Fearless Like Us

by Krista Ritchie

  Banks and I finish getting rid of the dead batteries, and Sulli stretches her muscular arms over her chest. She shakes out her limbs and lets out a humongous sigh.

  “You want to talk about it, Sul?” I ask.

  She finally uncorks her bottled thoughts. “I just don’t understand what I need to do for my dad to see me as Adult Sulli and not Teenage Sulli. I’ve already moved out. Do I need a job? Is that what makes an adult, an adult? Earning your own money?”

  “It’s not about money,” Banks says, clipping his radio back on his waistband.

  She sinks down on my bed, her green eyes lifting up to us. “I’ve never really had a job besides being an Olympian—but I was still a teenager back then.” Her professional athlete days are over, but those were important her whole life and to who she is.

  I was there.

  I know what winning gold meant. The tears in her eyes. The pride on the podium. All her hard work had an ending, and the new beginning has been constantly shifting with her desires.

  Sulli collapses backwards and stares hard at the ceiling.

  I wonder if she’s thinking about how she hasn’t given a lot of thought to a paying career. At least, she hasn’t brought it up to me lately. I grew up rich, but not the kind of rich that owns mega-yachts and boards private planes.

  She’s lived a privileged life. Able to travel, to climb and swim without setting monetary goals. I’ve always seen Sulli as a free spirit, chasing the essence of the earth and water, and I never saw myself as the man paid to follow her.

  I’m sworn to protect her. I’d give my life for Sulli’s life, but Ryke wasn’t wrong. She does pay me. Kitsuwon Securities is a business that Sulli and her cousins choose to use, and we have expenses. But why does it feel weird now?

  She shouldn’t have to pay me to protect her.

  I’m her boyfriend.

  It comes free.

  Sulli’s face twists in a thought. “Maybe my dad doesn’t respect me as an adult because I’m living off my trust fund.”

  I doubt that. “Hasn’t Ryke lived off familial wealth too?” I ask. “Your grandfather owned Hale Co.”

  “Which my dad walked away from.”

  Loren Hale is the CEO of the billion-dollar baby product company. Hale Co. is best known for diapers, strollers, baby oil, shit like that, but their logo is actually on popular air fresheners, skin care lines, facial washes, and even the first-aid kits Farrow packs in his trauma bags.

  So Hale Co. is massive. Something I’ll never achieve in my lifetime, just being realistic.

  Sulli reminds us, “Most of my dad’s income comes from doing sports drink sponsorships for Fizzle.”

  Her mom is the heiress to Fizzle, along with her aunts, but I’m almost positive most of Sulli’s family wealth is tied to the billon-dollar soda empire.

  But she’s told me that before her grandfather died, he set funds in trusts for her and Winona, and he made sure they were shareholders in Hale Co.

  She’s a double heiress.

  Or what she’s said to me, a double fucking heiress.

  She has enough money to live luxuriously for the rest of her life. I’ve been working since I turned eighteen. All college aspirations burned out fast. I wanted to run a gym, and college felt unnecessary. More like a roadblock to success than a building block.

  Her frown deepens. “If not age or money, then what makes an adult? Responsibility?”

  Banks pops in the new battery. “No, then my brother would’ve been a four-year-old adult.”

  We laugh, but I end up saying, “For me, it was death.” The bedroom quiets as they listen. “Losing a parent at seventeen just woke me up to a reality I wasn’t really ready for.” I take a beat. “One day I was excited about playing drums on a college field, then the next, I wanted to burn the application and never pick up sticks again.”

  Death changed the course of my entire life.

  The legacy of my family felt more important to immortalize than some adolescent love of playing drums.

  Banks clips the mic to his collar. “By your logic, you’re saying her mom or dad need to die for her to be an adult.”

  I shove his arm. “Not what I meant, man. And maybe it’s just different for everyone.”

  He bobs his head.

  Sulli rises onto her elbows. I can tell she’s still distraught at defining adulthood.

  Banks catches her gaze as he slips a toothpick between his lips.

  “What do you think?” she asks him.

