by Portia Moore
His flower.
Even the annoying nickname seems sweet, recast in the glow of love.
“I love you too,” I whisper, leaning up to kiss him gently on the lips.
“Then, you’ll quit?” He looks down at me. “If you quit, Rain, I’ll pay for tuition next year, room, board, spending money…anything you need. Just stop working at that place.”
I let out a slow breath.
My pulse is racing again at the thought. My entire tuition.
My dream, being offered to me by a man who says he loves me. And now that I know him more than I did that day he saved me from being hauled off to jail, I realize that he means what he says. There isn’t an agenda behind it. He just wants me to be happy. He wants to take care of me.
“How about we make a deal?” I offer. “I know you don’t want me working at the club…but I could work at one of your boutiques, if that’s okay.”
Vincent nods, almost too quickly. “Absolutely,” he promises. “You start as soon as you want. I’ll do the paperwork Monday. But you have to quit tomorrow,” he asserts, a finger raised to silence me before I can thank him. “Before you get in the shower, throw that awful uniform away.”
I grin, taking a step back. I bat my eyelashes flirtatiously, pulling the dress out of my bag and holding it out in front of him. “But I kind of like it,” I say teasingly.
I see Vincent’s eyes darken, and he takes a step towards me. “I like you out of it,” he growls softly, and as he moves towards me, I back up playfully.
“Gotta come in the shower with me if you want anything,” I tease. “I’m showering first.”
“Oh, I won’t be the only one coming in the shower,” he promises darkly, as he follows me towards the bathroom.
Chapter 20
Zach
Three years earlier
It’s been three days since I’ve seen Rain. She hasn’t answered any calls or texts from me. I even tried to catch her at school but I haven’t been able to. So I’m both glad to see her and annoyed and confused. Jade is sitting on my fucking lap, wiggling her ass in an effort to get me turned on, and I have to fight the urge to push her off me the moment Rain glances away. Her bright eyes immediately darken, and she turns away from us as if she didn’t even see me at all.
“Jade, get up. I need a minute.”
She pouts, and her gaze crosses the room to Rain.
“Rain, can I talk to you?” I ask.
“We’re busy,” Roni says, her tone clipped, but I ignore her.
“Can we talk?”
She nods, her lips pressed tightly together as she follows me outside.
The minute the door is closed behind us, I turn and stare at her. “Rain, what are you even doing here? Why are you hanging out with Roni?”
She shrugs. “She’s nice to me,” she says. “I don’t really have any girlfriends, you know that. She wants to be my friend. So why not?”
“Because she’s bad news, that’s why not!” I say, shaking my head. “She’s not the kind of girl you should be hanging around.”
“What are you, my dad now?” Rain fires back. “I thought you said your friends weren’t that bad. So which is it, huh? Are they great people, or are they trouble? Because you can’t have both, Zach.”
“They’re not bad,” I say defensively. “They’re just…rough around the edges. And like I’ve said before, they’re not—”
“Not my kind of people? But they’re yours? That girl in your lap looks like you think she’s your kind of people.” Rain crosses her arms over her chest, and I can see the hurt in her eyes. “That’s why you don’t want me here. Because you don’t want me to see you with another girl hanging all over you. What happened after I left with her? What did you do with that girl? Are you dating her now?”
I grit my teeth. I don’t like being interrogated by anyone, but this is Rain. I keep my cool, only because I can’t imagine yelling at her. “Rain…you can’t be jealous,” I tell her. It sounds stupid even to my own ears—of course she’s jealous. But I need her to not be. I desperately need things to go back to the way they were before. “I need my friend,” I say softly, trying to get her to understand. “I need us to move past this—this thing about us being together. We can’t be. People in love always wind up hating each other.” I see the pain in her eyes, and I want to make it stop. I take a step closer to her, knowing even as I do that, it’s the wrong move. It’s only going to send mixed signals. But I don’t want to hurt her. “I don’t want to hate you, Rain,” I whisper.
