< 21 >
RYKE MEADOWS
Lo raises his arms as we walk down the hallway towards him. “I called you ten times. What the hell were you doing?”
I point to Daisy beside me, a normal amount of distance between us even though I’d rather be back in the stairwell, with her wrapped in my arms. “I was trying to find this one. She wasn’t in her room.”
“I went for a vending machine run,” she says, masking the lie with a bright, overwhelmingly beautiful smile.
Lo relaxes some. He wears a backwards baseball cap, looking like a fucking ‘90s kid. But it’s partly to disguise himself from people, not that it’s doing a good job. He has striking features that bring attention, even among male models.
“So you came to check up on me?” Daisy asks with an even larger smile, bouncing on her feet as we stop by her hotel door. She looks to the other person next to my brother.
Two inches taller stands Connor Cobalt.
We’re the only ones who hopped on Connor’s company jet.
And it’s a new situation that none of us are used to—the three of us alone with Daisy. Usually it’s Lily, not the youngest, wildest Calloway with us.
“Yeah,” Lo says. “How are you doing?”
“Better.” She fits a strand of hair behind her ear.
Daisy looks fucking terrible. And I don’t say anything about it, but I think we all can tell that she hasn’t been sleeping. She’s really fucking pale, her body frailer, and all I want to do is hold her and tuck her into bed. I wear my concern outwardly, and I don’t give a shit if someone hounds me for it. I’m fucking concerned, and I’m going to stay that way.
“Right…” My brother says, not believing her at all as he scrutinizes her features.
I asked Lo to come along. I’ve been so fucking worried about his state of mind that it’d be just as hard leaving him as it was leaving Daisy.
But the tension builds in the room because we all know his feelings about my friendship with her. Now that Daisy and I have moved beyond that title, the lie weighs heavy on my chest.
Lies.
I’m used to being wound tight by them, and the guilt will come later. It always does.
“Bad news,” Lo says, turning to me. “Connor fucked up.”
I let out a short laugh. “I never thought I’d hear those magic fucking words.”
“So much of what you just said, I hate,” Connor tells me causally, as though he doesn’t really care, but I see that he does when his lips twitch.
Magic—Connor fucking hates magic.
He also hates being wrong. “What’d you do?” I ask.
“Nothing,” Connor says. “Which is why I didn’t fuck up.”
“He forgot to book a hotel room,” Lo explains. “And with the Rugby World Cup happening in Paris this weekend, plus Fashion Week, there’s nothing here or close by available.”
Fuck. “How’d you forget to do something?” I ask Connor, cringing the moment I give him that much credit. But honestly, he has a photographic memory. He has charts and alerts and fucking notes everywhere to remind him of things too.
“Not that it’s any of your business—I’m having a fight with my wife,” he says. “My mind was somewhere else.” He’s still fighting with her?
“Is she okay?” Daisy asks, pulling her phone out of her pocket to text Rose.
“She’s how she normally is,” Connor says vaguely.
“Bitchy,” Lo clarifies. “High-strung, obsessive compulsive.” He smiles. “God, I’m so glad she didn’t come.”
Connor’s eyebrow arches. “I’m starting to be thankful too. Truthfully, I’m not in the mood to handle two five-year-olds.” He pauses. “And in case you didn’t catch that, I was referring to her and you.”
Lo laughs, not taking the insult to heart. See—that shit is fucking annoying. If I said that to Lo, he’d give me the cold shoulder. But for Connor, he can say whatever he wants in this mellow, chill way and get any reprieve from my brother.
It irritates me so much that I turn to Daisy and hold out my hand. “Your key card.” She takes it out of her pocket and passes it to me. I unlock the door, hearing their conversation continue without me really in it.
Daisy asks, “She’s not texting me back. Should I call her?”
“No,” Connor says as I walk into Daisy’s room. They follow close behind.
She has a chair propped underneath the handle of her bathroom door. I set it back on four legs before any of the guys notice and ask questions.