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“I know you don’t want to be here…” Xander tells me. “But you have to ignore that voice. Not forever. Just ignore it this minute, this shitty second.” This minute. This second. I inhale slowly. “Small hurdles, you know?” Xander says quietly. “You can do that. I know you can, sis. You’re way stronger than me.”
I told you that he has no bad bone in his body. I told you that he’d give you the last shirt he owns. Right off his back. Shit, I told you he’s been kind towards the women he’s been with, and he would let Luna rule his world if she wanted to. I told you he’d be there for her. I told you they’d be good together.
“We didn’t grow up together,” Farrow reminds him. “Neither did me and my brother. I met Ryke the day I turned twenty-one.”
“But these relationships mean something to the people who love you. And I love you like a son, and I’m…I’m sorry I didn’t take your word beforehand. I’m sorry I’m an ass. I’ve been an ass. You deserved a father-in-law who listened, and I didn’t. But I promise, I’m going to try from now on.”
I just stare at the time and a pic of me and Donnelly in our shared bathroom. A mirror selfie: his inked arm is resting on my head while I show off my green tongue piercing. He’s flashing his silver nipple ring.
Donnelly has made me feel like my galaxy is the happiest, most exhilarating place to be, even if I’m the only one there.” I drop my head and gaze back at our photo. “He treats me like I’m his moon. His stars. Like I’m the person who makes him glad it’s today and there’ll be a tomorrow, and I don’t know if I’ve ever been that for anyone who’s not my family.” I’m important to someone. I’m not a failure. I’m not a fuck-up or future screw-up to Donnelly. I’m someone worth something. And he’s worth everything to me.
Today’s Focus: show Luna I still love her, even if I can’t date her.
Being on Lo’s shitlist, I can handle, but if I’m on Lily’s, I dunno…I think I’d still go fling myself off this planet and sob.
I’d rather be bait and roadkill than let a single soul harm Luna Hale. And I plan to prove it.
Today’s Focus: be the predator. You are a hungry hungry hippo
Important: make sure Luna knows she’s still loved. Try not to fuck your favorite friend.
Question of the Day: Can I take Luna to the Fanaticon Convention in December? Is a butterfly kiss considered a real kiss? Is Ryke Meadows’ secretly Loren Hale’s hit man?
Love that endures together is the toughest love. The strongest. I want that.
“You can’t smoke in here,” Connor says immediately. “I have a wife who’d already love to rip your head off your ugly shoulders and feed your testicles to piranha.” “Her exact words,” Lo informs me with a dry smile.
Connor stares straight through me. Like he can see every organ and blood cell inside my body. No way that’s possible, but if someone had X-ray vision, guess I’d say it’d be him.
“For Christ’s sake, Connor, he’s going in my car. I’m dropping him off. I’m picking him up. If you have a problem with that, take it to your god, whoever that may be. And if it’s yourself, there’s ten billion mirrors in your mansion, have fun.”
I die inside. It’s like being sucker-punched, knowing that what he just said…Luna’s dad just heard.
“You realize I make more money than Connor Cobalt?” He makes a face at me like I hit my head on the curb.
“Does Luna know?” His eyes ping to me, then back to the road. He’s still glaring. “I’m pretty positive she knows she loves me.” His eyes lacerate me. I try not to laugh and piss him off more. “It was a joke.” “Your jokes aren’t funny.”
If looks could kill, Lo is definitely trying to murder me. “Is this your way of telling me you’re thinking of having sex with my daughter? Because A. Did not want to know that because now I want to throw you out of my car,
He wants to be in my company, unearthly reader. He is seeking me out, even though we’re not supposed to be intimately together.
Before Donnelly shifts his gaze away, I catch his anger and his hurt. He loves the Cobalts.
My Cobalt brethren called me contaminated—like I’m toxic waste. But that’s not even what’s got me hot.
Hell, it’s hard for me to say no to most girls.
