by Chloe Cox
I think that was the exact moment I grew up: when I decided to be good enough because someone I loved needed me to.
I spent a lot of nights with Harlow after that, sneaking in and out, just letting her hold on to me.
Shit, just thinking about this is hard. I can’t even imagine how much harder it is for Harlow. Because no matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried, I could never make it better for her. I could never figure out how to take that pain and make it fully mine. That was hers forever.
And I’m thinking about that now while I wait for her and Dill, while I keep seeing them out of the corner of my eye only to realize that it’s wishful thinking again, because this is the first time in my life I’ve felt like I did when I saw Harlow’s heart break that day. Because I have no fucking idea how to fix what I’ve broken.
But I have to figure it out. I have to find a way to make it up to her, and I have to do it without telling her why I left. Because if I tell her—if she finds out—she’ll pick a fight that she’ll lose, and she’ll put herself in Alex Wolfe’s crosshairs. Harlow Chase will always choose to go down swinging, and this time she’ll lose everything she has all over again.
That is not going to happen.
I will move mountains, I will go to prison, I will do anything before I let that happen again.
And as Harlow rounds the corner with Dill right behind her, I’m reminded why. She’s fucking perfection. I don’t know what anyone else sees and I don’t care. I see the best woman I’ve ever known, her blonde hair tied up in a loose knot, a few loose strands dancing around her face, her eyes bright and big, her lips just as soft as I remembered. It’s a gray day, like it might rain, everybody else looks miserable. She glows.
She moves. I don’t know why, but the way she moves, like she’s aware of every single motion of her body, her curves, her limbs, her hips—it drives me insane. It’s like she dances without knowing it.
I exhale and curl my hands. It’s like getting smacked in the face with just how amazing she is, how no woman can ever live up to her, so I stand there, immovable, trying to roll with the blow.
No chance. No way to roll with it. Full impact, every time.
And then her eyes meet mine and the world around us grinds to a stop. I don’t know why it’s different now, but it is. Maybe it’s because now we’ve known each other, physically. Maybe it’s because we’ve both had five years to think about every moment, every memory, every desire, and now it’s all finally spilling out. Maybe it’s just because now we’re ready for each other. But this thing between us, this thing that happens when I look at her and know she’s looking back at me the same way, this thing is powerful. I feel the shift and I swear to God the air around her shimmers, and the crackling of the heat between us raises the hairs on the back of my neck.
It’s not gentle, like it used to be. It’s raw. Primal. Animal.
I can tell she’d leave marks across my back. I can tell I'd make her scream.
Goddamn, she almost snarls at me. I stride over, carving a path in the sea of kids and parents, making straight for them.
It’s good that Dill is here to bring us both back down to earth.
“Lo?” he says, and tugs at her sleeve. I look down at him briefly, but I can only keep my eyes off of Harlow for so long.
I breathe deeply and try to be a better man.
“Lo, they’re boarding,” Dill says. He looks at me, I guess finally picking up on the fact that there’s something going on here, and I can see that look of puzzlement, of almost-recognition.
“Hi, Dill,” I say.
That snaps Harlow out of it. “Don’t,” she warns.
I can’t help it. I don’t know why. Something in me is possessive as hell over both of them.
“Does he know he got that from me?” I ask. “Calling you Lo?”
“You’re Marcus, aren’t you?” Dill says, and now both Harlow and I snap out of it and look at Dill like he’s got two heads. Or maybe just one really smart head.
“Yeah,” I say, wondering what the hell that means to Dill. What does he know? Screw it. I put my hand out. “Nice to meet you again, Dill.”
Dill shakes my hand solemnly.
“Be nice to my sister,” he says.
Damn. I’m in trouble now. I look up at Harlow, and yup, she is pissed. Well, the damage is done. I might as well roll with this if I can.
“I promise,” I say just as solemnly. I mean it, too.
