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March 27 - April 16, 2024
“My mind is more like a roller coaster inside a labyrinth buried in an M. C. Escher painting that is riding on another roller coaster.” Xander shrugged. “But my mouth is a steel trap. Just ask me about all the secrets I’m keeping.”
Grayson isn’t okay, Jameson. I don’t think your brother has been okay for a very long time.” Jameson moved toward the edge of the roof—the very edge—and looked out at the sprawling estate. “Hawthornes aren’t, as a general rule, allowed to be anything else.”
“It also wouldn’t be the worst time to tell me that you aren’t jealous of Eve standing that close to Grayson.”
“And experience has taught me that I am utterly deficient when it comes to love. So.” Libby thrust the cowboy hat at me. “I am not in love with Nash Hawthorne. We are not a couple. We are not dating. And he is definitely not in love with me.”
“I’ve found duct tape more effective than advice, myself,”
“If you had a baby…,” I said. “When I have a baby,” came the deep, heart-shattering reply, “she’ll be my whole world.” “She?” I repeated. Nash settled back into his seat. “I can picture Lib with a little girl.”
“I don’t do vulnerable,” Thea retorted. “It clashes with my bitch aesthetic.”
I don’t ever want for you—for us, for this—to become a game.”
“Oren and Nash are right, Heiress.” Jameson’s hand found its way to mine. “It’s not worth the risk.” I was fairly certain Jameson Hawthorne had never said those words before in his life.
“Praying?” Nan grumbled. “More like giving our Maker a piece of my mind.” “My grandfather built this chapel so Nan would have someplace to yell at God,” Jameson informed me.
“Guessing,” Toby’s captor said silkily, “is for those too weak in mind or spirit to know.”
“The only person I trust with all that I am and all that could be, Heiress, is you.”
“If you want to borrow some duct tape when the knuckleheads get back,” Nash drawled, “I could be persuaded.”
“I love you. I would die to protect you. I would make you hate me to keep you safe because damn it, Avery—some things are too precious to gamble.”
“It was always going to be you,” I told Jameson. He needed to hear it. I needed to say it, even though always painted over so much. In response, Jameson gave me another crooked smile. “It’s times like this, Heiress, that I wish I’d fallen in love with a girl who wasn’t quite so good at bluffing.”
Grayson’s eyes met mine. “I owe her more than she realizes.”
“Sometimes, you have an idea of a person—about who they are, about what you’d be like together. But sometimes that’s all it is: an idea. And for so long, I have been afraid that I loved the idea of Emily more than I will ever be capable of loving anyone real.” That was a confession and self-condemnation and a curse. “That’s not true, Grayson.” He looked at me like the act of doing so was painful and sweet. “It was never just the idea of you, Avery.”
“I know that Jamie loves you.” Grayson looked at me the way you look at art in a glass case, like he wanted to reach out to touch me but couldn’t. “And I’ve seen the way that you look at him, the way the two of you are together. You’re in love with my brother, Avery.”
“Don’t say that,” I whispered. He looked at me one last time. “There are so many things that I will never say.”
Max had told me once to picture myself standing on a cliff overlooking the ocean. I felt like I was standing there now, because love wasn’t just a choice—it was dozens, hundreds, thousands of choices.
Some situations required a scalpel, but this? Bring on the chain saws.
Some words were just words, and others were like fire. I felt it catching inside of me, spreading, as searing as any kiss.
The knight returns with the damsel in distress,” Jameson declared as I made my way toward him. He glanced toward Grayson. “You’re the damsel.” “I figured,” Grayson deadpanned.
