Hothouse Flower (4 page)

< 5 >

RYKE MEADOWS

I shut the door behind me, finding Daisy almost
immediately. She sits backwards on her parked Ducati, the same brand as mine,
only red to my black. She leans back against the gas can near the handles and
props a map on her legs, a Sharpie cap between her teeth.

Her carefree nature
always
fucking draws me to her—even when I wish I could stay fifteen feet away. It
doesn’t help that her legs are spread apart. I’m so fucking thankful she’s
single right now. I
hate
her
ex-boyfriends, and I hate how men look at her and all they see is a girl they
believe they can mount. They can’t. She’s out of their fucking league, and yet,
she entertains them, too nice not to.

It pisses me off.

“There’s a party inside, you know,” I tell her roughly, “and
it’s for
you
.” I walk across the
concrete floor to reach her side.

“I know,” she mumbles and then spits the cap out. “Rose and
Lily shut the door on me when I tried to go to the bathroom with them. And
Connor and Lo looked like they wanted to talk about something private too, so I
figured I’d let them discuss what they needed to.”

I frown. “Why would your sisters do that?”

“Lily is five years older than me and Rose is seven,” she
says with a shrug. “I’m used to being left out. It’s the younger child
syndrome.” She sits up and hands me the map.

I scan it quickly.

“It’s for your road trip to California,” she explains. “I
marked some places that are supposed to be cool.”

“You also drew a fucking smiley face over North Dakota.”

“That’s because North Dakota is the happiest state. Everyone
knows that.” She grins, brightness in her eyes that I haven’t seen in a while.
It’s gorgeous beyond fucking words. But at night, that light starts to slowly
wane. It’s like Daisy Calloway is powered by the sun.

“Says who?” I ask, folding the map and tucking it into my
back pocket.

“I read it somewhere,” she says. “I’ve forgotten the source,
but I’m sure it was credible.”

“Yeah, says the girl who reads her horoscope every day.”

She mock gasps. “How did you know that? Have you been
reading my diary?”

“No, I’ve just been sleeping in your bed.”

“I thought that was some other guy,” she says.

I scrutinize her position on the bike, her legs on either
side of the seat, clutched tightly, still backwards. I’ve ridden on the same
motorcycle with her before. She does this thing where she rests her hands on my
thighs instead of wrapping them around my chest. I always have to grab her
wrist when she purposefully nears my cock.

She likes to tease, to see how far she can push me, and I’ve
never had a girl play with me like that, with confidence that radiates. It
drives me fucking nuts, and I find myself wanting to be around her even more,
seeking those give-and-take moments and her fucking joy.

But there’s a silent understanding between us. We both know
we can’t cross a certain line.

“You’ve let other guys in your bed?” I question with the
rise of my brows. Anger burns my muscles as I imagine the losers she’s been
with, all fucking her, all older.
Don’t
think about it.

“Not lately.” Her oversized sweater snags on the handle
behind her, almost flashing me. “Oops.”

My body heats, and the only thing that stops any kind of
arousal is the idea of another strange guy getting hard at the sight of her. I
don’t want to be one of them.

She adjusts her shirt, and I read the words stitched on her
chest:
Ooh la
la
.

I think it’s been about a year since she started choosing clothes
with sayings—kind of like her way of talking back to the paparazzi without
speaking. It’s cute.

“Have you ridden like this before?” she asks with a playful
smile.

“Backwards?”

She nods.

“No. I didn’t want to kill myself the billions of times it’s
crossed my mind,” I say dryly.

“I think I could do it,” she says, ignoring my sarcasm. “But
you’d have to be on the bike too, steering.” Her green eyes grow big. “Can we
try?”

I don’t dismiss her wild fantasies. Last week, we took the
wheels off a skateboard and tried to balance on a sideways trashcan. It was
more fun than it fucking sounds. But this—me on a motorcycle with her facing
me—it’s an image that’s too fucking intimate. I don’t even know if she realizes
this.

“My head will knock into yours,” I tell her. “It’s
impossible for me to reach the throttle and the brake.”

“You can wrap your arms around me to grab onto the
handlebars,” she says. “I can prove that it’ll work.” She scoots up towards the
gas can, giving me plenty of room on the seat. “Unless you’re scared.”