“Ok, good,” Dill says, as if that’s settled now. “Lo, I really have to go now. They’re all getting on the bus, choosing seats, and what if I have to sit by myself? I don’t—”
“Dill, relax,” Harlow says, and the anger in her face fades, replaced by affection. She bends at the knees and meets her little brother face to face. “Promise me you’ll try to relax. You’ll have fun, right?”
Dill takes a deep breath and blows out it with big cheeks, like a blowfish. Looks like he’s just as much of a stress case as Harlow is.
“I promise. Can I go now?”
Harlow gives him one last hug, embarrassing the kid, and then shoves him off in the direction of the bus. “Go! Have fun! Send me a text as soon as you get there!” she calls after him. Dill ignores her, like a kid who can take that kind of love for granted is supposed to.
I am so damn proud of Harlow.
Oh, Christ, I am so proud of her. And at the same time I don’t ever want to think of her having to do this alone.
Damn.
The bus driver honks his horn, and all the parents scatter out of the way, waving furiously. Harlow is just one of them, waving at Dill, trying to pretend she’s not feeling anxious and worried and probably just plain emotional, watching him go away to camp for the summer.
And then the bus is gone, and Harlow’s gaze sweeps back around and finds mine. The thing between us now is thicker, heavier, bearing the weight of all those years. Everything I’ve done.
It’s angrier.
“I just want you to know one thing,” she says, and I feel her voice crack against my skin, driving in deep. I want her so bad it hurts.
“What?” I say.
She’s breathing different. Faster. So am I.
“I only agreed to this for one reason,” she says, her eyes holding mine. “Because I want a goddamn explanation. I deserve an explanation. I am going to get it, and then I am going to be done with you, Marcus.”
I lick my lips, looking at hers. Everything she said made sense except for that last part. It was such a transparent lie. Even she knows it.
“That’s understandable,” I say. “But it’s not going to happen.”
Her eyes flash. It occurs to me that though I taught Harlow how to fight in the physical sense, I’ve never been on the other side of it. I’ve never been her adversary. Until now.
The messed up thing is that I want to tell her. I want to tell her why I left, why I couldn’t help her the first night Dill came home, why she had to go through all of this without me. And I can’t, or Alex Wolfe will come after her.
I’m actually curious about what will happen next when we’re interrupted by the last person in the world I want to see.
Brison Wolfe.
chapter 7
HARLOW
I’m just about to lay into Marcus for telling me I’m not going to get the answers I need—I mean, like hell I’m not, that is the whole point of this ridiculous arrangement—when his face darkens and he pulls me close to him.
It’s so sudden I don’t know exactly how to react. I haven’t been this close to him in years. I haven’t felt the heat of him, the hardness of him, the maleness of him. It all overwhelms and bypasses the higher functions of my brain, going straight for my core, and igniting my more animal urges.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Marcus barks.
I blink. It’s only then that I recover enough to look back, to just behind where I’d been standing. There’s a man there, tall and gorgeous, like Marcus, and with light gray eyes,
but fair-haired. There’s a similarity there.
Maybe it’s just the shared look of arrogance. I shake Marcus off, annoyed at myself for my moment of weakness, and look between these two men. There’s suddenly a whole lot of tension in the air. And this new man is looking at me, not at Marcus, his eyes appraising.
I shiver and rethink my decision to step away from Marcus.
“Just checking out the neighborhood, seeing what it has to offer,” the man says. “Just like you.”
I look up to see the muscle on the side of Marcus’s jaw tense, but he doesn’t say anything. I feel like I’m about to see a fight.
“Excuse me,” I say. “And you are?”
“This is Mr. Wolfe’s son,” Marcus says, biting off those words as though he hates the taste of them in his mouth. He hasn’t taken his eyes off this other man—Mr. Wolfe’s son, apparently, who I did not know about—but he’s moved closer, so that I stand somewhat back, behind him.
Well. Alex Wolfe's son. That explains it.
