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“I fucking love you, Aoife Molloy,” I repeated, focusing on an oil stain on the back wall of the garage. “I always will.”
“You’re honestly trying to tell me that those two aren’t in love?” “I never said they weren’t in love.” Chuckling, she added, “Only that they’re not together.”
While the rest of his friends had long since abandoned their girlfriends and dates, Gibsie hadn’t taken more than three steps away from Claire all night.
Our eyes met, green on green, and he winked at me from across the room. And just like that, I was ruined.
“I said no,” he snapped, snatching the joint out of my hand and handing it off to the stranger standing behind him. “I said no, Aoife.” “You can’t tell me what to do, Joe,” I growled, feeling a combination of drunk and dizzy. “You don’t own me.” “Well, that’s bad fucking luck on my account, because you sure as shit own me!” Drunk or not, his words hit me like a wrecking ball to the chest. Feeling the air whoosh from my lungs, I glared up at him, feeling a torrent of emotions crashing through me. “Why would you say that to me?” “Because it’s the truth.” “Since when?” “Since I was twelve.”
Nobody served up karma quite like Molloy.
“I always win, Joe.”
Because every part of me loved every part of her. The good, the bad, and the ugly. I fucking reveled in all of it. She had my heart in knots and my head spinning.
“Bad boy.” Her breath was laced with alcohol and so fucking warm on my face when she whispered, “Tell me you’re sorry.” I gave in without a fight, too weary and too damn in love to fight my feelings. “I’m sorry.” “How sorry?” “Very sorry.” “Good boy.” Her tongue was on my ear then, her body pressed flushed against mine. “Now, tell me you love me.” “I love you.” The words flew off my tongue in record time. “Say it again.” “I love you.” “How much?” “A lot.”
“Stop trying to protect me and start making me happy,” she countered, eyes locked on mine. “Because it’s time to pick your poison, Joey Lynch.”
“It’s you,” he repeated gruffly, fingers tightening on my waist. “I pick you. Every single time.”
“I’ll love you the right way this time,” he whispered, and his breath fanned my cheek. “If you’ll show me how.”
“I’m not your mother or your sister. I’m not another girl who needs something from you. I’m the girl who wholeheartedly wants you. I’m the girl who wholeheartedly loves you. The hurler. The mechanic. The boy. The protector. The asshole. The lover. The addict.” Sniffling, I added, “All of your versions. All of your shapes and colors. I accept them all. So, I don’t care how fucked up in the head you get, or how bad of an idea you decide you are for me. If you can’t be with me, warts and all, then walk away now, because I won’t go through this again with you.”
Snaking one hand up to cover the tattoo on my chest, she used the other to move the hand I’d been resting on her hip to her tattooed ass cheek. Leaning back, she looked me right in the eyes and whispered the words, “Ride or die, Joe.”
Her lips crashed against mine, and it was in this very moment that I knew I would never be able to untangle myself from this girl. Not in this lifetime.
“You’re really sticking around, aren’t ya?” “Afraid so.” I smiled in the darkness. “For the ring. The white dress. The white picket fence. The whole nine yards.”
“Hey, stud.” “Hey, queen.”
“I’m completely yours, too.” The words were a quiet, barely spoken admission, but they meant so much to me because I knew it all but killed him to expose himself to me. “I always have been.”
“Because I’ve got serious wifey feelings for you.”
“Because I’m only doing life for you.”
“I gained weight, asshole,” she shot back. “I never said I wasn’t beautiful.” “There’s my vain baby.”
“I don’t think St. Anthony can help find your missing period, Aoife.”
This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.
“That’s no boy,” Tony mouthed accusingly, gaping at the phone. “That’s a fucking man’s voice.”
If this hotshot fucker had taken time out of his rigid schedule to drive her home, then my baby sister had made more than just waves at Tommen. She’d summoned a goddamn tsunami.
And there it was. Staring me right in the face. My life was over.
Same girl
I could smell the bullshit a mile off every time she denied her very obvious feelings, and I smiled to myself as I listened to her ramble on about who I thought might be her very first crush.
“Meh. I’m an addict, you’re a bitch,” he mused, pulling me close. “No relationship is perfect.”
and my girlfriend had been possessed by some demon bastard called premenstrual syndrome.
“Nope.” Grinning up at him, I added, “I’m more into the lean, mean, cocaine-snorting machine type.”
“Oh, Jesus, that’s his sister? Cap’s obsessed with his sister!”
Poor fucker had gone and caught himself some big old feelings. For my sister, of all people. Go figure.
I growled, knowing full well that whatever I said or didn’t say could and would be used against me in the court of Aoife Molloy.
“Shit, Kav, I was wrong.” Gibsie chuckled, hovering over my shoulder like a child waiting for a slice of birthday cake to be cut. “This fucker right here is the daddy.”
“She’s out in the car.” “Why would you leave her in the car?” he demanded. “It’s freezing outside.” “Because she wouldn’t come in for me,” I replied calmly. “You can try to get her to come inside yourself if you want, but she’s not budging.” He didn’t answer me. Because he was too busy diving for the door. I smirked. “Lad,” Gibsie snickered, nudging my shoulder with his. “I think my best friend is a small bit obsessed with your sister.”
“But yeah, I reckon my sister is a small bit obsessed with your best friend, too.”
“Everything about Kav’s world is serious, stable, and selected since birth. His future is set in stone, and his plans are cemented in front of him without an inch of moving space. So, if he’s moving shit around to make space for her, if he’s even considering putting her slap-bang in the middle of those plans, then it’s not an accident. He’s about as spontaneous as a dustpan and brush, lad. So, if he decides to go there with your sister, you can be sure that he’ll have put together an entire thesis of the pros and cons of making such a move beforehand. Johnny’s careful, lad, and he’s stable,
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“Since she was four and I was six, and I promised her that I would marry her.”
The only person in our lives that had ever taken the time to dig deeper, to push further, was Molloy. Until now.
The helpless tone in his voice struck a chord with me. Because I knew that tone. I knew that desperation. I felt it daily. “Who is hurting your sister?” he repeated, as desperation and frustration fused together inside of him. This fucker cared.
“I want to know what’s going on here, Lynch. If she’s being bullied or some shit like that, then I can help. I can fix this if you just tell me.” “You can fix this?” “For her?” He nodded vehemently. “Absolutely.” “You like her.” I tilted my head to one side, studying him. “Maybe even more than like her.” He didn’t deny it. Good. Another tick for him.
We couldn’t live like this anymore. If something didn’t give, someone was going to die in that house. It would either be him or me.
“There’s no one else for me, Mam. I know it. I can feel it in my bones.”
“Because your baby’s father might be as pigheaded and stubborn as you are when it comes to admitting his feelings, but his heart has never once wandered from you, either.”
“God loves a trier,” Casey agreed, eyes dancing with mischief. “But Aoife loves Joey.”
“No, Molloy, that’s not what I’m saying at all. You’re not losing me, okay? I fucking love you. I’m yours to keep for as long as you’ll have me.”
We were both flat broke, but if I couldn’t buy my pregnant girlfriend a measly bag of chips, then I needed to be taken out into a field and shot.
“I’ve loved your daughter for six years,” Joey finally broke his silence by saying. “I can easily love her for another eighteen.”