My eyes narrow. “You can call me a fucking coward all you
want, sweetheart. I’m not falling for it.”
And
neither is my dick.

“Then I’ll just try to ride backwards
without
you present. How’s that?” She’s about to turn her fucking
key in the ignition. I have no doubt she’ll try.

She’s done wilder things in her free time, learning how to
whitewater
raft
and how to fly a plane. I’ve watched
her fall off the back of this fucking motorcycle. I’ve seen her crash into a
tree on a black diamond ski slope. And with every daring event, I’ve been
there, by her side, carrying her almost every time she’s fallen.

“Fine,” I tell her easily. I near her Ducati, and she stops
fiddling with the keys. I swing my leg over and straddle the fucking seat like
I normally would, facing the handlebars. She’s the one who’s all turned around.

Our knees knock together, and I’m satisfied with the fact
that I can’t near the handlebars. But she’s not ready to give up. She lifts her
legs on top of mine and scoots down towards me.
Fuck.

She’s straddling me, her back against the gas can, lying on
the motorcycle. I touch the fucking throttle and brake easily, extending my
arms over her, and her chest rises and falls in a shallow rhythm, acting like
I’m about to push into her. Like this is about to go somewhere it is definitely
fucking
not.

“You’re a wicked girl, Calloway,” I tell her. My cock is
pleading with me to thrust forward, and in this moment, I visualize the one
thing that keeps me down. My brother beating the shit out of me. And if that
doesn’t work, I imagine Lily’s whiny voice in my ear. She’s admitted to
thinking about me to stop her sexual cravings, so I don’t feel fucking bad
about it.

It works. I don’t move. And my face remains dark, never
letting on anything past
pissed
—and I
kind of am. This doesn’t feel fucking good. And yet, I always end up back at
this place with her because I love her company so fucking much.

“You’re right. It’s kind of uncomfortable in this position,”
she teases. “We don’t fit well at all.” Her lips lift in a mischievous grin
again. “I know how we could fit better—”

Fuck me.
“Don’t,”
I say, sitting up before her head nears mine and subsequently her lips. We’ve
never kissed. I don’t plan to start now. Her feet are hiked on the back of the
bike, her legs still split open to allow us room.

I fucking swear if she rocks her hips against mine one more
time, I’m going to throw her off the bike. And it won’t be nice.

She smiles even wider at the risk that’s clear in my eyes. “I
was just going to suggest taking off my boots. What were you thinking?”

My tongue in your
mouth. My cock so far inside of you.

My gaze darkens, and I try to ignore her silly smile and
roaming hands that grip the bike seat and then drift to her thighs. Some part
of her is always moving.

I say, “Something that’s too fucking dirty for your virginal
ears.”

She sits up like me, and her chest is only an inch or so
from mine. I set my hand on her knee to keep her from scooting any closer.

She says in a more serious voice, “I lost my virginity when
I was fifteen.”

“I meant that you haven’t popped your cherry on a
motorcycle. I know you aren’t a virgin.” She asked her sister for sex advice on
her sweet sixteen trip, and I was there to help Lily chaperone. I was filling
in for my brother who was in rehab, and Daisy pretty much said that she already
had sex. I just wish her first time wasn’t so fucking awful.

And I kind of wish she stopped at the first guy and waited
for someone better. Like…no one. I don’t think anyone is good enough for her.
Yeah, it’s fucking selfish. I don’t care.

I add, “I’m not surprised that you lost it that young
either.”

She nods. “Because my older sister is a sex addict.” As if
that fucking makes her one?

“No, because you try a lot of stuff, and I’m sure you felt
like you were missing out on something.”

Her lips rise a little. “When did you lose it?”

“I was fifteen too,” I say. “I was with an eighteen-year-old
girl.” My first time was on a fucking golf course at three in the morning.

Daisy digests this. “So you like older women then?”

“I like all women, sweetheart.”

She wears a crooked smile. “You like me?”

Fuck me.
“Daisy—”

She holds up her hands, her palms touching my chest because there’s
no fucking room. I go rigid beneath them. “I know, sorry, I shouldn’t have said
anything.” She drops her hands quickly, her breath heavy.

I try not to look at her as anything more than she can be.
But she’s gorgeous, not because she has this natural fucking beauty—no makeup
and bold green eyes, smooth skin and a delicate face.

