“Hold her,” I say. No one will do a thing to me.
“Riley, no—”
I push Danika into his arms and rush to Rhett’s side, pushing my hands against the wound. His eyes are unfocused, staring blearily up at the sky as he gasps for breath.
Someone else is being yelled at for panicking. I can’t understand a word being said around me, but I pick up a few.
“Stop resisting.”
“Put your fucking hands up!”
I turn to the officer abusing his power behind me. “Shut up!” I shout. “People are hurt, call for buses, help us—”
My words cut off on a broken gasp. At the top of the stairs, my dad is sprawled out on the stairs like a marionette without its strings. His eyes are open but rolled back in his head, blood splattered on his cheek and chest.
Next to him, Mikey lies still.
There are cops beside them both, but not trying to save them. They look defeated, murmuring amongst themselves as if there isn’t a cloud of hysteria around.
“Daddy...” I hear myself saying. “No.”
I don’t remember anything after that.
Linc says I fainted.
The shock of the event was too high for me to even feel it coming, and seeing my father lying dead on the ground beside my motionless uncle sent me over the edge completely. I passed out over Rhett’s body, my hands still against the gaping hole in his neck.
Rhett is very pleased at having bullet holes in his body—says it’s the only good thing I’ve brought into his life at this point, besides making Linc smile once in a while. He jokes about it like it’s no big deal. Linc tells me that’s his way of coping with life-altering events. I’m determined it’s his way of reminding me it happened whenever he feels I’m not feeling guilty enough.
The doctors tell me I saved his life. I should feel good about that. But it doesn’t feel like enough.
Duke was arrested and charged with conspiracy. He got released, eventually, after Carly’s dad took his case and convinced a judge he had no idea his friend would be causing any harm. He ended up defending most everyone who got charged or ticketed for purely bullshit reasons.
For the most part, everything is as I wanted it. Right? I have Lincoln, and he’s safe to hold my hand.
That’s all I wanted in the end. I want to be safe in my happiness, free to love who I please without worrying word will get back to my family.
I never wanted him to end up dead over my actions.
It’s like a bad dream. I can rewatch it on a loop in my mind’s eye, but it feels like I’m watching myself move through a video game. My body floats through the darkness and sees everything happen, but I wasn’t there. Not really.
I don’t think I’ve come back to my senses since.
The grass is wet, my ass damp as I slump in the grass. I’m rested back on Lincoln’s chest, his legs bent at my sides keeping me upright. We’ve been like this for hours after the burial ended. We didn’t have any family out, in spite of my attempt to contact Ryker. The rest of the attendants were people in our community, neighbors, old friends—and a lot of policemen and women stopped by to show their respects.
They all left to have a beer in celebration of my father. I just curled up on his new grave and wondered if I’d ever feel whole again.
“I didn’t want to have lunch with him,” I say, suddenly into the quiet.
Linc tightens his hold around me, kissing the back of my head. “That’s okay.”
“But I believed him,” I say. “I think he actually would’ve tried to be better. To accept you, at the very least. And I still didn’t want to have lunch with him. I didn’t want to forgive him.”
“That’s still okay,” he says. “He did a lot of unforgivable things. You don’t owe him anything, not even in death.”
I sigh and lean my head back on his shoulder. “I miss him,” I admit. “I hate him. And I love him. And I’d give anything for one more hug from him.”
Linc nods, resting his face in the crook of my neck. “It’ll make sense one day,” he says.
I close my eyes and ground myself with his presence. His breath fans over my neck, his arms strong and warm around my chest. He’s the only thing that feels real, solid, safe. His heartbeat thumps against my spine, a gentle rhythm that encourages mine to keep fighting.
“I hope so,” I answer finally.
“It will,” he says. “And I’ll be here when it does.”
I turn my face toward his, bumping my nose against his cheek. He asked if I’d blamed him for losing my dad. Maybe for a moment I did—if I’d never reached out, it might not have happened. Dad would still be alive. He’d just be a gorgeous stranger I shared a kiss with. A beautiful what-if.
