Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 162567 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 813(@200wpm)___ 650(@250wpm)___ 542(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 162567 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 813(@200wpm)___ 650(@250wpm)___ 542(@300wpm)
And that’s when I see the Rochesters. Wyatt, Will, Wesley, Winnifred, and their parents. Blue-blooded, affluent WASPs, dressed in black designer suits and dresses like they’re East Coast socialites—which they are. Wesley Rochester, Will’s younger brother, has a snide smirk aimed at me that I’d love to wipe off.
He whispers to Will, who’s avoiding my cold, lethal glare.
In the back of my head, I hear Will Rochester saying, fuck you, Sulli, from months ago, and I almost see red.
“Thatcher to Banks, don’t engage.” My brother is on comms and in my ear. “Stand down.”
I tear my glare off them.
Get her bracelet.
In and out.
“Whoa.” A nearby voice triggers my focus. My head jerks to my ten o’clock.
Seated next to the stairs, a college-aged girl with a blonde high-bun is pointing her phone at me. She’s recording or snapping photos. “Which one are you?”
Before I became famous, I’d answer honestly. Nicely, actually.
But my patience has short-circuited. It’s not her fault. Not really.
“The tall one,” I say.
Her nose crinkles. “No, I mean, are you Thatcher Moretti or Banks Moretti?”
My stomach churns. Ignore. But hell, I don’t want anything I do to come back to my brother. “Banks,” I tell her.
She gasps. “Are you nervous about Sullivan Meadows swimming today?”
I used to think it was funny how fans use their full names. Sullivan Meadows. Maximoff Hale. Jane Cobalt. Christ, no one even calls her Jane Moretti.
Marriage.
I shove the word away fast, my heartbeat spiking.
My narrowed gaze meets her phone’s camera. I didn’t sign up for some random girl’s insta-story. So I rotate my body and close off to the girl. Muscles stiff. Come on. One stair up.
Another.
I put more and more distance between her and me. But the further I climb, the more eyes pin to me. The stares slide a cold chill down my spine.
Six-seven.
Can’t hide.
“Hey.” A familiar, sharp-edged voice cuts into the crowd. “Can you guys make some room? Jesus, this isn’t a midnight Avengers release. We all don’t need to be dead-stopping on the staircase.”
Loren Hale.
“Fucking move,” Ryke Meadows adds.
Like the crowd has been zapped by an electric current, everyone picks up their pace. Ryke and Loren are standing at the edge of their row. Both glare at the crowds, not giving a shit what it means for their public image.
I wear a slight smile. Feeling a kinship on that front. Akara would be the first to say that it’s been freeing. Having no more fucks to give.
Once I’m close enough, Ryke nods down to me. “You alright, Banks?”
“Yes, sir.” I take a tight breath. Hating that I said sir after he went at me for the whole yes, sir thing a while back. But this doesn’t seem to bother him.
He just reminds me, “You don’t need to call me sir.”
“Yeah.” I nod to him again. “You have Sulli’s brace—”
Before I finish, he’s cursing and reaching into his pocket. “I fucking forgot. Fucking fuck.”
Lo laughs. “Anymore fucks and they’ll be kicking us out. There are children here.”
Ryke growls into a groan, “I’m trying.”
Families do pack the stands, but I’ve tried not to notice.
What kind of father will I be?
There it is.
That question again.
It freezes me over for a second. My dad bombed hard at fatherhood. He left my mom, my brother, and me without a second thought. When shit hit the fan and he lost one son, he decided to lose us all. I can’t—for a moment—believe I have that in me. To leave my kid. To abandon them.
But I am my father’s son.
I have his DNA.
I have some parts of him that I don’t even understand. All my life it’d been so easy to not lay roots. And if I don’t ground myself to anything, then I can’t be accused of abandoning it. I’m terrified of being like him.
Of having some inherited thing that I can’t excise away.
And part of me thinks maybe all this time—not jumping into a serious relationship—that was my dad in me all along. He never remarried after my mom, and as far as I know, he’s never had anything serious since.
I’m different now, I assure myself.
I have Sulli.
I have Akara.
I’m different than him.
Stay frosty.
I blink back those thoughts. Coming to focus on the space around me. I’m stuck in the middle of the staircase waiting for Ryke to find Sulli’s bracelet.
“Fuck, shit, fuck.” He curses under his breath, emptying out every pocket in his jeans.
Loren stares at his brother like he’s out of his mind. “Children,” Loren whisper-hisses in a reminder. “Sensitive ears. Sensitive souls. Those little things.”
I’m gonna have one of those little things.
I rake a tensed hand across my unshaven jaw. Good grief, Ryke has no clue his daughter is pregnant. And I’m standing in front of my girlfriend’s dad cradling this massive secret.
“Sorry, Banks.” He eyes me for a split-second while he keeps digging in his ass pockets.