Page 34

He has very vivid dreams about very red hair.

I’m not going to lie; I purposely wear my clunkiest boots to my second stint at the Ponderosa Falls Community Center.

I specifically choose a pair of tights I know are laddered too. A mini skirt to show them off. And a sheer black shirt that provides a perfect view of a lacy bra.

Jackson gave me some almighty stink eye when he picked me up, and I’m not exactly steady on my feet, but the look on the face of Alcoholics Anonymous' very own fashion snob makes it worth it.

Silas pinches the bridge of his nose when I stroll inside.

I park myself in the seat beside him, and he screws up his face like I’ve just taken a dump at his feet.

The meeting starts and he keeps on glowering, shaking his head, huffing pissy little noises that make me grin like a fucking Cheshire cat.

When everyone but me finishes recounting their daily strifes, I don’t bolt for the door like I did last week. I linger. I even subject myself to an offensively terrible cup of coffee, if only so I can relish in the nostalgic joy of disappointing my elders.

“What if you need to run away from something?”

The same way Silas eyes my boots critically, I crook a brow at the way his frail, old man hand shakes as he lifts a cardboard cup to his lips. “What if you need to run away from something?”

Eyes that remind me of a color in my artist brother’s vast range of paints named Gunmetal narrow. “That’s ageist.”

“Whatever you say, Grandpa.”

Silas harrumphs. “Your parents should lock you in a basement.”

“My parents are dead.”

Technically, my mom is dead. My dad, just in my nicest, wildest dreams.

Nothing in Silas’ expression changes, but his trembling hand abruptly stills. And, after a long moment and an exaggerated sigh, he extends the one that clutches a cookie—the last cookie, which he very pointedly snatched up right as I was reaching for it only minutes ago. “You can have it.”

I stare at the offered treat, unsure how to react. Which I don’t really have to, I guess, considering the leader of our motley crew decides to suddenly elbow her way into the conversation. “Si, can we have a minute?”

If I hadn’t just dropped the orphan card, I think the old man would crack a joke about me being in trouble. As it is, he just nods and hobbles off, leaving me and Erica alone. “You know,” she starts, and I already don’t like wherever this is going. “You’ll get more out of this if you participate.”

“I’m getting coffee.” I hold my half-empty cardboard cup aloft. “What more do I need?”

Her sigh reminds me of Lux. Her expression too. There’s even something distinctly big-sister about her tone, her cocked head, her question. “What’re you doing here, Lottie?”

“Waiting for Sunday night bingo to start.”

Erica’s lips thin. “You wanna know what I think?”

God, what is it with people and thinking so much about me? “Not particularly, but I have a feeling you’re gonna tell me anyway.”

“I think you wanna stay sober, but you’re not gonna actively try because that means admitting you’re an alcoholic.”

I start to shake my head—disagreeing or dismissing or just plain disliking, I’m not sure—but I abruptly stop when something catches my eye. A someone pushing through the double doors. I blink once, twice, three disbelieving times, but no, my eyes aren’t deceiving me. It really is who I think it is.

No fucking way.

As Erica follows my line of sight, she fixes a thoroughly undeserved polite smile into place. “Hi. Can I help you?”

A voice I suddenly realize I’ve never heard before rumbles, “This AA?”

Erica nods. “It is. Afraid you missed today’s meeting, though.”

The man I’ve only ever seen a handful of times from a distance or in a handful of particularly graphic nightmares kisses his teeth. “Oh.”

“Why don’t you come next—”

“No.” I cut Erica off, snatching away the flyer she reaches around me to grab and crumpling it into a ball. “He can’t come here.”

Erica frowns. “Everyone is welcome, Lottie.”

“He’s not.”

He shifts his rotten gaze to me. “Do I know you, girl?”

I think he does. I think he knows of me, at least, but then again, maybe he doesn’t.

He wouldn’t find the siblings of his daughter’s boyfriend— ex -boyfriend—at the bottom of a bottle, so why would we be worthy of his attention?

We’ve never met so he wouldn’t recognize me specifically, but maybe my face is vaguely familiar to him the same way his is to me.

