Author: Nyrae Dawn

“Where are we going?” I ask her when we get outside.

She looks unsure when she asks, “Want to go back to my place? Just to hang out and talk or whatever? It’s not… I don’t…”

“We’re good. I’m not going to jump you as soon as we get inside. Well… unless you want me to.”

“Do most girls want you to?” she asks as we start walking.

Inside, I’m saying, Fuck because the last thing I want to do is talk about other girls when I’m with one, but then she speaks again. “I shouldn’t have asked that. I don’t know why I did.”

For some reason, that makes me want to answer. There’s something so real about her that opens me up. She’s done it before and it scares the hell out of me that if I keep hanging around her, she’ll do it again. “I’m not going to lie and pretend I’ve been an angel. There have been girls. There will be girls, but I also don’t fuck around. I don’t let anyone think there’s something going on that’s not there.”

“How very noble of you.” Her voice is bitter like a lemon, but also with a little sugar sprinkled on top. She doesn’t like it, but she doesn’t hate me for it either.

“You asked and I was being honest. Haven’t you ever just had a good time with someone?”

She stops in front of an apartment and unlocks the door. “Will I lose cool points if I say no?”

She’s looking down at the key in the doorknob and not at me. It’s then I realize she’s serious. She’s the girl who lost her virginity to someone she loved. I was fifteen years old, when I didn’t know how to be a man. Christ, what the hell am I doing with this girl? “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.” So much like her words a few minutes ago; mine taste like lemon.

“I thought we were friends? Just because I don’t screw around with a lot of guys, we can’t be friends?”

“I didn’t say that, but you know I want you. That only makes things more… difficult.”

Delaney sighs and I feel like an asshole.

“I am so lucky I’ve been drinking right now or I’d never say these things. First, I do want to be your friend, Adrian. I want that a lot. Things are… complicated for me, but I think we’d be good… as friends.”

“But?” I step closer to her, thinking I know what she’s going to say.

“But… I think after last night it’s pretty obvious I’m attracted to you too. And while I’m not like the girls you pick up at parties, it doesn’t mean you have to pretend I’m going to break or I’m not up to your standards.”

With that she starts to open the door. I put my hand on hers, stopping her. She’s soft and warm even though it’s cold as hell out here. “Hey, I don’t think you’re not up to my standards.”

“Thanks,” she says, and I don’t add that she’s way better. That in a world full of people who are just as fake as me, there’s something about her that feels so fucking genuine.

Delaney steps inside and I’m right behind her. “Your brother’s not going to lose his shit, is he?” The door clicks closed behind me.

“He’s not here. He won’t be back all night. Plus, I’m an adult. He doesn’t have a right to lose his shit.”

“Doesn’t mean he wouldn’t.”

“Are you hungry?” she asks instead of answering.

“Yeah, but I don’t know if you can top the diner…”

She rolls her eyes. “You eat there because you don’t work there. My pancakes are way better.”

“Hmm.” I step up to her while she’s at the sink. “Care to make a little wager?” One hand is on each side of her, flat on the counter as I box her in.

“No thank you. I’ll just cook for myself if you don’t want anything.”

She shrugs and I bark out a laugh at that. I never know what to expect from her and I like it. “Fine. I’ll help. Scoot over and I’ll wash my hands.”

Casper moves and I take off my jacket and toss it on the table. The kitchen’s small, but that’s okay. It keeps me closer to her.

As I’m washing my hands, she gets ingredients from the fridge and a box of pancake mix, before starting to read the directions.

“What the hell are you doing?” I ask her.

“Seeing how many eggs to use and how much water?” Her gray eyes crinkle at the corners. It’s sexy as hell for some reason.

“Tell me you’re shitting me. You have to be.” I grab the box from her hand. “Grab a bowl for me, would ya, Chef?” A smirk peeks through. She grabs a bowl but doesn’t let go when I reach for it.

“Do you want me to show you how it’s done, or what?”

“You’re being different,” she says.

And I am. I know it. I think I might want keep on pretending for the next little while, so I pull the bowl out of her hand without replying. “The secret to the perfect pancakes is not giving a shit what the box says. Stand back while the master shows you how it’s done.”

I show her my secret pancake recipe, flipping them perfectly, and then we pile our plates and fill two glasses of milk, before she starts walking down the hall. I’m a little shocked, but I’m definitely not going to tell her I think we should stay in the kitchen.

I follow her into a bedroom and leave the door open, not really sure if she wants to be boxed in with me or not, but after setting her glass on the bedside table, she closes it.

Another thing I’m not going to complain about.

Her room is somehow exactly what I’d expect—everything matches. It’s all purple and gray. “Can I sit on the bed?” I ask.

“Unless you want to sit on the floor.”