“I thought you like her. I know I assumed it, but I’m usually not that far off. And she’s awesome. You should love her, actually. She’s that amazing, and she’s way better than you, honestly. Fuck you—”
Though it wasn’t Farrow checking on her yesterday, and he’s the only guy with an MD that I trust.
No baby’s head is breaching through Jane. Good signs? I have no clue, but I can one-hundred percent tell she’s dilated. A lot. And that definitely means labor. Meredith Grey would be so proud of me, I think.
“I don’t want to do this without him. I don’t want to.” She wants her husband. She wants Thatcher, and she’s sobbing. My heart splits open because I know I’m not a good stand-in for the love of her life.
“Congratulations, Papa Moretti. You’ve got a beautiful baby girl.” I lower the mic to the newborn who lets out softer cries.
Being able to witness a new life coming into the world has reminded me why I love existing.
I have a dark childhood. Probably worse than anything Thatcher even went through, and I have nothing against babies—but sometimes I do feel like they shouldn’t touch me.
“Maeve. It’s Irish,” Jane says. “It means she who rules. And in Irish mythology, she’s a goddess.” Irish. Because of me. My gaze clouds with more emotion, and I look down at Maeve Moretti.
Aunt Rose designed a special line of men’s suits for the spring, and all five of her sons agreed to model the clothes for a fashion ad. Each suit is even named after them. The Charlie, The Beckett, The Ben.
Teleportation might not run in the family, but I know lying does. I could’ve inherited this power from my parents.
Charlie and Eliot are alike in some ways—it’s the Loki in them, the destructive, mischief-wielding power they cradle and toss like bombs. But they’re also so vastly different.
Now Epsilon is becoming a buncha Thatcher Moretti clones, and there should only be one of him.
O me, the gods,’” Eliot recites a phrase from Shakespeare, one he usually says when he’s shocked.
He has this rare ability to make you feel like the greatest, most powerful version of yourself. Being around him amplifies all the pieces I love: the weird, unashamed, daring, happiest side of me.
“Lo knows I can’t have my family thinking I’m in love with her.” “Love?” Eliot’s grin has exploded. He buttons his slacks with an amused, delighted laugh. Tom is grinning now too. He told my best friends he’s trying to date me. That he loves me. It’s sinking in, and I feel my smile mushroom. Donnelly shares the grin. “You think I would do all of this just for a girl I sort of like?” “This is beautiful,” Eliot says, “and tragic all at the same time.”
Since you’re just friends at the moment with Donnelly, I propose that the friendship trio become a quartet. TOM I second this motion.
My parents are addicts too, but Donnelly hasn’t experienced sober parents. And I’ve never experienced parents off the path of recovery.
“Time is irrelevant when I’m always right here.” He hoists my wrist, the watch secured perfectly.
@StaleBread89: Seems far-fetched imo. Think Loren just hates Donnelly’s good looks.
a woodland fairytale nursery, complete with framed paintings of classics like Rapunzel and Little Red Riding Hood.
I think she’s so used to being present for everyone, kind of like Moffy but in a much different way since she has so many siblings. Maybe she’s not ready for this aspect to change. She’s one of the most reliable, dependable people in the family, and I wonder if she’s scared a newborn will make her flaky.
“Charlie.” Sulli makes a soured face. “I can’t believe you like Charlie more than Beckett. It’s like preferring raisins over chocolate chips.”
I’m being stabbed repeatedly, and if a knife is plunging into me, then a bulldozer is running over Lo’s whole being.
“I can’t lose you,” Lo sobs. “You’re okay. Come on, love. You’re okay. Wake up. Please, wake up. Lily…Lily.”
The last thing of Loren Hale I see is his hope in me.
Just tell me what the fuck is going on. Please.” “I know you can drive. I know you won’t wreck.” “Then why are you doing this to me?” His hurt is crushing. “Man, don’t say it like that,” Farrow breathes, tortured too.
