Kiss the Sky (51 page)

Connor rubs the wet streaks from my face.

“Can you fix my mascara?” I ask in a whisper.

“Look up,” he tells me. I stare at the ceiling while his
thumb removes the black smudges I’ve caused. When he finishes, he places his
hands on both of my cheeks again. “Rose,” he breathes. “I’d rather you cry in
my arms for ten minutes than pace manically for two hours. I’m always here when
you need me.”

“Literally a shoulder to cry on,” I say with a small smile.

“Literally, yes.” He shares it.

He kisses my lips chastely before he says, “We’re going to
get through this. There’s no challenge we can’t defeat together.”

He’s right. My chest lifts with a newfound strength, just in
time for the front door to swing open. We both look over, Loren and
Ryke
walking in.

“So the movers just left,” Loren tells us. “They said that
they couldn’t fit your cedar table in the truck, so we have to carry it to your
Escalade.” They stop by my coffee table like they’re going to lift it, but then
they just wait there for a second, staring
knowingly
at me
.
This is a level of weird
that I’m not used to.

They’ve seen me have sex.

They’ve most likely seen me naked or partially naked.

I have no idea if they watched the unedited tape on
accident, on purpose, or not at all, but the option is there. Instead of being
plagued by embarrassment, which threatens to creep up, I set my hands on my
hips and say, “What are you waiting for? Take the table to the car.” I
almost
snap my fingers at them. But I
withhold that impulse.

Loren cocks his head, and his mouth curves in a wicked grin.
“So you like to be tied up?”

My nose flares. Embarrassment sufficiently gone. Anger
intact. I am about to lunge (with poise and class) and swing my purse at him,
but Connor wraps his arms around my waist.

“What?” Lo says mockingly. “I’m just stating the truth.”

Ryke
gives his brother a look.
“Stop making her ashamed.”

Lo touches his chest innocently. “I just find it funny that
a girl who invents new ways to mutilate dicks every single day likes to be
fucked hard by one.”

Connor speaks before I have the chance. “She likes what she
likes. Let’s leave it at that, Lo.” He says it casually, but we all sense the
warning behind his words.
 

“Okay,” he says, but he’s having trouble holding back a
smirk and a laugh.
Ryke
shakes his head at him, but
he’s about to laugh too.

“I hate both of you,” I tell them.

Ryke
looks a little apologetic.
“We’re not laughing at you. Honestly, it’s just…” His eyes flicker between me
and Connor. He smiles again. “You go through life, seeing people one way. And
in one fucking moment, what you thought was commonplace becomes something else,
something…different.” He shrugs. “That’s all. I see you guys a little
differently. Not bad, not good. Just fucking different.”

It takes me a moment to digest that. I can be okay with
different. Connor is trying to stifle an even larger grin. I can practically
hear his thoughts:
Ordinary is boring,
darling.
He
loves
every word that
just came out of
Ryke’s
mouth. And that rarely
happens.

Loren nods to Connor. “You going to help us lift this?”

Connor’s eyebrow arches. “Is it really that heavy?”

“It’s
solid
wood,”
Loren says, about to kick the table to demonstrate.

I glower and hold a finger to him. “Don’t
scuff
my table.”

His foot freezes mid-kick. He sets it back on the ground
while Connor goes to the middle, each brother on either side.

Before they pick it up, Connor stares off for a second, and
I watch his eyes tighten in confusion. “I’ve been meaning to ask,” he says,
clearing his throat. He looks between both of them. “Did either of you fuck in
the showers?”

“No way,”
Ryke
answers first.

Oh. Shit. We couldn’t have been the only ones, right?

Loren says, “Lily was too scared to take a shower naked for
six whole months. Do you really think we were going to fuck in there?”

So there’s no footage of Lily bathing in the nude. She must
have kept her swim suit on. Thank God. I’ll take that miracle.

“Did you two do anything?” Loren asks us.