She’s beautiful because she can make the saddest person in
the world grin. And she can make the loneliest guy feel something more. She’s
youthful and wild. Primal and really fucking innocent. She’s all these things
that scream
big fucking risk.
 

“You know, I’ve only had sex with six guys in my entire life,”
she announces.

I stiffen. “Yeah?” I don’t really want these details, even
though a part of me masochistically craves them. “For some, six guys would be a
lot at eighteen.”

She shrugs. “I was testing out the waters.”

“And how were those fucking waters?” I snap. I shouldn’t
have asked. But I do. And I’m not going to take it back.

I wait for her to answer because I know she will.

< 6 >

DAISY CALLOWAY

I should really rethink hashing out my sexual
history to my sister’s boyfriend’s older brother. (Yeah, it’s a
tongue-twister.) But you know, I started so now I have to finish. I try not to
half-ass things.
Go full force, Daisy. No
hitting the brakes.
Yeah, I can do this.

I stare at his eyes that are hard and harsh, never softening
for me. Our close proximity doesn’t really alleviate anything between us, but I
like his closeness too much to jump off the motorcycle. And hey, he’s not
moving either. Good signs, I think.

“The first guy sucked,” I tell him. “We did it once. It
lasted like thirty seconds.” I should probably blush, but that time feels
ancient. I just remember sitting up in his bed and being like
that’s it? That’s sex? What the hell is so
awesome about it?

Ryke
keeps his face unreadable,
just dark and brooding. Okay. I can continue without crumbling under his
intense silence.
Go, go, go.

I lick my lips and say, “And the second guy, we did it a
couple times. He lasted maybe three minutes.”

“How old were these guys?” he asks.

“Only a few years older than me. I mean, I’ve dated guys in
their late twenties, but we couldn’t have sex. I wasn’t eighteen yet.” And I
wasn’t about to break the law and have a guy thrown in jail for sleeping with
me.

“I’ve met most of the older guys you’ve dated,” he reminds
me. “They were complete fucking morons by the way.”

“They weren’t that bad.”

“Julian?” he says. “You think he was better than a fucking
rat?”

“Connor called him an ape.”

“Connor gave him too much fucking credit.”

“Connor also called you a dog,” I say with a crinkled nose.
“Do you think I’m the cat to your dog or am I like a squirrel?”

“How’d we get to this place?” he asks like this is the
stupidest ‘fucking’ conversation.

“I’m a hamster, aren’t I?” I stick out my bottom lip.

“You’re not a fucking hamster.” He rolls his eyes and runs
his hand through his hair. I don’t think he realizes how hot he is when he does
that. “You’re a bird.”

“A bird.”

“Yeah a fucking bird that won’t stop flying or squawking.”

“Like an eagle?”

“You’re prettier than an eagle.” He rolls his eyes again. “Fuck.”

“You called me pretty.” I poke his chest, my smile
overtaking my face.

He stares at me hard. “Julian,” he finds the beginning of
our conversation. “You still like him? Because if you do, we need to have a
heavy fucking talk.”

I shake my head quickly. “No, I don’t like him.”

Julian actually really scared me. He went on a trip to the
Alps with all of us. I didn’t realize how in over my head I was until I tried
to break up with him, and he wouldn’t listen to me, as if I was too young to
really understand. Maybe I was. I don’t know anymore. All I know is that I
don’t want to be afraid of the person I’m with. That isn’t a danger I like.

 
“And just so you
know,” I say, “I haven’t been ecstatic by some of the girls you’ve chosen. One
of them called Lily a slut.” And behind
Ryke’s
back,
she literally pulled my hair.
Hard.

“I broke up with her the second she said that,” he reminds
me. “You were with that idiot for months
.
”

“I tried breaking up with him,” I retort. “I even wrote him
a letter. It went something like:
Julian,
I think we’re better as friends.
Xoxo
Daisy.
”

Ryke
groans, but his hand
unconsciously rises from my knee to my thigh. The affection speeds my heart.

“The hugs and kisses were too much, weren’t they?”

“Who breaks up with someone in a fucking note?”

“Someone who’s scared.” I’m not as fearless as my sisters
would like to believe.

“You’re not a fucking coward. You’re just with the wrong
guys.” He glances at his hand and takes it off me. Then his brown eyes flit
from the small space between our bodies to my gaze again. “Did any of them last
longer than five minutes?”