“Wow. Tequila turns you into a smart-ass.” My glass joins hers on the bedside table. Casper kicks out of her shoes and I do the same before we both sit on her bed. We’re quiet the whole time we eat. I keep looking over at her. Studying the way her mouth moves when she chews and how her neck moves when she swallows. I watch her tongue peek out of her mouth to lick some syrup from her lip. Fuck, this girl turns me on. It has to be the innocence and the fact that she feels so impossible to get, but that doesn’t make it easier to deal with.

“So?” I ask her when both our plates are clean.

“They were all right…”

“What the fuck ever.”

She laughs and I pretend to push her before grabbing the plate from her hand. “I’ll put the plate away from the pancakes you hated but ate all of.”

She doesn’t stop me while I walk into the kitchen and put our stuff away. It doesn’t take long before I’m heading back to her room and she’s sitting on the edge of her bed. Somehow the air in the room has completely changed in the thirty seconds it took me to walk to the kitchen and back.

I feel pulled to her. A little poem beneath my skin that’s called by her rhythm, but I hold it back. Don’t let my pencil try and etch the words because it feels too close.

“Can I ask you a question?” she asks.

I shrug. “Sure.”

She tries to smile, but there’s something fake about it, like she’s changed her mind about asking me what she originally planned.

“What do you like so much about pancakes?” she asks.

Her question shoots a bullet through my chest. BBs jetting out from the round and hitting every major organ inside me. She had me in her sights and didn’t even know it. It’s not the question she wanted to ask. It’s supposed to be light, funny, but it brings back images of big brown eyes, looking up at me from the table. “Cakes! Cakes! Cakes!”

I see Ash’s chubby hands clapping. His eyes so big and happy.

My vision blurs and I suddenly want a lungful of smoke to wipe it all away. “Do you mind?” I ask as I pull out my pipe.

“Kind of…”

I shove it back into my pocket. “They’re fucking good. What’s not to love about pancakes?” The words hurt to come out, like I’m screwing with Ash’s memory by not telling her about the little boy who loved my pancakes.

“I have another one for you. What would you do if… if you knew something that could hurt someone else. Not physically I mean, but emotionally. Would you tell them?”

This question takes me by surprise and I have to think about it. I wonder what’s going on in her life, but I won’t ask.

It hurts so fucking bad to think about Ash. To miss my sister so much that I would do anything not to think about it. To be able to forget. “If they’re doing fine without knowing, why screw with them?”

And now the time for talk is over. I want to forget about everything else, so I step toward her. I get so close that when I look down, I can see her pulse in the base of her throat. See it beat like crazy. I want to lick it. Hold my finger to it and count the beats just to feel connected to her. “What are we doing here, Casper? Are we gonna keep dancing around this?” Reaching out, I cup her cheek. Run my hand through her hair. “Are you going to let me stay, or do you want me to go?”

Please tell me to stay.

Chapter Twelve

~Delaney~

I asked. I asked and he said I shouldn’t say anything. That it would be screwing with someone to tell them the truth, which in a way is exactly what Maddox said too.

“Your ghosts are back, Casper.” His voice is low but somehow echoes through me. Fills me up until he’s all I hear, or know, or think. Adrian’s thumb brushes my face, right below my eye. “Let me help you forget about them. We can forget our ghosts together for one night.”

A shiver jolts through me. I said before he was good, but good doesn’t begin to describe him. Two voices are battling it out inside me: logic, who’s telling me to make him leave. Or to tell him the truth. To do anything other than let him stay with me. It’s telling me to be strong. That staying with Adrian is almost as bad as being like my mom. That I’m weak and giving in, but God, do I want to give in. I want to listen to that other voice, which tells me I—no, not even just me—we deserve to try and chase each other’s ghosts away. Which is what I came here to do. To try and make things better.

It’s a stretch. I know it, but my body buzzes to feel his hands on me. I want to feel his words, poetry on my skin, because those secret words he wrote were beautiful. And I want to see more. To know what other magic he hides inside him.

We’ve both had so many things taken from us that I think we deserve to give something back to each other. Whatever we can.

“Stay…,” I whisper. I try to look away, but Adrian doesn’t let me. The hand on my face gently holds it in place.

“I need to know how drunk you are right now.”

“Kind of late to ask that, isn’t it?” Fake laughter forces its way from my mouth.

“It’s too late for a lot of things, but not that.”

He’s right. Adrian doesn’t know it, but that’s exactly what I need to hear. I think it’s too late. Too late to walk away and too late to pretend there’s not more to my reason for being around him. There’s something about him that I don’t want to deny. Something that speaks to me, me. When others feel like this foreign language I’m trying to work out, I somehow understand Adrian. Not all of him. I’m not that stupid. I also know it could all be in my head, but it feels real and I like him and it’s too late to turn back.

I don’t know if it was the food or our conversation, but when I speak, I know my words are true. “I couldn’t be any more sober right now.”

He gives me a small nod and walks over to the bedroom door, flipping the lock. Adrian drops to his knees in front of me, putting us at eye level. “I don’t know what it is about you that makes me want you so fucking bad.”