But I don’t want him to be a beautiful what-if. I want him, for now, forever, for always.
My heart is in pieces, and so am I. But he’s here, and I wouldn’t sacrifice that for anything.
“Take me home, Gorgeous,” I say. I’m not ready, but I don’t think I ever will be.
He pushes my head back, large hand cupping my throat, and kisses me so tenderly I think my pieces just may fit back together one day. “As you wish, Trouble.”
Riley sleeps restlessly, her head pillowed against my chest and fists resting against my sides. It’s pushing noon, and we have nowhere to be. I’m grateful she’s sleeping. I put in my best effort to knock her out cold last night. I escorted her to bed and ravaged her body until she was boneless, until tears were spilling from her eyes but she still begged for more.
So I was showing off. I didn’t hear her complaining.
It’s been five years since she lost her dad and uncle in a mass shooting at the courthouse. Five years since she made the ultimate sacrifice and put herself on blast, since she realized her platform and power. We don’t talk about that night if we can avoid it. The only painful reminder is a light, jagged scar on her left hip, and the whole two pictures she keeps around of her and her dad.
She still wakes up in cold sweats, sobbing into her pillowcase. She’s grown tired of hearing herself lament, so sometimes, I pick her up and we sit in the shower together. The water runs cold, the steam suffocates the memories out of us both.
I’m haunted by the murder of a man who would’ve killed me and my mother. Her nightmares are of her own father. Being shot to save me, going on trial for me, losing everything for me.
She said she’d fight for me, and I doubted her. I was wrong. She’s done more than her share in backing me up, in speaking the truth. She doesn’t talk to Cheyenne and Carly anymore—they moved in together, put a damper on the friendship. Paris is still around, though, and Rhett has made a friend in Cheyenne’s older brother, Mason.
It’s for the best, really, in the long run. But the pain cripples her on the bad days.
Once, she cried to me that it was her fault her dad was dead. She should’ve been more vocal, argued his points when she first started questioning them. It all could’ve ended so differently, she thinks. He’d done too many unforgivable things by the time she met me, but he may have had hope.
Part of her knows that’s not true. Same as I know I wouldn’t be alive today if I didn’t shoot Royce. But it doesn’t make the guilt any less of a burden, no matter how many hours of therapy we throw at it. What if will always hang over both of us.
She doesn’t like to talk about it. In fact, we haven’t really talked about him in years. She focuses on other things, current issues.
She’s at every rally and protest and picket with me. She holds me in public, hangs off my shoulders whenever she can. She kisses me in front of crotchety old racists, until their skin crawls and they curse and storm away.
The world has made some progress in the last half decade, but we still have a long way to go. And for her, seeing how slow our forward motion is, how hard we fight and how loudly we celebrate the smallest victories, it ignites fires in her she didn’t know she had.
She got a first hand view of the darkness in the
world, and all she wants to do is shine a light.
She doesn’t think it’s enough, anything she does. But she’s the light in my darkness, and that’s more than enough for me.
A soft groan spills from her lips and she stretches, arms reaching, toes pointing, her whole body trembling with the effort before she collapses even heavier than before. She sighs and rolls over, glaring at the open window. “Mmph,” she sighs. And then, she’s sound asleep again.
The homeowner’s backyard is pristine. Acres of open space with over two feet of fluffy snow on the ground call me to put my snow boots back on and rush through the fluff until I’m covered in it. We do this vacation every year, and the owners know us on a first name basis by now. Two weeks hidden in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, Alaska, looking for moose.
Riley will officially wake up soon, and to avoid crankiness, that means I should have coffee ready. Holding back a groan as to not wake her, I untangle myself from the sheets and sneak into the kitchen. The cabin is fully decked out with a variety of coffee and tea choices, and over the last week Ri and I have experimented with all of them.