We stay silent as we both recall the blow job. I look far
more suspicious than Connor.

Loren meets my gaze, and I glare. He laughs harder. “Oh,
this is too rich.”

“What’s rich would be my foot to your balls,” I retort.

“Why don’t you just hit Connor?” Loren banters. “And then he
can spank you for it.”

“Or I can just spank you,” Connor says.

Loren laughs. “Before or after you tie me up?”

“After.”

Loren grins, and I cut him off as his mouth opens again,
“You’re both adorable. We get it.” Before he can comment, I add, “How are Lily
and Daisy doing?” I haven’t spoken to either of them about the tapes yet. I’ve
been avoiding, and they’ve been giving me space while I packed.

Loren and
Ryke
say nothing at
first, and my eyes must widen to saucers because Connor returns to my side,
drawing me to his chest.

“You go,”
Ryke
whispers to his
brother.

Loren shakes his head and then rolls his eyes. Then he looks
at me. “Lil is concerned about you. She’s fine, but…I mean…” He cringes. “We’re
both kind of relieved.” He looks guilty for saying so. “Honestly, we’re just
glad it’s not us.”

“Me too,” I say.

He exhales and runs a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry.
Really, Rose. If that was Lil…” His face breaks, and it looks like there’s a
physical weight that bears on his shoulders, dropping them.

“She’s okay,” I say with a nod. If not her, then me, right?
I can handle this. If I keep repeating it, it may come true. Or I’ll just
believe it until it does. “And Daisy?” I ask.

Ryke
stuffs his hands in his
jeans. “She’s been quiet. I think she’s just in shock.”

“She’ll be okay,” I say again with another nod.

“Yeah,”
Ryke
says, his muscles
tense, “she’ll be fine.” It’s like he’s trying my new tactic. Repeat it and
believe it.

Connor kisses my cheek and departs from me again to help
with the table.

I take a deep breath as I watch them lift the antique in the
air. The last piece of furniture in this townhouse. And the last moment left
before we’re free from the reality show.

But I realize that I’ll never be free from Scott Van Wright.

He stamped himself all over me.

And distributed it to the world.

[ 50 ]

CONNOR COBALT

“I’m sorry,” I apologize to my mother almost
immediately as I walk into her office, a city-view of Philadelphia covering a
whole wall. Her office is minimal. A couple black bookshelves and a clean desk.
No pictures of her family. Everything personal and private is kept out of
sight.

“Shut
the door,” she says stiffly.

I
close it behind me. The blinds are already snapped shut on all the windows that
peer into the hallway. We’re alone.

I
take a seat in the chair across from her desk. I wait for her to say something
about the sex tape, but she stares at her computer, clicking her mouse for an
extra minute. Leaving me to my own fucking thoughts.

I
always protected my reputation. It meant everything to me. But I don’t even
care anymore. I have what I want: a job at Cobalt Inc. and my girlfriend.
Besides Rose’s well-being, the only thing I worry about is how I’ve hurt
this
company.

Scott
can collect his cash.

I
have the girl. Now I just need to secure my position here.

I
wait for my mother to say, “You’re fired.” To strip me of my standing as
interim CEO. To hand everything I’ve worked for to Steve Balm. I could lose
something important to me, something that I’ve spent
years
toiling over, in five minutes or less.
 

“I’m
willing to make this right,” I say. “Whatever you need me to do.” It’s a lofty
statement, and I’m not sure I’m prepared to pay. But I fucking make it, and I
wait for her response.

She
finally swivels in her chair, facing me. And she says absolutely nothing. She
just stares at me, testing me, maybe. She wears a face I can barely even read.

“Did
you watch the tape?” I ask, internally cringing at the idea of my mother seeing
me screw my girlfriend.

“No,”
she says flatly. “I’ve read about your situation with Rose online. You have the
lawyers involved, I hope?”

“Yes.”
 

She
exhales loudly and nods a few times before leaning back in her chair. “Connor,”
she starts. “I don’t think I’ve ever told you this, but…I’m really proud of
you.”