  He lifts a shoulder. “Hell if I know the right meaning of anything, but I do know that no one should be telling you who you are but you.”

  She breathes in stronger. “I want so fucking badly to just listen to my own voice and feelings about who I am. I know I’m a woman, but I want my dad to see me as more than just his little girl too.”

  She cares about what he thinks.

  So do I.

  I want Ryke Meadows’ respect. I wish I could be like Banks and say, whatever the fuck. Screw it. But I can’t shrug this off.

  Probably because I don’t like to lose, and there has to be a solution. A way out.

  I’m lost in thought when Sulli tosses a small pillow at my chest. “Kits?”

  I focus on her. “Maybe you shouldn’t pay us anymore, Sulli.”

  “What?” she winces.

  “This is a bad idea,” Banks mutters, gnawing on the toothpick.

  “I have to pay you, Kits, for your protection services. You’re my private security. I’m not letting you work for fucking free.”

  “I can manage it.”

  Can you, Nine?

  I hear my dad’s voice in my head.

  “How will you afford rent?” Sulli asks. “How will you pay Banks’ salary?”

  By crunching a shit ton of numbers.

  I push back my black hair. “Just let me handle the business end, okay?”

  “My dad got in your head,” she realizes. “You know who knows nothing about dating a bodyguard? Ryke fucking Meadows. My dad has no clue how this all works. You know who does? Moffy and Jane. They’ve made it work.”

  I’m rigid. “Farrow and Thatcher aren’t running the company, Sulli. I am.”

  Moffy and Jane are paying me.

  I pay their husbands.

  Her shoulders slowly drop, realizing that this makes a difference to me.

  Banks keeps shaking his head like it’s still a bad idea.

  But one thing I know about my friend, he’ll follow me into any bad idea I have.

  5

  BANKS MORETTI

  We exit the bedroom and start cooking. Quinn can’t stop staring at the three of us like we’ve all grown horns and tails in the past three minutes. But I’m not hiding out in the bedroom. The mermaid is starving, and we’re doing our best to whip up something edible for Sulli.

  The kitchen is in direct line of sight to the living room, and Quinn still stares.

  Hell, maybe he’s just watching Sulli try to sauté this pound of broccoli. She pushes around the vegetable on the frying pan like it’s diseased.

  I angle towards her. “Stroke it any gentler and it might jump out at you.”

  She snorts. “And what, try to kiss me?”

  I crack a smile. “No broccoli is kissing my girlfriend.” I reach over her head and flip on the fan as smoke mushrooms up.

  She elbows me softly with a blushing smile. “Broccoli is the moldy armpit of vegetables. I wouldn’t let it near my lips unless it was the only thing in your freezer.”

  Which, it was.

  I grab a spatula and help her scrape up burnt pieces. “You hate most of what you can eat and love everything you can’t.”

  “You think I should quit being vegan?” Sulli asks.

  “Unless you really are withering away, I think you should do whatever you want. If that means challenging yourself, then go for it.” We look over at each other at the same time, and I add, “But like Akara, if I see you withering, you better believe I’m going to pi
ck you up and fling you across my shoulder.”

  She laughs into this overwhelmed smile that takes my breath away. “And then what?”

  I almost feel choked. “And then I’ll carry you to the nearest McDonalds. Get you the biggest McFlurry.”

  “Extra Oreos.”

  “All the Oreos.”

  Good grief, I’m in fucking love. And by some grace of God, I have Sulli for longer than a day or week or month. I can only hope this’ll go on for years, but I’m trying not to look too far ahead and miss out on what’s right in front of me.

  She’s stopped cooking. Letting me take over, but I’m just as terrible of a chef. The best cook among us is leaning against the fridge, texting.

  Sulli watches Akara, then looks to me, “What happens to the three of us if not everyone takes our relationship as well as Quinn?”

  Is Quinn taking it well?

  On the couch, he pretends to be reading Akara’s Fortune magazine. But he’s peering coyly at us like we’re strange beasts in a stranger zoo.

  “We stick together. Come what may,” I whisper to Sulli. “Nothing’s gonna pull us apart.”

