Page 75 of Liam (Preston Brothers #4)

Addie

We arrive back at the Preston property later than everyone else because Dayna insists on “bringing food to the occasion.”

Really, I think she’s just trying to impress Tom, or maybe just show her gratitude for how well he’s treated me and accepted me as his son’s girlfriend.

Dayna gasps when the Preston lake comes into full view. “This is so much prettier than the pictures you sent,” she says.

“This is all theirs?” Griffin asks, slowing the truck to a stop right next to Roman’s. “Like, this is their lake?”

“Yep.”

He lets out a low whistle.

I point in the general direction of the trailer park. “I lived right on the other side of the fence over there.”

“That’s a huge contrast,” Dayna says, turning to me.

“Yeah,” I agree. “You can kind of imagine what it was like for me growing up, seeing how the other half lives.”

“Oh, Addie.” Dayna frowns. “That must’ve been so confusing for you.”

Confusing.

Huh.

I’d never been able to fully comprehend what it was like watching the Prestons from afar. At first, I thought it was jealousy, and that jealousy turned to hatred, but maybe I was wrong.

Confusing is much more fitting.

The entire Preston crew is on or around the dock when we walk up, bags of food in tow.

Almost all the brothers approach, offering to take the bags from us.

They unpack it all on the aged wood of the dock, and before Dayna, Griffin and I have even settled in, half the food is gone.

Griffin chuckles, turning to Dayna. “That’s what it would be like if I coached boys’ baseball. ”

“You ain’t lyin’,” Roman murmurs. He’d clearly just come in from the lake, because his hair’s wet, droplets of water still clinging to his flesh.

Now, he’s sitting cross-legged on the dock, with Katie on his lap as she attacks his arm with a Sharpie.

It’s clearly something they do often, because he doesn’t seem at all phased, and she’s having the time of her life while her parents are out on a jet ski.

“You coach baseball?” Lachlan asks around a mouthful of food. He’s half in the water, holding himself up with his arms on the dock.

Griffin nods. “College softball.” He pauses a breath. “Well, I did. State cut funding and the team’s gone now, so…”

Liam pops up beside Lachlan, shaking his hair out.

I have no idea where he was or where he came from.

He pulls himself up on the dock, dropping water everywhere, and sits behind me, wraps his arms around my waist. I would squeal from the wetness, but his touch outweighs all other senses.

He presses his lips to my shoulder, then my cheek, my jaw, my neck, over and over until I’m squirming in his grasp, giggling like a fool.

“Gross,” Roman mutters.

I kiss Liam’s jaw and scoot lower, so I can lay my head on his chest.

“Lookie, Whoa-man!” Katie squeals.

Roman turns, lifting his arm to see the crooked lines Katie’s drawn on him. “I love it,” he tells her.

“More tattoos for Whoa-man,” Katie sings, then breaks out in a giggle.

“So, are you here to interview?” Lachlan asks, and I turn my attention back to him.

Liam says out loud what I’m thinking, “Interview for what?”

Lachlan answers, “Coach Harden’s retiring at the end of next year.”

“Coach Harden?” I sit taller and face Roman. “Your old coach?”

“He’s retiring?” Roman asks Lachlan.

On the other end of the dock, Logan and Leo play students while Benny teaches them some dance moves.

“Is he related to Miss Harden?” I ask.

“Husband and wife,” Roman mutters.

Huh. I never put the two together. And I don’t even know why it’s important because—I sit all the way up. “Wait, he’s retiring ?”

“Yeah,” Lachy says. “They’ve been looking for a replacement for the past year, but no one wants to move to the middle of nowhere, even to coach a team that produced a pro.”

“Ten years ago…” Lucas says, offering Dayna and Griffin a beer.

Dayna accepts for Griffin, muttering something about her driving, but she’s looking between Lachlan and Griffin, trying to gauge the situation.

“They don’t have any assistant coaches?” Griffin asks, and Dayna whips her eyes to Lachlan.

“Oh, they do, but they’re all shit-for-brains, which makes sense, since they’re all volunteers.”

Dayna glances at Griffin again, waiting for a response.

Since he lost his job, Griffin’s been delivering food just to make money.

He’s been searching for other coaching positions, but this close to a new season, it’s impossible to find something, even part time.

But—I’m not getting my hopes up. Dayna and Griffin live four hours away.

And besides, I had always planned to go back there…

for them . But, if they’re here—but they wouldn’t uproot their entire lives for—“You just said how you’d like to coach high school baseball,” Dayna says, shoving Griffin’s arm.

My pulse picks up. “You did?”

Griffin cracks open his beer, but doesn’t reply.

“You have to at least interview,” Roman says. “See what the deal is?”

“Yeah,” Dayna encourages.

“Dad should have his number,” Liam says. “He knows everyone. You should call him.” I can hear it in his voice, too, the hope that blooms. He’s fully aware that there are only two reasons I’d go back to Raleigh, and they’re both sitting with us now.

Still, Griffin doesn’t give a hint of what he’s thinking. Instead, he asks Lachlan, “Do you play?”

“Nah,” Lachlan says. “I run track.”