Maybe he sees my brother like I see his daughter.

Except I doubt that.

Because he’s never seen my brother the way I’ve seen his daughter.

And as the memory of her blank, bloodied face flashes through my mind, I all but yell, “He doesn’t deserve help.”

I don’t care if it’s a horrible thing to say, like Erica’s hiss suggests. I don’t care about the very foundation of AA, the number one rule. I do not feel anything for that violent, wretched man other than contempt and disgust and fear.

And nausea. It makes me feel sick that I share anything in common with him. It makes me want to do something violent myself, to see how he likes it.

If I stay here a second longer, I might. But to leave, I’ve got to get past him, and my stupid fucking shoes mean I can’t quite storm effectively, they slow me down, they give him a chance to grab me.

The second his overgrown, yellowed nails bite into my skin, I rip my arm from his grip. “Do not touch me.”

“You’re one of them.”

One of them . Like we’re a gang or some shit. Not the closest thing his daughter has to a family—though I don’t think anyone would include me in that bracket.

Apparently, verbal confirmation is unnecessary. All Ken Brennan needs is a good look at my face to answer his own question. Sniffing, he rubs the back of his hand beneath his nose in a way that makes me think alcohol isn’t his only vice anymore. “You know where she is?”

Loved up in the middle-of-nowhere Georgia, the last I heard, but fuck if I’m telling him that. I might not be Caroline’s biggest fan, but I’m not a monster. The only thing I’m telling the man who threw fucking glass at his daughter’s face is to, “Rot in hell.”

“ Lottie .” Fingers wrap around my bicep, yanking me back, forcing distance between me and Ken like I’m the danger here, like I’m in the wrong. “That’s enough.”

It’s not. Not nearly. Nasty quips are the least of what he deserves, the least of what he doled out. Maybe it makes me a hypocrite, maybe I should hop off of my high horse, but fuck. I’m a mean bitch, drunk or sober, and I was never Caroline’s biggest fan, but I’m not him . I can’t be him.

I’d rather fucking die than be him.

“Ask him what he did to his daughter,” I spit at Erica as I stomp the final few steps towards the exit. “Then you can decide if you still wanna give him your little pep talk.”

Besides throwing myself in the truck and commanding my sister to drive like a criminal fleeing a scene, I don’t say a word on the way home—much to Lux’s dismay.

She doesn’t know how to take my silent simmering.

I can tell she thinks it has something to do with her.

I reckon the father of our brother’s ex-girlfriend is the last thing that comes to her mind as the cause of the dark cloud hovering above my head.

I don’t know why seeing him has made me feel so… raw. Not just angry, which I am plenty of, but uncomfortable too. Confronted, in a way. Like the universe is punishing me for wanting to drink yesterday, thrusting the worst version of I could become in my face.

For once, I can’t get inside the main house quick enough. I need the hustle and bustle to overwhelm everything else, to distract me from pondering that horrifying thought any longer. But of course, the one time I’m in a hurry, Lux hangs back.

With a light grip, she makes me hang back with her, turning me towards a warily concerned face. “We’re okay, yeah?”

As it so often does when faced with my sister, guilt tickles the back of my throat. “Yeah.” I cough, only briefly hesitating before ripping the Bandaid off ‘cause I figure a little honesty might do me good. “Caroline’s dad was at my meeting.”

In the time it takes her to blink, Lux’s face contorts with ugly, raw anger. “Did you talk to him?”

“He came in after we’d already finished.” I wet my bottom lip. “I told him to go to hell.”

“Good girl,” comes out of her mouth instinctively before mother-mode kicks in. “Don’t speak to him again. I don’t want him anywhere near you.”

“You’re so right.” I snap my fingers. “I should stop going to meetings.”

“That is—”

“Kidding.” I crack a small smile, ending Lux’s spiral before it can really begin. “But if he comes back, I’m finding somewhere else.”

“Deal.” As tangible as an arm sling around my shoulders, hesitation stains the air. Eventually, it’s beaten out by curiosity. “How’d he look?”