  “Not even your brother?” Sulli wonders, concern flooding the prettiest green eyes.

  She’s worried he’ll take it badly.

  Truth: he probably will. But Sulli chose me and Akara over her father. And I’m picking her over everyone else.

  “Whatever happens,” I whisper, “we’ll always choose you like you chose us. No matter which direction I’m pulled in, I’m headed in yours.”

  She breathes in, and I take her free hand, twirling her in a circle until her back ends up against my chest. I tuck her closer while we burn some vegetables together.

  And then my phone buzzes on the counter.

  I stretch an arm and grab my phone. My mouth curves up seeing the Caller ID. What timing.

  How are the cats? – Cinderella

  Alas, the six-foot-seven Cinderella is texting. It’d be better if Thatcher were actually here right now. That way he could see my eyes roll around the fuckin’ room. He goes to Switzerland for his honeymoon, and the guy forgets how good of a cat sitter I am. Typical. I shift back from Sulli to text my brother: Alive. Well fed. You and Jane will see them tomorrow. Don’t panic before then.

  One second later, he replies.

  I’m not panicking. – Cinderella

  I’m about to put my phone down when he texts again.

  I’m coming home tonight. – Cinderella

  “What?” I say out loud, too shocked to cage this thought.

  Sulli rotates more to me. “What’s wrong?”

  Boiling water starts bubbling over a pot on the stove—the pot Akara was supposed to be watching. I drop my phone this time to grab the pot and lift it off the heat.

  “Shit, sorry,” Akara says, glancing up from his phone.

  Akara usually ranges from mediocre to subpar in the kitchen. I’m still smack dab in the terrible range, but I guess I found something I’m good at. Keeping a pot of boiling fuckin’ water from overflowing isn’t an achievement I’m going to be gloating about any time soon.

  When the water simmers, I set the pot on the stovetop. “My brother is coming home tonight,” I announce.

  Akara nods like he already knows. He pockets his cell. “He just told me, too. Thatcher and Jane are cutting their honeymoon a day short because of the cats.”

  I let out an annoyed breath. “What a fucking stunad. I’m doing a good job cat sitting.”

  Akara smiles. “It’s not you. Jane misses them. Thatcher won’t admit it, but I think he does too.”

  He definitely has a gooey soft spot for those pussies.

  Not so sure I’m going to be a soft spot in my brother’s heart after he learns about my current relationship status. Thatcher would be on guard in any scenario that involves me dating Sullivan Minnie Meadows. Even when he knows I had a Jupiter-sized crush on her, he was throwing down crash pad after crash pad in front of me. Like he knew I was about to plummet out of the side of a plane without a parachute on.

  I know my brother like I know myself.

  Maybe even better.

  He’s my twin.

  And I know, for a certain fuckin’ fact, nothing will have changed in his eyes. I’m head-over-heels in love with Sulli, but Akara is paddling in the same lovesick boat as me. Thatcher won’t jump for joy over this “triad.” He’s going to think I’m gripping the short end of the stick, and one day I might not be gripping it at all.

  But I’ve been through that insecurity in Yellowstone, and I’m over it. A choice has been made, and we all chose each other. That’s enough for me.

  Right now, I’m not worried about being the odd one out, but I’m buckling up for Thatcher’s worry to assault me tonight.

  I grab the box of rotini from the cupboard. After a quick check on the ingredients, I confirm there’s no egg and I toss the contents in the water.

  More smoke plumes from the frying pan. “Cumbuckets,” Sulli curses.

  “I have it.” Akara quickly takes the pan off the heat, but he doesn’t see me pass to throw out the pasta box. Heat lances my wrist, the pan bumping into me.

  “Shit.” Akara loses his grip on the pan and drops it.

  Broccoli scatters across the ground.

  Sulli stares at the vegetable for a second. “That’s where broccoli belongs, and you know, I’m not too sad it’s there.” Her eyes hit mine. “Are you okay?”

  “All good.” Just a small burn. Nothing I can’t handle.

  Akara cringes. “I’m sorry, man.”

  “Maybe the three of us shouldn’t be allowed in a kitchen,” I say.