I try to think back. “I think six minutes was the highest.”

“Were you seriously timing them?”

“I was waiting for it to end.”

He grimaces.

I pretty much dislike everything about sex. The before. The
during. The after. No moment is fun.

I’ve kept trying to see if it gets better.

It doesn’t.

It’s just a load of uncomfortable and awkward. Nothing about
sex gives me that fulfillment that other girls talk about. What is an orgasm?
Nerve-spindling? Head-spinning? I’ve had that skydiving and racing my
motorcycle down a steep hill alongside
Ryke
. That’s
as orgasmic as I’ve ever been.

“Sex is stupid,” I tell him.

“It is when you’re with guys who can’t satisfy you.”

I flush at his words. “Rose just told me to try it with more
guys and see what happens.”

Ryke
looks ready to spring off the
bike and go track down my sister. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I thought it was nice. She’s a proponent of experimenting.”

“Says the fucking
virgin
.”

“She’s not a virgin anymore,” I point out.

Ryke
glares. “So she’s slept with
one guy her whole life, and she’s telling you to fuck around to find someone.
She
didn’t fuck around, Daisy. Do you
see what I’m getting at?”

“She has no experience with experimenting, got it,” I nod.
“I’ve tried to talk to Lily about it, but she’s uncomfortable discussing sex
with me.” I shrug. “Sometimes she’ll open up though. It’s just hard finding a
day where she feels good enough to do it.”

Ryke
relaxes a bit at the mention
of Lily’s sex addiction and her shame towards the whole subject.

“Maybe I’m doing something wrong,” I say. “Is it normal for
guys to last so short?”

Ryke
runs his hand through his
thick hair. He’s never held back with me before, so I don’t expect him to now.
“They’re probably really fucking attracted to you, and when they get you in
bed, they just come early. It’s not a fucking reflection on you but them.”

“So I need to find a guy who’s not attracted to me?” That
doesn’t make sense.

Ryke
shakes his head. “No, Dais.
You need to like the guy you’re with as much as they like you. That way, you’ll
fucking come too.”

“But what happens when the guy I like isn’t
emotionally
available?”

“Stay single,” he suggests.

“Forever?”

Ryke’s
whole body tenses. I don’t
know if that’s a
no
or a
yes.
Inside I’m screaming,
give me something! Blink once for yes, twice
for no!

And then the garage door opens. “Hey,” Lo calls, “dinner
is…” His voice dies when he catches us on the motorcycle together.

Uh-oh.

Ryke
slowly climbs off the bike,
acting like he did nothing wrong. I mimic his guiltless expression, and I
follow him, swinging my legs over the seat and standing up.

Lo’s
eyes flash murderously at his
brother. “Did I interrupt something?”

“No,”
Ryke
replies coolly. “We
were just talking.”

Lo nods like he’s trying to believe that. “If you were
just
talking, then why were her legs
wrapped around your waist?”

“Lo,” I try to cut in, but
Ryke
holds up his hand to stop me. This is between them, I guess.

But I do care about Lo a lot. He’s always been another
extension of my family in a sense. He started as Lily’s best friend. Then her
boyfriend. Now fiancé. And she always brought him on Calloway vacations. He was
her plus one.

To say he’s like a big brother to me would be accurate.

Which makes everything with
Ryke
a
tiny bit weird, but at the same time,
Ryke
feels so
disconnected from Lo—a barrier built between them from years of separation. So
maybe it’s not as strange as it could be.

“We’re friends,”
Ryke
tells his
brother.

“Friends don’t do shit like that,” Lo retorts, pointing at
my Ducati like it violated me. I would actually
love
to be violated on that motorcycle by
Ryke
Meadows. I wonder how rough he would take me.
 

Or if I would even be able to orgasm at all.

Ryke
pinches the bridge of his
nose in annoyance. “What do you fucking want me to say?”

“That what I just saw was a mistake!” Lo shouts.

Ryke
doesn’t speak, so I will. “It
was a mistake,” I tell Lo. “I wanted to see what it would be like to ride on a
motorcycle backwards. I needed his help.”

Lo glares from me to him. “That’s the best lie you can come
up with?”

I smile. “It’s actually the truth.”
 

This only incites Lo more. “This isn’t a fucking joke,
Daisy. He’s seven years older than you. He’s been with more girls than you
probably even realize.”

