“Sure. ’Sup?”
He steps inside my room and closes the door behind him. His expression is pensive, and serious, as it is most of the time. “This kinda sucks for you, doesn’t it?”
I wait for him to elaborate, but he just stands there, frowning. “My earbuds drown most of the noise out,” I finally say. I have to assume he’s referring to the party happening downstairs and outside.
“I don’t mean the noise. Well, I do mean the noise. But it’s more than that. It’s everything—all the jocks, the girls, the people, the mess.”
I shrug. The mess isn’t much of an issue. River and Mav aren’t the tidiest, but we have a cleaner who comes every Monday.
I sigh and thread my fingers through his, squeezing. “I don’t need to be babied, River. I can handle the parties and the noise and everything that comes with it. I might not want to participate all the time, but I don’t mind being a silent observer. This is normal college-kid behavior. And we have a sweet house with a pool, and you and Maverick have lots of friends. I don’t want you to think you have to shoo everyone away because you’re worried about me.”
He flips my hand over and skims the faint crescent scars, most of them faded. “I feel like a shitty brother. I’m the one who pushed you to move in with us, and I’m hardly here. And when I am, there are always people to entertain, and you’re stuck up here.”
“It’s my choice to be up here.”
He nods, but I can tell he wants to say more. Instead, he drops his head and sighs. “I’m going over to a friend’s house tonight, and I’m probably gonna stay there.”
“A friend?” I quirk a brow.
“I’m not feeling the party vibe, and I have practice tomorrow morning.” He’s focused on his fingernails.
“Okay. Do I know this friend?”
He makes a face and ignores my question. “You want me to take you to Lovey and Lacey’s or something?”
Maybe he’s finally met someone he actually likes. That idea hurts a bit, because River and I don’t keep things from each other. Not often anyway, though anything involving Kodiak has been the exception to that rule. I let it go for now. “Mav has an away game tomorrow, right?”
River nods, dark hair flopping over his right eye. He’s freshly showered, and he smells faintly of cologne. I also note that he’s wearing his stylish jeans, his favorite running shoes, and a shirt I once told him made his arms look awesome.
“I’m good here,” I tell him. “I’m working on a dress, and I can sleep in if the house is quiet and empty in the morning.”
“Okay. Just keep your door locked. Some of those guys down there are douchebags.”
“Sure.”
He pulls me into a rare hug. It’s tight and hard and full of pent-up emotion. “I’ll always be your trampoline, Lav, even if you don’t need me to be.”
“I know I’m always safe to land.”
“Always.” He kisses me on the top of the head and slips out the door, waiting for me to turn the lock before he taps on the door and descends the stairs, leaving me to wonder what secrets he’s keeping.
Chapter Fourteen
Burn It All Down
Lavender
Present day
I WAKE UP to the sound of a door slamming at the ass-crack of dawn. Maverick’s game is in the afternoon, and the bus ride is two and a half hours. They won’t get back until this evening. I can wander around in my jammies and eat cereal out of the box without anyone getting on me about it. I can also watch TV in the living room on the huge screen instead of the small one in my room. But first, I’m going to sleep in.
I pull my covers over my head and snuggle into my pillow. However, after what feels like a handful of minutes later, I’m woken again by the obnoxious blare of a siren.
I bury my head under the pillow to block it out, but it’s not stopping. At all. In fact, it sounds like it’s right outside the house. After thirty seconds of pervasive sirens, I finally throw my covers off, drag my ass out of bed, and peek through the blinds. A haze hangs in the air, smoke coming from somewhere close by.
I rush to the next window—the one that has a view of the top of BJ and Kodiak’s house and a bit of their backyard. Smoke billows into the air, and the flashing lights of the fire truck out front make my chest suddenly tight.
“Shit. Shit.” Everyone should already be on the bus, except for BJ—who sleeps like the actual dead.
I wrench open my door and rush down the stairs. I’m not fully coherent yet, my body in flight-or-fight mode. My coordination is bullshit on the best of days, so I skid down the first set of steps on my ass, slam into the wall on the landing, and then hurtle myself down the second set. For sure I’m going to have bruises, but all I can think of is BJ in that burning house.
I bolt through the living room and come to an abrupt halt when I see BJ stretched out on one of the recliners, mouth open, a hot dog hanging out of the right side like an unlit cigar. He’s surrounded by empty food boxes. It smells like stale farts and sour sleep breath, but I have never been so freaking happy to see my cousin in my entire life.
I rush over, trip on a half-empty carton of Ramen noodles, and land on top of him. The hot dog slides out of his mouth and down into the chair somewhere. He grunts, but otherwise doesn’t rouse.
I shake his shoulders until his eyes pop open. It takes me a moment to find my voice through the panic. “There’s a fire!”
His confusion morphs into concern. “What? Where? Here?”
I give my head a violent shake and clamber out of the chair, stumbling backward. BJ is quick, though, and he grabs me before I land on my ass.
“Your place. Come on.” I grab his wrist and tug, making him follow me outside.
Instead of a clear, bright morning, we step out into a cloud of acrid smoke.
“Holy shit!” And now it’s not me pulling BJ along, it’s him pulling me.
I stumble, barefoot and light-headed. BJ wraps an arm around my waist and hauls me up so my feet aren’t touching the ground. He cuts across the lawns to get to his house, but police stop him. There’s already a crowd of students congregated across the street, watching smoke billow out of the windows on the first floor.
“Hey, hey, you can’t go in there,” an officer tells us.
“That’s my house. What happened? Was there anyone in there? Is there anyone in there?” His panicked gaze darts to mine, the same fears reflected there.
“Game.” My voice is a whisper I’m sure he can barely catch over the sound of people shouting and the spray of water.
“Shit. Right. Thank God.” BJ runs his free hand through his sleep-messed hair.
The police officer nods in confirmation. “The house is empty. The fire started in the kitchen. You said you live here, son?”
BJ scrubs his palm over his face and motions to me. “Yeah. I crashed at my cousin’s last night.”
The police officer looks from him to me and back again. “Your cousin?”
It takes me a few seconds to understand why he’s wearing a confused expression. BJ is dressed in only a pair of low-slung jogging pants. His entire lean, somewhat wiry chest on display, along with his tattooed arm, which is mostly a colorful burst of flowers. Lilies to be exact, because that’s his mom’s name, and he loves the freaking shit out of her.