LITMIR.BIZ

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maybe it would be good for him to know. He’s lived his life as a substitute for Remy for so long, maybe it would wake him up to know someone as good as you, as kind and loving as you, has feelings for him and has for a long time. I know deep down he’s a good guy, he just buries it under so much bullshit it can be hard to find.”

      My plan was to avoid Rule until hell froze over. I didn’t regret sleeping with him; in fact, it had lived up to every expectation I had ever had of sex and, in all truthfulness, my ideas of sex with him. There wasn’t any other person I could have imagined giving my virginity to. While I wish I had been sober and that it had been based more on emotion than physical attraction, the deed itself had been amazing and worth any twinge of remorse I had. I knew my relationship with Rule would never be the same and I had to be okay with that. I refused to be the girl who pined after him, who stalked him and called him a hundred times a day. I decided the morning after it was all said and done that I was lucky it had been as nice as it was and if that was all I was ever going to get from Rule it was going to be enough.

      “No, his knowing wouldn’t change anything; it would just make me feel worse. We both know I’m not his type and I’ve dealt with enough rejection from people who are supposed to love me to last a lifetime. Rule and I can just go on being uneasy companions when we’re forced to spend time together and that’ll just have to be how it is.” Rome didn’t need to know that things were bound to be even more strained and awkward between us now.

      “Dinner with your dad was that bad this year?”

      “He got married again; she’s twenty-five.” I rolled my eyes. “She spent the entire dinner telling me why I should rush the sorority she was in last year before she graduated. Dad spent the whole dinner trying to tell me that I needed to give Gabe another chance. He wrote me out a check for a grand after implying he would double it if I took Gabe back, so it was more like extortion and torture than dinner.”

      He chuckled without humor. “No word from your mom?”

      “No.”

      “I don’t know how someone as softhearted as you came from those two.”

      “Me, either. I’m just glad I only have to deal with them in limited doses anymore. Being a constant disappointment is exhausting.”

      He lifted a dark eyebrow. “My little brother probably knows a little bit about that.”

      “Clever.”

      “I try.”

      “What happens at birthday dinner stays at birthday dinner—right, Rome?”

      “I’m not going to say anything. If he hasn’t noticed it after all this time it’s not my job to hit him over the head with it, but I do think there is a good chance the two of you might be really good for each other. Opposites attract and all that.”

      The problem with that was I didn’t think Rule and I were really all that opposite. I mean, yes, he had ink from the top of his Mohawked head to his booted toes, and he was all metal barbells where I was pearls and antique cameos, but we were both people trying to live beyond the boundaries everyone else seemed to want to set for us. We both had deep, painful issues with our parents and we both loved the other Archer boys beyond measure. We both desperately wanted to be seen for the value we had without other people’s expectations of what we should or shouldn’t be doing, and after Saturday, I now knew we both wanted sex to be just a little bit rough and just a little bit dirty. Yeah, not as opposite as one would think at first glance.

      “I’ve been trying to keep Rule from living in the dark ever since Remy died. It’s only gotten worse, not better, and he just can’t keep going down that path if there’s never going to be an end,” I said.

      Rome sighed as we got up and headed out into the chilly air. “At the end of the day, little girl, we’re all each other has, so no matter how tough it gets for any of us we just have to power through and keep it together.”

      I gave him a hug and rubbed my cold hands together. I clutched the picture close to my chest and shivered as the bitter night breeze got past my scarf. “That’s easy for you to say because you’re an ocean away. Most of the time it’s just me and Rule in an uneasy truce, with your parents breathing down our necks and mine ignoring me.”

      “You said it yourself, Shaw—you’re not a kid anymore. You can figure this out. I have faith in you.”

      That was just Rome. He was the protector, the one who ultimately wanted what was best for all of us. I told him to call me before he headed back to Brookside and made my way back to the apartment. It was a rare day that Ayden and I both had off so she was sprawled in the living room with books everywhere. She was studying so intently with the radio up so loud I don’t think she heard me come in. She had been giving me crap all week about Rule. While she was all for me sowing wild oats and making decisions that made me happy—and believe me, he had made me oh-so-very happy—she knew that my feelings for Rule were more complicated than I tended to let on and was convinced I was courting an even more thoroughly broken heart.

      I tiptoed behind her and tapped her on the shoulder, making her shriek and whirl around. The reaction was so dramatic it made me double over in laughter. I flopped on the couch with a groan and took off my coat and scarf. She scowled up at me as she reached over to turn down the radio. “Not cool. How was dinner?”

      “Good.”

      “Just good?”

      “He grilled me about Rule; he seems to think we can fix each other or some nonsense like that.”

      “Speaking of the troublemaker, have you heard from him?”

      I shook my head. “No. I know how he works, Ayd. Do you know how many sad, bewildered girls I’ve seen him ditch the morning after? I refuse to be one of them.”

      “Yeah, but you guys know each other; you were kinda friends.”

      I shrugged a shoulder. “That doesn’t matter to him. Women have always been interchangeable. It’s been that way since we were young.”

      I ran a hand through my tangled hair and stifled a yawn. I had been studying extra hard because midterms were right around the corner and the extra weekend shift at work was starting to wear on me. Add in the fact I was waking up in the night all hot and bothered and I was a tired girl.

      “I think I might go curl up with a book and crash out early.”

      “I’ll keep the music down.”

      “No worries, have a good night.”

      “You, too, and hey, at least the hickey is starting to fade.”

      I stuck my tongue out at her and went into my room. I flopped face-first on the bed and swore under my breath when I heard my phone ringing from my purse. Normally, I would have ignored it but it was playing my mom’s ringtone—Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It.” If I didn’t answer she would just keep calling until I did. Her time was deemed just that valuable. I rolled over and dug it out.

      “Hello, Mother.”

      “Shaw, I’m sorry it took me so long to get back to you about your birthday. We were in California. Jack had a business trip and since it’s so cold here I thought the kids would like the beach.”

      I guess phones don’t work in California. “No problem.”

      “I talked to your father. He said you seemed distracted and out of sorts. We discussed it and I really think whatever game you are playing with Gabe has to stop. You’re a mature young woman now, Shaw; you need to start making smarter life decisions. Flitting from boy to boy will just not stand any longer.”

      She didn’t even tell me happy birthday. “I’m not interested in Gabe, Mom, not at all.”

      “Interest is frivolous. He comes from a good family, he has a planned out future; those are things that a young woman of your lineage needs to look for in a partner.”

      I blew a hiss

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