I think about it, about how honest I want to be. “Hungover.”

Lux grunts.

“He, uh, asked where she is.”

“And?”

Gut-punched by the single word, I shrug off her arm. “I told him. Gave him her phone number too, naturally.” Shaking my head, I huff a sardonic laugh. “Seriously, Lux? You think I’d tell him shit?”

She swears beneath her breath, twining her fingers around mine and yanking me back to her side. “No, I don’t. Sorry. Him asking about her just stresses me out.”

Yeah, I can tell. I think I just watched a strand of her hair turn gray. “Is she… is she okay?”

Just like that, poof goes her anger—soft, glowing, proud relief replaces it. “She and Hunter got married.”

Woah . Didn’t expect that.

Instead of asking if our old ranch hand went straight from his divorce lawyer’s office to the courthouse—Lux sees the thought go through my head though, I know she does—I ask, “Is she coming to the wedding?”

“She’s invited.” Lux side-eyes me cautiously, knowingly . “Is that a problem?”

“She’s not my ex-girlfriend. Why would I care?”

A snort is the only answer I get.

Too irritated to decipher whatever the fuck it means, I dodge my sister when she makes another grab for me, jerking a thumb towards the barn. “I’m gonna check on Ruin before dinner.”

A hard expression tells me exactly how she feels about it, but she doesn’t stop me. She does, however, warn, “So help me God, kid, if you get on that horse—”

“I won’t,” I promise over my shoulder as I speed-walk away, halfway to the barn before she can even think about changing her mind.

Except when a handful of figures emerge from the red structure, I start changing mine.

My steps slow, my mouth twists in a grimace, I’m not in any kind of form to be polite and amiable, but it’s too late to do anything about it.

The other ranch hands spot me easily. And as most of them wave in acknowledgment, one shoots an appraising whistle across the yard.

“Damn,” Yasmin yells despite the measly few feet of distance between us. “Who’re you all dressed up for?”

I slick on a poor excuse for a smile and hope it passes as mysterious. “No one who deserves it.”

Tittering playfully, she links our arms at the elbows before starting back the way she came, knowing exactly where I’m going and apparently keen to join me. “Your hair looks cute.”

Absentmindedly playing with one of two bubble braids, I cast a backwards glance at the man who did them.

Who bumbled into my bedroom at the crack of dawn while I was still knuckling the sleep from my eyes.

Who briefly, almost compulsively ogled yet another matching pajama set before clearing his throat, handing over a coffee made exactly the way I like it, and doing exactly what he did the day before.

I still smell like homemade ointment. My scalp still tingles with the ghost of gently combing fingers. I can’t stop thinking, wondering, if that moment is what intimacy actually is. If that was my first real brush with it.

If Finn is.

Standing by his truck, he laughs about something with the guys as he leans against the hood, arms crossed casually like he’s… waiting. For me. Waiting for me so we can go inside together, sit together, have dinner together with my family who he considers his family, in some way.

Oh, how weird friendly feels.

I look away before Yasmin notices—or before she can comment on noticing, I should say.

Because of course, she notices, she’s as observant as she is aggressively friendly, but for once, she’s silent.

She keeps her thoughts to herself—though her smirk certainly says plenty—as we enter the barn, heading through it and out the back to the attached paddock where Ruin spends most of his time.

I should probably hesitate before lifting the latch on the gate and shoving it open, but I don’t.

I should probably be a little afraid, or wary at least, as I leave Yasmin behind the fence and cross the field, but I’m not.

I should probably consider the possibility that the stallion will be pissed, that he’ll charge like a damn bull, but I don’t. I know he won’t.

As I whistle softly, his ears prick. He lifts his head, eyeing me as I hobble towards him. And with a swish of his tail, he starts his own, much more graceful approach.

It’s not, like, dramatic or anything. Ruin doesn’t bound towards me like some animated caricature, neighing gleefully with a majestic rear. I don’t glow like a cartoon princess or start commanding him with the power of song or magically stop feeling the very real ache of some very bruised bones.

We just… exist. Together.

Chaos and fucking Ruin.