The man laughs. “‘Mr. Wolfe’s son?’ That’s cold, Marcus, even for you.” Gray Eyes smiles brilliantly at me and puts his hand out. “I’m Brison Wolfe.”
I’m not normally rude, but I don’t want to shake his hand. I feel like there’s something more going on here than I know, even beyond Marcus’s involvement with the Wolfe family, and I don’t like it. I don’t like being ignorant, I don’t like being out of control. I don’t like feeling crowded by Wolfe men when they’re trying to get me to do something. I just look at Brison’s hand until he puts it down with a shrug.
“Maybe that’s why you look familiar,” I say. “Did you grow up here?”
“They lived out on Long Island,” Marcus says. “Nice big house.”
The change in Marcus’s voice gets my attention. It sounds strained, pulled tight and taut, right on the breaking point. I look up at his face like I expect to be able to read him the way I used to, and I’m only reminded of how much time has passed between us when I don’t know immediately what’s going on his mind. It’s the weirdest kind of near-déjà vu, and it unsettles me. Because the thing is, I can read Marcus’s emotions plain as day, just like I always could. He’s furious, and he’s protective—of me.
But I don’t know why. I have no idea what he’s reacting to, what’s going on his life, what kind of history he has with this Brison. At least not the specifics of it. And this is getting weird. Maybe it’s natural that Brison Wolfe would be in the area, helping his father out while Alex Wolfe is apparently working with the developers to make sure everything goes through smoothly. But Marcus works for Alex Wolfe, too. It’s not like they’re on different sides of the issue.
And then I suddenly remember that I am on the other side of the issue, and both of these men are here messing up my neighborhood and my life. That Marcus is not my friend, and that whatever macho pissing contest is going on between Marcus and Brison has nothing to do with me.
And I know this—I know this, even if I have to remind myself of it—because Marcus chose to go work for Alex Wolfe. He chose to leave me the way he did, and he did it like it was the easiest thing in the world.
So I watch Marcus practically snarl at Brison, like Brison is invading his territory or something, and I kind of can’t believe it. I’m not Marcus’s territory.
In fact, I can’t trust him at all.
Right?
“Jesus,” I mutter. Neither of them seem to notice.
And I’m trying not to notice Marcus like he is now, his shoulders back, his arms tense, his back stretching his leather jacket to its limit. Getting all primitive and possessive, putting himself between another man and me, his moods mercurial and mystifying. I want to tell him he’s a jerk and then beg him to fuck me.
What is wrong with me?
“Ok, well,” Brison says, shaking his head, “this has been awkward, so Marcus, thank you for that. Harlow, I hope to see you around the neighborhood.”
“You stay away from her,” Marcus growls, and I have to do a double take.
I’m not even thinking about how ridiculous the whole thing is anymore. Or why Marcus feels the need to turn full caveman. I’m not thinking about anything but how much I want him, because it all just hit me in a frightening, dysfunctional rush. It washes over me like a tide, heat pooling between my legs, my skin prickling with electric awareness, my knees feeling weak from the pressure of it, and not for the first time I feel like I’m overcome by him. Only it’s not him, this time, not in the same way—I don’t feel close to him in the same way that I did back then. But I want all of him. I want this darkness that I see.
It’s overwhelming.
It’s more than that. It’s debilitating. I have to fight it.
I stop and close my eyes, and the first thing that comes back to me is a memory I can’t handle right now—right after my parents died, Marcus comforting me, holding me while I dissolved in his arms. My mind quickly shies away, and the memory fades into the darkness like some rare and terrible fish, flashing away into the depths. What I’m left with, though, is something helpful. I’m left thinking about how Marcus’s training helped me through that.