“You could never hate me.” She looks up at me with those wide, trusting blue eyes. “And I could never hate you. We’re soulmates, Zach. Together or not together, it’s always going to be that way. It doesn’t matter how many slutty groupie girls you sleep with around here. You’re always going to wish it was me. And it doesn’t matter if I date someone, I’m always going to wish it was you.” She pushes herself away from the wall and steps away from me. “I’m making friends with Roni for the same reason I’m going to the writers’ group. I need something else in my life besides you.”
I see tears fill her eyes, just as quickly as she blinks them away. “I need something to do besides watch you fall in love with other people,” she says quietly, and then she turns away from me, heading back inside.
Shit.
Hearing her say the words she just has, has made this more real than I’ve ever thought. There’s no more playing around it or pretending it’s not happening.
I kick at the wall of the clubhouse just as I turn and see Jade standing in the door as Rain pushes past her. She strides towards me, and I clench my jaw.
Fuck. How much of that did she hear?
The older Rain and I get, the more impossible it seems for us to just be friends. The skinny, pretty little girl with clothes too big is gone. She’s beautiful, her body having curves and bends in just the right places, her lips fuller, and her eyes not as innocent as they used to be when she looks at me.
“You and her…just friends?” Jade says with a knowing smile before she slips under my arm and leans up against the wall where Rain just was, crossing her arms over her chest. She’s not wearing much makeup today, and it makes her look younger, sweeter.
More like Rain.
Except she could never be Rain.
“We’ve been friends for a long time,” I say carefully. I know I’m walking a thin line here. The truth is…I like Jade. I don’t love her—I barely know her—but she’s easy to be around. She doesn’t make me feel like I’m not good enough. I’d never have to worry about disappointing Jade. I’d never have to feel that maybe I should be something I’m not, in order to make her happy.
I might want Rain, but Jade makes sense.
“That didn’t look like just friends,” Jade says easily, no jealousy behind her words or irritation on her face.
“Rain’s like my little sister,” I tell her, exasperated. “We’ve been friends for years. I take care of her... She’s important to me. But it can’t be romantic.”
Even after all the nights I’ve spent thinking about her, not after our kiss. Not knowing how my heart feels like it’s being shredded every time I think about her dating someone else, someone else being her first…
“I have an idea.” Jade snaps her fingers in front of my face, and I jerk backward. “Let’s hang out with her more together, so she gets a feel for me. Like a double date.” Jade’s excitement is almost filling the room, and the thought of a double date makes me want to vomit.
“She doesn’t have a boyfriend,” I say, hoping it shuts the idea down.
Jade smirks. “She’s a pretty girl. I’m sure she can find a date. If she’s important to you, then I want to get to know her too.”
I look at Jade warily. It feels like a trap, but if I say no, then it’s going to be clear that my feelings for Rain are more than just brotherly, or platonic. The idea of Rain taking someone out on a date grates on me, but I just nod. “I’ll talk to her about it,” I say
calmly, trying to keep my face expressionless.
“No, don’t worry about it,” Jade says breezily. “I’ll talk to her. Like I said, I want to get to know her better.” I’m caught off guard by how sincere she sounds, but there’s something underneath it that makes me feel uncomfortable, and I realize it might not be anything with her but everything with me.
I can’t help but feel that this is going to go very badly.
Chapter 21
Rain
Present day
By the time the six-month anniversary of Vincent and my first date rolls around, my life before him seems like a distant dream. The days spent worrying about making rent, the nights slogging through endless shifts at the bar, the cups of ramen noodles, and Pop-Tarts for breakfast seem so far away that I can hardly remember them. I’ve stopped arguing with Vincent about how he spoils me and am starting to let myself enjoy it. Two days after I quit the bar, I started work at one of his boutiques, an upscale establishment that sells designer-wear lingerie. It’s nothing like any store I’d even been in before. All marble floors and black granite counters, everything polished to a high gleam, no more than two or three of each item in stock at any given time, every item unique and one-of-a-kind.