French vanilla is good. Mocha is better. My girl says hazelnut tastes like butt, but it happens to be my favorite. I brew that for myself when I’m giving her a hard time for no good reason. Call me a sadist, I have a good time watching her struggle. She scrunches her nose up and everything.
“You left me,” Riley growls. She rubs her knuckles against her eye, glaring at me sleepily as she stumbles nearer.
“I’m making coffee.” I grin and reach for her, pulling her tired body against my chest. She leans her back against me, tilting her head back on my shoulder as she squeals out a yawn.
“Fine,” she sighs and smacks her lips together. “Acceptable reason.”
I chuckle and tilt my head down, pressing a wet kiss to the side of her neck. “You sleep okay?”
“Like the dead,” she says. “How could I not? You wore me out like it was your job last night.”
I can’t hold back from smirking against her soft skin, moving my lips to her ear to whisper, “If I remember right, you were the one begging for another round.”
A tremor runs up her spine and she draws in a shaky breath. “You’ll have to follow through this morning,” she says, trying for confidence through the haze I put her in. “Which means, I need this coffee even more than I thought I did.”
“Oh, I could wake you up just fine without it,” I laugh, swatting her ass before leaving her at the sink to fetch the creamer out of the fridge and the mugs off the wall. Her lip is caught between her teeth as a pink flush creeps up her neck, a newfound alertness in her eyes at my promise.
Coffee schmoffee. I’m your Huckleberry.
She looses a deep breath and pushes the curtains over the sink open, shifting her focus away from the anticipation of returning to the bedroom. A moose is traipsing around the yard, rustling his snout through the bushes to reach the leafy goodness beneath the snow. He raises his head at the noise from inside the house, and huffs when he sees it’s just us once again.
“Moose,” Riley declares. It’s not the first sighting by any means, but we still make a joke out of the whole thing.
She looks so cute, standing there in my tee shirt, half of her long brown hair a ratted up mess, smears of make-up under her eyes and the corners of her mouth. Soft purple bruises decorate her thighs and neck, little gifts she begged for to show the world she’s mine.
She’s all mine. Officially. Fearlessly. She doesn’t give a damn what anyone else thinks or feels or says. It’s us against the world, lionhearted and indifferent to hate and negativity.
Love trumped all in our story.
I had such an elaborate fucking plan for this. But let’s be honest, I have elaborate fucking plans for everything and I am never able to follow through. It’s little shit like this, the cute oblivious behavior she exhibits that does me in and I can’t hold back anymore.
“Babe,” she prompts when I don’t immediately return to her side to admire the moose. “Our friend is outside again.”
I abandon the creamer and the mugs on the counter and drop to one knee behind her, bedhead and all, and perch the jewelry box at the tips of my fingers, waiting for her impatience to take over. My heart is sprinting in my chest, thumping up into my throat with such force I worry it will tumble past my lips and suicide itself right here on the kitchen floor.
I’m terrified, but this is what I want. She is all I want.
She huffs and turns, as suspected, her hand floating towards me before she sees I’ve made my way to the floor. She’s scared for a moment before she sees the box, and her mouth falls open in a silent gasp. Her skin goes pink, green eyes wide as saucers, and for a moment, we’re completely still. Neither moving, breathing, or thinking.
I push the box open in a meek attempt to break the tension. A gold ring with a square emerald, and two small accent diamonds on either side sits inside, wedged between two miniature velvet pillows
“There’s a moose,” Riley manages brilliantly.
I smile. “He’s my witness.”
“Witness,” she breathes, then heated embarrassment flashes in her eyes and she presses her lips together anxiously.
“Riley Allison McLeon,” I say, trying to spare her from her rambling. This isn’t the magnificent setting I’d planned—we’re not far out in the wilderness, or standing in front of a million bigots on capitol hill, or traipsing in front of newscasters at a protest against police brutality—but maybe I can still make my proposal special. “You—”
“Yes,” she says before I can get a single word out. “Yes, a million times yes, Lincoln.”