  Akara laughs. “Hey, I’m all for takeout.”

  Cheering escalates on the TV, and we glance towards the living room. Quinn’s still eagle-eyeing the fuck out of us, even behind the Fortune magazine. And I don’t even think he realizes he’s doing it.

  Akara looks back. “How about we take out the remnants of this pasta to the penthouse? Maybe we won’t have an audience there.”

  “Right on,” I nod.

  Sulli says, “Sounds like a fucking plan.”

  We’re able to finish cooking the pasta. Strain it. Divide it into three different paper bowls. No vegetables. No spices. I stare at my bowl of overcooked, musciad rotini that literally has only a splash of olive oil.

  My mom would be wearing a thousand different expressions of disappointment if she saw this mess. Christ, even Thatcher would be giving me shit.

  We ride the elevator up to the penthouse. Hand-to-heart, it feels like there’s no storm ahead on the ascent. No worries. No cares in the world. Just three knucklefucks in an elevator carrying bowls of disgustingly bland pasta.

  Akara keeps glancing at the red welt on my wrist. “You should ice it.”

  I wear a slight smile. “You should stick to being the boss and not the doctor.” I stab my fork into the pasta. “You’re not supposed to ice burns.”

  He sends me a look. “And suddenly Banks has an MD.”

  “No, I have an MG. I make guesses. But our MD told me not to ice burns.”

  “Farrow?” Sulli asks.

  “Yeah. The night of the townhouse fire, my dumbass was icing a burn with cold vending machine drinks.” That night I only really had minor burns. Nothing that doctors needed to treat. Nothing that left permanent scars. Not like my brother who still has lasting reminders of that horrible fucking night.

  Akara bows his head with a pained expression. “Top five worst nights of my life.” He physically pinned me down when my brother ran into the fire. When I thought I’d lost Thatcher, Akara made sure he didn’t lose me too.

  I clear a tight knot in my throat. “Yeah, let’s not talk about it then.”

  Both of their gazes soften on me.

  Akara pats my back. “I see burying painful shit is still the Moretti standard.”

  “Not that easy to break,” I say lightly, but I know if I could, I’d break the silence with them. I al
ready told them I had an older brother. Skylar. They know about his existence and his exit from this world, but I haven’t been able to really describe that night to either of them.

  It’s not just fourth or fifth in my Worst Nights ranking.

  It’s number one.

  The absolute motherfuckin’ worst. And seeing as how my dad is working for Akara now, I’m not too peachy keen on shading my dad into some kind of villain. What he said to me at twelve-years-old was just about as villainous as they come. Akara can’t know.

  I can’t tell him.

  Maybe one day I can tell her.

  “And here I am,” Sulli says, stabbing her pasta, “the over-sharer.”

  I can’t help but smile. “You can always overshare with me, mermaid.”

  She leans closer to me, and I wrap an arm around her shoulders.

  “Funny, I was going to say the same thing,” Akara says with a teasing smile on Sulli, “Minus the mermaid part.”

  Sulli elbows him. “That’s the best part.”

  Fuck it, I’m gloating.

  Akara looks unafflicted. Confidence at 110%. I’m at 100%, and I’m A-okay with losing a battle of arrogance if the winner has a surplus.

  Akara says, “You melted when he said you can overshare.”

  “Banks is good with words,” she professes.

  Nobody has ever said that about me before. I stare down at her with a swelling feeling rising in my chest. I’m already six-seven, but fuck, I feel a thousand-feet taller.

  Akara leans down and whispers in her ear. Loud enough that I can hear. “I’m better with my hands, Sul.” His fingers trail down her spine towards her ass.

  Hot fucking damn.

  I watch her squirm a little. Hell, I feel her squirm since my arm is around her shoulders. Her breath shortens, and he whispers, “There is still so much I want to do with you.” The depth in his voice makes his words sound greater. Like he’s lamenting about more than just sex. Like he’s yearning for time.

  “Kits,” she nearly whimpers, then lightly pushes his arm before grabbing onto him, bringing him closer to her other side. “So the mighty leader is becoming the follower now since you’re following Banks’ lead?”