There were some growing pains, of course. It started with my new hire paperwork, where I caught the manager glaring angrily at me as I filled it out with Vincent at my side. It didn’t take me long to figure out why—he hired me at fifteen hundred dollars a week base pay, not even including the commissions I might make on sales of the outrageously expensive items the store stocked. It was clear from that moment that I wouldn’t make any friends among the store staff. They’ll be cordial and professional, but I won’t be invited out to any happy hours or going to anyone’s birthday party, that’s for certain. It’s my first glimpse into how lonely this sort of life could be. I have Vincent, but the money and privilege he is lavishing on me is going to make me more enemies than friends, especially in a situation like that—a sales associate making double what the manager of the store makes.
But he wouldn’t hear any argument. “I would give it to you regardless,” he insisted. “Now you can feel as if you’ve earned it.” My paychecks were set up to be direct deposited to my personal bank account, and by the time that six-month date rolled around, there was a number sitting in my savings account that I’ve never seen in my entire life. It was hard to believe. However, I can’t help but enjoy it…and I am feeling less and less guilty about that.
I deserve a break. I deserve to be happy. And Vincent makes me happy. I seem to be his whole world, and his world involves a life I never dreamed I might have—complete with dinners, vacations, and sex that I never even fantasized about before I met him.
Every month, my portion of the rent and utilities go to Dena and Mallory, and sometimes it is the only time that month I’ll see them. I want to see them more, but Vincent keeps me so busy—and when I’m not with him, I want to be at the store. Even so, I am only managing maybe two shifts a week, and I know every other staff member hates me. I feel guilty for being there so little—but it also makes me dread going into work. I’m not learning anything, and no one wants to talk to me.
For our six-month anniversary date, Vincent takes me back to the restaurant where we went the very first time. I mention that I want to go visit my parents. He offers the use of one of his ridiculously expensive foreign cars, but I insist on driving a rental. “I want to feel somewhat normal,” I say firmly. “And my parents wouldn’t understand. It would make them feel distant from me.”
“Let me give you your anniversary gift, then.”
I bought him a very expensive watch, engraved with his initials and the date of the first night we’d gone out. He loves it, but once again, his gestures always dwarf whatever I do. I unwrap the large, beautifully wrapped box and pull out a black Chanel bag with rose-gold hardware. I’m stuck staring at it. “Oh my god, Vincent, it’s beautiful. Thank you!”
“There’s more,” he says, smiling indulgently. He takes the bag back from me, pulling out two black velvet boxes. In one is a pair of diamond earrings; in the other, a diamond bangle bracelet. He reaches out, clasping the bracelet around my wrist and sliding the earrings into my ears as I sit here, stunned. “There,” he says finally, with satisfaction. “I like seeing you in diamonds and lingerie,” he breaths, leaning forward to kiss me again. “You look stunningly gorgeous, my Poppy. You were meant for this.”
It isn’t until I arrive at my parents’ house—in Vincent’s Mercedes that he convinced me to drive, with a $300 hairstyle, wearing designer jeans and a silk wrap top, diamond studs in my ears, and clutching my Chanel bag—that I’m embarrassed for the first time in a long time about how Vincent spoils me. Pulling up in front of the plain frame ranch that I’d grown up in, the yard slightly overgrown and my mother’s roses unattended, I feel suddenly, terribly out of place.
My mother walks out onto the porch, dressed in jeans and a loose black t-shirt. She’s always been athletic and coaches the girls' volleyball team at the school where she teaches now, but she looks slightly heavier than usual. Her face is drawn, new lines at her forehead and around her eyes, and she looks tired and pale. The last time I came to visit, she was her usual cheerful self, happy and full of energy, fit and excited about a half-marathon she’d been training to run. Dad had been better, even working a job. From seeing her now, I know that had to have changed.
