn’t been one-hundred percent put together, and it usually coincides with sickness or “Aunt Flow.”
She plops down in the chair across from me and groans, grabbing my bowl of cereal.
“Nothing, dude. I just had a rough night. I’m trying to recover.”
“A rough night?” My brows furrow. “Didn’t you spend it with Goldi and Becca?”
She’s shoveling cereal into her mouth, but pauses and points her spoon at me. “She hates it when you call her