She throws herself down on the floor with me, tackling me to the hardwood floor and hugging my neck so hard I can barely breathe. Her whole body shakes with excitement, her face split with a megawatt smile that melts me from the inside. I laugh at her antics, hugging her close to my body. “I was just gonna ask if you wanted sugar for your coffee,” I tease.
“Oh shut up,” she giggles.
“Seriously, I had a whole speech,” I huff. “You ruined the whole thing.”
“Ask me. C’mon, finish,” she prompts, swatting my chest with both hands and looking down at me eagerly. “Get on with it, I wanna say yes.”
I’m still laughing when she sits up and straddles my waist, but I offer the ring once again. She has struck my stupid, her favorite pastime, and all I want now is to kiss her. “Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
“That’s your speech?” she asks, raising a skeptical brow.
“I forget now, I have an angel sitting on me,” I say honestly. “It was something about you being the love of my life and I never want you to be anyone else’s trouble. Might’ve been an I-love-you in there, a couple tears. Definitely a big middle finger to the world.”
She snorts and slides her hands up my shoulders, leaning in close until our lips are nearly touching. “I’m sorry I got so excited and missed out on that.”
I beam at her. “Is that a yes, future Mrs. Sanders?”
“That’s a hell yes, Mr. Sanders,” she says.
I take her hand, trembling with anticipation and smiling brighter than I’ve ever smiled before. I slip the ring on her shaking finger, giving her a moment to admire it while I admire her. She’s lit up from the inside, the first time I’ve seen genuine, unabashed joy on her pretty face in a long, long time.
And then I’m pulling her down into my arms and kissing her like she’s the very air I need to breathe.
Our first kiss as an engaged couple.
As the future Mr. and Mrs. Sanders.
It’s perfect.
It’s flawless.
Loving her is fearless.
fin.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It is a damn miracle this book actually made it into the real world. No shit. It is one of the hardest things I have ever written, and in the four years I have labored over it, I have nearly burned it a
million times. Riley and Lincoln wanted their story to be told and fought me at every attempt to quit, but if it weren’t for a few of my biggest cheerleaders, this book wouldn’t exist.
There is no particular order to this. I legit put you all in a randomizer so I wouldn’t have to decide who comes first because you all have helped so much, there’s no way I could prioritize you that way.
Cassie Chapman, you beautiful bitch, I hope one day I can adequately express my undying love for you. Thank you for reading the very rough fetus drafts of this puppy and encouraging not only the idea, but the blunt edges. Your support of keeping racism front and center helped more than you’ll ever know. And thank you for creating the MOST PERFECT cover I could ever dream of, and out of the literal nothing I gave you to work with. You are an actual gift from the otherworld. I love you.
Sam Destiny, my one and only, you keep me going. I hope you know how much I love and appreciate every little thing about you. Our conversations mean the world to me and your declarations of love make me smile on even the darkest days. I hope one day I will see in myself the author that you do.
Lissa Lynn Thomas, believe this—I would have thrown this fucker away if it weren’t for you. It would go under my bed and collect dust for all eternity. Your love of Linc and your unyielding enthusiasm is truly what gave me the strength to hit publish.
ALISSA. YOU BRILLIANT SQUIRREL. Editor queen, beautiful crazy, wonderful rodent sister of mine, I am so happy I found you. You get the jumbled garbage disposal that is my brain and help make the pretty words readable. Thirteen thousand words of this book are all because of you. It would never have been the same book without your special touch. It just wasn’t as good without your magic.
Nadège, my queen, I only hope to one day be as brilliant and talented as you are. Look at this book, look at the eyeporn you have performed (and I am writing this before you’ve even had the chance). You inspire me every single day, and I strive to be half the woman you are when I grow up. Thank you for everything, and especially for being fearless in all that you do.
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