“No, I realize that he’s slept with a lot of women, but his
number is probably one that I would have easily reached at twenty-five too.”

Lo grimaces like that image is disgusting. “I’m in an
alternate universe right now.”

“Really? Cool. Is it more fun here? I think it is.” I turn
to
Ryke
. “What do you think?”

“Tone it down,” he tells me, his eyes fixed on his brother.
“Lo—”

“You’re not good enough for her,” he says. “You realize
that, right?”

Ryke’s
jaw locks, and his
shoulders tense. “I care about Daisy just as much as you, if not more, so you
don’t need to pull this overprotective bullshit on me.”

“It’s not bullshit if you’re fucking her.”

“We’re not fucking!”
Ryke
shouts.

More people trickle in the garage. Connor. Both of my
sisters.

Rose is classily outfitted in a black high-collared dress,
stomping through the doorway in five-inch heels. She looks like a perfect match
beside the ever-confident Connor Cobalt.

Lily has on one of
Lo’s
shirts and
a pair of leggings, and she squeezes through the doorway to reach Lo near
Rose’s parked Escalade. I envy her short brown hair that’s chopped at her
shoulders. “What’s going on?” she whispers to Lo.

“I caught them fucking on her motorcycle.”

Ryke
groans. “Come on! We were
both on the bike, fully fucking clothed. We’ve
never
had sex!” He shakes his head. “How many times do I have to
say it? You know what, we might as well fuck if you all think we’ve done it a
thousand times already.”

My eyes widen. Really?

“Whoa, whoa,” Lo cringes, holding up his hands. “I can’t
stomach you guys doing it once. So please spare me the goddamn picture of it
happening a thousand times.”

“Both of you,” Connor says, stepping down the three stairs
into the garage. “Stop for a second.” He stands between both brothers to
mediate. “You’re overreacting.”

“I don’t like being accused of things that I didn’t fucking
do,”
Ryke
growls.

“Yeah? How do you think Dad feels?!” Lo yells.

It’s like a bomb dropped,
Lo’s
hostile voice echoing before the garage goes quiet.
Ryke
breathes heavily but makes no attempt to answer Lo. It’s a loaded question.

Lo returns to the central issue. “She’s eighteen.”

“Here we go,”
Ryke
says, throwing
his arms in the air. “Let’s fucking hear it, Lo. She’s eighteen. She’s like
your little sister. Her mom hates me. I know. I know. I fucking
know
.”

Lo’s
face contorts in a series of
emotions, and Lily reaches out and wraps her arm around his waist. He calms
down by the single touch.

Rose places her hands on her hips. “I don’t see the problem
here.”

“Darling,” Connor says with the shake of his head. “Don’t
make it worse.”

She huffs. “They’re both consenting—”

“I’m not consenting,”
Ryke
suddenly says, not looking at me. “Because nothing is fucking going on.” His
eyes meet
Lo’s
and they soften for him. “Okay?”

They both have trust issues.

I know it doesn’t help that
Ryke
is lying to him about sleeping in my bed. If Lo found out, he would disapprove
and
find a way to separate us for the
betterment of my health. But I think my health is the best when I’m with
Ryke
. Sleeping without him has been nearly impossible. I
need the reassurance at night, the confidence of another person in order to
sleep without fear. Otherwise, I can’t even get an hour of shuteye.

But I’m not keeping
Ryke
at
gunpoint. If he wants to leave, I’d let him. And I guess I’d have to find
someone to replace him. I’m not even sure that’s possible though. Maybe in my
heart, I just know that I only want
Ryke
Meadows.
 

“Let’s eat,” Connor says. “The eggs are going to get cold.”

We all wait for one of the brothers to make a move first.
They have the power to reignite the argument or dissolve it.

Lo opens his mouth, needing the last word. “I didn’t accept
you into my life so you could bang my girlfriend’s little sister. Don’t make me
regret letting you in.”

That one stung. I felt it like a sharp kick.

Lo walks away, disappearing inside, and
Ryke
doesn’t wait for me. He goes in right after him. Connor is next, leaving me
alone with my sisters.

“Well,” I say to them, “there are always fireworks at my
parties, aren’t there?”

“Do you need a hug?” Rose asks me. “Because if you do, Lily
can give you one.”