Marcus taught me how to push through the pain. How when you hit that wall you need to push into the pain, let it become you, until you break through to the next level and get your much-needed reward of endorphins. And so that was how we approached the grief, too. It was weird—I don’t know if it’s like this for everyone, but for me grief was almost like getting a stomach bug. You’d think you were ok—or what passed for ok—and then it would hit you in this sudden wave of sickness and despair, and you’d be in utter hell until the wave would pass. I pushed through that pain the same way I pushed through the body pain at the end of a round, letting it wash over and through me, and the wave would eventually subside, leaving me exhausted but relatively free.
Fighting it like that makes it less terrifying. It makes you feel like you’re in control of what happens to you, of the choices you make. I asked Marcus about it once, after one horrible workout, when I was just flattened, lying on the concrete floor of Pops’s gym.
“Why do we do this to ourselves?” I panted. “It’s not normal.”
I remember the sound of his laugh, echoing in the empty gym. “We’re not normal,” he said. “I need it. Need to find that space, when you’re just about to give up…”
“But you keep going,” I finished for him.
“You decide who you’re going to be,” he’d said.
It was clearly something he’d thought about before.
I could read into that all day if I wanted to. But the main thing was that we were alike. We understood each other. And it was because he understood me that he could teach me. And it was because he could teach me that I survived what happened later.
And since it was Marcus who taught me about love and lust, too, now I’m wondering if the same technique will work here. If I can just push through these waves of intense attraction, of wanting him so badly I can practically feel myself vibrate with need, of wanting him to just shut up about everything, stop trying to tell me lies or make it up to me, and just do what I want. Give me something that will make it all stop.
I don’t want to hear him. I don’t want to have to forgive him. I just want to get over him, and for that I feel like I need him. It’s like an itch I need to scratch. And I know that I can’t.
I touch his hand.
I see the sensation of that touch travel through his body, I see it ripple up his arm, his shoulder, his neck, until he’s turning to look at me, his expression softening, his eyes wide and burning.
Just touching him leaves me unable to breathe.
“Let’s leave,” I say. “Please, let’s go.”
Marcus swallows, his Adam’s apple dipping up and down. “Yes,” he says, his voice hoarse.
He grabs my hand, dwarfing it in size, and pulls me alongside him as he starts to walk down the street, away from Brison Wolfe.
“I’ll b
e in touch!” Brison shouts after us.
I can’t help but wonder what that’s about.
***
We’re past Driggs Avenue now, walking toward Bedford Avenue, and I remember myself enough to pull my hand from his. I sever contact, and it’s like it shocks both of us—we stop our brisk pace, Marcus looking at me, confused. It’s a strange moment. Like a spell has been broken.
We stare at each other for way too long. I’m the first one to try to cover it up.
“Are you going to tell me what that was about?” I ask.
“No,” he says. His voice is deep. I feel another wave coming on. Damn it.
“Marcus,” I say, taking a step back. “I wasn’t kidding before. I need an explanation from you.”
He looks pained. He opens and closes his hands. Finally, he says, “It’s not that simple.”
I’m getting pissed.
“Yes, actually, it’s exactly that simple. People do it all the time. They explain things. In fact, you should have done it before you left.”
“No,” he says, running a hand through his dark hair. “I just shouldn’t have left. At least not the way I did.”
“What the hell does that mean?” I say, throwing my hands up.
Marcus glares at me, irritated. “Sometimes things are complicated, Harlow! Will you just…Christ, Lo, look at me.”
Marcus grabs my hand before I can pull it back and the spell is activated. Whatever it is, it’s infuriating. Some kind of sense memory of this man, of everything he did for me, of the way he used to hold me, invades my mind and colors my perception of the present. I’m not just feeling Marcus’s hand around mine today, and I’m not just seeing him standing in front of me, begging me to listen. I’m feeling and seeing all the times Marcus Roma has mattered to me.
It’s a lot.
I look. And I listen. And I am mesmerized by those eyes.
“Harlow, will you at least believe one thing?” he says, and draws me closer. His thumb is pressing into the palm of my hand, moving in small circles, and his voice is urgent with need. “Will you please believe that I will do my damn best for you?”