For Better or Hearse

by Ava Hunter

“My daughter.” “Claire. Also called Claire Bear. You love her, but you’d love her more if she hadn’t settled for, and I quote, that ‘deadbeat, dead-eyed sorry excuse for a husband.’”

And as you repeated numerous times on the plane, you will not save him from a shark attack, and I am banned from doing so as well, which is exactly my type of petty.”

“I may be a lot of things. Ill-reputed. Disheveled. A Scorpio. But I’m no con artist.”

“We need a task force that stops white men from starting podcasts for no reason.”

“When I was ten, I was so unhinged about Jack the Ripper and Lizzie Borden that my mom had to go to a parent-teacher conference about it.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Ash says as she passes the people. “He’s a nepo baby. No one ever said no to him when he was a child.”

“I couldn’t find you,” he rasps. The instinct she triggers in him is primal. He reaches out, slides his arms around her slender waist to pull her to him. The moment she’s in his arms, his tension ebbs.

He can’t help but want to take care of her. Maybe it’s the doctor in him. Maybe it’s because he actually cares about this chaotic girl. The thought of her being without sugar terrifies him.

“But…I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself rather than focusing on what others wanted of me.”