“You can’t do both?”

“I don’t really do team sports.”

“No?”

“I’m the youngest of seven,” Lachlan cracks. “I need to be the center of attention.”

Griffin laughs at that, and then Lachlan swims away, and no one mentions the coaching job again. Not even Dayna.

We spend the entire afternoon and early evening in and out of the water, playing with the kids and the “big boy” toys.

Griffin seems to have a blast on the jet skis, the ATVs, and dirt bikes.

Dayna and Laney hit it off, talking about their crafting hobbies, and Liam and I never leave each other’s side.

We get in the water, and I latch onto him while he swims around.

I hold on to his waist while he rides the jet ski.

I park myself in the crook of his arm while he lies on a towel on the rocky shore.

One day, he might get sick of how needy I am for him, but that day isn’t today, and so I’ll take it while I can.

“Liam!” Linc calls out, and Liam lifts his head. “You want to set up now?”

“One second,” Liam yells back.

“Set up what?” I ask.

“We got a big screen and projector. We’re doing a movie night.” He kisses me—a little too passionately in front of his whole family. “You’re staying, right?”

I look over at Griffin and Dayna—Dayna trying to balance on a paddleboard while Griffin laughs, shaking the board. “Yeah, I think we’ll be here a while.”

“Perfect.” He kisses me again. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

We wait until the sun begins to fade before we all gather to watch the movie. Some of the Preston boys line up their trucks and sit in the beds, and others are happy to sit on the grass. Dayna, Griffin, Roman, and I sit together on giant blankets provided by Tom.

“This is so unreal,” Dayna says, pushing into my side. “It’s like a private drive-in.”

“I know. It’s crazy.”

Linc and Liam are on the bed of Lincoln’s new truck, where the speaker, projector, and laptop are.

I get giddy when Liam hops off the truck and starts making his way toward me.

I adjust, making room behind me where I know he’ll sit.

Dayna shifts to the side so he can put his legs on either side of me, his arms immediately going around my waist.

“Gross,” Roman mutters.

Liam chuckles. “How’s Heidi?”

“Who’s Heidi?” Dayna teases. She knows as much about Heidi as I do.

Roman sighs—so done with our crap.

The speakers crackle, and the moment the screen flickers on and the intro for the Preston Twins channel starts, Benny and Katie shout, “Uncle Twinnies!”

The twins appear on the huge screen, Liam behind the wheel, and Lincoln right beside him. It’s an older video, though, one I saw back in my stalking days. “What’s up, guys?” the on-screen twins yell, and all the Prestons here shout, “We’re back!”

I giggle, snuggle in closer.

On-screen Lincoln says, “We finally caved to your demands, and we’re going to answer your random questions from the comments.”

“Oh, I’ve seen this one!” I blurt, turning to Liam.

He shakes his head. “Not this version, you haven’t.”

“What?” I face the big screen again.

Lincoln continues, “And since Liam doesn’t read the comments, and I didn’t want to spoil it for myself, we had our brother find some questions for us. Which brother, you ask?”

Logan pops up from behind the driver’s seat. “I can’t believe you had me hiding all that time.”

“As some of you already know,” Liam says, “This is our brother Logan. Logan say hi.”

“Hi.” Logan smiles at the camera before grasping Liam’s shoulders. “Don’t worry, we’ll ease into it.”

I turn to real-life Liam. “I’m positive I’ve seen this one.”

Liam presses his lips to my temple. “Just watch.”

I sit and watch, and everything that plays is exactly as I remember it.

Them joking about Lucy reading the comments because she’d pick out girlfriends for them.

Then the question about sports and how they used to play but people got mad because they were too good.

They swear in some places, and it’s bleeped out in this version—likely for their niece and nephew.

So far, that’s the only difference I’ve noticed between this one and the online version.

On-screen Logan focuses on his phone. “Okay,” he says, then reads out, “expose the weirdest thing y’all have done. No limits.”

“No limits?” Lincoln says, a sinister smile playing on his lips as he looks directly into the camera.

In the version I watched, half of what he said was muted, a black bar over his mouth so people couldn’t read his lips.

Liam’s arms around me tighten, just as Lincoln continues, “When we were little, like eight or nine, Liam had the biggest crush on this girl and he would—” The audio cuts out, just like the one I’d seen before, and all of the Prestons boo , throw random things at the screen.

But then the video pauses, rewinds, and I sit taller, looking from the screen to Liam and back.

The video starts again, right at the beginning of Lincoln’s speech.

“When we were little, like eight or nine, Liam had the biggest crush on this girl and he would always want to be around her. He’d come up with reasons just to be near her.

Like, he made me play baseball, even though I hated it, just because she was on the team.

” Air traps in my lungs, my mind working, my pulse racing.

“That’s crazy, right?” Lincoln says, shaking his head.

“Wrong. You want to know what’s crazy? One day, she started wearing her hair in a braid with these different colored ribbons weaved through the strands.

And every single day, he would write the color of the ribbon in his little school planner.

Always in code. O R for orange. P P for purple.

L B for light blue.” He pauses a beat. “Her name was Adelaide Baker… the love of Liam’s life… ”