Wait.
I repeat her words over again in my head. “Are we talking about the same
situation…?”

She
smiles. She
actually
smiles. “You
have a sex tape. And I’m not proud of you for that, although, I really want to
talk to Rose at the wedding. To clarify. I was in a bad place when we met at
the restaurant, and I was projecting. I mistook your relationship with her as
somewhat distant and contrived. Really, that was what I had with your father.”

“My
father.” She never talks of Jim.
I
never talk of Jim. He’s nothing more than a name on a birth certificate.

“We
were rarely intimate.” Why is she telling me this? “When we were, it was to
have children. And then I couldn’t have any more after the twins…” She clears
her throat, and lines wrinkle her forehead in hurt. She lets me see it.

Sweat
gathers underneath my white button-down. My whole body heats at her unfamiliar
sincerity. I feel like I’m on fire. It’s my
only
feeling in this moment. I don’t understand my reaction. I can’t understand
anything. I just listen and try to let my mind reconnect to my body.

“Hearing
about you and Rose…I think you’re going to make it for the long run.”

My
mother just approved of my relationship
after
a sex tape circulated online. What world do I fucking live in?

“Like
I was saying,” she says, “I’m proud of you.” She straightens up and rests her
hands on her desk, shifting papers nervously. She shows me that emotion as
well. And then her dark blue eyes meet mine. “You’re incredibly intelligent,
and you will do
great
things in life,
Richard… Connor… Cobalt.” She smiles at my full name, as though she remembers
when she chose it for me. “I have no doubt about this.” Her eyes tighten in
pain the longer she stares in my direction. I don’t know how much time passes.
Maybe a minute before she says, “And I’m so very
sorry
for things that I have done to you.”

“What
are you talking about?” I shake my head. She’s put a weight on my chest that I
can’t release.

“I
made you feel like you didn’t need a father in your life—that it was so
unimportant that you could live without one.” She takes a sip from a glass of
water. “It’s taken some therapy to come to terms with this, but I have…” She
pauses. “You didn’t need Jim. And you didn’t need me. I gave you necessary
tools to thrive on your own, but I never gave you the ones that every child
deserves.” She wipes a tear before it falls. “I never showed you love. And I’m
so
sorry for that. I hope…I hope that
Rose can do what I’ve neglected for so many years.”

I
open my mouth, but she cuts me off with a raised hand.

“Let
me finish. There’s something else.” She grabs a tissue, sniffs, and walks
around her desk.

She
sits in the chair next to me.

And
just by the serious, tortured look on her face—I know there’s no way to prepare
for her words. I can’t anticipate anything she’s going to say.

So
I grip the armrest, I clench my teeth, and I brace myself.

I
don’t want to fall.

I
never have before.

* * *

I feel blindsided.

My
whole life I always made sure I knew every possible path, every probability and
what if
so that I wasn’t ever
assaulted by this feeling. And today, I wake up and there it is.

The
path I never saw coming.

I
left Cobalt Inc. with this insane thing ripping through my chest. I thought
about calling Frederick, but there’s only one person I want to see. And it’s
not my therapist.

The
Calloway Couture loft is crammed with people and boxes, bustling around with
fervent urgency. A dramatic change from months ago. Her company is still in
flux. She won’t know how the sex tape will impact it until a few weeks
pass.
 

I
find Rose in her glass-walled office in the back. She subconsciously touches
the bruise on her cheek, concealed with makeup, as she scans her computer
screen. I enter quickly and shut the door.

She
springs to her feet in an instant upon seeing me. “What’s wrong?” Her fingers
touch the corners of my eyes, as if she needs to feel my tears to know they’re
real. I don’t blame her. I did the same fucking thing.

I
don’t remember the last time I cried. But it was probably over something
trivial. A grade. An accomplishment I didn’t fully succeed. The things that
used to matter to me. I never cried over a person until now.