I slide out of the car and see her eyes widen as I walk towards her. “Rain?” she asks, coming down the steps. “You look so, so different!”
I bite my lower lip. “I’ve got a lot to tell you, Mom,” I say, giving her a hug. “But let’s go inside?”
My father is sitting in front of the television, beer in hand, watching a football game. He grunts as I give him a kiss on the cheek, wrapping his free arm around my waist in a halfhearted hug.
“He’s half-drunk already,” my mother says flatly as we drop my bags in the guest room and walk into the kitchen. “Help me with lunch?”
“He needs to go to rehab,” I tell her as I help her slice leftover roast from their dinner two nights ago, and toast bread for sandwiches.
“Where are we going to get that kind of money, Rain?” she sighs. “I can’t afford to keep throwing money away. And it never sticks.”
“He didn’t stay the whole time last time,” I remind her. “He didn’t keep up with his AA meetings, either.”
My mother shakes her head, dismissing me. “He needs to work. Him going to rehab isn’t in the budget.” She sighs.
“But he’s not working, Mom!” I say urgently.
She relents. “It’s too dangerous for him to be out on the construction sites when he’s hungover, and the boss caught him drinking on the job again. So now he’s home for two weeks, no pay, supposed to dry out and go back. You see how that’s going. And he’s not going to get many more chances.” She glances at me as I spread mayo and horseradish on bread. “You look really great. You can’t be making that much money at the bar place, can you?” she asks, scrutinizing me.
“Thanks,” I tell her, my cheeks flushing. I take a handful of chips out of the bag and pile them
onto a plate. “Here’s Dad’s.”
When she walks back in, she’s staring at me thoughtfully. “What’s going on, Rain? How are you affording all of this?” she says, gesturing to my new appearance.
I add chips to our plates and we sit down. I let out a long sigh. “I…I wanted to tell you that I have a boyfriend, Mom.”
She looks at me as if that’s not an explanation.
“Vincent. He’s really sweet,” I say quickly. “And he takes care of me. He really wants me to be happy…he’s even helping me go to school next year.”
“Are you still working at the bar?”
“No…” I say slowly. “I’m working at one of his boutiques. As a sales associate.” Her eyebrow shoots up.
“His boutiques? Meaning he owns them?” she asks with a fro
wn. My skin is heating up as the conversation continues. I nod. Her eyes narrow in on mine.
“How old is this boyfriend, Rain?” she asks tightly.
“He’s only thirty-six Mom,” I say, already preparing for her reaction, which is as predictable as I knew it would be. The wide eyes, the disapproval in her expression. I know what she’s going to say before she even says it.
“That’s almost forty, Rain! What does a forty-year-old man who owns several boutiques want with a girl who’s not even twenty?”
“He’s not forty, Mom. And he loves me,” I say defensively. She’s already nodding her disapproval.
“Are you living with him?” she asks me pointedly. My face is on fire by this point.
“No,” I mutter, not looking at her. It isn’t exactly a lie. She lets out a long disappointed sigh.
“But you’re working for him. As a sales associate. And this job pays enough to buy a Chanel bag, and wear real diamond earrings?”
“Yes,” I say, feeling a tremble in my voice.
“Does it? Or does he just give you the money under the guise of working for him?”
The comment cuts a little too close to the bone for my comfort. “He’s not like that, Mom,” I say sharply. “He just wants to make my life easier, that’s all.”
“Rain, you went to Chicago to get a good job and save for school. That’s what you told me.” She’s covering her face now, and I feel embarrassed, guilty, and cheap.
“I did. I’m still working, and I’m saving. He’s going to help me pay for school, Mom.” I’m whining now sounding like a child begging for a puppy.
“So he’s rich,” she says, seeming as if it’s taking everything in her to keep the disdain out of her voice that is showing under her reluctant expression.